Category: higher education

437. Impostor Phenomenon

Posted in cognitive psychology, diversity, emotion, engagement, equity, first-generation students, growth mindset, higher education, learning, motivation, teaching
March 18, 2026

Impostor phenomena can deter college students, especially students from historically underrepresented groups, from pursuing majors in STEM disciplines. In this episode, Sara Kien joins us to discuss strategies that can reduce imposter phenomena and reduce equity gaps in student success.

Sara is an Associate Teaching Professor at Northern Arizona University. She has a PhD in cognitive psychology and recently completed a masters degree in information and data science. Sara is an award winning educator with over 20 years of experience and the author of Data Science and AI in Psychology, an interactive eTextbook on data science, big data, and machine learning in psychology.

Show Notes

Transcript

Rebecca: Impostor phenomena can deter college students, especially students from historically underrepresented groups, from pursuing majors in STEM disciplines. In this episode, we discuss strategies that one faculty member has used to reduce impostor phenomena and reduce equity gaps in student success.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

John: Our guest today is Sara Kien. Sara is an Associate Teaching Professor at Northern Arizona University. She has a PhD in cognitive psychology and recently completed a masters degree in information and data science. Sara is an award winning educator with over 20 years of experience and the author of Data Science and AI in Psychology, an interactive eTextbook on data science, big data, and machine learning in psychology. Welcome Sara.

Sara: Thank you so much. It’s great to be here. Thank you for having me.

John: Thanks for joining us.

Rebecca: Today’s teas are:… Sara, are you drinking tea with us today?

Sara: I am. I was so excited about this part of the podcast. This tea, I have to say, is pretty legit. I love tea, and I put time and effort into tea, yeah, so I was really excited about this. So my tea comes from a local company in the southwest called Old Barrel Tea Company, and so we have one of their flagship stores here in Flagstaff, Arizona, which is where Northern Arizona University is located. And so they just have a wide range of tea options. And so this tea today, I chose berry, and then I even have some special honey, like oak-infused honey added to this tea. And so I was just really excited to get my tea ready and to brag about my tea, and also to plug the Old Barrel Tea Company, because they’re fantastic. and the oak

John: And the oak-infused honey certainly fits with the old barrel, [LAUGHTER] nicely.

Sara: Yeah.

Rebecca: Yeah, it sounds right up. John’s alley.

Sara: Wonderful.

Rebecca: Today I have Scottish Breakfast tea.

Sara: Hmmm

John: Good. I had that a couple times yesterday, but today I have a ginger peach green tea.

Sara: Oh yum.

John: We’ve invited you here today to discuss your work addressing impostor phenomenon and your work in redesigning data science classes in psychology. What does the data suggest about the prevalence of impostor phenomenon among college students?

Sara: That’s a great question. It’s also a bit of a complicated question, because it really depends on how impostor phenomenon is measured, and it also really depends on the context. So just to provide a little background regarding this construct, impostor phenomenon, which is also commonly known as impostor syndrome… so I think a lot of folks will be familiar with that terminology… was actually coined in 1978 by Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes as part of their work examining or investigating highly successful women who had a really difficult time internalizing their success. And so at that time, they coined the term impostor syndrome, and over the years, increasingly, the research has suggested that impostor syndrome, or now as we refer to it, impostor phenomenon is highly prevalent. It’s quite pervasive, actually, with recent findings suggesting that, in terms of just generalized impostor phenomenon, rates might be high as 80% in the population of individuals experiencing a sense of impostorism. And so what is impostor phenomenon? What are some of the defining features or characteristics? Currently the field identifies three elements. So the first is a really intense or chronic feeling of self doubt in spite of overwhelming evidence of achievement. So really just a belief that you’re a fraud. That’s really the heart of impostor, right? That I’m an impostor, that I’m a fraud, that I don’t belong here, that I’m here by accident. Everybody else belongs here, but I don’t. And so that second element, like that I’m here by accident, is discounting our success, or believing that our success is undeserved, and that we attribute our success to factors other than ability, so luck, for example, or maybe in the case of academics, a lenient professor. So I received an A in that course because my professor is really lenient and it’s just an easy course. Or I just worked harder than everyone else, but everybody else just has, like, natural ability that I lack. And again, I just really want to emphasize that it’s not just any feeling of self doubt, but really a feeling of self doubt in the face of conflicting evidence suggesting otherwise. So like in many cases, in spite of overwhelming achievement. And so how can we experience such levels of self doubt that contradicts the evidence, by discounting the evidence. And then the third element is just a fear of exposure. So if I’m a fraud and I don’t belong and I’m an impostor, then I’m just constantly sort of hyper vigilant about covering my tracks, and very concerned about being exposed as a fraud. As I mentioned, there’s recent evidence to suggest that rates of academic impostor phenomenon can be as high as 80% in the general population, and for this reason, recently, researchers have moved away from “impostor syndrome” as a relevant term to “impostor phenomenon,” because that level of prevalence really suggests potentially more systemic issues, rather than individual level factors. So syndrome suggests that there are issues at the level of the individual. In addition, it’s not a clinical diagnosis, syndrome really often refers to something that’s more clinical in nature. This is a common set of thoughts and feelings that are experienced by many individuals, quite commonly. With respect to academia, more specifically, the estimates for the prevalence of academic impostor phenomenon vary quite widely, again, often depending on how it’s measured. So, in some cases, the measurement might just include feelings of impostorism. But in other cases, measures might include all three defining elements that I mentioned earlier. And really one of the issues has been that within academia, or academics, more specifically, we haven’t had a relevant measure of academic impostor phenomenon. And so the evidence suggests that the rates range from maybe 20% to 50% or higher, depending on the degree program, depending on the context. And so in degree programs that tend to be more competitive, where there’s an emphasis on like hyper-productivity and the stakes are really high, like in medicine, for example, we see higher levels of impostorism. And again, that just highlights potentially systemic level issues, system level processes that are contributing to how individuals are experiencing their success and how they’re interpreting their experience within academia. So, fortunately, recently, some of my colleagues have developed an academic impostor phenomenon measure. So Valerie Todd and David Mcilroy published a validated measure of academic impostor phenomenon in 2025. Recently, as part of a joint effort within that collaborative team, we have been applying that specific measure in a program of research that’s examining academic impostor phenomenon. We’re very excited about the potential to examine rates of impostor phenomenon in the academic context, more specifically. And then in our case, as a research team, we’re all psychologists, so we’re starting with psychology majors and exploring rates of impostor phenomenon within the field of psychology. I guess one thing I could add, actually, before I say a little bit more about our program of research with respect to the validated measure that was recently developed by Todd and Mcilroy, that that measure is available for anybody who’s interested in the Journal of Current Psychology. And then the other thing I wanted to mention, in terms of addressing prevalence within academia and the call for a more validated measure, there’s an excellent review of the literature that was published in 2023 by Dana Ménard and Laura Chittle in the journal Review of Education. And so for anybody who’s interested in more details regarding prevalence and measurement, that’s a really excellent review.

Rebecca: It’s exciting to hear that there’s new measurement tools available, because even in casual conversation with students, in my context, it’s orientation for all the graduate students at our institution, they all easily say, “Yes, I know what that is. [LAUGHTER] I’ve had experience with that.” And when we bring it up and try to address it as a group, there’s a really high affect towards that in acknowledgement that that’s an important thing that we’re addressing in our orientation for these students.

Sara: Exactly. So that’s such a great point, because that actually leads to the next thing that I wanted to say. But just to address that specifically, as we’ve been developing this program of research, the number of students who are interested in getting involved in the research, either as participants or as undergraduate/graduate level researchers, or even just colleagues, like other faculty. So this is pervasive throughout academia, feelings of impostorism and self doubt. In spite of academic achievement. The number of individuals who want to get involved in this work really is quite overwhelming. For students. It’s very relevant, especially within the field of psychology, as I’m sure is the case in other fields, students really want to make a difference, and they’re very familiar with their experience and the experience of their peers, and they want to get involved in work that they think will be supportive and help to support wellbeing among their peers more generally. And the same is true for faculty. Of course, faculty care about student success and want to do everything they can to support students and so learning more about this phenomenon and the factors that predict this phenomenon, or intervention strategies and even to support their colleagues or even help to enhance their own wellbeing within the context of their career. It’s just really relevant. It’s very personally relevant for many folks in academia. So this research team includes Valerie Todd and David Mcilroy, who are both at institutions in the United Kingdom. So this is part of an international collaboration, but also Jennifer Coleman at Western New Mexico University and Ivette Merced at Irvine Valley College. We’ve started investigating rates or prevalence of impostor phenomenon among psych majors with this new tool, and what we found is that, as you just mentioned earlier, actually the majority of students report some level of impostor phenomenon. And then what’s also interesting with respect to prevalence, and so I mentioned that it’s a little complicated because it turns out it’s context specific. As part of this work, I’ve actually been leading one line of research in this larger program that’s focused on supporting students, supporting psych majors in more STEM-focused courses as a part of their psychology degree program. So we contextualized this tool to measure academic impostor phenomenon in relation to statistics, more specifically, or research methods more specifically, or psychology in general, in addition to the more generalized measure. And what we found is statistically significant differences in average scores of academic impostor phenomenon depending on context. For psych majors, academic impostor phenomenon in relation to statistics scoring significantly higher than other types of AIP. So again, what’s the prevalence? It really depends on how we measure it. It depends on the context, it depends on the domain, and we’re seeing like just a growing body of research and literature in this area. So I think it’ll be really interesting to continue exploring this question moving forward.

John: So you mentioned some ways in which it varies. You mentioned in statistics classes, for example, there seems to be higher rates. You mentioned earlier that in the more competitive fields, there seems to be more. What other factors seem to result in higher levels of impostorism.

Sara: So, in terms of the factors that predict impostorism, there are a few individual level factors, but we’re seeing increasingly that the individual level factors really interact with what’s happening more at the systems level, with systemic factors. Some predictors include some personality characteristics. There’s some evidence to suggest that neuroticism, for example, predicts impostor phenomenon more generally, as well as academic impostor phenomenon to the extent that that’s been measured in academic context. Perfectionism is strongly correlated with academic impostor phenomenon. We also see other correlates. So for example, academic impostor phenomenon, and impostor phenomenon more generally, is associated with mental health issues like depression and anxiety, psychological distress, burnout. But one thing to note here, in addressing these correlates and the factors that predict academic impostor phenomenon, is there’s really a lack of research that investigates causality. So it’s difficult to know, for example, whether feelings of impostor phenomenon give rise to perfectionism or lower self esteem, which is another correlate of impostor phenomenon, or whether lower self esteem and perfectionism predispose individuals to higher levels of impostor phenomenon. So it’s hard to discern the nature of that relationship, but some other factors as we start thinking about like, “Well, what’s happening at the individual level versus a more systemic level?” There’s been a body of work examining demographic differences in impostor phenomenon. So Kevin Cokley at the University of Texas at Austin has been studying impostor phenomenon in academic contexts for over 10 years, and has published some really interesting work in this area, and also in the area of mental health implications of impostor phenomenon. And again, that review that I mentioned earlier, the Ménard and Chittle review, published in 2023, does a really nice job of highlighting essentially what is intersectionality, or the interactive nature of individual level variables and what’s happening at the systems level. So with respect to demographic factors, a number of researchers have explored group differences between individuals who are historically minoritized in certain settings or pathways, and examined variability among those populations. And ultimately, the findings are mixed, with some research suggesting that there are group differences, for example, gender differences or differences based on race or ethnicity, while other research suggesting that there are no group differences. And so follow up research has revealed that with respect to group differences, the answer is, “it depends.” So, there aren’t just inherent differences in academic impostor phenomenon across demographic groups, with certain minoritized groups, for example, Women in Data Science focused degree programs or computer science focused degree programs. In the field of data science, for example, women only make up 20 to 25% of all data scientists. So in fields where women are historically minoritized or are underrepresented, we don’t necessarily see higher levels of academic impostor phenomenon among women. What matters is the context. So whether the context that women are in highlights those disparities. So is there evidence of racial discrimination or gender discrimination in these environments? Is there evidence of prejudice? Are there sufficient role models who can serve in a mentoring capacity for individuals who might be underrepresented within a particular industry or domain, and is there access to representation? In addition, often environments that are more competitive in nature tend to exacerbate impostor phenomenon for individuals who might be historically minoritized or underrepresented in certain domains. And so really, what the research suggests is that academic impostor phenomenon may serve as a mediator or a mechanism by which prejudice and discrimination underrepresentation, hyper productivity and competitiveness can impact mental health. So without that context, group differences in impostor phenomenon may be similar, but if you add those stressors, then we might see an exacerbation of impostor phenomenon, in the sense of: “I don’t belong here. I don’t belong. I don’t fit in. I don’t know how I got here. I’m at risk of being exposed for my lack of ability,” which then can have implications for mental health and for future outcomes.

Rebecca: You’ve talked a bit about the prevalence and that it’s pretty common that people have some of these feelings. What are the consequences if students experience impostor phenomenon in their persistence?

Sara: The consequences can be widespread and cascading, unfortunately, and different people handle the experience of impostor phenomenon in different ways. Generally speaking, the research suggests that some of the most prevalent or pervasive kinds of consequences include effects on mental health… so, depression, anxiety, psychological distress, burnout. There is also a relationship with lower self esteem, lower academic self confidence or self efficacy, so your belief in your ability, which aligns well with those three elements of impostor phenomenon… maladaptive perfectionism, so a kind of perfectionism in which you set almost unattainable standards and goals which can exacerbate feelings of distress and burnout and exhaustion. And in turn, these mental health struggles can lead to unfortunate outcomes, for example, procrastination, like, how do we cope with these kinds of mental health issues, right? And how do we cope with these distressing thoughts and feelings related to self doubt? So procrastination, avoidance, and withdrawing can lead to delayed graduation. In the case of students, we might change degree programs. In the case of faculty, we might change careers. We might leave academia and pivot and pursue a different line of work. Sometimes students are at risk of dropping out. Another unfortunate outcome that can occur is a type of self sabotage, in which students become less risk taking because beliefs about their lack of ability, in other words, are less likely to pursue certain scholarship opportunities, or maybe less likely to pursue graduate school, or, in the case of professionals within academia, are less likely to pursue promotion. So that’s one kind of consequence or outcome, another outcome related to perfectionism. And then what we see also, in relation to certain personality traits like conscientiousness, is that we see on the flip side, some individuals compensate over-preparation, which can be a mechanism leading to exhaustion and burnout. So then again, we see, in terms of the impact on academic performance like GPA, the findings are mixed because many individuals who are experiencing impostor phenomenon overcompensate through over-preparation and perfectionism, so they’re still dealing with the mental health struggles associated with impostor phenomenon, but because of a fear of being exposed, they’re working harder than anyone else to try to hide what they perceive as their lack of ability. The language I’m using is like “t\They’re doing this, [LAUGHTER] you know, this is what they do,” but just as full disclosure, most of us are familiar with this phenomenon. So even for myself, on a daily basis, I’m challenged with feelings of impostorism. Even preparing for this podcast, I have a perception that there’s a certain level of expertise that I should be demonstrating as part of this podcast interview, have self doubt at times about my level of expertise and whether I can communicate effectively. For me, I fall on the more perfectionist side of the equation, so that I’m at risk of over-preparing and starting to feel self doubt about whether I can cover everything that I want to cover. A little later, we’ll talk about strategies and intervention for addressing feelings of impostor phenomenon. But I have to take a step back and recognize what’s happening and reframe my experience, and just to highlight that this is a common experience, and even for those of us, or maybe even especially for those of us who are conducting research in this area, we’re motivated by similar kinds of experiences that we’ve had that have impacted us throughout our educational journey or throughout our career. So with respect to students, for educators who really care about students and who are really student centered, it’s really important to consider the mental health struggles that they might be experiencing and the ways in which those could be impacting their performance in the classroom as a function of academic impostor phenomenon, including whether students participate in classroom discussions or how engaged they are in group work. If they are concerned about a sense of belonging, whether they belong, they might feel less comfortable sharing or engaging with other students, with their peers, and in particular, if they feel that there’s risk of being exposed as a fraud. So in many cases, a student who may seem withdrawn isn’t necessarily disinterested or uninterested in the course material, they might be dealing with significant feelings of self doubt, fear of exposure, that are leading to mental health struggles, all of which might be associated with their behavior in the classroom.

