Event Follow-Up: Collecting and Working with Mid-semester Feedback

Below is the recording of the “Collecting and Working with Mid-semester Feedback Workshop” hosted on Monday, Oct. 11, 2021. We’ve provided the video as a PlayPosit Bulb so that you can engage with questions from the workshop facilitator.

To view the bulb, type your first and last name, then click “Save.”

Here are the resources discussed during the workshop:

We’d love to hear from you!

Let us know how you collect and work with mid-semester feedback. What strategies have you employed? What works? What do students like and what are some areas to avoid? Feel free to share sample prompts and success stories. Comment below or drop us a line at catl@uwbg.edu.

Event Follow-Up: “What Will You Carry Forward?”

We will all carry literal and figurative things forward from the experience of teaching in the last year. Often, these two blend together. For example, perhaps an instructor re-worked an attendance policy to accommodate a student who had to return home to attend to a family member. The policy and the memory behind the policy will both linger. Or, perhaps an instructor created a series of virtual labs and now has videos, supporting data, and Canvas assignments which they can use to help students who are not able to attend a lab in-person. Last spring, the Center hosted a discussion and posted a blog article called “The Things We’ll Carry” which prompted a lot of reflection about the literal and figurative items that instructors will carry with them from teaching last year. At the end of the discussion, there was interest among instructors for a practical workshop in the fall where instructors could see how their colleagues had adapted the lessons of the pandemic to their preparations for the new school year.

With apologies to Tim O’Brien for the continued use of his metaphor, the Center responded by hosting another workshop called “What will you carry forward?”. This workshop featured four instructors who did a “show and tell” about how they incorporated lessons from the pandemic into their teaching. They then fielded questions from the audience.

Now, through the magic of video technology, we are extending that workshop to those who were not able to attend the live event.

Below you will find the “show and tell” portions and, importantly, you will be able to interact with the videos as well because they are streaming through a service called PlayPosit, which allows instructors to add interactive elements to videos.

Please interact with these videos on multiple levels. First, learn from what the presenters have to say. Second, use the interactions in PlayPosit to engage more deeply with the content and with other people who have watched the videos. Finally, if you would like to use PlayPosit in your own class, please contact CATL at dle@uwgb.edu to have it added to your courses.

First presentation

Breeyawn Lybbert, who teaches in Natural and Applied Sciences, discusses her four-point plan for increasing equity in her science classes.

Second presentation

Next, Praneet Tiwari, who teaches in the Cofrin School of Business, discusses multiple strategies for incorporating students who participate in-person, at home, and asynchronously.

Third presentation

Third, Nichole LaGrow, distance education coordinator in CATL and associate lecturer in English, discusses how she extends G.R.A.C.E. to herself and students (Guided autonomy, Resources, Authentic assessments, Community, Expectations).

Fourth presentation

Finally, Jillian Jacklin, who teaches in Democracy and Justice Studies, synthesizes the previous presentations and discusses how she balances all the tips within the realities of teaching a heavy course load.

Next Steps for Moving Beyond the Asterisk and Toward Better Support for Our First Nations Students

This semester CATL partnered with staff and faculty in the First Nations Studies (FNS) program to bring you a series of events and resources on how to better support our Native students. Often after these types of events, attendees feel moved and invigorated to help affect change, but are at a loss for where to begin. While we recognize that there is no easy checklist to follow for becoming a better ally, we have collected some suggestions made by First Nations students, staff, and faculty during these events in the hopes that it might give you a starting place.  

Please note that throughout this post we use the terms “First Nations”, “Native”, and “American Indian” interchangeably to refer to those who identify with any of the 574 federally recognized Tribal Nations in the United States, as all three terms are used in scholarly writing on First Nations topics. 

Changes to Advocate for at an Institutional Level

Smudging, a regular and recurring part of many Native individuals’ religious practices, involves burning sacred plants to create smoke and is often conducted in living spaces to remove negative energy. To smudge in UWGB student housing, students must fill out a form and submit it to Residence Life at least one week in advance each time they smudge, as well as meet with a Residence Life staff member after submitting the form to discuss the location where the smudging will take place and receive fire extinguisher training. Some have likened our current smudging policy to requiring a week’s notice in advance every time one wishes to pray.

Our current policy also lack transparency both in the protocols students are expected to follow and in the religious protections students are provided. As a result, many First Nations students have reported feeling scared to smudge for fear of getting in trouble. In some cases, students have even had their dorms searched by campus police after smudging due to misinformed reports of smoke or odors. UW-Superior's smudging policy provides an example of a much more robust and accommodating policy at another UW institution that we could borrow from as we consider reforming our own policy.

