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The Center for Faculty Development offers a number of programs and events which may be specifically useful for late-career faculty.
If, as a mid- or late-career faculty member, you become a program director or department chair (and have other faculty reporting to you), then another program that might be useful to you is the Chairs' Community of Practice (CoP).
This informal forum for chairs and directors from across the university is an opportunity to share ideas, expertise, practices and perhaps even challenges. Over a collegial glass of wine, you'll have a rare change to talk to your peer group with the aim of making chairing a more enjoyable experience.
To find out more about the Chairs' CoP meetings scheduled for this year, visit the Chairs' CoP website.
Wednesdays: Apr 7, Apr 21, and May 5 | 2:30–3:30 | Zoom link provided upon registration
Facilitated by Katherine Raichle
The Center for Faculty Development is launching an affinity group for faculty parents of school-age children. The purpose of this group is to provide a space to discuss and explore the unique challenges faced by faculty who have children in their care. The challenge of parenting while maintaining a rigorous schedule of teaching, research, and/or service to the university is not new. However, the benefits of finding a community of support around parenting has never been more urgent. We face unprecedented demands of caregiving and schooling while balancing the work of our academic lives during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The psychological benefits of convening groups of people around common identities and experiences are well known. Research on affinity groups, in particular, has shown that they enhance agency and optimism, while also providing access to beneficial information and support.
At its most basic level, we hope that this group offers a space where you can feel less isolated in your experience. We hope to foster a community of support amongst faculty parents, where they can share experiences, offer suggestions, and explore how to navigate these extremely challenging times.
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Teaching and sustainability: How can I include sustainability in my course?
Tue, Apr 13 | 12:30–1:25 | Zoom link provided upon registration
Co-sponsored by the President's Committee for Sustainability (PCS) and the Center for Environmental Justice and Sustainability (CEJS)
Facilitated by the President's Committee for Sustainability
When faculty members contemplate teaching a course that includes material outside their expertise areas, the result is often anxiety - and avoidance.
The topic of sustainability epitomizes this challenge. At Seattle University, we define sustainability in an inclusive way, encompassing human and ecological health, social justice, secure livelihoods, and a better world for all generations. No single course could possibly address every aspect of sustainability, and no faculty member has a deep understanding of every sustainability-related concept. Nevertheless, sustainability is a significant part of Seattle University's Strategic Plan and is included in the learning outcomes of many programs on campus. While many of us already address sustainability at some level in our courses, we sometimes feel out of our depth, or we wish we could develop different or deeper ways to address the core sustainability concepts and issues within our courses. Given the breadth of the topic, different strategies can be implemented. This virtual poster session is designed to provide ideas and concrete tools for addressing sustainability-related concepts in your courses by providing examples from those who have successfully developed and used them in their classes.
This session will feature a variety of faculty from across the Seattle University campus and curriculum; each will briefly "show and tell" a sustainability-related activity, project, exercise, or model that they have found to work well. They will also reflect upon their experiences, highlighting "lessons learned."
This poster session will provide an opportunity to hear about a variety of teaching techniques and methods and is intended to help you brainstorm how you can more effectively cover the cross-disciplinary concepts so central to sustainability, whatever your specific expertise. Please join us!
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The Personal Intellectual Project: Capturing, focusing, and (re)inventing your scholarly agenda
Thu, Apr 15 | 2:00–3:30 | Zoom link provided upon registration
Co-sponsored by the Office of Sponsored Projects (OSP)
Facilitated by David Green and Kara Luckey
Spring is often the time when faculty are preparing their files for promotion or tenure, or are reflecting on their work to date to help clarify their summer projects.
Yet depending on our career stage, our scholarly agenda can pose a variety of challenges. For many newer scholars, it can be hard to step back and identify exactly what we’re doing – and why it matters. For more seasoned researchers, in contrast, we often find our passions have shifted to new topics, or that we need to reinvent ourselves as scholars in somewhat different academic fields than where we began.
Difficulty in describing our research arc can affect our chances of winning grants, of being promoted, or simply of feeling in control of our own scholarship. It can lead us to take on projects that don’t exactly align with our expertise or intellectual curiosity, and to missing out on those that do.
