2023 Keynote Speaker

Dr. Bridget Arend

arend_headshot-2.jpg

Bridget Arend, PhD, is the associate director of teaching and learning at Metropolitan State University of Denver with 25 years of experience teaching and supporting teaching and learning in higher education. She enjoys helping college faculty develop an intentional teaching practice so that they can feel calm and purposeful in this aspect of their work. She continues to teach courses in Education and Applied Communications at MSU Denver and the University of Denver. Bridget owns a professional development organization called Intentional College Teaching and is co-author of a comprehensive text about instructional practices, Facilitating Seven Ways of Learning: A Resource for More Purposeful, Effective and Enjoyable College Teaching. Bridget is spending part of this summer revising (and revising) a chapter titled, “What makes college assignments meaningful?” for an upcoming Stylus publication. She received her PhD in Higher Education and Adult Learning and continues to pursue research interests including teaching strategies in higher education, the role of reflection in learning, encouraging critical thinking in discussions, and alternative ways to evaluate teaching.

KEYNOTE

Five Strategies to Refocus on Intentional, Meaningful Teaching
September 29, 10:30 AM-Noon Central Time via Zoom

As we take a breath after the last few years, many of us find ourselves busier than ever at a time when teaching and student learning is more visible and more complex. In this interactive plenary, we identify successful strategies that strongly resonate with faculty across disciplines to provide a sense of control and purpose in our work. From designing for long-term learning, centering values and care, addressing pedagogical challenges, proactively identifying limitations, and developing reflective practitioner habits, we will share strategies and examples that lead to a calm, manageable, and intentional teaching practice.

 

KEYNOTE WORKSHOP

The Role of Reflection in Learning: Lessons from the Literature 
September 29, 1:00-2:30 PM Central Time via Zoom

Instructors in all disciplines use reflection to help students engage in deeper learning. The use of active learning, inquiry-based methods, and online and hybrid formats have created even more need to make the thinking process visible. Yet student reflection can be messy, subjective, and elicit student resistance. How do we best structure and scaffold reflection? What type of feedback is best and how often should we use reflection? And how can we possibly evaluate the reflective process? In this session, we will explore emerging literature about structuring, supporting, and assessing student reflection by exploring useful frameworks and discussing cautions and proposed best practices.

Recent Keynotes

FTTC 2022 featured Bryan Dewsbury, PhD, as the dynamic keynote speaker from the Florida International University (FIU). Dr. Dewsbury is a Gardner Institute Fellow and the Principal Investigator for the SEAS (Science Education And Research) program. His research is focused on the social context of teaching and learning, including questions relating to identity constructs, bias, relationships, and the effects of those variables on learning in students (from K-PhD). Dr. Dewsbury has developed a number of teaching approaches and programs relating to social belonging and higher education and draws inspiration from the possibilities of education as a force for intellectual liberation.

Dr. Dewsbury was born and raised in Trinidad and Tobago. He pursued a Bachelor’s degree at Morehouse College and a Masters and PhD from FIU. At FIU, he explored a number of interesting questions in marine ecology and ecological economics and developed a number of teaching approaches and programs relating to social belonging and higher education. He is personally inspired by the possibilities ​of education as a force for intellectual liberation, and as a means to increase critical consumerism. In between, he tries to find time to keep up with his never ending reading list, try new microbrews, and teach himself and his wife Kizomba!

Power, Practice, and Pedagogy - Classrooms as Spaces for Inclusion and Equity (Anchor Session)

In this talk Dr. Dewsbury troubled the notion of what college teaching means, especially as it relates to the agency of its participants, teachers and students. The case was made for learning environments as formative experiences for everyone to grow and learn. We discussed how this can be thought of and practiced in our classrooms, and what strategies will help you achieve more inclusive and equity-minded outcomes.

 

 

On Assessment and Inclusive Classrooms (Workshop)

Like any other component of the inclusive classroom, the assessment process should be open and partaking in the dialogue process. From that lens, information gathered can reflect several areas of improvement pertaining to the education experience, including our own approaches. In this workshop we explored this pedagogical humility with context, and identified new, more dialogic lens to think about analyzing our classroom experiences.

 

mcguire-saundra.jpg

Keynote:

Wednesday, September 29th, 2021

10:30am-12:00pm

Help Students Assume Their Role in the Learning Process: Teach Them How to Learn

Dr. Saundra Y. McGuire, Wednesday Keynoter

Dr. McGuire is the Director Emerita of the Center for Academic Success, Professor Emerita in the Department of Chemistry, and retired Assistant Vice Chancellor at Louisiana State University. She is an internationally recognized chemical educator, author and lecturer who has traveled the globe promoting sure-fire strategies to help students, including those underrepresented in science and math professions, to be successful in their coursework and careers.  She has delivered keynote addresses or presented workshops at over 400 institutions in 47 states and twelve countries.   Prior to joining LSU, she spent eleven years at Cornell University, where she received the coveted Clark Distinguished Teaching Award.  Her best-selling books, Teach Students How to Learn and Teach Yourself How to Learn were published by Stylus Publishing.

Dr. McGuire’s most recent accolades include being listed in the 2020 edition of Marquis Who’s Who in America, the 2019 Distinguished Lecturer Award from the National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development (NISOD), the 2019 Commitment to Excellence in Academic Support Award from the Commission for Academic Support in Higher Education, the 2017 American Chemical Society Award for Encouraging Disadvantaged Students to Pursue Careers in the Chemical Sciences, and induction in 2017 into the LSU College of Science Hall of Distinction.  She is an elected Fellow of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), and the Council of Learning Assistance and Developmental Education Associations (CLADEA). Additionally, she was awarded Lifetime Learning Center Leadership Certification by the National College Learning Center Association.

