Category: Partners

Schools in the Liberal Arts Consortium for Online Learning

LACOL DH panel at ACH 2023 – June 29

LACOL

DH, Social Justice, and Liberal Arts: Developing an online, multi-campus DH course through the LACOL consortium

Thursday, June 29 at 5:15pm-5:45pm EDT (online)

Beth Fischer1, Mackenzie Brooks2, Liz Evans3, Austin Mason4, Nhora Lucía Serrano5, José Vergara6

1Williams College Museum of Art, United States of America; 2Washington & Lee University; 3Liberal Arts Collaborative for Digital Innovation (LACOL); 4Carleton College; 5Hamilton College; 6Bryn Mawr College

Through a unique collaboration across peer colleges, LACOL’s Digital Humanities: Social Justice Collections and Liberal Arts Curricula has fostered a prodigious environment of original, collaborative research, undertaken by students as part of an interdisciplinary online course. First taught in 2021, the course will be offered for the third time during summer 2023.

Over eight weeks, the team of instructors introduces students from LACOL’s eleven partner schools to ways of working with digital humanities data, digital modes of humanistic inquiry, and specific approaches including text analysis and geographic analysis. Students work in teams, closely mentored by the instructors, to implement projects that use digital methods to explore historically and socially relevant topics drawn from their engagement with multiple campus archive collections, such as representations of BIPOC at PWIs in the 1960s and the documentation of women’s suffrage and environmental/climate movements across campuses.

In this presentation, the teaching team, course development collaborators, and the director of LACOL share how this course was developed and implemented, and the ways the partner schools have managed handoffs and transitions between their own institutions and this shared collaborative curriculum. We will address key components for the course’s success, especially how the model developed under LACOL might be enacted among institutions that do not have such a pre-existing framework and how the course has sparked ongoing student engagement with DH and social justice topics, and led to the development of new courses at partner institutions.

ACH Session #6B: Perspectives on Critical Pedagogy

https://ach2023.ach.org/

Why Teach ‘Why College’ with A. Hines

LACOL

Multicampus Microlearning Series – Winter 2023

Why Teach ‘Why College’

Date/Time: Wednesday, January 25, 2023, 3:00pm-4:15pm Eastern
Format: interactive Zoom discussion
Leader: Andy Hines, Associate Director of the Aydelotte Foundation, Swarthmore College

A. Hines, Swarthmore College

There is a robust critical conversation about the past and present of American higher education that has increasingly become the subject of courses at liberal arts colleges. One example is a first-year seminar course at Swarthmore, Why College, taught by research scholars of the Aydelotte Foundation.

What does it mean to study “the American university” at institutions that are often de-emphasized in conversations in critical university studies? Do students really want to investigate the institutions where they study, let alone the institutions they don’t attend? How does this work connect us to colleagues at different kinds of institutions in a critical moment for higher education? Andy Hines, Associate Director of the Aydelotte Foundation, will address these questions and more with a brief presentation and conversation about his work teaching critical university studies courses.

Andy Hines is the Associate Director of the Aydelotte Foundation at Swarthmore College. He is the author of Outside Literary Studies: Black Criticism and the University and the editor of a keywords collection on higher education to be published by Johns Hopkins University Press. 

Bryn Mawr and Haverford connect students around the world through Transformative Sustainability Project

LACOL

By T. Donahue-Ochoa, Visiting Asst Professor of Political Science, Haverford College, M. Darwish, Lecturer and Coordinator of Bi-Co Arabic Program, Bryn Mawr and Haverford Colleges, and E. Hartman, Executive Director of the Center for Peace and Global Citizenship, Haverford College.

T. Donahue-Ochoa

At Haverford and Bryn Mawr, many students and faculty are co-creating an ocean-spanning online exchange. It’s called “the Transformative Sustainability Project.” In it, these scholars work with peers in the Persian Gulf on some of the world’s largest questions. How can we join cross-regionally to sustain our communities? How can we use the UN Sustainable Development Goals as shared yardsticks of progress? To answer, the peer groups divide into teams spanning the Philly suburbs and Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates. As they tackle these problems, they swap their localized perspectives. For a time, they see the issues from the standpoint of 7,000 miles away.

With funding from the Stevens Initiative, the Project partners colleagues at Haverford and Bryn Mawr, Dickinson College in Carlisle PA, and American University Sharjah (AUS). It matches seven Pennsylvania-based faculty with six at AUS. The faculty duos work across disciplines in teaching paired courses. These aim to foster ties across cultures and empathy for differences. All course pairs hold several joint meetings. They also group their students into the ocean-spanning teams. Each of those does a term-long assignment on local and global efforts to sustain communities.

