How are you?

This simple, taken-for-granted question that we often ask when greeting each other has become weightier in these past few months. And much more complicated to answer on most days. When I zoom way out to a cosmic view of the universe and the vast scope of time, I can feel okay. And when I zoom very close in – me, my partner, and our little cat – I can feel okay. It’s the middle parts that are most troubling – my surrounding community at Evergreen, in Olympia, in higher education, in places I used to live, the United States, and even the world. It feels like we are caught in an unrelenting undercurrent of collective existential crisis, and varying kinds of not-so-existential crisis. 

I  have a grounding practice that I’ve come to rely on in these times. It consists of three simple questions (given to me by my therapist), written on a post-it note stuck on my desk that I read several times a day:

How do I feel right now?

What do I need right now?

How can I be gentle with myself right now?

In the spirit of checking in with ourselves and our community, our Faculty Scholar Julia Zay has been working on an Evergreen Faculty Survey. You’ll have a chance to learn more about it at the week 10 faculty meeting, and we hope that you’ll participate. Use it as an opportunity to check in with yourself as part of our community. We want to know how you’re doing so we can be strategic about providing the right kind of support, right now and in the future.

Jaime O'Connor, Assistant Director
Washington Center for Improving Undergraduate Education

The Learning and Teaching Commons newsletter is delivered to your inbox on the first Friday of the month during the quarter. Click here to read past newsletters

Biology: Symmetry and Fractals students celebrate the construction of the Sierpinski Tetrahedron 

If you've been in the lobby of Evans Hall lately, you may have noticed a playful jumble of colorful paper pyramids in various states of construction. This installation project is part of the Biology Symmetry and Fractals program led by professor Melissa Nivala. The students in the program achieved the construction of an 8-foot pyramid in winter quarter, and the project will be expanded on in Spring.

In Melissa Nivala's spring program, the Spring Practice of Organic Farming, students will have the option to participate as a special team project under the credit block of Applied Systems Thinking. "I will teach about fractals, chaos, and the self-organizing processes that nature uses to create form," Nivala states, adding that this has a strong connection to Adrienne Maree Brown's Emergent Strategies, a previous Evergreen common read.

The goal in spring quarter is to construct three more 8 foot tetrahedrons to be assembled into a 16 foot tall version. This ambitious undertaking will require cutting, folding, and taping 3072 more individual tetrahedrons. One advanced computer science student has volunteered to work with facilities engineer Marshall Urist to design a lightweight skeleton structure that can help stabilize the structure.

Students will be taking on some grassroots organizing and will be requesting participation from faculty, staff, and student groups to contribute portions to the project. Our LTC staff recently took on the challenge as part of a team-building activity in a staff meeting, and we encourage others to get involved!

Learn more →

Have an exciting project coming up in your program? Contact us to be featured as a Community Highlight in the newsletter!

Join us on Tuesdays from 12-1:30 PM in SEM II E3123 or on Zoom to sharpen your online teaching tools with Timothy Corvidae. 

Making the Most of Week Zero: Welcoming and Orienting Students Before the Quarter Begins | March 18

Yes, this workshop is being held during evaluation week. Not convenient! But a robust finding in research about online learning is that Week Zero—the interactions and resources you provide students before class even begins—make a huge difference on students’ experience of inclusion and their confidence and preparedness for learning. On the quarter system, Week Zero hits during Spring Break! So let’s get ready for it together.

Beyond Busy Work: Designing Asynchronous Activities that Enhance Synchronous Sessions | April 1

A major complaint in online learning is that discussion boards and other asynchronous learning formats fall flat or feel like busy work, disconnected from the learning that happens on Zoom.

We’ll discuss strategies of backwards design that can help you build asynchronous activities that scaffold the work you want to do with students in class sessions.

 Group Work that Works Online | April 8

Group projects are generally beloved by Evergreen students. We like to learn together around here. But that doesn’t make us immune to the most common complaints about project-based learning: mismatched goals and expectations between group members, wanting more guidance or clearer instructions from faculty, discomfort confronting conflict, indirect communication that leads to scheduling difficulties, power imbalances, and more. Let’s talk about how we can use online tools and structured design to help groups thrive.