John: A while back, we interviewed Peter Arcidiacono, who was one of several authors of a study that looked at the attrition rates from students in STEM majors. In particular, what they found in the study was that women, on average, did better in introductory STEM courses, yet they were more likely to not pursue a major in it, even though they were interested in a major, in large part because of the lower grades received in STEM classes. Is it likely, perhaps, that impostorism may be one of the factors where the signal of lower grades in some disciplines may encourage some people to leave the discipline, especially if they’re already underrepresented in those areas.

Sara: Yeah, absolutely. impostor phenomenon could be one of probably several factors that are relevant, like one of the things that unfortunately occurs in more competitive degree programs, like STEM degree programs, a kind of a culture and environment where showing struggle can be penalized, where there’s additional pressure to maintain a perfect facade. If an individual is from a historically minoritized background with respect to that degree program or that domain, and is experiencing a fear of exposure for a lack of ability, may be less likely to reach out for support, may be less likely to engage in help seeking behaviors where they share openly about their concerns and their doubt and their struggle, and therefore are less likely to receive support, both in terms of mental health, but also academically. And then, as I mentioned earlier, what are the factors that predict persistence. What helps the student to be more likely to persist and to follow their interests and to follow their passion? Self efficacy is a strong correlate. So belief in your abilities, which is undermined by impostor phenomenon… faculty support which is less likely to occur if students are afraid of being exposed, and if the culture, as I mentioned, emphasizes projecting an image of success, so less likely to access faculty support if we feel penalized for sharing our struggles. Aso, you know, one major issue with respect to impostor phenomenon is that we don’t talk about it enough. It’s such a relief to hear that more institutions are introducing these discussions for incoming classes of students, because it’s not just what students can be doing, what faculty can be doing, but really what needs to be happening at the institutional level, where we’re normalizing impostor phenomenon so that students feel like they’re not alone in these experiences, and they feel more comfortable reaching out for support and sharing their struggles, especially in highly competitive contexts. For students who start to experience any type of failure, who are internalizing their failure, but failing to acknowledge their success and maybe even essentializing that failure as an indicator of lack of ability, those failures are pretty high-stakes situations. For those students, that’s an indicator of lack of ability that suggests that you’re not cut out for that field or that discipline. In those more competitive environments, it is the case that grades and research productivity and networking success are pretty high stakes, so early evidence of failure can feel catastrophic in those types of competitive environments where the stakes are so high. And again, if we had more opportunities to normalize the experience, more faculty support around these issues, potentially students would feel more comfortable reaching out and getting the support they need early. I really want to emphasize that it’s not students who are self selecting out. It’s really systemic, which is why, at an institutional level, we need to provide these supports. Without an institutional support system, it’s really the system pushing students out, especially students who are historically underrepresented, who maybe also feel lack of role models that they can reach out to, or lack of representation, which exacerbates their experience of impostor phenomenon.

Rebecca: You’ve talked a bit about the importance of normalizing impostor phenomenon as a way of systemically starting to address some of these issues, because if more of us in leadership roles or in an educator role are also modeling that we experience this too, then it becomes less scary for a student to also admit those same experiences. What are some of the strategies that you’re using in your own classrooms, to start to mitigate the feelings of impostor phenomenon and the potential outcomes that can result?

Sara: That’s a great question. I feel like there are some strategies that I’ve been implementing for several years, and I also continue to improve in my ability to provide support in this area. Normalizing, as I mentioned, is a really important one, and we can also model our own impostor phenomenon experience in an effort to normalize. And what I find is that students experience great relief in learning that an individual who’s in a position that they might aspire towards also has experienced similar kinds of feelings. And really, what I found is that it helps to really open students up, and then students are more likely to share some of their own experiences of self doubt and concern. In my case, I’m teaching research methods and data science courses within the field of psychology, and the statistics and research methods courses for psych majors tend to be the most dreaded courses. And as a woman within the field of psychology, teaching data science, where women are underrepresented by and large (even in the subfield of quantitative psychology, at the upper levels, we see an under representation of women), I think it provides additional support for students with diverse gender identities to relate, in particular, to a role model who is underrepresented with respect to that particular domain or within that field or subfield. And so I do as much as I can to just share openly and honestly, to allow myself to be vulnerable in a public setting with students. For me personally, that’s required that I do my own work in addressing my feelings of self doubt and trying to understand the source of those feelings. Then that leads to the second highly effective strategy, which is cognitive restructuring or reframing. It’s quite normal to have thoughts and feelings related to self doubt, even if we understand the source of those thoughts and feelings, it’s still common for us to experience those thoughts and feelings, but we don’t necessarily need to attach ourselves to those thoughts and feelings. So reframing those experiences when we notice them can be highly effective, and there are a few different strategies for doing that. Mindfulness meditation is really helpful in becoming increasingly aware of automatic thoughts and emotions that arise, and becoming aware of those thoughts and emotions in a non-judgmental way. So mindfulness meditation is often a strategy that’s suggested in relation to cognitive reframing, but once we notice those thoughts and feelings, we can apply a new frame, for example, a growth-mindset frame. One thing I should emphasize is that there’s actually some evidence to suggest that the outcomes associated with impostor phenomenon are not necessarily negative, that there are actually some positive outcomes associated with impostor phenomenon. For many of us, if we experience feelings of self doubt, it can be a motivator. It can motivate us to learn more and grow in our abilities and to work harder. So when we experience feelings of self doubt, we can actually reframe even that impostor phenomenon from a growth-mindset perspective, like these feelings are just like my mind and body’s way of helping me to feel motivated. Of course, if they become maladaptive and start giving rise to depression and anxiety, then it’s important to start addressing those specific thoughts. More specifically, one example is if we’re feeling self doubt and concern about our ability in relation to any academic task or a particular academic course. Instead of identifying a specific end result that relates to social comparison, like I need to be at a particular level, we can reframe our experiences just in a perspective of growth. You know, I’m going to put effort into this activity that I care about, and my goal is to simply continue growing and developing in my experience, regardless of standards of success that are presented within a particular field or within a particular profession, so to reframe in terms of like interest and growth and effort, rather than essentialized abilities that have a particular end goal. One helpful approach to cognitive reframing is to reframe our thoughts and emotions in terms of growth mindset. So a growth mindset emphasizes effort and improvement, even in the face of failure as a function of effort. So really understanding that our abilities grow out of interest, passion and effort. In contrast, a perspective of traits or abilities as fixed suggests that these traits and abilities are innate, that we’re born with particular traits and abilities, so that failure reflects a lack of ability. Really, failure is an opportunity to continue to learn and grow, and imagine that we could continue to improve as a function of effort, even in the face of failure. So that would be an example of cognitive reframing in relation to growth mindset. And research has shown that growth mindset, in particular, is a really helpful approach to cognitive reframing.

John: Are there other things at the institutional level that can be done to reduce the impact of impostor phenomenon?

Sara: Yeah, and actually, I can say a few more things about instructor-level support. So in addition to normalizing and cognitive reframing, other approaches that are helpful that I also try to encourage in my own classroom include helping to support sense of belonging. So opportunities for students to work together in meaningful ways where they actually get to know each other and can support each other in accomplishing a challenge or a task is an effective way to help offset feelings of impostorism, but also to allow students opportunities for support among their peers. And as part of the research that I’ve been conducting in collaboration with my research team, we’ve actually started developing more formalized interventions that incorporate all of those elements, so normalizing, reframing, cognitive reframing, the value of faculty support and modeling, the relevance of role models that students can relate to, and increasing sense of belonging. We’re just currently launching a study that specifically examines the effectiveness of an intervention that includes all of those different elements. At the institutional level, some strategies can include integrating mental health support into the curriculum, increasing access to mental health support for students, normalizing at the departmental or institutional level, which is something we’ve already discussed, having those conversations for, like incoming cohorts of students. There’s research showing that faculty who have greater self efficacy in addressing diversity are more effective at addressing diversity in the classroom, and that can be particularly relevant for addressing impostor phenomenon that’s exacerbated among historically underrepresented students, students from racial, ethnic, gender, sexual orientation backgrounds that are not necessarily represented within their fields of interest. Some of the findings coming out of our teams include the importance of classroom comfort and faculty support, so normalizing and discussing these issues, not just at the level of student, but also among faculty, providing opportunities for faculty to learn and share about their own impostor experiences, so that they are better equipped to bring these kinds of strategies into the classroom or to have these kinds of conversations with students.

Rebecca: We always wrap up by asking, what’s next?

Sara: The focus for our research team, as I mentioned, is really to continue this intervention work, and members of our research team continue to offer workshops as well. We give talks and seminars related to impostor phenomenon that can help to support faculty and staff and students within academia as they address impostor phenomenon in their own lives, but also that offer strategies and tools and techniques that they can bring with them into their departments and into their classrooms. We want to continue to expand the research to include more diverse contexts, disciplines, and even more diverse institutions. So right now, we’re focused on psychology majors, but we are really looking forward to extending this research to other disciplines and other institutions. As I mentioned, it’s an international collaboration, and we’ve had a lot of interest among other faculty and researchers who want to join this effort. And so we really want to expand our research to include international contexts, and then to continue to develop workshops to support faculty training around academic impostor phenomenon. We’ve discussed the possibility of writing a book together that addresses, in particular, context specificity of impostor phenomenon. So one of the novel findings that we are bringing to the literature is the variability in academic impostor phenomenon in relation to even specific courses within a degree program, in relation to different contexts within a discipline. And so I think it’s really important to continue investigating intersectionality and the complexity of impostor phenomenon. Under what circumstances do particular contexts give rise to impostor phenomenon? So it’s not just like for whom, but for whom under what circumstances. And another element of that is, for whom, or under what circumstances, are particular strategies or interventions effective. So there probably won’t be a one-size-fits-all formula for helping to mitigate experiences of impostor phenomenon. The strategies that are effective will depend on for whom and under what circumstances the kind of impostor phenomenon that a student is experiencing. And so we’re really excited about really diving into the complexity of this phenomenon, of this construct.

Rebecca: We look forward to hearing where the research leads and your findings.

John: Thank you for joining us. This is an issue that clearly is affecting a lot of people. So getting more information out to other educators, I think, is going to be helpful.

Sara: I’m really grateful that you invited me to participate in this podcast. As I mentioned, I did some cognitive reframing for myself in preparation for this interview. And for me, one of the helpful thoughts and strategies was to just acknowledge that even if there’s some information that I really would like to cover that I forget, let’s say, or like, even if I’m not quite as comprehensive in addressing all of the relevant points that I would be really excited to share with you, that increasing awareness at any level is meaningful with respect to academic impostor phenomenon, because almost all of us experience it, and unfortunately, many of us experience it in isolation. So the more aware we are of the shared experience of self doubt, even in the face of high levels of achievement, I think the better equipped we’ll be to navigate our own educational and professional journeys in an informed way, in a way that will help us to maximize our true potential and pursue our passion and interest. I just really appreciate an opportunity to share some of this information, to have this dialog and this discussion. It really is my passion, in particular, to support students and to support psych majors in STEM related courses. So, thank you.

Rebecca: Thank you so much.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

John: Editing assistance provided by Fred Llerena.

[MUSIC]

436. The Joyful Online Teacher

Posted in emotion, engagement, higher education, instructional communication, learning, motivation, online discussions, online learning, pedagogy, social presence, teaching
March 11, 2026

Online classes provide opportunities for students not served by traditional in-person classes, but asynchronous experiences can seem isolating for both students and instructors. In this episode, Flower Darby joins us to discuss ways to make online instruction more joyful for both students and faculty.

Flower is an Associate Director of the Teaching and Learning Center at the University of Missouri. Prior to this position, she served as an Assistant Dean of Online and Innovative Pedagogies and Director of Teaching for Student Success. Flower has over 30 years of teaching experience, including both in-person and online modalities, and is frequently invited as a keynote speaker at academic conferences. She is a co-author of Small Teaching Online: Applying Learning Sciences in Online Classes, and The Norton Guide to Equity-Minded Teaching. Her new book, The Joyful Online Teacher: Finding Our Fizz in Asynchronous Classes, has just been released by the University of Oklahoma Press.

Show Notes

Transcript

John: Online classes provide opportunities for students not served by traditional in-person classes, but asynchronous experiences can seem isolating for both students and instructors. In this episode, we discuss ways to make online instruction more joyful for both students and faculty.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

Rebecca: Our guest today is Flower Darby. Flower is an Associate Director of the Teaching and Learning Center at the University of Missouri. Prior to this position, she served as an Assistant Dean of Online and Innovative Pedagogies and Director of Teaching for Student Success. Flower has over 30 years of teaching experience, including both in-person and online modalities, and is frequently invited as a keynote speaker at academic conferences. She is a co-author of Small Teaching Online: Applying Learning Sciences in Online Classes, and The Norton Guide to Equity-Minded Teaching. Her new book, The Joyful Online Teacher: Finding Our Fizz in Asynchronous Classes, has just been released by the University of Oklahoma Press. Welcome back, Flower.

Flower: Thank you so much. It’s my true delight to be here with you both.

John: We’re really happy to talk to you. It’s been a while.

Flower: Yes, we’ve all been busy, I think. Lots going on.

John: And certainly you have been. [LAUGHTER] Our teas today are:… Flower, are you drinking tea with us today?

Flower: I do have tea, and I went with a classic Earl Grey today.

John: Very nice.

Rebecca: Nice!

John: In a nice inclusive education mug. Is that what I saw on there?

Flower: That’s what I have, from CU Boulder, inclusive educators. This is actually from their podcast, Inclusive Educators.

John: Nice.

Rebecca: I have a cinnamon cardamom tea.

John: And now that the temperature has risen above zero, today we have a heat wave. I think we just checked and it was 12 degrees. I am having spring cherry green tea in honor of the spring, which will be here sometime in the next few months.

Flower: Love it.

Rebecca: Sounds good with the temperatures rising. Flower, we invited you here today to discuss The Joyful Online Teacher. Can you tell us about the origin of this book?

Flower: Yes, Rebecca, this has been a long time coming. It originally started through inspiration from Dr. Sarah Rose Cavanagh’s really transformational book in my life and in the lives of many educators and students. Her book is The Spark of Learning: Energizing the College Classroom with the Science of Emotion. She has other ones, but that’s the original inspiration for this book. And as soon as I read it, I thought, “Wow, there is so much potential when we truly apply the findings from emotion science to asynchronous classes in particular.” So I began cultivating this idea. This book is also inspired by the work of Dr. Barbara Means, a very well published scholar, researcher on education, learning, and technology, and in 2022, she put out a paper calling for the application of psychological literature to online classes. She pointed out that the frameworks that we are accustomed to talking about really come out of educational technology, and we need to go a little deeper into how people learn online. So that factored into this. And then I would say the third ingredient that sort of shaped this book is just my ongoing sense that online classes are kind of less than. They’re just not as fun [LAUGHTER] as teaching in person, at least for me. I love teaching in person. I love when we get to be together in a room, and yet I see so much value and purpose in asynchronous online classes as well. Student demand is growing. It is an equity issue for me to make these classes as positive and supportive as they can be, and so what we ended up with is The Joyful Online Teacher.

John: And s peaking of positive, your first chapter begins with a discussion of Martin Seligman’s PERMA model of well being to provide a theoretical framework for your book. It’s been a while since we discussed this model on the podcast, and I think we only discussed it once before. So can you provide our listeners with an overview of this model?