We can learn a lot by giving up our North Atlantic viewpoints for a while, instead seeing things from the Persian Gulf.

– – Prof. T. Donahue-Ochoa, Haverford College

Three Haverford-Bryn Mawr faculty currently work on the Project. In the spring, Manar Darwish will offer the course, “Society and Culture of the Middle East through Film.” “Its horizons will be widened by our Sharjah partners,” says Darwish. Meanwhile, Eric Hartman is now teaching “Human Rights in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania in a National and Global Context.” And Tom Donahue-Ochoa is offering “Development and Transnational Injustices” and “Comparative and Transnational Studies.” They’re pairing those courses with AUS counterparts offered by Salma Thani and Kristina Katsos. 

M. Darwish

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Language Pedagogy & Proficiency Workshop

LACOL

Date: Monday, 31 October (arrival and group dinner on Sunday, Oct 30)
Location: Swarthmore College (campus location TBA)
Agenda: LACOL Workshop – Language Pedagogies, Proficiency, and Reverse Design 
Facilitator: Dr. Cathy Baumann, U. Chicago CLC
Register by Oct 26: https://forms.gle/htzeBDTaLvYeLrAL6

Workshop Goals:

  • Bring LACOL language leaders, teachers and experts together for a substantive 1-day workshop facilitated by C. Baumann
  • Use proficiency as a lens to frame exploration of pedagogies and assessment strategies that support various teaching modes and styles; agenda is adaptable based on participant interests
  • Share learning and dialogue to continue building relationships across LACOL language programs and people; participants may consider opportunities for collaboration to enhance liberal arts language offerings (areas of common interest such as lesser taught languages and learning enrichments for students heading into study-abroad)

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June 2nd at Davidson College

LACOL
Dr. Kim Gallon

LACOL 2022 Keynote Address: Crisis, Collaboration, & COVID: A Digital Blueprint for Racial Equity and Social Justice

Date/Time: Thursday, June 2, 9:30-10:30am, Wall Center Atrium

Kim Gallon is an Associate Professor of History at Purdue University. Her work investigates the cultural dimensions, including race and medicine, of the Black Press in the early twentieth century. She is the author of a number of articles and essays as well as the book, Pleasure in the News: African American Readership and Sexuality in the Black Press (University of Illinois Press, 2020). 

Gallon is also the author of the field defining article, “Making a Case for the Black Digital Humanities” and the founder and director of two black digital humanities projects: The Black Press Research Collective and COVID Black 

She also works in instructional and e-learning design to develop curricula for secondary, higher education, and adult learners. Her most recent work in this area includes working with the American Medical Association to develop e-learning modules on the history of race and medicine.

Gallon is the recipient of fellowships and grants from the American Council of Learned Societies, National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Spencer Foundation for her work in the black digital humanities and adult education.

Bayesian Statistics – Shared Course Opportunity, Spring 2022

LACOL

Jingchen (Monika) Hu, Assistant Professor of Statistics at Vassar College
Prof. Monika Hu, Vassar College

Shared LACOL Course: Bayesian Statistics
Instructor: Professor Jingchen (Monika) Hu, Vassar College
Syllabus & Enrollment Info: http://bit.ly/bayesian-stats
Topics and Objectives:

  1. Understanding of basic concepts in Bayesian statistics and ability to apply Bayesian inference approaches to solve scientific research problems and real-word problems.
  2. Ability and skills to use statistical programming software (R/RStudio and JAGS) to realize Bayesian analysis.
  3. Practice of reading, discussing, and critiquing statistics research journal papers.

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LACOL 2021 – Poster Session

LACOL

from the LACOL 2021 Workshop hosted by Hamilton College … Digital Posters!

Also see: https://conferences.hamilton.edu/lacol2021/posters

Advancing Data Curation and Archiving

Latham Poster

An Application of Coding to Lab Management in the Geosciences

  • Tierney Latham ’21, Hamilton
  • Cat Beck, Assistant Professor of Geosciences, Hamilton
  • Bruce Wegter, Sciences Instrumentation Technician, Hamilton
  • Ahra Wu, Data Science/Analysis Research Librarian, Hamilton

View Poster

 

Joining the Team

Strohmeyer Poster

Collaborating with Athletics for Increased Student Success

  • Kristin Strohmeyer, Research and Community Engagement Librarian, Hamilton
  • Nhora Lucía Serrano, Associate Director for Digital Learning and Research, Hamilton