Collaboration Online: A Lucid Tutorial | April 15

Using digital whiteboards can enhance both synchronous and asynchronous learning. Come spend some time practicing with Lucid, a digital whiteboard that’s free and works inside of Canvas. Let’s keep the tech we’re asking our student to use streamlined, secure, and easy to find.

Less Painful Sites and Slides: A few Graphic Design tricks to Ease Your Eyes | April 22

Let’s face it, Canvas is not pretty. It’s just not. But there are a few things you can do to make it a little easier on the eye. We’ll learn how to make buttons and discuss best practices for organizing information and orienting your students so they don’t miss things. We can also touch on some quick tips for teaching videos and presentation slide design.

Michael Wallis is the Student Learning Consultant for The Washington Center. His collaborative services are available to faculty who wish to improve the equity and student learning focus of their curricula.

Looking for someone to talk to about your teaching? Wondering how to prepare for future programs? Need a friendly listener to offer support? Contact Julia Zay, LTC Faculty Scholar for a confidential consultation! 

This month's Contemplative Corner links you to Julia Zay's recent contribution to The Chronicle of Higher Education's Teaching newsletter where she talks about her approach to faculty professional development at Evergreen.

Learn more →

Michael Wallis is the Student Learning Consultant for The Washington Center. His collaborative services are available to faculty who wish to improve the equity and student learning focus of their curricula.

One thing I’ve been thinking about a lot recently is how to organize information. My brain is not exactly the most efficient tool at my disposal for keeping hold of new learning, nor does it find much effect in establishing robust routines. One of the great quests of my recent life has been to discover the boon of a simple strategy that reflects my brain’s natural desire to call up bits of information from a wide array of categories...

Learn more →

This newsletter finds me 10 weeks out from my last day at Evergreen. I’m moving on to what may not be Greener pastures (can’t get Greener than working here!), but pastures that have been tugging at my heartstrings for some time. I’ll be opening a therapy and facilitation practice in Tacoma, in the little 1890 built cottage behind my house that I’ve been remodeling for some time. It will be a more analog life.

Learn more →

April 24-25 | Rainbow Lodge

The Integrative Learning Curriculum Planning Retreat supports faculty in creating integrative learning experiences. It benefits both newcomers and experienced educators in linked or paired courses, clustered courses, first-year experience programs, living-learning communities, or coordinated studies programs.

This two-day retreat at Rainbow Lodge offers flexible programming for collaboration and individual or team work on curriculum design. Sessions focus on student success, integrative assignments, team teaching, and guided pathways.

This Spring Quarter, Evergreen will hold its seventh annual Equity Symposium on Wednesday, April 16th and Thursday, April 17th. Learn more →

Mark your calendar now and make plans to incorporate Equity Symposium events into your course or program. Equity Symposium programming includes an opening plenary address followed by lunch, two days of engaging workshops led by Evergreen community members, and a keynote address with Alexis Pauline Gumbs which is free and open to the public.

SUPPORT STAFF THE EVENTS  

Do you want to support the event, but don’t have a workshop idea? We are recruiting event support staff! Find more details about the needs via the sign-up form. 

More information on Equity Symposium speakers coming soon! 

Questions? Email socialjusticecenter@evergreen.edu

Rhetorical Grammar: Antiracist Approaches to College Writing | Friday, March 21 | 10-11:30 am

Facilitated by Ansley Clark & Carla Haddad, The Evergreen State College

[REGISTER]

What does intentional, creative, and linguistically and culturally spacious academic writing look like?  This workshop focuses on how instructors can use linguistic justice and critical language awareness frameworks to teach grammar and other foundational college writing skills. [Learn more]

How Status Interferes with Learning in Groups and What Instructors Can Do About It | Tuesday, April 22 | 10-11:30 AM PT

Sunshine Campbell, Ph.D., N.B.C.T., The Evergreen State College

[REGISTER]

Group work offers numerous benefits for both academic learning and social-emotional development. However, teachers often abandon it as a teaching strategy due to a variety of challenges that hinder students’ learning. One major obstacle is status, or how students perceive themselves and others as competent, which can create barriers to effective and equitable group work. In this workshop, we will explore status hierarchies and discuss strategies teachers can use to make learning more accessible for all students.