Flower: Yes, so I did deviate from what a lot of us who write about online education really tend to rely on like the Community of Inquiry framework, for example. And I just wanted to find out how we could foster thriving and flourishing and well-being in our asynchronous classes in general, because in my experience teaching online for decades, it doesn’t feel like I’m flourishing in that environment. And what the students tell us, and what many educators tell us, is that that’s a common experience. So I turned to PERMA, as you said, Seligman’s theory of well-being that he introduced in a 2011 book called Flourish. And PERMA is an acronym for five building blocks of individual well being. And what I love about this model is, first of all, it’s extremely well tested, and there’s a mountain of empirical evidence that shows that it reliably predicts well being and success better functioning in every life domain. So I love that it’s so well validated and supported. But I also love that you can pick and choose between these five building blocks based on what resonates with you, your personality and such. So let me quickly summarize the five building blocks, and the idea is cultivating experiences within any of these domains are going to enhance our own sense of well-being, our own happiness. So “P” is for positive emotions, and what the literature shows is that when we are experiencing positive and pleasant emotions, like enjoyment, like gratitude, satisfaction, pride, a whole range of pleasant experiences, we’re going to feel better. And that makes sense, right? But as Seligman himself points out, about 50% of the world does not go around feeling positive all the time, and so I love that there are other sort of building blocks. “E” is for engagement, that’s the state of flow. That’s where we’re so absorbed in the task at hand that we lose all sense of time and self, and that’s a source of well-being. “R” is for relationships, and specifically positive relationships, I think about these especially in an online class in terms of supportive social connections. “M” is for meaning. When we find value and purpose in the thing that we are doing, that in itself, is another way to boost our own well being. And “A” is for accomplishment and this one resonates with me. It is crossing the item off the to do list. It is winning the game of cards just for the sake of winning. It is helping our online students cross the finish line of our classes. So what I did in this book is I highlighted two of these domains as particularly relevant and impactful for asynchronous online classes. I take a deep dive on positive emotions, what does the emotion science say? And how can we put that to work in online classes, and then “R,” relationships, supportive social connections? How can we help everybody thrive and persist in those online classes based on those two elements specifically?

Rebecca: So in your book, you provide an analogy between building a course and preparing for a road trip as a way of establishing this sense of well being. I know, personally, I enjoy planning trips. So what are some design strategies that can be used to promote well being during the semester, particularly around these like positive emotions?

Flower: Yeah, it’s funny you said that, Rebecca, because I hate planning for a road trip, and I got to be so real, I don’t love all the stuff that we have to do as instructors to get ready for an online class. I feel overwhelmed, and I don’t think I’m alone by all the rubrics, all the checklists, all the frameworks, all the “you should do this” and “best practices that,” organizing the modules, it’s not my favorite. It’s not where I find the fizz, making sure the rubrics are there, the dates are all right. All of that is not my favorite, but it’s funny that you said that, because, of course, I discuss everything with my amazing husband, Tim. He’s an instructional designer. He’s been supporting faculty teaching with technology in classrooms and online for over 30 years. And he was like, “Wow, I kind of like planning for the road trip.” [LAUGHTER] And I was thinking specifically about the tasks that may not be as fun, like getting the car to the mechanic, getting the wheels aligned, but when you take the time to do those things, then you foster a more enjoyable trip when you’re actually on the road trip. So chapter one really is about what I find to be a little bit less fizzy, but then I know there’s other folks like you who are like, “No, it’s okay, let’s get our checklists done.” And so, thinking about how do we set up our course? And this is not really new [LAUGHTER] for anybody who has any experience supporting online teaching or teaching online. It is about, well, first of all, I encourage us to remind ourselves of the “why,” of the meaning and of the purpose. Again, back to the “M” in PERMA, I know for a fact that online classes literally change lives, to quote one of the folks who’s featured in this book, Michelle Pacansky-Brock, “they make it possible for people to attain a college credential or degree when it would not otherwise be possible to do.” And so when I do get a little bit bogged down with the tedium, the administrivia of preparing an online class, I have to remind myself of my “why,” and so that’s what we start with in chapter one. Then, I kind of go through some of those relatively well understood strategies in terms of making sure your course is organized. And to your point about fostering a more enjoyable experience, when my course is confusing, then what happens is the students get confused, and what we know from emotion science is frustration or confusion demotivates learning and learners, then they email me with questions, as they should, and then I have a whole mountain of email, right? And so it’s kind of like when the wheel is out of alignment, it’s harder to steer the vehicle and keep it on track, but when you take the time to make sure that things are set up, that they are organized, everybody does have that more enjoyable experience. So one other thing that I would mention here, as we’re setting up the class is to kind of set ourselves and our students up for success by announcing our availability. Now more than ever before, online students might expect an answer in the moment, and we are not AI chatbots. We are not available 24/7, so help our students know that. When life circumstances come up for ourselves that impact our availability, let our students know that. Let them know if we need to be away for a few days, when we’re going to be back, anything like that that we feel comfortable sharing. All of those are ways to set up the journey for success.

Rebecca: One of the things that I heard you say, that I think everyone can relate to, is not enjoying piles of email. So having less piles of email alone could make for more joyful experiences for everybody. [LAUGHTER]

Flower: And if I could just comment on that, any strategy that has been successful in my own teaching and anything I recommend that seems to resonate with folks more broadly is pretty much all about saving me pain. [LAUGHTER] There are tedious aspects of teaching, and oftentimes it is something that we could do better. If a lot of my students are missing the mark on an assignment, maybe I wasn’t as clear or explicit in the instructions. So if I go back and I add to the transparency of what I’m asking students to do, eventually the result is less grading time for me because they’re getting it on the mark. So I admit it’s purely selfish, but whenever I can save myself pain or help other faculty save themselves some pain, I actually think it’s benefiting their well being and student success as well.

John: Now, I’m with you in that I much more enjoy the interactions with students as the course is progressing, but after I started teaching, I realized I couldn’t really be that improvisational and just do things day to day and so forth. And I’ve learned also that putting in the extra effort, getting all the details in, creating a consistent course structure, making sure that everything is there in advance, just makes it so much more enjoyable later. I don’t enjoy that part of it, but it does pay off in terms of the rest of the course, and those few weeks of getting things ready in advance, or maybe more than a few weeks, depending on whether it’s a course you’ve done before or if it’s a new course, really pays off nicely.

Flower: That’s exactly right, John, I agree with you 100%.

John: And I was thinking when you mentioned that about how we started this podcast. When we first started talking about I said, “Okay, well, let’s record one tomorrow, and we can release it later this week.” And Rebecca’s response was, “Well, why don’t we plan to start releasing them in about a month or so? Let’s get everything organized and planned first.” So it worked out well, but it was a bit of an adjustment there.

Rebecca: It’s a little yin and yang going on here.

Flower: That’s good!

John: So, in an in-person class, having an energetic and enthusiastic instructor can help inspire student engagement, because we know that emotions are contagious. It’s a little bit harder, perhaps, to do that in an online class. How might instructors create a similar environment in an asynchronous course?

Flower: This is such an important question, and the beauty of it is that a little goes a long way. And one of the things that I do in this book is I tell the stories of people who love teaching online, and we just get to learn from their experiences. So the book is as much storytelling as there is research and empirical evidence to support the recommendations, but there’s also people who love teaching online, and I really think keeping our focus on that, on the people in the class, seeing our online students as people, and not just names on a screen, which I myself have been guilty of, and really highlighting the importance of regular interactions, but not in a mechanical way. So to get to your point, as you already mentioned, emotion is contagious, and there is a lot of evidence to show that teacher enthusiasm literally infects students and energizes them, and this definitely applies in online spaces as well. Anybody who’s familiar with my work are going to see some themes [LAUGHTER] that have been characterizing my work for some time now. But let’s think about, how do we convey our passion to our online students? Whether it is in the recording, maybe an audio or a video recording. The research shows that even, especially video, even like animating our facial features and inflecting some enthusiasm in our vocal intonation that can energize students, even in an audio recording. Again, there’s more depth and nuance, and we can convey that excitement about what we’re doing in class. We can also convey that we really care about our students when we’re more willing to bring that media. It doesn’t even have to be just media, though. We can do this in our written comments, announcements, feedback, discussion posts. It really is about being “the sun” is the way I think about it. I personally think Canvas, Moodle, Blackboard, places like these, are ugly. I really do. [LAUGHTER] I cannot believe how they are so not user friendly, so unappealing visually. So I think about what individuals, as instructors, what we can do to bring warmth, energy and enthusiasm into our classes. And it may be that you send an announcement with a meme, or maybe you tend to use emojis. Those kinds of things that are resonant to our authentic selves, and being mindful to project our enthusiasm about our topics, about student success, those are ways that we can create a similar environment in online classes.

Rebecca: One of the other areas where there’s a lot of growing evidence is that students are more likely to persist and learn more when they feel like they belong. What are some of the strategies you recommend to help students feel that they belong in an online class, particularly in an asynchronous setting?

Flower: Yeah, I’m really glad to be talking about this. My co-authors and I took a deep dive on this in The Norton Guide to Equity-Minded Teaching, which is freely available thanks to W.W. Norton. That’s where I really began to articulate, “what does the research say, and how do we apply it in online classes?” And what we know is persistently, consistently, for decades now, students in asynchronous online classes have told us that they don’t feel they do belong, they feel isolated, they feel lonely, they do not feel connected with other people. In fact, there’s a relatively recent study that reports one student saying that they don’t even think it’s possible to feel that there’s a community in online classes. So we have work to do here. Those feelings of isolation and loneliness definitely contribute to those higher attrition rates that we experience in online classes. I love the example of, again, my friend and colleague, Dr. Isis Artze-Vega, lead author of The Norton Guide, and she really put into practice this idea of relentless welcome, which we learned about in Relationship-Rich Education by Felton and Lambert. It’s this idea of communicating to students repeatedly that we’re there for them, we will help them. If they have a late assignment, what can we do to help them get that assignment in, to help them cross the finish line? Again, Isis’ story about asynchronous teaching is in the book. There are many others, but it is about helping our students see us as a real person. For example, I’m in a lot of online classes, and I speak with a lot of online instructors, and it surprises me, and quite frankly, it saddens me, how frequently there is not even a photo of the instructor in the online class. There may be good, valid reasons why an individual instructor does not want to post an image of their face. I understand and respect that. But I think there’s a lot more of us who just haven’t put two and two together. Students tell us they feel like we’re not real. They tell us that they think we’re just computers or bots. So let’s help our students see who we are as a real person. A headshot, a photo of ourselves doing a hobby, and again, it’s not just one and done. It’s not just an “all about me” page at the beginning of the semester. It is about interacting in ways that help our students see that “Wow, we really are ice hockey fans,” and “did you see that game over the weekend,” right? Or whatever our personal interests might be, that we feel comfortable bringing into class. Again, not crossing any boundaries, but helping our students see that we are real people can help them feel connected to us. And the flip side is also true as well, being intentional to get to know our students as real people really goes a long way. As I already mentioned, I have been guilty of seeing a name on a screen and struggling to envision the real person who was on the other side of that screen. So first-day information sheets, where we collect some information from our students, and maybe invite disclosure, I don’t think we should require, but maybe invite students to share a little bit about their personal interests, hobbies, career goals. Those kinds of activities can help us demonstrate to our students that we do see them, that we do care about them, that they are a valued member of the community, that fosters belonging and that predicts academic success and completion of the online course.

John: And we’ll include links to The Norton Guide, as well as Relationship-Rich Education, as well as a couple of podcasts we had with some of the authors. Along those same lines, one of the things that may be difficult is that we know that there’s research that suggests that when people read written feedback, they’re more likely to perceive it as negative than if they hear it being said, because we don’t see facial expressions, body language, tone, and other things. Now, video can help address some of those things, but if people are not going to be using video, how can they convey this more positive and supportive environment to reduce the risk of misperceiving some of the comments that students may see?

Flower: Yeah, great question, and again, a relatively simple thing that we can do when we pay attention to the words that we write. I alluded to this earlier in this conversation, it is 100% possible to convey enthusiasm, support, encouragement, “you got this,” when we take another moment or two to write some of those quick phrases. Some online instructors find it helpful to have some template text that they can copy and paste. I personally tend to be more spontaneous and in the moment, but there is an aspect of taking a few more moments to share a few more words that help students and being intentional. Now, I don’t think any of us should be inauthentic. As you may know about me, I tend to have kind of a natural cheerleader kind of a personality like, “Come on, we can do this!” And I don’t think people should break that way if that’s not their style, but I do think we can overcome the transactional distance, create warmth that is not always evident in these text heavy environments. The course material itself is often written in a dry academic language. I take inspiration from research that shows that warming up the tone of your syllabus can help students feel better prepared for success, the same is true in our written materials in online classes. And the last thing I would say is findings from research on immediacy cues in asynchronous classes, specifically immediacy cues that comes out of the field of communication and it’s a way to help students feel that you are approachable as an instructor, that you are on their side, you are available to help them. We often think about these immediacy cues in in-person classes, for example, maintaining a pleasant facial expression of body language that is a little bit more relaxed, not standing at the lectern and just reading your notes. These are in-person nonverbal immediacy cues, but research has shown that there are things that we can do in online classes to apply this effect as well. One of them is about the perception of time, so students notice the length of our comments or our feedback on an assignment, and if it seems like we were very brusque and abrupt, again, sort of a negative perception is formed, but if they perceive… because we have included just a few more words in our message… if they perceive that we spent a little bit more time with them, it boosts their motivation and engagement, both of which are precursors to learning. So in my opinion, how do we do this when we’re relying on text, it is faster. I think that typing comments is faster than recording video. I certainly encourage people to use more video, but when I’m teaching online, taking just a mindful moment to add a few more words of encouragement, maybe even to acknowledge, “hey, this is challenging, but I know you can do this.” Typing words like that makes a difference.

Rebecca: One of the things that we mentioned just briefly a little bit ago was that in online, asynchronous classes, there’s higher attrition rates than in-person classes. What are some other strategies we can use to encourage students to persist?

Flower: Yeah, so I’m thinking of a 2024 research paper that came out and I love when articles have a catchy phrase. This one, the first part of the title is, “It Helped Push Me Through the Class,” and it’s the things that we have been talking about. It is relational online teaching. It is teaching with rapport. And as I mentioned at the very beginning here, a little goes a long way. Having that photo of the instructor, writing opening materials in an online course in a way that makes it very clear for students to understand what they need to do to get started, maybe trying to break up our written materials in the online classes with a little more white space, with a little bit more use of headings, keeping everything accessible, so that we are meeting digital accessibility requirements, absolutely, but we can bring in more of that relational kind of online teaching. That’s the way I think about it. Again, Michelle Pacansky-Brock is doing great work in this area. She talks about humanized online teaching. It’s the same thing, it is about cheering our students on, pulling for their success, maybe reaching out. Attrition rates are higher, they have consistently been for decades. Maybe what we do is we’re intentional to take 15 minutes on a Monday morning and check and see who has not really been active in the class in a few days, send a little message to that individual and say, “Hey, I noticed you haven’t been here. Are you okay? Is there anything I can do to help?” That kind of a strategy doesn’t take very long. It can make a huge difference for students, because it communicates that you noticed, that you saw that they were not there, and you took action to reach out in a supportive way. That’s the kind of thing that can and does make a difference with helping students persist and complete the online class.

John: Just a few minutes ago, you suggested that one of the ways we can help connect to students and create a better relationship with the instructor is by finding out more about the students and asking them some questions so that we get to know our students a bit better. But if they share that information with other students, could that help build community in some way, if we can bring some of those things into discussion forums or some class activities where they’re revealing something that they’re comfortable revealing about themselves and why they’re taking the course, perhaps. Might that help forge better connections among the students in the class?

