Category: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

Reflexively Making Popular Culture References with Our Students

April 24, 2024 by Caleb Green

Be reflexive about the ways you bring popular culture into your classroom. “I don’t understand the things that you are saying. They do not make sense to me.” When I heard these words, I could feel my entire body tense up. We were discussing a new theory in class, and I had just made a […]

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Mind Over Monsters: An Interview with Author Sarah Rose Cavanagh on Compassionate Challenge

March 27, 2024 by Sarah Rose Cavanagh, Cheri Madewell

Read an interview with Sarah Rose Cavanagh, keynote speaker at the 2024 Teaching and Technology Summit. Researcher and author Sarah Rose Cavanagh opened the Ball State March 21-22 Teaching and Technology Summit with “Hope in a Time of Monsters: Supporting Student and Faculty Mental Health with Compassionate Challenge.” In the following post, Cheri Madewell, director of […]

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First-gen Pedagogy: Who are First-generation Students?

March 29, 2023 by John Carter

How do we “view” our first-generation students? Who are they and what identities and backgrounds do they bring with them to the classroom beyond their first-generation status? From childhood memories of hanging out in academic offices to late night co-working sessions decades later as a graduate student, growing up with a mother who was a […]

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Six Tangible Ways to Support First-Generation Students

March 22, 2023 by Cheri Madewell

Help first-generation and other students unfamiliar with higher education navigate the business of being a student with transparent course materials, agency, and guided learning through your course design. As a first-generation college student, neither of my parents (or their parents) attended college. The small and private, four-year liberal arts college I attended may as well […]

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Less Worry, More Learning: How Ungrading Has Changed My Student Experience

January 25, 2023 by Shane Lanning (they/them)

Read about how ungrading in a graduate class changed the author’s experience and helped them center their own reasons for taking the course. The Teaching Innovation Team offered a summer book club for faculty in which we read Ungrading: Why Rating Students Undermines Learning (and What to Do Instead). In its literal sense, ungrading is […]

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Rethinking Syllabus Disability Statements

January 4, 2023 by Eva Grouling Snider

Consider how to craft a syllabus disability statement that students will read and will encourage them to seek help with their learning. When you include a disability statement on your syllabus, do your students… Of course, we’d like to think that it’s always C. Unfortunately, many students at best ignore disability statements and at worst […]

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How Changing Our Assumptions Can Impact Student Learning

December 14, 2022 by Shane Lanning (they/them)

It’s easy to unintentionally make assumptions about the background knowledge students bring with them to class. How can we check the assumptions we make, and how can we assist students who do have background knowledge gaps? In August 2022, I facilitated a workshop on implicit bias and course design. My overall goal was to engage […]

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Bringing the Future of Higher Education to the Here and Now

November 30, 2022 by Shane Lanning (they/them)

In a time of rapid change, these tactics can help higher education faculty “center the needs of the students” and “ensure equitable and inclusive experiences.” For the past few months, I have been thinking about the future of higher education. Recently, I have learned from books like the Great Upheaval and at conferences like OLC […]

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Challenges Ball State Learners Face

November 22, 2022 by Eva Grouling Snider

Learn more about who Ball State students are, the challenges they face in their academic and personal lives, and how this can impact your teaching. Every Fall and Spring, Ball State deploys a survey to students (online and in-person) through institution-wide Canvas announcements. This survey, which consists of about 40 questions, is designed to evaluate […]

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Leveraging User Personas for Course Design

November 9, 2022 by Shane Lanning (they/them)

Learn how a tool from user experience design can help inform student-centered and empathetic course design. User personas are a tool for user experience design to help make products with the specific users at the center. While I’m not advocating for a view of higher education that sees students as consumers and courses as products, […]

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