In this session, we’ll provide a space for you to think through your own “Personal Intellectual Project”—the big-picture encapsulation of your different scholarly topics and agendas. For newer scholars, can you sense its form yet? Do you recognize the parameters you want to set to keep it manageable? For more experienced scholars, has your intellectual project evolved since you last considered it? What has changed and what remains the same? What projects might reignite your enthusiasm?
Through a structured process and through interdisciplinary small-group conversation over Zoom, you’ll be better placed to advocate for yourself and your scholarship and will have a clearer vision of viable and enticing scholarly topics for the future.
Be sure to have a copy of your up-to-date CV with you for the session.
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Optional Follow-up Session
Attendees who would like to check back in on this topic can do so in a later discussion and debrief.
Thu, May 6 | 2:00–3:00 | Zoom
Teaching sustainability and the Ignatian tradition
Tue, Apr 20 | 12:30–1:25 | Zoom link provided upon registration
Co-sponsored by the President's Committee for Sustainability (PCS) and the Center for Environmental Justice and Sustainability (CEJS)
Facilitated by the President's Committee for Sustainability
At Seattle University, we define sustainability in an inclusive way, encompassing human and ecological health, social justice, secure livelihoods, and a better world for all generations.
A group of specialists in Ignatian pedagogy and in teaching sustainability will share their expertise, experience, and perspectives in this lunchtime panel discussion focusing on teaching sustainability using the Ignatian approach.
Sustainability features prominently in Seattle University's Strategic Plan and is in the learning outcomes of many SU programs. Many of us already cover some sustainability-related material in our courses, but we may not be familiar with the ways Ignatian teaching traditions may relate to the teaching of sustainability concepts and issues.
Planned speakers for this panel discussion will share their experience with Ignatian fundamentals and/or sustainability teaching, their expertise in these areas, their ideas and perspectives about the intersection of these concepts, and the rich promise of a teaching focus that capitalizes on this intersection. Invited speakers will include:
This promises to be a thought-provoking discussion - please join us!
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Nonviolent communication
Fridays: April 23 and May 14 | 11:00–12:15 | Zoom link provided upon registration
Co-sponsored by the Faculty Ombudsperson
Marshall Rosenberg's model of nonviolent communication (NVC, also called "compassionate communication") offers us ways of proceeding and engaging with one another that is both empathic and authentic. NVC encourages us to listen intently to understand others' perspectives and to express ourselves genuinely so that we can reach common understanding from a position of trust.
This Community of Practice provides an opportunity for any faculty who have read Rosenberg's book, Nonviolent communication: A language of life, to join us and explore how we put the model into practice in our everyday work and our home lives.
While the model appears straightforward, it requires practice and care - as well as asking us to unlearn our cultural norms in communication. The rewards can be significant, and when effectively used, this carefully developed communication method can lead to smoother and more productive teamwork.
This Community of Practice is co-facilitated by McKenna Lang (Faculty Ombudsperson) and David Green (Center for Faculty Development).
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Co-sponsored by the Center for Jesuit Education and the Office of Diversity and Inclusion
As a participant in this module of the Ignatian Pedagogy Series, you will
It's important that participants attend all three sessions in the series and complete two short written assignments between sessions
Up to twelve places are available, and participants will receive a $100 stipend from the Center for Jesuit Education on completion of the module and related reflection assignments.
The entire series is co-directed by David Green of the Center for Faculty Development and Jen Tilghman-Havens of the Center for Jesuit Education. Joining them in this module are Holly Slay Ferraro (Center for Faculty Development/Management) and Katherine Raichle (Center for Faculty Development/Psychology).
Twelve spaces are available on a first-come, first-served basis. It's essential that you can attend all three sessions of the series. To apply, please complete this Ignatian Pedagogy Series application form on Survey Monkey. You will receive an email confirming your participation in the module in early April.
Please be sure to block off the three sessions in your calendar when you apply so that you are definitely available.
If you have any questions about the Ignatian Pedagogy Series, please email faculty-development@seattleu.edu, David Green (greend@seattleu.edu), or Jen Tilghman-Havens (tilghman@seattleu.edu).