Flower: Yeah, it’s all about, as you said, helping students find some common interests. And the way I think about this is to structure social interactions throughout the class, not just in the first week in the introductions forum. I mean, that’s standard, and I do recommend that we should do that, have an introduction forum in week one, but in many online classes, that’s it. There’s no further attempt to build connections and relationships among the students. When we are intentional to do that, what happens is, again, that more naturally warm environment, a more trusting environment, which will help students engage. So for example, I think it can be helpful to have maybe a weekly social post only. I was speaking with one instructor recently who changes the prompt every week, and if this aligns with your grading philosophy, I recommend assigning points. Make it worth points, because online students are busy, they don’t do things that aren’t required. I understand that, but maybe one week, the topic of discussion is, “what series are you binging right now?” Maybe the next week, “what is one favorite hot beverage, given the icy temperatures,” right? Things that don’t have much to do with class, encourage students to post photos or memes. If they want to do that, it will be amazing. And I think people will really see the benefit of investing time and part of the grading scheme and module space in structuring ways for students to connect and engage with each other in ways that are not necessarily about the material in the class, just person to person.

Rebecca: In a lot of ways, that’s very similar to the small talk or small interactions that happen before or after an in-person class. And you have to be more intentional design those opportunities when an online environment is kind of a drop in, drop out, as you need or as it makes sense for you on your schedule. So you have to kind of make those spaces for that to occur.

Flower: That’s exactly right, and I actually want to qualify some of what I said, I get very carried away with myself. But to your point, social interactions can happen spontaneously and naturally, whether it’s turning to your neighbor and saying, “Hey, do you have an extra piece of paper,” whatever it might be, and the research has found that that’s actually really important to help students be successful. So that’s why I say “Yes, it doesn’t happen by accident in online classes. Let us structure those opportunities.” But, [LAUGHTER] I want to qualify that. I have learned over time that in some courses that may not be as necessary in some disciplines, maybe students don’t have time for the social stuff as much. So two points here, for example, once a number of years ago, I was speaking with a professor in an MBA program. He’s like, “My students are motivated, they are busy, they are professionals, they know what they need to do, they want to get in and out, they don’t have time for all that fluff.” And at the time, I wrestled with that, but I think he has a point. So instructor preference, discipline, the nature of the program, the kinds of students that you have, these are all factors that we want to take into consideration. I still would argue that some social support is more beneficial than not having that much, but every recommendation like this, I think individual instructors need to filter it through their own wisdom and experience, and make those informed decisions based on what they think will be best for their students, their discipline and such.

Rebecca: I can imagine some of those could be a little more spontaneous feeling if you have students that have some similar interests that you learn as you’re interacting with them, and you connect them to one another because they do have some shared goals or interests or pursuits.

Flower: Yeah, one of my favorite recommendations, again, people who are familiar with my work may have heard me talk about this before,[LAUGHTER] but it’s because it’s so good. This idea originally came from Dr. Courtney Plotts. What I like to do is to provide a slide, or it could be a Canvas page, for example, with some images that represent kind of a wide range of emotional and mental states. And then make this a discussion forum, and it would be “which picture best,” and then you can finish that sentence however you want to, in terms of the prompt, right? “Which picture best represents how you’re feeling about your weekend,” or “this upcoming project that we have due,” or “your college classes in general for this semester,” and then again, if it’s in a discussion forum, students can connect with each other over the pictures that they choose. And so the slide that I tend to use a lot has a happy looking dog. It has the nervous slash playful looking cat. It has a dark mountain scape with heavy clouds and snow. It has a humming bird drinking nectar from a flower. And when students see that somebody else picked the dog, “Oh, yeah, tell me about your dog!” There are ways to structure with some degree of spontaneity as well. And like I said earlier, my personal sense is that in asynchronous classes, assigning points is more necessary because we know students don’t do things if they’re not worth points. That is not my overall grading philosophy, but regarding asynchronous online classes, I would say that when students see that you’re assigning points for some of those things, it conveys that it’s important. It conveys the value that you place on those activities.

John: For many years, one of my colleagues and I have been using this metacognitive cafe, low-stakes discussion forum where students reflect on their learning process, and at the end of the semester, they always said that that was one of the things they valued the most, because it helped them see that other people were struggling with some of the same issues, that they weren’t alone. Besides the benefits from just the metacognitive reflection on their learning, it helped them to see that the things they were struggling with were experienced by other students as well, and they would often bring up things saying, “I have to take care of a two-year old, and it’s really difficult to do these things.” And then other people would respond about some of their challenges, and it just helped form much more of a community where they got to know each other much better than they would have if the focus was just on the content directly.

Flower: That is a wonderful example. I love that so much, that empathy building, that sense that we’re not in this alone. That’s exactly what online students tell us, [LAUGHTER] they feel like they’re in this alone. So I love that opportunity to, if nothing else, vent or commiserate [LAUGHTER] and share that experience to build that trusting community. I love it.

Rebecca: One of the things that we talked about a little bit earlier was how some students may think that we’re just a bunch of bots teaching these online classes, and obviously the proliferation of generative AI generally can really feel like it sucks the joy out of some teaching. How do we prevent some of that from happening and maintain this joy and online instruction in the presence of AI?

Flower: Yeah, a really important and very timely topic. In the forthcoming book, there is a subtitle that basically says, “don’t let AI steal your joy.” That sums it up for me. There are people who are calling for the end of asynchronous online education because it’s impossible to prevent students from using AI to outsource their learning. I don’t agree with those calls. We know, again, that this modality makes it possible for people to pursue a degree when they wouldn’t otherwise be able to, not to mention, it’s a business model that is well established [LAUGHTER] in higher education. Student demand for this format is growing. What we need to do is to figure out how we double down on the human connections we’ve been talking about, and motivate students to not outsource their learning to AI. So, and I do want to be very clear, I’m not talking about agentic AI. It is horrifyingly possible now for a student to use an agent browser to go in and complete online class tasks. That, I’m gobsmacked. [LAUGHTER] I still think that the human connection will help students choose not to do that, but I’m not talking about agentic, I’m only talking about generative AI. And again, I do firmly believe that cultivating trust, that building the social connection among students and instructors, that we can help students choose not to use AI in inappropriate ways. I also think all of the recommendations that people are making for how to teach and facilitate meaningful learning with AI, in in-person classes, we can apply those same ideas online: give students transparent guidance on exactly what you’re asking them to do, exactly what you don’t want them to do with AI, invite students to… not invite… I would say, actually assign students to disclose where and how they used AI, structure a reflection that gets students to think, to John’s point, about the metacognitive aspect, “did my use of AI help me, or did it hold back my learning? Or was it more trouble than it’s worth?” All of those kinds of recommendations where we are talking to students about AI, building critical literacy, awareness of the ethical concerns, responsible AI use, I think all of those same ideas can totally happen in asynchronous online classes. And I would argue that we would double down again on that human connection. Now what I am seeing, I’ll just add briefly, many asynchronous instructors are needing to shake things up a little bit. So we have always relied on discussion forums. Some instructors are moving towards social annotation using tools like Perusal or Hypothesis. Some folks are kind of rediscovering tools that we’ve had for a while, like Voice Thread because, yeah, let’s face it, those often tired and uninspiring discussion forums that we’ve relied on for a long time, that have been ripe for change for a long time, some of those existing or traditional ways of doing things just make it too easy for students to outsource their learning with AI. So changing things up in ways that are long overdue, I would argue, these are some of the ways that we can address the threat that AI poses. Last thing I would say on this is I know for a fact that there are hard working people who want the learning and they want the degree legitimately, they’re going to do the work. We have an opportunity to think more creatively, to inspire and motivate our students by giving them meaningful, relevant activities and tasks online.

Rebecca: This feels like the flat tire part of the road trip where you actually successfully get a new tire. [LAUGHTER]

Flower: You know, this isn’t a surprise to you. When we were in the pandemic, when we were coming out of the pandemic, many of us were going,”Great! We can change some things that have needed changing!” It feels that way to me again. There have been many aspects of asynchronous online classes that needed refreshing, maybe now we’ll actually do this.

John: And these issues, these challenges from AI, are not unique to asynchronous instruction. It’s basically with any type of work that students are doing outside of the classroom. And there’s a lot of people exploring this, both in face-to- face classes as well as in online classes, and we do have to think more carefully about the assignments we’re giving and how they might work, and how we can incentivize students to focus on the learning rather than outsourcing that.

Flower: I would like to add, there are really wonderful smart scholars like Dr. Tricia Bertram Gallant and her co-author, Dr. David Rettinger, there’s a global community of folks working on academic integrity, and these folks are rightfully [LAUGHTER] inviting some conversation about how valid our assessment of student learning can be on any work that happens outside of a physical classroom. To your point, this does not just apply to online classes, but anything we ask students to do that does not take place under our watchful eyes and without any technology, which introduces some inclusivity concerns. This is a concern. So in the context of asynchronous online, especially, because I don’t think it’s going away, I don’t think it can or should go away. I do wonder if we might see a return or a resurgence of in-person testing centers. And I’m kind of speaking that in that voice, because it’s not ideal in some ways, but proctored tests are a thing that still happen. For example, the NCLEX exam in nursing, that is a supervised in person experience. It has to be. I would like my nurse to adequately give me the medication that is prescribed. So I’m wondering, for asynchronous online classes, if we might see more in-person assessment. And I’ll share one model from my former institution, Northern Arizona University. In Arizona, there’s a wide rural population, and I love this model. Basically, agreements were made with local libraries, community colleges, other such gathering places around the state, and students would just make an appointment and go to their local place to do an in-person assessment. So, I just wonder if we can, and maybe even should, begin to explore that option more fully than is currently the case.

John: And when we talked to the authors of The Opposite of Cheating, we’ll share a link to that as well, one of the things they talked about was the possibility of consortiums of schools or state university systems, perhaps, agreeing to do some joint proctoring to provide capabilities for that throughout the state, and that might be an option, but it would be hard for smaller private schools, perhaps, to join in these types of things, but it is something that I think we should explore because of these challenges.

Flower: And that’s why I love the model at NAU, where a local library or a community college or other offices that already exist, they just entered into an arrangement and had a system and had a system and a process.

Rebecca: All right, so we always wrap up by asking, what’s next?

Flower: Well, I have to tell you, what’s next for me is finishing my PhD! [LAUGHTER] This is something that I have been quietly pursuing in the background for a number of years now. My program is fully online, asynchronous, I have been walking a mile in the online students’ shoes, and I am not undertaking any other big projects until I finish this PhD. My experience has informed the book. When I said earlier that I talk with a lot of online students, it’s because they’re my classmates. [LAUGHTER] So that is next for me. I want to finish this. It’s a PhD in psychology. How do we learn, and therefore, how do we teach more effectively? So it completely aligns with my work. It finally became time to pursue this, but it’s hard, just like for our online students to be a working professional with many pursuits in life and try to juggle that as well. So that’s next for me, is finishing that program.

Rebecca: You got this, Flower! [LAUGHTER]

Flower: Thank you! But I tell you what, no more books until it’s done. That I know for sure. [LAUGHTER]

John: Yes and keep the fizz going through the dissertation process.

Flower: Yes, absolutely.

John: Well, thank you. It’s always great talking to you, and we’re looking forward to hearing more about your research on your dissertation.

Flower: Yes, thank you so much again for having me. As you know, these conversations bring me fizz, and I hope your listeners feel a little bit more uplifted and fizzy as a result.

Rebecca: I think they will. Thank you, Flower.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

John: Editing assistance provided by Madison Lee.

[MUSIC]

435. Insights From The Field

Posted in access, edtech, educational technology, engagement, equity, higher education, inclusion, learning, online learning, pedagogy, personalized learning, social presence, teaching
March 4, 2026

This podcast is a recording of a panel session featuring three online learning leaders, that was presented at the SUNY Online Learning Summit on Wednesday, February 25, 2026. The panelists are Yakut Gazi, Marina Amini, and Van Davis. Yakut is the Vice Provost for Learning Innovation and Digital Education at Duke University. Marina is the Executive Director of the California Virtual Campus, and Van is the Executive Director of WCET and the Vice President of Digital Learning at WICHE.

Show Notes

Transcript

John: Today’s Tea for Teaching podcast is a recording of a panel session, featuring three online learning leaders, that was presented at the SUNY Online Learning Summit on Wednesday, February 25, 2026.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

John: Welcome to: “Insights from the Field,” a special Tea for Teaching podcast on policy, data, and inclusive collaboration. I’m John Kane, an economist and the director of the Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching at the State University of New York at Oswego.

Rebecca: I’m Rebecca Mushtare, a designer and the Deputy Dean of Graduate Studies at SUNY Oswego. We’re the hosts of the Tea for Teaching podcast and the moderators for this session. Our guests today are Yakut Gazi, Marina Amini, and Van Davis. Yakut is the Vice Provost for Learning Innovation and Digital Education at Duke University. Marina is the Executive Director of the California Virtual Campus, and Van is the Executive Director of WCET and the Vice President of Digital Learning at WICHE. Welcome Yakut, Marina, and Van.

John: Today’s teas are: …and we’ll start with Yakut.

Yakut: So I’m Turkish originally, and Turkish tea is the big thing. We always have Turkish tea brewing in our houses. So that’s my tea.

John: Very good. And Marina?

Marina: And I’m from Afghanistan originally, so I’m drinking green tea with cardamom.

John: Excellent. And Van?

Van: Well, I’ve already switched over to water today, but my favorite tea is lapsang souchong. I love a nice smoked tea.

John: I do too. I have to keep it separate from my others so they don’t all become smoked flavored tea, but it’s a very nice flavor. And Rebecca?

Rebecca: I have a Pekoe tea, Edinburgh’s Gin Tea and Roses today.

John: And in honor of this recording time in January in upstate New York, I am drinking a spring cherry green tea, [LAUGHTER]…looking forward to somewhat warmer and less snowy weather. So we’ve invited you here today to discuss the future of online education. We’ve seen rapid proliferation and evolution in generative AI platforms since they were publicly introduced just a little over three years ago, leading to concerns about the integrity of online assessments, especially recently given the development and use of AI agents. How should online learning leaders address the risks that this poses to the perceived value of online courses and degrees?

Rebecca: Yakut?

Yakut: It is true that advances in AI created risk for the way traditional education is delivered, and also assessed. The concern about AI undermining validity isn’t unique to online education, though, it affects all of higher education. If you remember, COVID has created a pedagogical emergency. Generative AI created a new one, but I’m not sure if you’re treating it the way it needs to be treated like we treated in the COVID period as an emergency. Online learners, I think, may be actually better positioned to respond, because we have already been engaging in academic innovation and advocating for active learning and authentic assessment for many years. So this may be an opportunity to implement better approaches in a full-scale manner, where the focus becomes the process of learning rather than the product of learning, because that now can be created through the use of AI, and it’s actually being done in all of our classrooms, whether or not we like it. So we, as the learning leaders, need to push the conversation from preventing AI use to designing learning experiences where the use of AI is transparent, ethical, and skill building. So this means creating policies that allow for AI use, like when and how, rather than ban AI use, and also focusing on authentic assessments, project-based work, reflective practice, collaboration, things that AI can support but cannot replace. But I think the challenge is not necessarily modality, like online as a modality is a challenge. We know how to do these things. The challenge is doing these pedagogically sound things at scale. In my mind, this is a moment that poses a risk for online education at scale, more than online education broadly. But then for us to implement this approach where focus is not on the outcomes but the process, we have to work with employers, we have to be able to articulate our competencies to employers that AI is not a threat to credibility, it’s the part of our formula in higher education and how we how we train people. For example, imagine every course in our institutions have an opportunity for hands-on authentic learning, where at the end there is a skill that’s visible to future employers. There are 8.2 million learners in higher education who wants an internship, but only 3.6 million of those get one. There’s a huge gap already, so hands-on internship opportunities during our course of higher education should not be for those who want it, or it should not be postponed to last year of education. It should be an integrated part of the equation. These are, to me, pedagogically possible, but the challenge is to be able to figure out the logistics and systems to do this at scale.

