Students lead the way as co-inquirers of teaching and learning

Western Today staff

December 5, 2012

Serving as the hub for the study of teaching and learning at WWU, the Teaching-Learning Academy (TLA) has engaged many student participants in its ongoing dialogue with faculty, staff, and community members. As one sign of that engagement, several students and alumni have co-presented at national and international conferences this past year:

  • On January 27, Carmen Werder (Libraries& Learning Commons/Communication), Daniel Espinoza-Gonzalez (English student/Ethnic Student Center Coordinator), and Dmitri Simuel (Kinesiology student) co-presented at the AAC&U annual meeting in Washington, D.C. on “Raising Student Voices: Developing Democratic Engagement Through Dialogue About Teaching and Learning.”
  • On May 21, Blair Kaufer (Anthropology student) and Werder did an invited keynote presentation in Michigan titled “Engaging Student Voices in the Study of Teaching and Learning: Ordinary People, Plain Pretzels, and Conversational Scholarship.”
  • At the International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (ISSOTL) Conference, Oct. 20-24, in Hamilton, Ontario which drew participants from US, Canada, the UK, and Australia among other countries, Western alumna Kara Yanagida (Human Services) was a featured speaker on a plenary panel titled “Students as Change Agents.”
  • Another panel at the 2012 ISSOTL Conference included the WWU presentation team of Werder, Deb Currier (Theater Arts & Dance), Shevell Thibou (Libraries & Learning Commons), Paige Lord (Communication student), and Kara Yanagida (alumna) on “Integrating Student Voices: Evidence of Changing Attitudes that Change Practices.”
  • On November 10, Werder and another WWU alumnus, Erik Skogsberg (English/Fairhaven), who is in his second year of doctoral studies in education at Michigan State, did an invited keynote presentation on “Students as Co-inquirers in Dialogue: A Threshold Concept in the Scholarship of Teaching & Learning” at the 2012 Symposium on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Banff, Alberta.
  • Werder has also co-authored several related pieces with Currier, Thibou, Kaufer, Espinoza-Gonzalez, and Skogsberg in various publications about the role of students in the study of teaching and learning.