View Poster

 

“No Time to Play Around”

Jackson Poster

Addressing Equity and Cultivating Play with Library Workers

  • Lorin Jackson, Interim Head of Access & User Services, Black Studies Librarian, Swarthmore

View Poster

LACOL 2021 – Featured Presentation

LACOL

Up Close and Personal: Art Museums and Digital Models

Beth Fischer, Postdoctoral Fellow in Digital Humanities, Williams College
Amber Orosco, MA candidate, Art History Graduate Intern, Williams College
Liz Gallerani, Curator of Mellon Academic Programs, Williams College

Moderated by Austin Mason, Assistant Director for Digital Humanities & Director of Digital Arts & Humanities, Carleton College

How do you bring digital imaging, including RTI (reflectance transformation imaging) and photogrammetry, to students in a liberal arts environment? How do digital models enhance and not replace in-person learning with art?

This panel presents strategies for digital imaging that focus on digital accessibility, equity, agency, and liberal arts learning.

In fall 2020, the Williams College Museum of Art launched a minimal-budget imaging project that initially responded to concerns about equity for hybrid and remote learning. This panel presents strategies for digital imaging that focus on digital accessibility, equity, agency, and liberal arts learning. The pilot program at the Williams College Museum of Art aims to make objects more engaging in a time of distance, while remaining attentive to data bias and trying to highlight under-used objects. Goals of the project include increasing comfort level with objects and digital models, and also encouraging agency, exploration, and play.

By sharing our own iterations throughout this ongoing project, we offer a range of possibilities to participants who may wish to explore similar methods and applications. Working with limited staff and resources, we focused on individual strengths and perspectives–Liz with the collection, teaching, and relationships with faculty across campus; Beth with digital humanities, teaching, and entry-level digital technologies; Amber with prior experience using RTI and perspective as a graduate student who is both learning from and teaching with models. Amber is the Academic Programs Intern at the museum, and is also the Teaching Assistant in a studio course that is a key collaborator in this project.

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LACOL 2021 – Featured Session

LACOL

Aus der Finsternis: Cross-Institutional Intermediate German with Dark (Netflix 2017-20)

Sunka Simon, Professor of German, Film and Media Studies, Swarthmore College
Matthew Miller, Associate Professor of German, Colgate University
Pia Eger, DAAD Fellow, Colgate University

Three colleagues explore both synchronous and asynchronous activities and projects built on cross-institutional team-screenings of weekly episodes of Dark’s first season on Netflix.

This presentation showcases the pedagogical and technological tools utilized to achieve the learning outcomes for the LACOL sponsored cross-institutional digitally connected Intermediate German course in the fall semester of 2020 between Swarthmore College and Colgate University.

Read more about this LACOL project: Intermediate German Digital Link-Up (Fall 2020)

LACOL 2021 Play and Innovation

LACOL

Consortium-wide LACOL Workshop
June 21-23 virtually @ Hamilton College

For Full details on the Workshop Program, Schedule, and Registration, see: https://conferences.hamilton.edu/lacol2021

The LACOL 2021 Workshop is over!  Thanks to Hamilton College for hosting. 

Hamilton College hosted the summer 2021 consortium-wide LACOL, June 21-23, 2021.  With “Play and Innovation” as the official 2021 theme, this summer gathering brought together faculty, technologists, research librarians, academic support specialists, and other educators and students for collaborative exchange and playful discussion. Read More

Toward Equity in Assessment … Student-Led Coffee Chats Spring 2021

LACOL

Toward Equity in Assessment: A Cross-Constituency Dialogue

THIS SPRING, LACOL hosted a series of weekly coffee chats led by student pedagogy partners entitled Toward Equity in Assessment: A Cross-Constituency Dialogue. These multi-campus, multi-constituency discussions build on the Summer 2020 and Fall 2020 series.  

Assessment is one of the thorniest dimensions of teaching and learning, and it has been recognized as an arena in which inequities are particularly severe.

The global pandemic has exacerbated existing inequities and created new ones; therefore, now more than ever faculty, staff, and students need to be in dialogue with one another about how to challenge both existing and new inequities. This coffee-chat series supports faculty, staff, and students in explorations of the possibilities for developing equitable approaches to assessment that honor the diversity of students’ strengths, needs, and aspirations. Each session will be facilitated by a group of experienced student partners, and all sessions will be run as semi-structured conversations that strive to integrate the questions and insights of all participants.

Resources:

Registration is closed (series complete); coffee chats ran February 22 and run weekly through April 12 – details below. 