Marina: So we are talking a little bit about the word academic integrity. You know that really resonated from your description, John, and I’m from the California Virtual Campus, which represents the California Community Colleges. We’re 116 colleges serving about 2.2 million students, and this is an issue that we’ve been grappling with around academic integrity, especially with agentic AI. And just to kind of put it in perspective of what do we mean by agentic AI? Because I think it could have a couple of different definitions. When I’m talking about agentic AI, I’m talking about these autonomous agents that can go and log on into an LMS, a learning management system on behalf of a student, scan for assessments or assignments or discussion posts to complete them and submit them on behalf of the student within seconds. And we already have analytics in our learning management system that indicate that a student can go in, and has gone in, because we have the data and completed a 50-item quiz, short answer quiz, not multiple choice, and submitted it within about four seconds, so we know that the student is not searching for these as prompts on like ChatGPT, because that would actually involve some interactivity with the student. They’re actually having an agent go in and submit it on behalf of themselves. That’s a very big concern that we take very, very seriously. Obviously, the consequence is that our degrees and our programs and our transcripts will lose its value and that they will become meaningless. And so I think it’s similar in the case of being like other crises, like COVID 19, for example, but it’s also uniquely alarming in kind of the destruction that it can have on the value of our grades and our courses and our programs. And the question of, “How do we address the concern?” I think we do handle it in the way that we handle these other risks. We have to be deeply engaging with our faculty. We have to pull together our technology partners. And I think a mistake or a pitfall of this can be if technology says, “Well, the solution lies only in faculty changing the way they assess, adopting project-based learning or authentic assessments.” And if faculty turn around and say, “Well, the problem can only be solved technically if we create some kind of barrier or blocker for these agentic browsers.” And I think those are both equally flawed in terms of its approach, because we’re expecting the answer or the solution to be around the silver bullet, when in actuality, I think the solution lies in a deep partnership where we sit down with each other, with our partners, we look at both programmatic and technical solutions to making sure that the academic integrity of our institutions remains intact.

Rebecca: AI enables more efficient adaptive learning and provides increasingly personalized pathways in support of student success. How do we strike a balance between personalized learning and the formation of human connections essential to creating a sense of belonging? You want to start, Van?

Van: Sure. So this year marks my 30th anniversary of being in higher education, and I started my career as a faculty member, I spent a decade in the classroom as a history professor. And one of the things that I learned very quickly during that time is whether I wanted to or not, you end up teaching to the middle. You run the risk of losing the students that are ahead. You run the risk of losing the students that, for whatever reason, are behind. As much as I wanted to personalize learning, I couldn’t do that, at least not at scale. I think that AI does give us the opportunity eventually to be able to personalize at scale. That does not mean that the human piece loses out. In fact, that human piece, I think, becomes even more critical. We know that relationships matter. We know that, beyond a shadow of a doubt, a student can succeed when they have a relationship with somebody on that campus, ideally, their professor. I’m a big fan of Parker Palmer’s work, and specifically, I’m a really big fan of To Know As We Are Known. And if you’re familiar with it, Palmer talks about relational epistemology, which is really just a fancy way of saying that, at the end of the day, what matters is a faculty member’s ability to create a relation with a student, and for students to create relations with each other, and that is the moment at which learning takes place, not the transmission of knowledge, but real learning takes place in the midst of those relationships, and a skilled faculty member turns the classroom into an opportunity to develop relationships and for people to co-create knowledge together. I don’t think AI changes our ability to do that. I don’t think it takes away our ability to do that. I think what AI may be able to do is to take some of the burden off of faculty when it comes to trying to personalize learning, so that faculty can focus on what a human does best and what faculty do best. And that’s the creation of relationships, and that’s where I think the true learning takes place. And I have to say, when I was a faculty member, that was the piece that excited me the most, and probably the piece that, unfortunately, I got to do the least.

Yakut: If I can jump in here, plus one to everything Van said, I mean, so insightful, and I’m not going to repeat because that’s exactly where I was going. But one thing that, when I was listening to you Van, I was reminded of the statistics. Khan Academy’s, Khanmigo, last year, they published their self-efficacy study results within the school districts that they worked with. If you’re familiar, Khanmigo is basically personalized learning using AI. Within the school districts that they worked with, where the tool was available to all teachers and all students at no cost, only 9% of students, 0, it’s not 19%, it’s not 90%. 9% of students used the tool to the level that Kahn Academy deemed standard use, which is two hours a week. So where I’m going with this is provision of the technology, provision of the platform or the tool, does not necessarily lead to the opportunity to learn. So we think these technologies are going to make these available for everybody, which they will, but then there is still a missing piece that makes the student use the technology to learn, and that’s, I think, the inspiration to learn, and that’s the human thing. So as Van mentioned, it takes a faculty member or a parent or an uncle somewhere to inspire people to do something. So if we relieve people of the busy work that takes place to prepare for teaching, or actual teaching in the classroom, we may give them time to actually do this human element of inspiring to learn. And I think the two are hand in hand.

Rebecca: So Marina was kind of hinting at some of the data that’s available in our LMSs. And one thing that online learning leaders increasingly rely on is this use of data analytics, based on institutional and LMS data, which provides more information on student learning practice. AI tools allow for more efficient analysis of this data. So how can this data be leveraged to improve the online learning ecosystem? This could be faculty workload, course offerings, student engagement, and anything else that you can imagine.

Yakut: There are a few things I can mention. First, predictive analytics for early intervention, identifying student interest much earlier, not just those who are failing, but those disengaging. And there was an example about this earlier, struggling with specific concepts and provide targeted support before they fall behind. We have been pursuing these kinds of systems for a long time. I have 32 years in this profession now, and probably half of it was all about predictive analytics. The challenge has been the siloed nature of our data systems at our institutions that create only a partial picture of student success, unless you invest in data lakes, integrated data solutions and whatnot. And then there’s also the governance issue around data. AI can create a leapfrogging effect here. An ability to do this predictive work can also reduce faculty workload. This way, the human is in the loop and is the one doing the empathetic work and empathetic outreach, asking, rather than finding out who needs this kind of outreach, doing the work of outreach, saying, “Are you okay?” Apparently it’s one of the most powerful things you can reach out to students about, are you okay? The heavy lifting is done elsewhere, and then we become more human. Another example could be curriculum optimization. By analyzing patterns across courses, we can identify where students consistently struggle, what courses are synergetic to take together, for example, what courses are toxic to take together and then provide information to both faculty and students around those. Where are the gaps that exist in our program pathways? So if there are skills that are needed, and then that analysis of curriculum and skills matching can be done by AI, and then this can impact our course redesign and sequencing decisions. And also our institutions can allocate resources a little bit more effectively. Analytics can help us understand the actual demand patterns, optimal cohort sizes. We usually say, “Oh, 30 students,” but then we don’t really base it on I mean, it’s a habit that’s telling us about the cohort size to be. It may be classroom size. We can actually do deeper analyses, especially when we’re facing enrollment pressures and financial pressures. But I have to also emphasize two things here. One, this data should inform our decisions, so it’s data-informed decisions, not even data driven, because sometimes we may have to make decisions that go against data, it can be political, it can be governance reasons. We need governance structures that will take this data and generate insights from it, and then transparent communications with students about how their data is used. And this is crucially important. We need to democratize this data and allow students to have access to it, along with institutional access or faculty access. So transparency, ethical use, shared governance around analytics are very important as we become more excited about AI’s potentials in this analytics stage.

Marina: I love all of those things around predictive analytics, early intervention, and then optimization as well. So I’ll just try to add to that conversation a little bit. I’m really interested in how we’re serving our students in online modalities, and who it is that’s succeeding in those courses, because I think we know that traditional education has served a certain group and demographic and gender over time, and only in recent years are we sort of aware of some of the biases in the design of our curriculum and our courses that serve certain people, and how can we analyze our data more efficiently to address what exactly is it that we’re doing that’s helping some students fail and helping some students succeed? And I’m saying that intentionally, because I think we are agents of that success and failure in many ways, as our institutions are structured, and so I’m very interested in sort of decolonizing online education through the use of data analytics and institutional research is notoriously slow. You have to wait a year to get your IR office to work on some data set. It’s a lot of intensive, hard work, and then a year later, you get this sort of lagging indicator of, like, well, like two years ago, this was the thing, and it’s not even relevant now, or things have changed. So I’m excited that AI and data visualization and optimization can allow us to have this in a more timely manner, like just-in-time data. It can help faculty to realize how their own strategies are impacting certain students, well or not well, and then make those changes immediately. If I have an AI coach in my class and it’s telling me that they have identified, I have six African American students, but one of my strategies is unintentionally impacting them in a negative manner, I want to know that now. I want to know what it is that I’m doing in a private message from my AI assistant, [LAUGHTER] and I want to rectify that and immediately change. So that’s the kind of agility that we currently lack in education and in research that I’m very, very excited about: bringing in AI to help with that sort of private, supportive coaching done in the privacy of my own course from a desire to want to improve and serve all of my students.

John: Now, you’ve talked a little bit about some of the benefits, or some of the cost first, and now some of the potential benefits that we have from using AI. How do you see online learning changing in response to AI? And we’ll start with Marina.

Marina: Yeah, so I just want to say it’s really hard to follow up with all the positive, I think benefits that AI can bring that Van and Yakut have brought up, and I 100% agree with those. So I don’t always want to be the downer [LAUGHTER] in this podcast, but if I had a crystal ball and kind of playing on the previous question that you asked, John, around academic integrity, assuming that that is a problem that we’re not going to be able to immediately solve, either programmatically or technically, one of the concerns that I have is that it will affect a specific kind of online learning, which would be fully asynchronous online courses. The ones where they don’t have any set live meetings, I think people will be most critical of those kind of modalities. And so if I have a crystal ball to look at, I suspect that we’ll be bringing back more hybrid forms of online education to replace more asynchronous forms, because of the concern around academic integrity. That’s my crystal ball. What does that mean? Well, it could mean that hybrid, maybe half the courses meetings will be in person, half online, or it could be that there’ll be more proctored assessment, either online proctoring solutions with some of the main vendors that you may have heard of, or in person. So we would need some kind of proctoring network, or some way to address that concern. So I think as a stop gap measure until we kind of come to terms with the academic integrity piece, I see some of that changing. That being said, I do want to sort of add to the good elements that you know Van and Yakut are bringing up, because I think AI can help humans be more human in some ways. I have not been in the classroom for a number of years, but I did teach online for a long time, and I would love to go into my learning management system, and my AI assistant pops up and says, “Hey, Johnny has not interacted with you or any other students for eight days. You might want to check on him to make sure he’s engaged.” Or my assistant tells me, “Hey, you interacted with these 10 students in the discussions this week. You might want to answer posts from these 10 on the public posts” and things like that that help me to be more human, that help me to be more equitable in terms of how I interface and touch my students online, I think that could be a really amazing use of AI, and I don’t think we’ve really realized the true potential of that.

Van: And if I could jump in, I agree with everything that Marina said. My fear, though, is exactly what her crystal ball says, and that is that asynchronous, online education may become more difficult, or will face additional scrutiny, because we already know that we’re highly scrutinized, but we also know that online, asynchronous education plays a critical role in access for a certain student population, and I would hate to see those students, particularly adult learners, or learners who are working or have caregiving responsibilities, lose those opportunities. I think that the main thing that AI is going to do for online education is, I do think it’s going to force us to rethink our pedagogical practices. And I think that we are probably going to need to think about, how do we do alternative forms of assessment, and how do we move from assessing knowledge to assessing abilities and skills. I said that I started my career as a historian. When I took my PhD history exams back in the 1990s so back in the last century. When I took those exams, I sat in my office with my laptop and had no ability to consult any sort of document. It was purely from memory. It was eight hours of answering questions from memory. The reality is, though, that whenever I got into a classroom to teach, I never created a lecture, I never created an assignment, I never created a test without pulling a textbook down or pulling some sort of reference manual down and looking at it. What I did in terms of my teaching was completely disconnected with the way that my graduate program, which came from an R1 institution, assessed me. And so I do think that one of the things I hope AI is going to push us to do is to really rethink our assessment practices so that they are more in line with the reality of our students after they leave our classrooms. And that’s not unique to online education. I think that that type of shift in pedagogical practices really needs to happen across the board if we want our students to truly be prepared for the world that they’re going into after they leave us.

Yakut: Can I quickly add two things that we’re seeing actually happening in terms of change in online, and that’s in the design process. Those of you who are designing online courses will know that one of the first friction points is when we ask faculty to write learning objectives, because they’re not used to thinking about the end in mind, right? They’re used to thinking about, “This is the content I’m going to teach.” So that friction is reduced by use of AI, because you’re easily creating a set of objectives, reiterating from that. And then the other aspect is video production process. You can now ask a faculty member to say something for three minutes, and then you can make that faculty member say anything in any language. Now it may look fake, but it’s going to get better, right? So the video production process and instructional design process are immediately impacted by the use of AI, and it’s going to impact those professions, so we need to do something about it, but I think it’s making our institutions a little bit more agile in terms of updating courses, but also creating new courses based on the input from the market. I also see in larger, better adoption of open source content, because open OERs are problematic because faculty do not have the time to go and research, curate, adopt OERs. AI is proving useful in that process too, going and researching and bringing you things to review and curate. So I think there are immediate gains there as well.

John: Moving to a somewhat different topic, federal regulations and political shifts, of which we’ve seen an awful lot in the last year or so, can create uncertainty. And we’ve seen a flurry of executive orders designed to dismantle long established higher ed priorities concerning equitable and inclusive education, while also restricting financial support. What advice do you have for leaders trying to stay agile and innovative in this evolving and somewhat seemingly random political environment while maintaining compliance with federal regulations in areas such as accessibility and SARA and any other area that may pop up?

Van: Well, if you don’t mind, I’ll start. Given what we do at WCET, if you’re familiar with WCET, we really function at the intersection of policy and practice of digital learning, and we spend a lot of time monitoring what’s going on, particularly in Washington D.C., at the federal level, at the Department of Education, and increasingly in the executive Oval Office, and translating that to the field, in terms of what that means. It’s not lost on me that before I joined the webinar this afternoon, I was watching several of my colleagues respond in real time to the negotiated rule making that’s taking place in Washington DC right now around things like accountability measures, new accountability measures around student loan limits. So it really is a dynamic environment that we’re in. I think that there are ways that AI can help us navigate this, actually. So, one of the things that I played around with, I spoke to a group of SARA administrators, that’s the State Authorization Reciprocity Agreement. I spoke to a group of SARA administrators this summer at their annual meeting, specifically about AI. And one of the things that I played around with was taking the SARA policy manual, pointing Perplexity to that manual, and then asking it specifically to create a synthesis of the regulations in that manual, and then asking it to go out and pull out the contact information for each state SPE that’s the State portal entity, that’s the primary SARA person in each state, and to provide me with a table of who those individuals were and what their contact information was. This is something that it would take somebody hours, if not days, to do, I got this back in two minutes. So I do think that there are ways that AI can be used to help us navigate the policy landscape more quickly than what we have been able to do in the past, and to democratize that so that everyone has the ability now to understand these regulations, rather than just a few people at each campus. We are going to have to remain vigilant. We are going to have to make sure that we follow what is happening, particularly in Washington D.C. I will tell you that this Department of Education is very bullish on AI. They are particularly interested in finding ways that it can be used in the educational process. Having said that, they have done very little, though, in providing regulatory guidance. So, my advice is to monitor, to lean on organizations like WCET that are monitoring this for you, to not be afraid to experiment with it. And then I would say this, regardless of the technology: start small and fail, and learn from your failures, and don’t be afraid to fail. And I think that that last piece is really critical, it’s critical with any technology, but I think it’s especially critical with AI, because the only way we’re going to be able to figure out how to best leverage this is if we experiment with it, and if we experiment with it, we have to accept the fact that we’re going to fail sometimes, and we can learn from those failures. That’s scary in higher education, we’re taught not to fail in higher education, and I think that we’re going to have to shift our mindset so that we really are embracing a growth mindset, to borrow Carol Dweck’s framework, if we’re going to be able to remain agile, but also be very innovative, and leverage AI to the ability that we are able to.

