In higher education, we want learning to be relevant to students’ lives, but how often do we explicitly incorporate students’ lives--who they are, what they know, where they come from--into our teaching and research? How do we take an asset-based approach, drawing upon the diversity of Berkeley's student population as well as our own subject matter expertise, to create a richer learning experience for everyone? What does this look like across different disciplines and what's at stake?
A discussion is a powerful tool, but facilitating challenging discussions often leaves many of us feeling ill-equipped to address the very complex emotional and intellectual topics that enter our classrooms.
In this pre-semester conversation, we considered a variety of perspectives, methods, and frameworks for these discussions and considerations that we might take back to our classrooms. Questions we have considered include:
What is the history of the use of terms such as trigger warnings and safe spaces that populate our concerns for the...
This event was an open dialogue, supported by campus climate data from several recent surveys. Together, the speaker and attendees considered whether the survey results support their own experiences; how the data might shift expectations of relationships with students; and what resulting efforts individually and collectively could be designed to provide an equitable and fully inclusive classroom.
Event Outline California Demographics Berkeley Undergraduate Demographics Race/Ethnicity Gender Sexuality Socioeconomic Status (SES)...
Violence and trauma are all around us—fatal shootings by police, sexual violence, family separations, addiction, abuse, displacement of refugees. Often, these situations give rise to individual healing journeys and collective efforts to create change. But the pain and loss embedded in them also have a damaging effect long after the events have passed.
We invite many difficult experiences into our classrooms, historically intimate and distant, often through written and visual text depicting traumatic events and experiences. At the same time, we have many students...
Find on our Student Projects page a collection of the powerful projects growing from the collaborative understanding and effort developed in UC Berkeley's ACES courses to inspire you to create thought-...
As we move towards the end of thesemester, we invite you to join us for two timely conversations, one focused on research impacts during COVID-19 and one focused on teaching. Both will center issues of equity, inclusion, diversity and belonging. The programs are intended as open-ended, peer conversations for participants to talk about their experiences, ask questions, and share ideas and resources with colleagues from across campus. We hope you will join us. If possible, please RSVP so...
During times of crisis and disruption, it’s natural to default to very practical and immediate concerns. These are important. But as instructors, we also care about our students as people and as members of families and communities facing a multitude of challenges. We want to create conditions for them to thrive, even as we ourselves are learning to adapt to new and unfamiliar challenges. How do we ground ourselves in what’s important for each of us and our values, when everything is being upended? How do we sustain ourselves, meet the ever-changing needs of our students--...
The latest systemwide data from the UC Institutional Research & Academic Planning team at the UC Office of the President confirms that 39% of undergraduates and 23% of graduates at UC Berkeley are experiencing food Insecurity. Additionally, 5% of undergraduates and 6% of graduate students self-report experiencing homelessness at some point during the academic year.
At this event we discussed the full student experience data, learned about Berkeley's Basic Needs model, and to explored how we, as campus faculty and administrators, could help make a difference...
How can we use the misunderstandings and conflicts that arise in the classroom as points of embarkation toward more honest and rigorous intellectual pursuits? How can we think of our evolving values and priorities, not as accommodations or concessions, but as opportunities for deeper learning? Dr. Sarah Lappas moderates a conversation revolving around these questions and more as we imagine new strategies for equitable learning through dialogue and collaboration.
The event has been rescheduled to Tuesday, November 2nd, 12-1:30pm on Zoom. If you previously registered for the event, we kindly ask that you confirm whether or not you can attend the event on the new date on this Google form.
About
Commitments to the work that connects diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging/justice, anti-racism, anti-Blackness, anti-white...