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Student-Led Brown Bags, Fall 2020

LACOL

Student Perspectives on Trauma-informed, Anti-racist Teaching and Learning in Hybrid and Remote Contexts

THIS FALL, LACOL hosted a series of weekly brown bags led by student partners on Trauma-informed, Anti-racist Teaching and Learning in Hybrid and Remote Contexts. These multi-campus discussions expand on the high-impact Summer 2020 Student-led Dialogues as semi-structured, open conversations with LACOL colleagues in a small group format. 

The importance of the topic is high in our current moment, as argued in this opinion piece.

With fall courses in progress now, the student partners will engage in aspects with direct relevance to the hybrid/remote classroom, building on a set of curated and annotated resources, prompts, and activities to facilitate discussions based on interests expressed by discussion participants. Read More

Intermediate German Digital Link-Up (F20-S21)

LACOL

Prof. Simon Swarthmore College

Professors Sunka Simon and Matthew Miller teach Intermediate German as an intensive language class that meets four days a week on campus at Swarthmore College and Colgate University respectively. The curriculum is built to enhance the four language skills (oral, aural, reading and writing composition) through a combination of up-to-date, authentic print and audio-visual geo-political and cultural material to move students from A2 to B1 level proficiency within the span of one semester. Both classes work from a textbook (e.g. Stationen) that integrates Landeskunde (learning about the specificities of German-speaking regions and cities) with B1-level grammar and vocabulary lessons.

Prof. MillerColgate University
Prof. Miller
Colgate University

We carved out the potential of holding a synchronous class together once a week as a joint web conference. Asynchronously, cross-college teams of students will prepare didacticized assignments consisting of blog-posts, a discussion forum and Zoom video-conferencing tools utilizing newly acquired linguistic concepts to react to consecutive weekly episodes of German-language original dramas such as Dark, Skylines, Dogs of Berlin or Berlin Babylon. The semester will culminate with a virtual symposium and/or video-essay student presentations.

On the benefits of linking courses across two campuses, Professor Simon notes:

Our linked class creates a broader cohort of language learners. We are “in it together.”

As the course wraps up, digital student projects will be shared with the LACOL language community, including web-published symposium papers and final video essays.
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Antiracist Pedagogy – Student Perspectives

LACOL

LACOL 2020 Virtual Workshop – Summer Dialogues

Student Perspectives on Trauma-informed, Anti-racist,
Remote Teaching and Learning

Resources proliferate on how to prepare for remote teaching and learning that is equitable, inclusive, and anti-racist, but where are students’ perspectives and voices in the mix?

See also: Fall 2020 brown bag series: https://lacol.net/student-led-brown-bags-fall-2020/

In August 2020, Student Partners working in the Summer Pedagogical Partnership Program at Bryn Mawr and Haverford Colleges led a series of semi-structured conversations with faculty and staff across LACOL.  Pairs of these students partnered throughout the summer with cohorts of faculty to support their pedagogical planning for the Fall-2020 semester.

As part of this work, the Student Partners read resources and identified what they think matters most in developing trauma-informed, anti-racist, remote teaching and learning. These points shared below served as a basis for the 1-hour small group conversations via Zoom.

Feedback from faculty participants highlighted the value of these discussion as they plan for the fall:
“We shared resources and ideas…so I feel like we walked away with tangible strategies and tools to apply to our remote work in a more equitable way.”

 

“It really made a difference for my course prep, and overall well-being as a faculty member living through these challenging times.”

 

“The students modeled the kind of non-judgmental openness to questions, concerns, and ideas that they recommended we exhibit in the classroom. I have a long set of notes taken during the meeting that I am eager to implement when I’m next teaching.”
Likewise, reflections from student partners capture important threads in these conversations:
“[This work] opened my eyes to the incredible number of things professors have to consider and worry about when planning a course, which is definitely going to help me consider others’ perspectives in an out-of-the-box way.”

 

“…talking with faculty partners and student partners has more thoroughly convinced me that a lot of misunderstandings or dissatisfactions among students and faculty could be remedied or clarified by faculty being more direct and transparent about their reasons for adopting certain practices, assignments, and course policies, and by asking students to share their feelings and feedback directly.”

 

“I have found a voice and a language with which to communicate with faculty and have/facilitate conversations that previously felt out of the realm of things I could do. I think I have learned a lot of important facilitation strategies that I carry with me into other work. I aim to apply this language, knowledge, and skills to other work across disciplines to open space for more accessible and equitable conversations and practices.”

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