Yakut: So Van has been doing this for such a long time, I don’t know if I can add anything except for a plus one to everything that he said. Maybe one thing that I can add is agility does not mean reacting to every political signal. Staying grounded in institutional values and your personal values, and then building flexible implementation strategies. So our commitment to accessible, inclusive, high quality education, and student success doesn’t change how we articulate and implement that work may shift because of what’s happening around us, and the importance of being connected to networks like WCET, UPCEA and learning from these state compacts and peer networks is extremely invaluable. There may be institutions out there without enough resources to allow their people to be connected to those networks. So maybe this is the time to urge these professional networks to be a little bit more lenient and allow, for example, I’m just making this up, I just thought of this while I was listening to Van, what would it be like if professional organizations allowed 5% of an institution’s size to be peers like gift memberships? So the institution X, a regional university, may not have the resources to become a member, but it is so important for all of us to be successful at this point in time. Maybe, you know, my institution can gift a 5% of our size to that institution, so like sister institution kind of thing. And very important to document your decision-making processes at your institution, how you’re interpreting regulations, documented, so that you have both accessibility to that information but also accountability. It protects your institution. It demonstrates good faith effort and legal counsel and government relations are your friends in this uncertain political environment, and proactive communication with them is very important.

Rebecca: In states with multiple public colleges such as the SUNY system, each campus is, to some extent, competing with other campuses in offering online degrees. What mix of cooperation and competition is optimal in such environments?

Marina: I can talk a little bit about the California Virtual Campus because the California Community Colleges are very similar to SUNY in terms of just being a big ship to steer. A lot of you know, local decisions, some centralization, and people are always, I think, generally speaking, a little bit threatened by the centralized stuff. When the California Virtual Campus first rolled out, gosh, 10 plus years ago, and we talked about course sharing, there was immediately sort of concerns around, “Are we going to be cannibalizing our enrollment?” We love the word cannibalizing, I don’t know why in education [LAUGHTER], but immediately it’s like, “oh my god, we’re going to lose enrollment. This is going to be terrible for us. The Big Brother is going to take over our curriculum and tell us what to do.” There’s all of these anxieties that come out from administrators, from faculty, from different leaders, and so I think to put that in a different perspective, has been really hard, because you’re fighting against that cultural anxiety that we have around being an independent institution. So when do you hear and when are you independent? What I’ve tried to do with the CBC and our system is to have some very honest conversations around “what exactly is your concern? Is that concern an institution centered concern, or an enrollment concern, or a funding concern, and how does that then relate to your learners?” Really shifting the conversation from, “we’re worried about how we do things to what’s the best-case scenario for our students? Do they have the options that they need? Do they have the access that we need? Are we really leveraging our collective power in a way that benefits the learners in the most compelling and powerful way?” That’s sort of the question that I’ve had to ask, and it took about 10 years [LAUGHTER] for California Community Colleges to get on board with course sharing, and now it’s a big success. We share professional development, we’re sharing financial aid, we’re sharing transcripts, things that people have held on to so closely, of like, “No, this is our school. This is our university.” And I think this idea is very outdated now, thankfully. And the future really is less institutions, especially smaller institutions, rural, under-resourced institutions trying to be everything for their students, trying to give them every class that they need for every program, and meeting every need. That’s exhausting, and what we’re finding is courses are being discontinued, faculty are, in some cases, unfortunately, losing their work, especially part-time faculty and adjunct faculty, programs are being discontinued, and in some cases, entire institutions are being shut down and absorbed by other institutions, or just not being absorbed at all. And so to avoid this, I think, unfortunate, outdated approach, we have to pull together, we have to pool our resources, and we have to put aside our institutional egos and really realize that there’s a lot of strength in our collective power and when we come together. I can give some examples later but one thing that we’re doing in the California Community Colleges, which is really exciting, is several of our rural colleges, which, again are tiny, they don’t have a lot of staff, they don’t have a lot of programs or money. They’re pulling together to create fully online associate degrees. So by themselves, they would never be able to meet all the requirements to offer those degrees online, but collectively they are, so it’s benefiting their programs, they’re able to grow their enrollment, and it’s benefiting a large swath of their students as well. So that’s the kind of thing that I think doesn’t have to be competitive, but they can actually be mutually beneficial for students and institutions.

Van: So you know, the “C” in WCET stands for cooperative. We’re the WICHE Cooperative for Educational Technology. So we take this idea of collaboration and cooperation really seriously. And I think just plus one to everything that Marina said, it’s always hard to follow Marina whenever I’m on a panel. I think that course sharing was a great example. It’s also oftentimes a really scary example for faculty, especially. What I wish that I would hear more about is the way in which institutions begin to share administrative burden. And I think that maybe, if there’s a thin end of the wedge that can maybe help an institution eventually get to that course sharing, It’s to have that conversation about, “Are there administrative functions that can be done better collectively than individually? And what are those?” And maybe the easiest thing to do to start with is an arrangement where you are jointly purchasing services. We know that folks are able to get better deals whenever they go in with multiple institutions than whenever they go in with individual institutions. At an earlier point in my career, I was in charge of online education in the state of Texas, and the legislature asked me to determine what each institution in the state of Texas was paying for its learning management system, and I learned very quickly that A) I didn’t have access to that information because there were non-disclosure agreements, and B) there were non-disclosure agreements because what institutions were paying for the same learning management system were vastly different. And so I do think that one of the things that institutions can immediately do, that isn’t scary, is to create those purchasing co-ops and to look at what administrative functions can you share. And then, by all means, move as fast as you can towards course sharing, because I think that Marina is absolutely right when we think about what is in the best interest of our learners, course sharing is oftentimes in the best interest of our learners. It gives them access to a larger number of classes, it gives them access to a larger number of opportunities to progress in their academic career and move towards that credential that they’re seeking, and it allows institutions to specialize. As a recovering historian, as much as I would love to see every institution offer a history major, the reality is every institution probably doesn’t need to offer an online history major. So think about what is it that your institution can do that is unique to you, that you can double down on and do well, and then begin to share that with other people and with other institutions. And I think that will help us greatly in terms of being able to really move towards what our learners need, rather than just what’s going to be in benefit of us. And the last thing I would say is not only think about, are there programs you can specialize in, but think about, are there student populations that you can specialize in? You know, maybe you have an institution that is particularly good working with English language learners. Not every institution is going to have that level of expertise. And so maybe think as well about, in addition to the programs that you may have some specialization in, are there learner populations that you know that you are doing a good job of meeting their needs, and you can help other institutions do that as well.

John: Institutions vary quite a bit in terms of their size, their funding, how well established online programs are. What strategies can leaders at small or resource-constrained colleges use to develop sustainable online learning practices despite often limited staffing and infrastructure, or in environments where faculty are experiencing burnout or there’s some form of organizational resistance to change?

Yakut: Well let me jump in, and I think there are quite a few parallels between this question and the previous question that was asked. 15 years ago, I was at a regional university in Texas, and in fact, I know Van from those days. In a matter of three years, this was a new institution, we rolled out 13 online programs. It was amazing. There were not a lot of resources, brand new university, faculty resources are scarce. I was a team of one. So fast forward to today. This would not be possible. One, the market is so saturated with degrees, you don’t have the competitive advantage anymore. And two, the resources are even reduced compared to 15 years ago. So in places where resource-constrained or smaller institutions, sustainability of effort comes from focus. So, not trying to do everything like, “Oh, let’s just roll out an online program for every single program that we offer,” but intently looking at the market need and connection to jobs, starting with that community where the institution exists, but a little broader too. So those small number of programs that clearly advance this mission and student access, then invest deeply in quality faculty support, instructional design, quality is by itself, a whole entire conversation, I think. And then faculty burnout. It’s real. And many times when faculty resist online, we take it personally. We don’t like it. But then it’s just exhaustion rather than real opposition. Transparent communication, realistic timelines, recognizing that this is instructional labor, this is on top of everything else that we’re asking from you, and then supporting that instructional labor in a respectful way goes a long way in helping faculty burnout. Sometimes, the most strategic move is to slow down and build that trust and capacity within the institution, because let’s face it, in institutions like that, you’re going to rely heavily on faculty time and faculty effort to design and develop those courses, compared to larger institutions where there are large teams of instructional designers or video producers that are going to do the heavy lifting for your faculty. Again, tying to the previous conversation, shared tech services, vendor collaborations, a lot of these institutions can punch above their weight and without overextending people, so that those kinds of strategies should be part of it. And finally, I want to tie this conversation to the AI conversation. Many universities have responded by signing big enterprise deals with AI companies. And they paid a lot of money for this, and they wanted to achieve equitable access for their own communities, they wanted all their students to have access, all their faculty to have access. But this results in us treating AI as a competitive advantage, where we should start seeing it as a collective challenge. So we should be forming system-wide and cross-institutional partnerships when it comes to AI deals as well. These partnerships can be between universities, between universities and community colleges, sister campuses like sister cities, so that we raise all boats and ensure equitable access for everybody. There is room for all of us to be successful, and our actions should complement that belief. And we need to bring faculty into these decisions, because the moment you announce a deal, AI deal, that will allow everybody to have access to AI, it may be interpreted as a blanket permission for unrestricted AI use in every course, which is not the case at many of our institutions. So faculty’s presence at these tables is very important.

Marina: Yeah, I just want to say amen to Yakut’s point about faculty burnout and kind of respecting the time and the expertise that they bring to the table. Our faculty also have, at many of our institutions, expressed burnout, and so anything we do is really thought around that concern. In terms of AI, if we want to foster leadership amongst the ranks of our faculty, we actually created an AI fellowship, and we selected a couple dozen AI fellows from the system to lead some really important work. And they’re being compensated with reassigned time or stipends in some cases, to do that work, in addition to some staff members, classified staff members as well, because they often, you know, occupy the gray space that we forget about, that support faculty and instruction too. So that’s very important. I think about a parallel to online learning, and actually it’s an important parallel with open educational resources. In my previous role as a dean at one of the community colleges in our state, we wanted to grow open OER, but it was the same thing. Faculty were like, “In order to change my textbook to an OER, it’s gonna take so much work and effort, and I have to change all my tests and all my prompts and all of this.” So we started giving very small stipends. I think at the time, it was like $500 for faculty to adopt OER. And I did an analysis of this over time… I wish I had AI to do that, but I had to do this [LAUGHTER] myself… but essentially, we saved students something like five million dollars within the first couple of years that it was being adopted, and we spent, I think like 200k during that same period of time. So doing the data on the return on investment for supporting faculty, it’s going to be tremendous to kind of ensure that they’re not burnt out, that they have time, and they have the space mentally to do the work that we need them to do. So that would be one key thing. And I think OER, what we’re finding, and what we found in our institution is as well, that there are higher outcomes in terms of success rates and grades in online courses when an OER is used in that course than in the same course with a physical textbook that students had to purchase. So those are kind of connected. And then just to kind of go back to course sharing, I can always count on Van to be my greatest ally with course sharing, but we have colleges that were very reluctant to get involved in course sharing, as I mentioned. When I joined the CVC four years ago, we had something like 2,000 enrollments on course sharing and 2,000 enrollments for a system of our size is not that great. We’d joke that most of it’s our staff trying to see if it works. This year we’re going to have more than 50,000 enrollments. So within four years we went from 2,000 to 50,000. I think we’re going to double and triple that in years to come, because we finally gain momentum and trust and involvement and engagement. Of those 50,000, you look at the numbers, some rural colleges are making out like bandits. They’ve gained 1000s of enrollments through course sharing, by putting their courses on our course sharing platform, and benefiting from it tremendously, and gaining enrollments that they would never be able to get from their local zip code because of their rural environment and so forth. So, it’s a win-win proposition, it doesn’t add any extra work. We let them fill their classes locally with their local registrants, meaning they’re returning students, their athletes, their disabled students, and so forth. And then any courses that are not filled, we pull them into our platform, and they’re open for anybody in the state to take. It’s a very simple formula that, again, has really netted 1000s of enrollments for these small rural colleges, brought in funding, brought in additional resources for their burnt out faculty and their staff and their infrastructure. So I think my suggestion for strategy is find those formulas that are win-win propositions. It doesn’t need to be something where one person loses, another person wins in order to get the involvement, there are ways for everybody to win, and that’s, I think, an exciting opportunity for us.

Rebecca: We always end by asking: what’s next? Start with Van?

Van: Sure. So ironically, I just finished writing a blog post for WC Frontiers on this, this morning. I don’t have a crystal ball. I do have a magic eight ball, though, if you remember those. My predecessor gifted me one to help me navigate the challenging federal policy environment. So I have my trusty magic eight ball. I think there’s six things to look for in 2026. I think the first thing is we need to remember that the connection to workforce education is everyone’s responsibility. It’s not just a few faculty members’ responsibility. This is particularly important with the move to Workforce Pell, but it’s important as we see a workforce increasingly asking for graduates that are AI literate. And I think that AI literacies is everyone’s responsibility. Two is AI literacies. I think that we need to desperately change the narrative from just focusing on academic integrity to beginning to focus on AI literacies and you’ll notice that I use the plural there, because I don’t think it’s black and white. I don’t think it’s you know or not know. I think that it’s a spectrum of issues that faculty and students and staff need to have mastery of. Three, and this really ties to what Marina was just talking about, we need to get creative economically. Like I said, I’m a historian by training. That means that I tend to run towards the pessimistic side, because I know just how bad things can get sometimes, and I am afraid that we’re looking at a very challenging economic environment on the federal level, and that’s going to trickle down to the state level, especially for our public institutions. So I do think that we’re going to have to get creative economically. We’re going to have to do things like think about course sharing, like thinking about purchasing consortiums, changing our business model in higher education and in digital learning. I think that that means that one way that we can do that is to lean into those post-traditional learners. There are 43.1 million Americans who started college and did not get a credential. That is a travesty. We should not have 43.1 million people that stopped out. That tells me that, first of all, we’re not doing right by those folks, but it also means that there are 43.1 million people that we can get back into higher education if we try, and we won’t get all of them back. But we need to think about how do we offer programs that attract those adult learners and keep them. What did we do wrong the first time around to make them stop out? It’s not all an institution’s fault. Adult learners have a number of challenges that they’re juggling, but are there ways that we can attract them back into our classes, and that we can make sure that we provide them with the supports that they need in order to stay and be successful? I don’t think we can lose sight on accessibility in 2026. It is not just the right thing to do ethically, it’s going to be the right thing to do legally, with the Title II regulations that go into effect at the end of April. And the upshot of those five things is that digital learning is going to be more important than it has ever been before. And that means that your job as digital learning leaders, your role on your campus, your role in the SUNY system, is going to be more critical than it has ever been before. And so I think that that’s what we have to look forward to and the upshot of it is that, at the end of the day, what you do as a digital learning leader matters and is going to be more important than it has ever been before, more important than it even probably was during the COVID-19 pandemic. So that’s what the magic eight ball over in my WCET office says.

Yakut: Now, how do I follow this? I mean, you covered everything, Van. I was actually going to start with the same sentiment, online education sits at the center of all the challenges higher education is facing, and the work ahead of us is to leverage its pedagogical power, its ability to expand access to affordability, and its ability to amplify our institutions’ impact. You covered a lot of things. There is one thing that I would like to just append to what you said. I want to point out that we in higher education often forget that we are not just educators. We’re also employers. In many cases, we are one of the largest employers in our communities. And many campuses, many of our institutions still lack a coherent AI upskilling plan for our own workforce. We have tons of projects facing transfer efficiency across our institutions, productivity, but then we don’t really have, in many cases, a plan to help our own people adapt. A Brookings Report from, now, a year and a half ago, estimated 19 million US jobs that are significantly affected by AI. And many of those roles exist right on our campuses. Many of our employees hold jobs at risk of automation, such as legal analysis, paralegal, administrative assistance, accounting, communications, we just talked about instructional design and production. These job categories are, drumroll, they are populated by women. You know, we identify these areas of risk, but we don’t really come up, at least in higher education, strategies to address those. We must understand that there is a differential impact of AI on our workforce. These jobs that I listed are stable middle class professions. They are pathways for upward mobility for a lot of families. So we have to ask this year and beyond, what happens to our societies when women or any subgroup begin to disappear from the workforce as a result of AI, and what are we doing to stop that from happening? Thank you.

