Academic Development

Mentors and What Really Matters

It was a fun and busy day. I really appreciate being able to reconnect with mentors and had a chance to talk to Dr. Barbi Honeycutt who taught me a lot while I was a teaching postdoctoral scholar here. I remember attending several workshops facilitated by Honeycutt, preparing a teaching philosophy, and even doing a […]
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Actionable steps!

As part of the 2020 SABER Diversity and Inclusion Efforts seminar series, Starlette Sharp from Penn State University and Dr. John Matsui from UC Berkeley presented last September on “Actionable steps toward equity in STEM.” Both Dr. Matsui and Sharp started with land acknowledgements for the lands and people on which their campuses now exist. […]
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“This is a time for self-reflection”

Last September, Dr. Bryan Dewsbury from the University of Rhode Island gave a talk entitled: “Lessons from a hot spring: Authentic transformation in the higher education classroom”as part of the SABER Diversity and Inclusion Efforts. I had watched this talk last year and wanted to revisit it because I remember how conversational, honest, and uplifting […]
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Immigrants in Higher Education

Drs. Meseret Hailu and Brooke Coley from Arizona State University presented last December a session entitled “An exploratory investigation of the experiences of Black immigrant women in undergraduate STEM” as part of the SABER Diversity and Inclusion Efforts. The title caught my attention because I haven’t thought about Black immigrants and their challenges in STEM […]
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Supporting Black Women in Mathematics

In a presentation entitled “Black women and belongingness: An interrogation of STEM education as a white, patriarchal space.” Drs. Luis Leyva and Nicole Joseph from Vanderbilt University presented work on the experiences of Black women in STEM. First Dr. Joseph discussed the gaps in representation for Black women in STEM and particularly in mathematics. Leyva […]
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Scholar Activism and the Classroom

Tonight I watched the recording for the October 21, 2020 SABER Diversity and Inclusion series. Dr. Terrell Morton from the University of Missouri gave a talk entitled “But is it really “just” science? Engaging critical race theory to unpack racial oppression with implications for Black student science engagement. ” and describes himself as a male, black […]
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Building Communities with Kindness

I had a fun day reconnecting with former students who have now become colleagues and collaborators. How cool! Their energy, willingness to teach me new things about technical writing and videos, and kindness have always been evident despite communicating only every couple of months. Kindness! That’s why when I saw Dr. Mica Estrada’s SABER talk […]
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Diversifying the STEM Faculty

Tonight Amada and I watched a SABER spring 2021 talk entitled “Structural racism, institutional transformation, and diversifying the STEM faculty” by Dr. Kimberly Griffin from the University of Maryland. This presentation happened live on February 18th. Griffin started by talking about the small share of US college faculty that are nonwhite by presenting Pew Research […]
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How do students perceive their understanding of biology terms?

Dr. Lisa McDonnell is an Associate Teaching Professor at UC San Diego and was on the Online with LSE webinar series to discuss a recent publication about “Identifying Troublesome Jargon in Biology.” I like how Online with LSE is now having graduate students moderate the sessions! McDonnell began by highlighting how there is a lot […]
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Studying Faculty ‘Personas’

I watched the Online with LSE: “Using Personas as a Tool for Learner-Centered Professional Development” webinar tonight. Dr. Paula Lemons from the University of Georgia described their study with nineteen faculty from long-term learning communities at six institutions. These communities focused on evidence-based assessment practices. Lemons started this study in early 2014! The volunteer participants […]
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