 

stachowiak-bonni.jpg

Keynote:

Thursday, September 30th, 2021

10:30am-12:00pm

Igniting Our Collective Imagination

Dr. Bonni Stachowiak, Thursday Keynoter

Dr. Stachowiak is dean of teaching and learning and professor of business and management at Vanguard University of Southern California.

As the creator and host of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, she provides a space for discussing the art and science of facilitating learning. She also explores ways to improve our productivity, so we can be more present for our students and have more peace in our lives.

The podcast has welcomed such guests (including several past FTTC keynoters!) as James Lang, Stephen Brookfield, Cathy Davidson, Maha Bali, Saundra McGuire, Todd Zakrajsek, Clint Smith, José Bowen, Ken Bauer, Michelle M. Miller, Jesse Stommel, Kevin Gannon, Ainissa Ramirez, and Ken Bain. The Teaching in Higher Ed podcast was awarded a MERLOT Classics Award (2016) and has been profiled in The Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed, and EdSurge.

Her Doctorate of Education in Organizational Leadership degree is from Pepperdine University. She also earned a Master of Arts in Organizational Leadership from Chapman University. Her Bachelor’s degree is in social sciences, which is also from Chapman University.

Bonni has conducted workshops and presented keynotes at various academic conferences on how to more effectively facilitate learning. She’s also shared ways to use educational technology to improve teaching and approaches for providing greater agency to our students in their learning.

She is married to Dave Stachowiak, host of the Coaching for Leaders podcast. They have two young children, work full-time jobs, are both computer geeks, and are living joyfully ever after together.

 

Keynote Session: Igniting Our Collective Imagination

 

Keynote Session: Teaching Distracted Minds: Old Challenges, New Contexts

 

Dr. James M. Lang, Assumption College

James M. Lang is a Professor of English and the Director of the D’Amour Center for Teaching Excellence at Assumption College in Worcester, MA. He is the author of five books, the most recent of which are Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning (Jossey-Bass, 2016) Cheating Lessons: Learning from Academic Dishonesty (Harvard University Press, 2013), and On Course: A Week-by-Week Guide to Your First Semester of College Teaching (Harvard UP, 2008).

His next book, Teaching Distracted Minds, will be published by Basic Books in late 2020. Lang writes a monthly column on teaching and learning for The Chronicle of Higher Education ; his work has been appearing in the Chronicle since 1999.  His book reviews and public scholarship on higher education have appeared in a wide variety of newspapers and magazines, including the Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, and Time. He edits a series of books on teaching and learning in higher education for West Virginia University Press; he co-edited the second book in the series, Teaching the Literature Survey Course: New Strategies for College Faculty (2018).  He has conducted workshops on teaching for faculty at more than a hundred colleges of universities in the US and abroad, and consulted for the United Nations on the development of teaching materials in ethics and integrity for college faculty.  In September of 2016 he received a Fulbright Specialist grant to work with three universities in Colombia on the creation of a MOOC on teaching and learning in STEM education. He has a BA in English and Philosophy from the University of Notre Dame, an MA in English from St. Louis University, and a Ph.D. in English from Northwestern University.

Read more about James M. Lang.

Keynote Session: Making the Classroom a Relationship-rich Educational Environment

Executive Director Peter Felten, Elon University, North Carolina

 

Peter Felten is executive director of the Center for Engaged Learning, assistant provost for teaching and learning, and professor of history at Elon University. He works with colleagues on institution-wide teaching and learning initiatives, and on the scholarship of teaching and learning. As a teacher and mentor, he regularly writes and presents with Elon undergraduates, and he works with Elon College and Honors Fellows on their research. As a scholar, he is particularly interested in learning and teaching, individual and institutional change, and student experiences and agency in higher education. His books include the co-authored volumes: The Undergraduate Experience: Focusing Institutions on What Matters Most (Jossey-Bass, 2016); Transforming Students: Fulfilling the Promise of Higher Education(Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014); Engaging Students as Partners in Learning and Teaching(Jossey-Bass, 2014); Transformative Conversations (Jossey-Bass, 2013); and the co-edited book Intersectionality in Action (Stylus, 2016). He has served as president of the International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (2016-17) and also of the POD Network (2010-2011), the U.S. professional society for educational developers. He is co-editor of the International Journal for Academic Development and a fellow of the John N. Gardner Institute for Excellence in Undergraduate Education.

Keynote Session: Teaching for Critical Thinking: What Students Say Helps them 'Get' Critical Thinking

Dr. Stephen D. Brookfield, University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis, Minnesota

 

Dr. Stephen D. Brookfield is the John Ireland Endowed Chair at the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He currently serves on the editorial boards of educational journals in Britain, Canada and Australia, as well as in the United States. During 2002, he was a Visiting Professor at Harvard University. In 2003, he was awarded an honorary doctor of letters degree from Concordia University (St. Paul). After 10 years as a Professor of Higher and Adult Education at Columbia University in New York, he now holds the John Ireland Endowed Chair at the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota where he recently won the university's Diversity Leadership Teaching & Research Award and also the John Ireland Presidential Award for Outstanding Achievement as a Teacher/Scholar.

In 2008 he also received the Morris T. Keeton Award of the Council for Adult and Experiential Learning for his outstanding contributions to adult and experiential learning. In 2009 he was inducted into the international Adult Education Hall of Fame and in 2010 he received an honorary doctor of letters degree from Muhlenberg College. In 2008 he was awarded the Morris T. Keeton Award of the Council for Adult and Experiential Learning for "significant contributions to the field of adult and experiential learning." He was also awarded the Coin of Excellence from the General Army Staff Command College.

He is an author of Teaching Race: How to Help Students Unmask and Challenge Racism, Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher, The Discussion Book: 50 Great Ways to Get People Talking.

Read more about Dr. Stephen D. Brookfield.