Marina: It’s unfair to go after Yakut and Van, but I just want to really say I appreciate that Yakut points to our own employees and our own communities, and starting at home, I think that’s something that’s an important reminder for me myself. If I could just leave with three additional things to summarize some of our conversations from today, I would say, you know, number one is a reckoning when it comes to AI in higher ed. There is a reckoning for specifically, as I mentioned, asynchronous fully online courses, and how we’re going to manage that, and the long game of changing the way we teach and the way we assess our students and the use of outcomes in our courses. So I think this is going to be the next big thing for us to tackle. The second and this is something Van has spoken to about extensively, is a move toward thoughtfully shared resources. In our system, we pay for the common LMS. We pay for and negotiate common ed tech vendor contract tracks as well, course sharing, as I mentioned. So there’s going to be more and more a move toward this, especially in light of federal funding issues that colleges are experiencing. And the final piece of it that’s actually really near and dear to me, is a revisiting of old norms and ways of doing things. The way we handle our transcripts, for example, is… I’ve spoken about this in other venues… highly inequitable. The way we handle our financial aid, that can be very hit or miss depending on what institution a student goes to. The way students have access to courses, our levels of accessibility, the way we gather analytics and research, which I think AI will dramatically transform. Institutional research is going to greatly change in the next couple of years. I think these are going to be really exciting “what’s next” as well for higher ed.

Rebecca: Well, thank you so much for joining us. We appreciated the conversation and the many things to be thinking about as we trudge down 2026.

John: Yes, thank you.

Yakut: Thank you for having us.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

John: Editing Assistance provided by Madison Lee.

[MUSIC]

434. TUnE Bio

Posted in engagement, equity, feedback, first-generation students, higher education, inclusion, learning, motivation, pedagogy, STEM education, teaching
February 25, 2026

Students planning to major in STEM fields, especially students from groups historically underrepresented in these fields, are often deterred by their experiences in introductory courses. In this episode, Sarah Rose Cavanagh joins us to discuss an NSF-funded initiative designed to enhance student success in introductory Biology classes.

Sarah is a psychologist and the author of four books related to teaching and learning. She is the senior associate director for teaching and learning and associate professor of practice at Simmons University and also is a regular contributor to The Chronicle and many other publications. Sarah often serves as a keynote speaker and we were very fortunate to have her join us for a keynote address at a recent Academic Affairs Retreat on our  campus.

Show Notes

Transcript

John: Students planning to major in STEM fields, especially students from groups historically underrepresented in these fields, are often deterred by their experiences in introductory courses. In this episode, we explore an NSF-funded initiative designed to enhance student success in introductory Biology classes.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

John: Our guest today is Sarah Rose Cavanagh. Sarah is a psychologist and the author of four books related to teaching and learning. She is the senior associate director for teaching and learning and associate professor of practice at Simmons University and also is a regular contributor to The Chronicle and many other publications. Sarah often serves as a keynote speaker and we were very fortunate to have her join us for a keynote address at a recent Academic Affairs Retreat on our campus. We’re also looking forward to her upcoming keynote address at the SUNY Conference on Instruction and Technology later this year in May. Welcome back, Sarah.

Sarah: Thanks for having me.

Rebecca: Today’s teas are:… Sarah, are you drinking tea with us today?

Sarah: Ah… I never am. I actually have a confession. I’m actually drinking a Celsius energy drink. [LAUGHTER] I’ve graduated from even coffee, but I only do this. I’m like, I don’t know if you’ve seen this, but Zoran Mamdani, he has a Red Bull once a week, and so, like Mamdani, I have a Celsius once a week. Gives me a real boost.

Rebecca: Right now is the time. We’re catching you at this moment this week?

Sarah: Well, yes, and we also ran out of coffee filters, so… [LAUGHTER]

Rebecca: That’ll do it. How about you, John?

John: I am drinking an Irish Breakfast tea today.

Rebecca: Oh, seems to be like a new favorite, John.

John: Actually, it’s because we’re snowed in and most of my other teas are up at the office.

Rebecca: I have an English afternoon today.

Sarah: What time of day is it? This seems to be a conflict. One of you is doing breakfast? One of you is afternoon.

John: It is afternoon, isn’t it?

Rebecca: yeah, I don’t know. Yesterday we recorded at 5pm and we both had breakfast teas, so… [LAUGHTER]

John: We did.

Rebecca: It might just be an indicator of how much caffeine we needed at a given time. [LAUGHTER]

Sarah: Gotcha.

John: We’ve invited you here today to discuss the TUnE-Bio project, an NSF-funded academic initiative, for which you are a principal investigator and network leader. Can you give our listeners an overview of this project?

Sarah: Sure. So the focus of the project’s right in our title. So it’s Transforming Learning and Equity in Undergraduate Biology Education by Cultivating an Ecosystem of Feedback, which is a big mouthful, so we call it TUnE-Bio. So we’re tuning biology education. And the focus of the project is really on tackling the problem of high attrition and weed out in undergraduate biology education, and by extension, STEM fields in general, the fact that so many students come to the study of biology and the study of STEM fields in general and want to be doctors and surgeons and scientists, and then they encounter difficulties in their introductory courses and leave for other majors. There’s something that is known as the STEM grading penalty, which is when students get really low course grades in STEM courses, but then they get high grades in their other courses, then that in particular seems to kind of lure them out of the field. And we want to change that, in general, because we need more scientists and we need more nurses and surgeons, but we also want to change that, because there’s also a lot of inequities in terms of who is weeded out, and disproportionately women, students of various races and ethnicities, first-generation status. All these things tend to increase the chances that you will leave STEM fields, and we want a really educated, diverse STEM workforce, and so we’re really trying to do something about that by improving pedagogy.

Rebecca: Sounds like a good initiative… [LAUGHTER]

Sarah: We think so.

Rebecca: …right up our alley around here, right? [LAUGHTER]

Rebecca: At the beginning of the project, you first gathered information on the current landscape of biology education using surveys and focus groups. Can you tell us a little bit about the process of data collection?

Sarah: Yeah, sure. So we started this grant with what’s called an incubator. So NSF has two versions of this particular mechanism, and the incubator is meant to, just like it sounds, to give you a little bit of money to start building a network, start showing the NSF that you can do what you are promising to do. And then we got a full version of the grant a few years later. So this really goes all the way back to, I think, 2020, and we were unsuccessful a few times before we were successful. [LAUGHTER] So it actually goes back to more like 2018, I think, but we got the incubator grant, and one of the things reviewers said to us is, all right, you’re saying you want to innovate in pedagogy in biology, but before you can innovate, don’t you need to know the current state of play, like, what are people doing in their classrooms currently, before you start asking them to do something different, like, maybe they’re already innovating. So we took that charge, and in the incubator year or two, we did a really large survey of people who were teaching introductory biology, all sorts of different institutions all over the country, about 300 of them, and then did qualitative interviews of 27, I think, of them… took a deeper dive. And we’re really asking people about their practices and philosophies in teaching intro bio. What were they doing in terms of assessment, in terms of feedback, in terms of grading? We asked about what they perceived as barriers to innovation. In the early phases, we’re a little more focused on alternative grading. And so we asked a lot of questions about: had they heard of it? had they tried it? Questions about that. And so that was our attempt to figure out the landscape before we started innovating with the full proposal.

John: And what did the data collection tell you about the landscape?

Sarah: Well, first, I have to say that I do think we got a bit of an unusual sample. It’s always the case in research, because we tried to keep the survey under 15 minutes. But still, who has 15 minutes to do something completely optional, and then the people who spoke with us in the qualitative interview study, that was a significant investment of time. And so I do think we got a sample of people who were really interested in pedagogy already, but, that said, we saw a lot of innovation already. So the old school model of two exams and a final in intro courses, we really didn’t see a lot of that. People were using a lot of quizzes, a lot of clickers. They were really thinking deeply, especially in the interviews. They had thought deeply about equity. A lot of the folks we talked to, they really felt the pull of doing more like differentiated instruction and really changing their pedagogy, student by student. And had a lot of frustrations with not being able to find the time to really do that better. And we also asked about barriers to innovation. And shockingly, the top three barriers were time, time, and time, I think the top was no time to implement. The second was the perception that some of these innovations would take more time. And then the third was no time to even like, figure it out, do the reading, restructure the course ahead of time, do those things. So we saw a lot of innovation, but a lot of desire for more, I think.

Rebecca: So that kind of sets the ground for the pedagogical side of the landscape. Can you go into a little bit more detail about attrition rates and the equity gaps that the project is meant to overcome?

Sarah: Yeah, sure. So a pretty significant number of students leave early STEM education for other majors, and it does seem like investigations that have probed the why of that and the motivation has really found it tying to these early low grades in these introductory courses, and I think, in particular, students who are drawn to health sciences, just the way everything set up in secondary education, tend to be students who are quite used to getting high grades, [LAUGHTER] and so having this experience of just getting As and As and As and then you hit college, and you take Intro bio, and then all of a sudden you have a C for the first time in your life. And that being very alarming. There’s also, and certainly we heard this in the survey and the interviews, in terms of the equity, something that people really thought a lot about and felt very deeply about, was the fact that, especially courses that are introductory courses, like intro bio, students would be coming to them with very different backgrounds. Some students had taken AP Bio with a tutor and all these extra meetings and already knew half the material that they were going to be taught. And other students from lower-resourced high schools did not have that experience, and faculty really struggled with that. Starting out from the gate, these students were on paths to differential outcomes, and then that would shape whether they stayed with the STEM study or not. And none of them had really easy solutions, and one of our goals in going forward is trying to give faculty tools to improve pedagogy in ways that equitize that landscape a little bit more. I mean, that basic problem is still always going to be there. It’s a societal structural problem. But if we can nudge faculty to improve how much feedback they’re giving, how motivational that feedback is, how timely it is, all of these things that maybe we can bring those students on those two paths a little closer together.

John: This issue of disparate gender outcomes in STEM fields is something we addressed a little bit on an earlier podcast with Peter Arcidiacono. This seems to be common in many disciplines, so addressing these issues, I think, could be really helpful. And one of the things that really impressed me was looking at the people in the network, or the people who are involved in this program. I’m not a biologist, but I recognize an awful lot of the names there. How was the TUnE-Bio network assembled?

Sarah: Dialing it back to those incubator years, and before our unsuccessful to successful outcomes, originally, Jim Lang and I were co-PIs, so we were both still at Assumption, and were both in the same center, and so we were working together on this, and I was actually really new to the field of teaching and learning, and didn’t know a lot of people. I started out as a psychology, emotion science, person, and only in the last 8 to 10 years moved into teaching and learning. So a lot of them Jim recommended, and then it was like a snowball. So we recommended them and some of those people said, “No, but have you thought about asking this person?” And so we kind of snowballed out, and we had our steering committee, we asked them for recommendations, and they went out from that. And then Jim retired. Then that’s when Michele Lemons my co PI who is a neuroscientist, biologist at Assumption, that’s when she joined. Jim’s still on our steering committee, but now Michele and I are co-PIs on the full proposal, and then we did a big webinar, we did a big launch meeting, and we just actively recruited. So it’s really kind of a snowball method. Also, Bryan Dewsbury is on our steering committee, and he has a beautiful essay, I think, called the soul of my pedagogy in Scientific American, and I had read that, and I was like, “Let’s invite that guy,” [LAUGHTER] and Jim was like, “Great suggestion.”

Rebecca: It’s always fun to see all of those folks assembled in the same place, virtually or otherwise. [LAUGHTER] How does this project connect to the concept of compassionate challenge that you focused on in Mind over Monsters?

Sarah: Well, since we’re focused on feedback, and I think we’ll talk about that in a little bit more, I see feedback at the heart of compassionate challenge. So my framing of compassionate challenge is that students, to be motivated and to learn effectively, they need both compassion and challenge, kind of that false dichotomy that we get into and dueling Chronicle op eds between like, “oh academic rigor” and “oh student focusedness.” Like we need all of it. And I think that we respond best and are motivated when we both are in a place where we feel psychological safety and where we feel understood and seen as people, but then where we also are challenged to rise to expectations. And feedback, I think, is just so critical for student learning, because what feedback is, is you’re giving students information about “okay, where are you at in your current learning journey, and where could you go, and how can you get there?” In that way, it’s stretching them saying, like, “Great job at the learning so far, but here’s all the other places we could go.” [LAUGHTER] But then we’re really focused in the project, on how can we give better feedback, and better feedback being compassionate, growth mindset, motivational, offered in time that they can use it, including more revisions of work, so that there’s a reason for them to read the feedback. If they assess them on a learning outcome, you give them feedback on how they did, and then they’re never assessed on that learning outcome again, I wouldn’t read that feedback. [LAUGHTER] And so I think feedback is really at the heart of compassionate challenge.

John: So right now, it sounds like much of the work of the group is done in working groups, and you have five working groups which are focused around different ways of providing that feedback. Could you talk a little bit about some of the work of these working groups?

Sarah: Absolutely, in the grant, what we’re doing currently is we’re developing tool kits, so we want to give faculty really practical ways that they could improve their feedback. And one of the other aspects of the grant is that it intentionally puts in the same room, often the same Zoom room, that we are gathering in person this May, educational developers and people from the scholarship of teaching and learning, and then biologists. And so we’re putting these minds together so that the biologists can provide the context of teaching biology, and then educational developers can provide the scholarship on teaching and learning. And we want to put them all together in a room, develop these toolkits that will help biology faculty teach in ways that improve feedback. And so one of the first things we did is we assembled these toolkit working groups, as you’re referencing John, and we just today decided to call them twigs. We keep saying T, W, G, and that’s very difficult to say out loud. And then we were on a meeting with one of our steering committee members, Linda Fergusson-Kolmes, and she was like, I keep wanting to call it twig. And I was like, “Let’s do it. Let’s do it.” So these twigs, [LAUGHTER] these each have co-leaders, and then they have members who are also amazing folks, and they’re focused on five different themes. So those themes are, first, how do we get students motivated to actually use feedback and actually read it? Because there’s some data that suggests that, especially when feedback is paired with a poor grade, students won’t even read it. So one group is developing tools to help faculty motivate students to uptake and use that feedback. Another is focused on peer feedback. Some of the tools in that toolkit will relate to LAs, learning assistants and teaching assistants, but then also ways that you can provide peer feedback in class. So motivation, peer feedback. One group’s all focused on classroom assessment techniques like clicker questions and other ways to quickly assess and get feedback on student learning. One of the groups is developing a toolkit on the seven principles of good feedback, asset-based feedback. And then finally, my favorite topic in the world, but we have some lovely volunteers who are willing to go there, AI. [LAUGHTER] if we’re doing something on feedback, they have a challenge ahead of them.

John: I don’t think we’ve had a podcast in the last couple of years that have not at least mentioned AI in some way.

Rebecca: This was yours, Sarah. [LAUGHTER] Now you can move on. [LAUGHTER]

Sarah: Yes, we’re done. Check the box. Check the box.

Rebecca: One of the things that we often hear is like feedback and grading are intermingled or tangled up together. Can you talk a little bit about decoupling of the two?

Sarah: Yeah, sure. We definitely saw this, especially in the qualitative interview. We tried to ask faculty separately about assessment, feedback, and grading, and we defined those for them ahead of time and in the process of the interview. And we defined feedback as information that’s given to students about the current state of learning or their performance on the assessment, other than grading. And then we wanted grading to be grading. Faculty found that very difficult to respond to those three things separately, because they’re all so integrated, and grading is one form of feedback, of course. We really tried to get them to focus more on things like written feedback on short-answer questions, and we have a subcommittee working on the qualitative interview coding. That’s Brian Dewsbury and Lindsay Wheeler and Michele and I, and we have a conceptual model of feedback that we’re building, and we really are thinking of feedback even as things like body language in response to students’ questions, like really expansively about feedback. And I think that the more we can decouple feedback from grading the better. And there’s actually studies showing that if you give feedback before you give the grade, if you like, kind of withhold the grade and you give the feedback, students are more likely to use it and implement it, because I think that the emotional power of the grade just blows everything else out.