» Apply
Embodied practices in teaching and research
Thu, Apr 29 | 12:30–1:30 main event, with a follow-up discussion until 2:30 | Zoom link provided upon registration
Co-sponsored by the Consortium of Interdisciplinary Scholars (CIS)
Facilitated by Jen Schulz (Interdisciplinary Liberal Studies)
After a year of working in the oft-labeled "disembodied" Zoom space, many of us are recognizing how, faced with the lack of opportunities for interpersonal engagement as well as the fear of infection, we have become increasingly aware of our own embodiment. The ubiquitous threat that discriminatory practices, systems, and implicit bias poses to certain bodies over others has, again, been thrown into bold relief during this time.
Come listen to Jasmine Mahmoud (College of Arts and Sciences), Alic Shook (College of Nursing), and Dean Spade (School of Law) respond to the following question:
How do you attend to embodiment (conceptually and/or in practice) in your teaching and your research?
Following each talk, we will invite you into lively conversation and collaboration. Bring your lunch and stay, if you can, for the next hour.
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Navigating overwhelm in uncertain times
Fri, May 7 | 12:30–2:30 | Zoom link provided upon registration
Co-sponsored by the Faculty Ombudsperson
Circle Keepers: McKenna Lang (Faculty Ombudsperson) and Pamela Taylor (College of Education)
A significant challenge of being overwhelmed individually, regardless of the cause, is how hard it can be to have or maintain awareness that you are actually overwhelmed...The continuum of overwhelm can range from feeling surges of overwhelm occasionally (after which you reset and move on) to spending years trying to keep your head above water.
–Laura van Dernoot Lipsky
In her book The age of overwhelm: Strategies for the long haul, Laura van Dernoot Lipsky explores the nature and causes of the idea of "overwhelm" as an individual and collective premise under which so many of us operate. She builds on her previous trauma work to identify the complex external and internal forces of tasks and expectations that pervade our society. Her ideas resonate in these uncertain times. Critically, van Dernoot Lipsky also envisions a pathway beyond depletion to help manage the overwhelm. These strategies can help de-escalate conflict. Please join us in a traditional talking circle as we explore ideas on overwhelm and strategies to move forward. The intention of the talking circle is to act as a primer for thinking about how to manage being overwhelmed during these uncertain times. We will draw upon recommendations and strategies from the work of van Dernoot Lipsky. The book is not a prerequisite for participation but learners may find it to be a valuable resource. All are welcome.
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Thinking about resiliency practices: The why and the how
Mon, May 10 | 12:30–2:00 | Zoom link provided upon registration
Co-sponsored by the Faculty Ombudsperson
Facilitated by Heather DePuydt (College of Nursing) and McKenna Lang (Faculty Ombudsperson)
Every morning we are born again. What we do today is what matters most.
–The Buddha
Resiliency derives from Latin, meaning “to spring back,” and Masten (2014) describes it as “The capacity of a dynamic system to adapt successfully to disturbances that threaten system function, viability, or development.” Resilience is related to change. Much of the important work on resiliency is anchored in trauma-informed care research. This research shows us that there is hope and that people may find strategies to move forward successfully despite the profound implications of stress and trauma. Resiliency practices in classroom settings can be especially valuable, supported by the growing literature on the value of conflict resilience. Please join us for this guided workshop as we look at some of the roots of resiliency practices and identify some resiliency resources. All are welcome.
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Planning an intentional summer
Wed, May 19 | 2:15–3:30 | Zoom link provided upon registration
Co-sponsored by the Office of Sponsored Projects (OSP)
Facilitated by Holly Slay Ferraro
We often look forward to summer as a time for rest, rejuvenation, deep thinking, and writing. But how many times have you started the Fall tired and disappointed that your summer wasn't what you hoped? This active workshop provides an opportunity to be intentional about your summer. For example, do you have personal goals you want to achieve such as more rest or time with family and friends? Perhaps you want to finish an article, book, or have extended time for reading and writing. This workshop encourages you to identify goals that are important to you and create strategies to have the summer you desire in an encouraging and supportive community. Join us to craft an intentional summer!
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Retirement planning
Click here to see a bibliography of resources pertaining to aging and retirement (compiled by Jacquelyn Miller, 2015).
