inclusive teaching

Non-Traditional is the New Norm: Lessons from Teaching at Community Colleges

Editor’s note: This is the second post in a two-part series focused on  working with community college students and/or alumni. Please also see Samantha Lawrence’s post on challenging the community college stigma. By Katie Webber When referring to “college students”, many people think of a typical 18 to 22-year-old admitted fresh out of high school. […]

Challenging the Stigma of Community College Students & Alumni

Editor’s note: This is the first post in a two-part series on working with community college students and/or alumni. Samantha E. Lawrence The word “college” is often connoted with emerging adults attending 4-year universities as “full-time students,” living in dorms, and balancing their course loads with keg parties. Students’ college experiences, however, may differ radically […]

More Than an Athlete: Teaching the Whole Student

Stay informed of our latest posts plus resources on teaching by subscribing to our monthly newsletter! In one of my first sections as a Philosophy Teaching Assistant at UConn, I overheard an exchange between a student athlete and another classmate that I will never forget. As the students were packing up and heading out, the […]

Not Just Trigger Warnings: Supporting Survivors of Sexual & Domestic Violence in the Classroom

By Lynne Alexander Sitting here in the aftermath of the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings and swearing-in ceremony, I feel anguished and drained. Surviving in this fractured and divided nation and being bombarded with imagery and rhetoric from all sides that is potentially triggering and deeply upsetting has been a struggle. The past few weeks were particularly […]

Diversity for Beginners: Easy First Steps Toward More Inclusive Courses

By Cynthia DeRoma Diversity and inclusion matter not just for equal opportunity considerations, but also for academic outcomes. Scholars who feel the objectivity of their field preempts them from having to worry about issues of inclusion should be aware that recent research has been showing positive correlations between diversity and academic success. For example, Steffens […]

Whose (dis)comfort? Claiming, Naming, and Holding Pronouns in the Classroom

By Susan B. Marine Hi, my name is Susan, and my pronouns are she, her, and hers. So goes my standard introduction these days, at everything from faculty meetings, to church functions, to meeting the new barista at my local coffee shop/office. It rolls off my tongue quite naturally, but this was not always so. […]

When Parents Can’t Help: How Can We Support First-Generation College Students?

In the following post, PhD student in sociology Jessica Yorks, discusses the challenges–and assets– first-generations bring to higher education. Based on her personal experiences and conversations with others, she offers advice on how instructors can better support first-generation students while recognizing the value of the perspectives they bring to higher education. For many of us, […]

Inclusivity Lessons From a Women’s College

By Emma Bjorngard-Basayne & Kristi Kaeppel Isabel Fields is a first-year student from Smith College intending to major in Women and Gender Studies with a minor in Public Policy. She has her own podcast called She Said, which tackles topics “from menstruation to sex education to reproductive justice” (iTunes description). For our March series on […]

Lift as We Climb: Instances of Women’s Peer Support in Navigating the Academy

By Emma Björngard-Basayne and Kristi Kaeppel Last spring, as we made that precarious leap from a school friendship into a full-blown, text-every-day, drink-wine-together-on-weekdays-friendship, a curious thing started to happen. The daily anxieties and feelings of self-doubt that accompany being a graduate student started to weigh less heavily on us. Over coffee, we chatted excitedly about […]

LGBTQIA+ Students Speak Out: An Interview about Inclusive Educational Support

By Timothy Bussey This is the fourth and final post by PhD candidate Timothy Bussey on inclusive teaching and curriculum for LGBTQIA+ students. The following interview was conducted with a diverse group of UConn undergraduate students, who are all members of the LGBTQIA+ community. These students were selected based upon their high level of achievement […]