Are you feeling the emotional weight of supporting your students? Consider inviting an Evergreen Community Circle to your course or program to provide a supportive space for sharing feelings and experiences.

In our community circles, students will engage in a structured sharing protocol. Each participant will have uninterrupted time to speak while others practice deep listening. This process, guided by a skilled facilitator, helps foster a sense of community and mutual understanding among students.

The Social Justice Center and the Washington Center have collaborated to provide support, care, and resilience through Evergreen Community Circles. These circles are designed to help students engage in community-centered healing.

If you're interested in hosting a circle in their course or program, contact us and a member of our team will be in touch to schedule and plan for the facilitation.

The Learning and Teaching Commons is pleased to announce a new resource to support faculty with narrative evaluations. This practical guide includes example narrative evaluations from your colleagues that you can annotate using Hypothesis. We invite you to check out the new module:

A guide to Narrative Evaluation at Evergreen. 

Let us know what you think.  Send your feedback to learningandteaching@evergreen.edu.

If your class is doing something cool this academic year, especially this Fall please email Shandra Witke: your name, the class title, what your class will be doing, and a general idea of the date(s) you will be doing it. 

We are hoping to connect with Faculty to schedule some updated shots. We need photos of:

-Updated classroom and group discussions

-Classroom demonstrations

-Class activities outside the classroom – both on and off-campus

-In the forest

-At the beach

-Off-campus field trips (downtown Olympia, local nature, Study Abroad)

-Class visits to the library or other places on campus 

-Art and design classes like woodshop or ceramics

-Classes in the computer labs or 3D printing lab

-Students making cool stuff or showing off their projects

-Students working and collaborating in the science labs or with science equipment

-Anything fun, engaging, unique, Evergreen

Email Shandra Witke→

Hours of Operation for Winter quarter: 

1 to 5 p.m. Monday and Friday, Appointment Only

1 to 5 p.m. Wednesday, Drop-In

Holidays & Campus Closures are observed.

The Basic Needs Center, CAB 135, is located on the first floor of the CAB building. Separate entrance from the Greenery.

Learn more →

General Writing Center Hours:
In-person, Olympia and Online:
Monday-Thursday, 12pm-7pm
Friday and Sunday, 12pm-4pm
Contact: writingcenterstaff@evergreen.edu 

In-person, Tacoma:
Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, 2pm-4pm
Saturday, 10am-3pm 
Contact: Kileeo.R.Wideman@evergreen.edu

Tutoría de escritura en español - en zoom https://evergreen.zoom.us/j/4631248757
lunes 12-5pm con Carla (Olympia y en zoom)
miercoles, 12-2pm con Carla (Olympia y en zoom)
lunes y jueves, 4pm-7pm con Esmeralda (en zoom)
viernes, 12pm-4pm con Esmeralda (en zoom)
sábado, 10am-3pm con Carla (Tacoma y en zoom)

Contacts:
Esmeralda.Zuniga_Lemus1@evergreen.edu

Carla.I.Haddad@evergreen.edu  

Events: 

Writer's Circle: a casual creative writing gathering with supportive conversation and writing prompts, every Wednesday from 5pm-7pm in the Writing Center (Library 2304)

Writer's Open Mic Night: Thursday, March 13th, 5-7pm, an open mic night for all forms of writing, hosted by the Writing Center, the Library, and BLISS

There are many opportunities for faculty to share their achievements, and we want to encourage you to contribute to the wealth of knowledge in our Evergreen community. Learn more about how to share your work with our community.