Visual representation in the form of art, photography, and other displays around campus is important, however it is only helpful if done in a respectful and meaningful manner. Some of our First Nations students and alumni have asked that we evaluate our campus’s current depictions of First Nations peoples and ensure that their inclusion is positive and thoughtful. At minimum, artwork by Native artists or photography of Native peoples displayed on campus should include names, dates, tribes, etc., to provide context for the work. We should also strive to increase visual depictions of contemporary First Nations peoples on our campus, rather than just historical photos and references.

Our First Nations students cite the Center as one of the most important support systems during their time at UWGB, as it is one of the best ways for them to connect with staff and faculty that are also of a Native background. For non-native students, staff, and faculty, the Center is also a great educational resource, and yet, many are still unaware of its existence. If the university hired a full-time staff to manage the Center’s resources and educational materials, we could expand and refine our collection to make it an even better resource for research and education.

Recently the photos of alumni that hung in Mary Ann Cofrin Hall were replaced with photos of new individuals. Among those original photos were two particularly important Native figures from our community—William Gollnick, who served as Oneida Chief of Staff from 2006–2011, and the late Maria Hinton, an Oneida Tribal Elder. Many in the FNS program have expressed that they wish for these photos to be tracked down and either hung in a new location or turned over to the Education Center for First Nations Studies so they can display them.

The inclusion of Native faculty and staff at a predominantly white institution (PWI) helps break down longstanding stereotypes about Native peoples, especially when their presence is seen and felt in a variety of professional areas. As highlighted in the introduction of Beyond the Asterisk, Native faculty and staff are also key to Native student success, especially at PWIs. It is important to our students that they can see themselves reflected in the faculty and staff they interact with on a daily basis. As a non-native ally, continue to support the First Nations faculty and staff around you and encourage our institution to continue hiring Native individuals in a variety of positions and departments.

Changes You Can Implement Personally 

In 2018, First Nations faculty at UWGB created our university’s own land acknowledgment statement. Including the land acknowledgment in your teaching or other practices is a way to help First Nations students feel seen and acknowledged. If you’d like to learn more about the land acknowledgment, we encourage you to watch this roundtable panel on the topic from the 2021 Instructional Development Institute and then read this blog post for follow up resources and suggestions.

The university’s Education Center for First Nations Studies and the Intertribal Student Council promote many campus-wide or public events that create spaces for non-native students, staff, and faculty to learn about Indigenous cultures and form relationships with their Native colleagues and peers.

While students should feel welcome to share their own experiences or knowledge of First Nations topics, they should never feel pressured to do so just because of how they identify. Be careful not to single out a Native student or treat them as a “spokesperson” for people of their background or other Indigenous backgrounds; to do so is a form of tokenism.

Our Education Center for First Nations Studies, which has its own curated collection of resources, is a great place to look for educational materials for yourself or for your classroom. The Center also sponsors Elder Hours in which any member of the campus community can drop in during certain hours (either in-person at the Center or virtually via Zoom, depending on COVID guidelines) and meet with a local tribal elder. Stay tuned to see if Elder Hours will continue over Zoom or return to in-person for Fall 2021.

Wisconsin First Nations, created in collaboration between the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction’s American Indian Studies Program, PBS Wisconsin, and the UW-Madison's School of Education, is a site full of educational resources on Wisconsin American Indian studies. The Disproportionality Technical Assistance Network has also compiled a fantastic collection of articles, publications, media, and more on First Nations histories, cultures, stories, and educational practices. You can also consult our university’s First Nations Studies Library Guide for a collection of educational resources accessibility through the Cofrin Library.

Encourage the First Nations students that you teach, mentor, or work with to apply for internships, participate in undergraduate research, get involved with student organizations, and engage in other opportunities that will help develop their personal and professional skills. If you teach and your course has group projects, lab groups, or small group discussions, consider rotating the leaders/facilitators so students that might not typically volunteer to lead still get an opportunity as well.

Are there opportunities for you to include the work of First Nations authors, scientists, musicians, or artists in your content area? One example offered by a former student was to include the work of Native poets in an English course. Additionally, are there faculty in your field at a local tribal college that you could collaborate with or invite into your classroom as a speaker? Look for ways to meaningfully and intentionally include their voices and presence in your own work. The staff of the Education Center for First Nations Studies would be happy to assist you in finding those materials or making those connections.

First Nations students often report feeling invisible or othered. Like any students, Native students want to be seen as people. To the same extent that you would with any other student, make an effort to get to know your First Nations students on a personal level—learn their names, greet them in the halls, ask them how their day is going, etc. Though small, these simple actions help build trust—and eventually relationships—over time.
As a student, it takes a lot of courage to speak up and share your point of view. When Native students do so, it is our job to listen. Doing so shows that we value them and their perspectives, and makes them feel more welcomed, heard, and understood.

Thank You

There is still much work to be done, but by working together on these initiatives we can make strides towards a more supportive and inclusive environment for our First Nations students. We welcome you to take these next steps with us as we make UW–Green Bay a better place for all to learn, grow, and succeed.

This post, the Beyond the Asterisk reading group, and the First Nations Students’ Perspectives of UW–Green Bay film showing and panel are a part of a larger series created in collaboration with the staff and faculty of the First Nations Studies program. View the series, titled Building Our Shared Stories Through First Nations Student Engagement, and a complete list of events here.

 

UWGB Team Joins National Efforts in OER Promotion and Adoption

O.E.R.
Grafik: Markus Büsges, leomaria,
CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Building on the preliminary work for the recently funded OER Strategic Priority Initiative proposal, a small team from UW-Green Bay has been accepted to participate in the inaugural AAC&U Institute on Open Educational Resources. The team will collaborate with leaders in the open educational resource (OER) field as well as other institutions to “design and implement a campus transformation strategy to accelerate campus OER plans for large scale engagement and adoption.”

OER adoption aligns with UW-Green Bay strategic goals 3, 4, and 5, and has been shown to reduce time to graduation and student debt (Florida Virtual Campus 2018), improve student learning outcomes (Jhangiani et al. 2019), and reduce DFW rates for part-time, first and second-generation students (Colvard et al. 2018; Griffiths et al. 2020).

Instructors interested in participating in the OER Strategic Priority Initiative should look for upcoming information this fall. General questions regarding OERs can be directed to UW-Green Bay libraries, refdesk@uwgb.edu, or the Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning, catl@uwgb.edu.

MS Teams group photo from IDI wrap-up session

Highlights from the 2021 Instructional Development Institute

Each January the UW-Green Bay Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning and the Instructional Development Council host the Instructional Development Institute, a conference for faculty and staff that promotes the continued development and application of best practices for teaching and learning. The conference was held virtually this year on Jan. 19 and 21 and consisted of a variety of synchronous and asynchronous presentations that explored this year’s theme, “Making Meaningful Connections”. UWGB staff and faculty made up the largest portion of presenters and attendees, though we also had individuals outside of UWGB both present and attend.

Troubling Connections: Five Lenses for Teaching Toward Justice, a presentation by our keynote speaker, Dr. Kevin Kumashiro, was perhaps the most popular session this year. The session explored fives lenses for understanding and making meaningful connections in higher education with an emphasis on how we might re-imagine and democratize education to work toward equity and justice. These five lenses are: 1) naming the moment, 2) curriculum as intervention, 3) contradictions of teaching, 4) learning through crisis, and 5) movement building as a frame. Dr. Kumashiro presented each lens one by one, providing both real world examples and citations for the philosophy behind them. Many attendees commented on how they were invigorated by the presentation, with some opting to dive deeper into these five lenses in a follow-up workshop later that afternoon.

Another standout session was The UWGB Land Acknowledgment: How to Meaningfully and Respectfully Recognize Wisconsin’s First Nations. The panel, comprised of several First Nations community members and instructors that teach in related studies, gave an overview of the First Nations people groups that once resided on the land our university now occupies. Attendees were encouraged to reflect on the importance of learning about and publicly acknowledging First Nations’ history. Our panelists offered several concrete suggestions for making the land acknowledgement a more regular part of our activities both for the university at large and within our individual classrooms.

The session Student Perspectives of Learning in a Pandemic, a live Q & A with a panel of five UWGB students and the Dean of Students, Mark Olkowski, also had high attendance. The panelists addressed instructor questions, offering honest feedback on topics like group work, discussions, virtual classroom settings, and instructor communication. The students often acknowledged the challenge of balancing academic rigor with a necessary level of flexibility to meet student needs during a pandemic when making their suggestions. The ability to honestly and openly engage with our students about teaching was a valuable experience for panelists and participants alike and we have already received requests to include student panels at future conferences.

In addition to these and many other live sessions, the Institute also included asynchronous “on-demand” sessions this year that span a range of topics from course accessibility to assessment of teaching. These asynchronous sessions come in the form of pre-recorded videos, PowerPoint presentations, and Canvas pages, paired with interactive elements like quizzes and discussions. During a time when it is understandably difficult to coordinate events synchronously, we were excited to have an opportunity to include more submissions in this way and hope to continue offering asynchronous options in the future.

If you were unable to attend this year, or attended but missed some of the sessions, it’s not too late to partake in what the Institute has to offer. Session recordings and other asynchronous content are now accessible in the Canvas course and will remain there until the end of spring semester. We highly encourage you to continue engaging with the materials there as you have the time and space. Consider also posting a comment or question in the session discussion boards to show support to your colleagues and contribute to these important conversations.

The Instructional Development Institute was made possible in great part through the hard work and participation of many of our faculty, staff, and students, so a huge “thank-you” to all that contributed to making this year’s conference a success. We very much enjoyed our time together and hope that you continue “making meaningful connections” in all that you do!