Rebecca: As in, like the grade feels too final?

Sarah: Yeah, and if the grade is lower than you expected or desired, especially if it’s significantly lower, I think a lot of students get very anxious, and it can be very difficult to think really logically when your body’s all kind of in a disarray.

John: For many years, when I gave back exams, the students who did well would sit there and they’d be really happy and really not focused that much on going over it and answering questions, and the students that did badly just look kind of unhappy and just kind of set their scowling, which is one of the reasons why I switched to two-stage exams, where they took it first individually, and then it was such a different experience. I remember the time I took a short video clip of the students in the second stage, and I shared it with Rebecca, because it was just so impressive to see them actively discussing things and working through it, because it was so different than earlier experiences going over exams in class.

Sarah: Yeah, I love two stage exams.

John: And I’m reinstituting them after moving away during COVID [LAUGHTER] in one of the classes that I’m teaching. I’m looking forward to that again. You mentioned before that one of the main barriers that faculty face in trying to implement things was time, and certainly that’s a major factor. But are those the only barriers that faculty face when they try to change their teaching techniques, especially if they’re younger faculty, junior faculty in departments which may not all be using these types of techniques.

Sarah: Right off the bat, you identified one of the major ones that we heard is, does your department support innovation, and is there that support? And another thing that came up a lot, and I see this a lot across all my work in different institutions, is students [LAUGHTER] often resist innovations. And I think health science students tend to be disproportionately this type of student who is used to a certain level of grades and a certain level of positive feedback from their secondary education, and then they hit college and they want to do that same thing. And this has always worked for them, you know, these big exams, memorizing stuff, putting out the answer, like that’s worked for them in the past. And so I find when I’m working with faculty who are innovating, especially in the arena of grading, they get the most resistance from the students, who probably are going to get an A at the end of the day, because of that resistance. But those two things can combine, and I saw this at my previous institution, in the biology department actually, and there were some faculty who were really doing innovative stuff, both with grading, but also with active learning and kind of flipped classroom sorts of things. But then most of the department was not doing that, and they experienced more student resistance, I think, because they were in this setting where students would have that reassuring kind of traditional experience in other faculty at that institution, and then they would hit this one course with all this innovation and dislike it more than if more the department were innovating. So that’s another big one. There’s also, and I think this was in your question as well, but precarity of position, and that was one thing that we asked about on the survey so that we could contextualize the responses. Contract faculty and pre-tenure faculty, sometimes they innovate somehow, and it goes not so well, and then they really get burned on their course evaluations at the end of the semester, that that could put their livelihood at risk or their tenure trajectory. So that’s another big barrier, time, time, time, departments, really large classes, that it being difficult to increase the amount of feedback you’re giving students, especially things like written feedback or in person, audio feedback. If you have 500 students, that’s very difficult. So large class sizes.

Rebecca: One of the innovations you mentioned at the top was about alternative grading practices. And given that low grades are discouraging, and certainly one of the barriers for students succeeding in STEM fields, how does alternative grading sit with some of the recommendations coming out of your network?

Sarah: Interestingly, we were more focused on alternative grading in the early stages of the grant, we actually thought that was going to be a major focus of the grant, so the incubator was not honed in on feedback. It was more broadly assessment, feedback, and grading, and we asked all those questions about alternative grading. We moved toward feedback for a couple of different reasons, one being our sense that there was already amazing work being done on alternative grading by other networks and other authors, an entire ungrading conference, and feeling like that need was already being filled a little bit in the world of teaching and learning. But then also, we observed two things in the surveys and the interviews. One of the questions we asked is, How aware of these alternative grading methods? And then we asked about a bunch of critiques of traditional grading, and the extent to which people agreed or disagreed with them, and whether they had tried them, if they hadn’t tried them, why? And there were a lot of folks kind of innovating at the margins. So they weren’t going full ungrading, but they were including pieces of that, and there was some resistance to it. We heard from some people that they were not interested in it because of a variety of reasons, and so we didn’t see as high interest as we might have expected on alternative grading. But then we also saw that people were most dissatisfied with their feedback practices. So when we asked people to rate how satisfied they were with their current assessment feedback and grading practices, we saw overall, a fair degree of satisfaction, but much lower for feedback, significantly lower than for assessment or grading. And this came up on the interviews as well, that we heard a lot of dissatisfaction. People would often wince, [LAUGHTER] when we’re like, “What about your feedback? How satisfied are you with how often and the types of feedback you give?” And they would be like, “Oh, I should do better.” [LAUGHTER] So we saw that, both on the survey and the interviews, with such a high degree of interest in improving feedback compared to assessment and grading. And then also, we felt like all the alternative grading folks were already doing a great job working on that, and we thought we could maybe contribute more and have more of a novel contribution if we honed in on feedback instead.

John: So this project has been going on for quite a while now. What are the next stages?

Sarah: The next stage is very exciting. So the twigs, the toolkit working groups with the five focuses, have been working really hard, and we’re so grateful to them developing a draft of their toolkits. And then in May, we’re going to gather at Simmons University in Boston, although it’s going to be a hybrid meeting. So some folks will be joining virtually, but a lot of us will be in person, and the toolkit working groups are going to present their toolkits to the rest of the network, so not just people on twigs and the steering committee, but also people involved in the network more generally, and we’re going to give them, wait for it, feedback, [LAUGHTER] feedback on their toolkits, and then they will have a whole another year to refine the toolkits based on the network’s feedback on the toolkits, what people would see is useful to include or ways they could shape or tune the toolkits. And then there’s a last stage of the grant. The last two years of the grant is actually, and this is one of the reasons why I’m really happy to be talking with you today, maybe it can spark some interest out there. We also are going to offer some money from the grant to form regional hubs to apply for some funding to use the toolkits in local events. And so we imagine maybe there’d be like New England, Midwest, West Coast, and a couple different institutions can gather together. There’s a few stipulations. There has to be at least one community college or minority-serving institution involved from a non-deficit framework. There has to be multiple institutions interested, someone willing to host, but they can apply for these kind of vouchers to use, to bring in a speaker, or pay for some food or something in these regional events, to use some part of the toolkit in an event regionally.

Rebecca: It’s an exciting new development.

Sarah: Yeah. I like the idea of it. You just give people money to improve pedagogy and gather together. It’s like rare. [LAUGHTER]

Rebecca: It’s a nice luxury. [LAUGHTER]

Sarah: Yeah.

Rebecca: Weeding out is not just a biology thing. [LAUGHTER] It’s common in a lot of different STEM departments. Do you see that the recommendations from the TUnE-Bio project to be applied and expand maybe to these other disciplines as well?

Sarah: Absolutely, and we know it’s not just STEM but certainly feedbacks everybody. And we’re focused on undergraduate biology because that’s what the money’s for, [LAUGHTER] but a lot of us have at the heart, we just want to improve pedagogy across the board, and a lot of the toolkits, as they’re being developed, because we’ve been meeting with the twig co-chairs regularly… I think the classroom assessment technique twig is a little more biology focused. I think they’re developing actual biology modules that people can use in intro bio, but a lot of the other ones, certainly the seven principles of asset-based feedback and how to get students be motivated to implement feedback are not going to be biology specific, and are going to be useful to anyone teaching anything, I think. And the toolkits will be distributed through the regional hubs, but they’re also going to be just downloadable. We’re going to put them on our Qubes site. Qubes is a open website run by the NSF, and we have a membership. So all of these toolkits, people and teaching centers can download a workshop in a box. People who are teaching in their individual class can download the peer feedback, how to train students to give better peer feedback, so they’ll be widely open to everyone, and a lot of them are not going to be biology specific or stem specific.

John: When we were talking about the AI groups, you didn’t seem quite as enthused about the AI twig. Could you talk a little bit about some of your concerns about the increasing reliance on AI in higher ed?

Sarah: Yeah, we could have a whole thing about AI. I don’t want to have a whole [LAUGHTER] conversation about AI, but Pooja Agarwal, I don’t know if you know her, she does retrieval practice, is a widely known speaker in higher ed, but we had a bunch of meetings. We were going to do an edited collection called F-A-I, and it was all going to be just critical AI. So I’m not a fan of AI. I do think there are roles for AI in feedback, in particular, and I’m not completely resistant to that. And I think that if a student were studying alone in their dorm anyway, but there was some kind of responsive tutoring type of program that instead of doing flash cards or just underlining their notes again, they had this experience that was differentiated to them and where they were at in their learning journey, that could be very effective. My concern is that we’re going to instead replace not the studying alone in the dorm with AI, but a student coming to office hours and sitting across from an instructor and having this one-on-one conversation and developing a relationship and, oh, you just happen to also talk about an internship that the student could apply to, or students working together in small groups and giving each other feedback. So if AI is like, on top of all the other stuff we’re doing, like, I think it could be powerful and interesting.

John: Those are really good points. On the other hand, just to bring up one counter argument, we do know that first-generation students and students from historically minoritized groups are less likely to go to office hours and ask questions, and also maybe less likely to ask questions in class because of imposter syndrome or some concern that they don’t want to reveal that they don’t understand something. If they have a Socratic tutor, which is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, they can ask it anything without fear of embarrassment, which may help them build up more confidence, so that they can then approach the instructor with questions, without being as concerned about not being able to phrase things well or revealing that they don’t understand things.

Sarah: That is a good counter argument. I would still go with the additive one, though, like, okay, let’s make that available to them, but let’s not stop all of the efforts that we do to try to draw them into office hours and into the work, into the relationships in the class, as long as we don’t, then be like, “Oh, it’s fine. I don’t have to do any of that inclusive teaching stuff anymore, because we have this chatbot,” additive, not subtractive, um hmm. [LAUGHTER]

John: And a great reference on some ways of creating a safer environment for students, a more comfortable environment where they feel more comfortable talking to their instructors is this book, I think, Mind Over Monsters is the title. [LAUGHTER]

Sarah: I may have heard of that one.

Rebecca: So we always wrap up by asking: “What’s next?”

Sarah: For the grant, the May meeting. This is definitely for me and my co-PI, Michele Lemons, and a lot of my steering committee and the twig co-leaders. This is going to be an intense four months I guess, now. So that’s the big thing, meeting together. I’m hoping it’s also gonna be really fun. I think that the network’s supposed to be a network, and I want everyone to feel like they belong to this, like community. But so far, you know, the twigs have been working kind of on their own, and the subcommittees of the steering committee. And I’m really looking forward to having everyone working together and playing together a little bit in the evenings, probably. So that’s what’s next for the grant. In terms of what’s next for me, I just signed a new book contract.

Rebecca: That’s exciting.

Sarah: So it’s called Where are all the Happy People? So it’s a psychology book, not a teaching book, and it’s about the fact that no one is happy, and how can we be happier? And so I go to different spots to try to find happy people and then build a model of happiness. So some of those spots are the nunnery. So I interviewed some nuns. Nude beaches is another. The college classroom, actually is one, and I interview Bryan Dewsbury for that. Burning Man is another. So I’m Lithuanian in part and there’s a burgeoning pagan revival there. So I’m hoping to get over to Lithuania with my sib kid who has been learning Lithuanian.

John: A somewhat different sort of research. That sounds like it could be a lot of fun.

Sarah: I’m hoping so. I just wanted to spend the next three years thinking about happiness.

John: Happiness has been a little sparse for academics, especially for the last year.

Rebecca: Well, I hope we find out where all the happy people are, and we can join them.

Sarah: Meet at a nude beach. [LAUGHTER]

John: It is 15 degrees right here today…

Sarah: Yeah. [LAUGHTER] maybe not. [LAUGHTER]

John: …or that’s the projected high later today. It would have to be one of those polar bear ones.

Sarah: Mmm, doesn’t sound safe.

Rebecca: …or happy. [LAUGHTER]

Sarah: No. Safe or happy. Shall be tucked in around a fireplace about now, I think.

John: Well, thank you. This is a wonderful project, and we’re looking forward to seeing those final toolkits. And I’m wondering if maybe there might be some TUnE math and some TUnE chemistry and TUnE economics and other projects in the future coming out of this.

Rebecca: Perhaps we’ll just tune the academy.

John: That would be much better.

Sarah: Oh, thank you both so much.

Rebecca: It’s always a pleasure.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

John: Editing Assistance provided by Fred Llerena.

[MUSIC]

433. Academic Freedom

Posted in classroom community, higher education, instructional communication
February 18, 2026

Academic freedom in the U.S. is increasingly under attack. In this episode, Kent Kauffman joins us to discuss the legal and contractual origins of, current threats to, and the social benefits resulting from maintaining academic freedom. Kent is an Associate Professor of Business Law and MBA Programs Faculty Liaison in the Department of Economics and Finance at Purdue University. He is also the author of Navigating Choppy Waters: Key Legal Issues College Faculty Need to Know.

Show Notes

Transcript

Rebecca: Academic freedom in the U.S. is increasingly under attack. In this episode, we discuss the legal and contractual origins of, current threats to, and the social benefits resulting from maintaining academic freedom.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

Rebecca: Our guest today is Kent Kauffman, an Associate Professor of Business Law and MBA Programs Faculty Liaison in the Department of Economics and Finance at Purdue University. He is also the author of Navigating Choppy Waters: Key Legal Issues College Faculty Need to Know. Welcome back, Kent.

Kent: Thank you for having me back. It was great to be with you last year, and I’m honored to be back on your podcast again.

John: Today’s teas are:… Kent, are you drinking any tea?

Kent: I’m a little bit late to the party so you can make fun of me, but I have recently started drinking matcha tea.

Rebecca: Hey, I’m happy that you’re drinking tea on the Tea for Teaching podcast, we get a lot of coffee, you know. [LAUGHTER]

Kent: I didn’t know if I was allowed to say that I do drink iced tea every night for dinner. But I didn’t know if iced tea counted as tea for teaching. So I have been drinking matcha tea, and so I think that is legitimate, right? I can freely say that on this [LAUGHTER] podcast?

Rebecca: You could say iced tea too. We’re not discriminatory around here. We just give coffee drinkers a hard time.

Kent: I am a coffee drinker. I do like the matcha tea, though, I have to say, but I sometimes feel like maybe I’ve fallen after mowing my yard in the summer, so it’s getting me ready for the summer, which is at least encouraging in the winter. But I will say that I am enjoying it.

Rebecca: That’s great. I have a Scottish Breakfast tea today, John, despite the fact that this is the end of the day and not the beginning.

John: And I also have an Irish Breakfast tea today. So it’s the same for me.

Rebecca: … clearly the first week of classes that we’re recording. [LAUGHTER]

John: I’ve already had a lot of caffeine today because it’s going to be a long day.

Rebecca: So Ken, we’ve invited you here today to discuss academic freedom and the currently polarized political environment. We talked a bit about this in our earlier podcast with you, and we’re hoping to explore it a little bit further. To start the discussion, can you remind us of the legal basis of the concept of academic freedom?

Kent: Sure, I would say there’s three sources of academic freedom, and the first one isn’t so much a legal source, but it sort of is an underpinning for the legal sources, and that’s the tradition of academic freedom. There is a long standing tradition of academic freedom, and you can source it back to, I would say, enlightenment era French and German universities that granted rights to faculty to research and teach in ways that didn’t have to meet the approval of the leaders of the dominant religions in those countries. Of course, Nazism killed academic freedom during that time. In America, though, now I would say that second source of freedom, beyond the tradition that America has of academic freedom, is a contractual basis of academic freedom, and that’s when employment contracts for faculty or policy statements related to faculty on teaching and research activities endorse that faculty have academic freedom in their work. To me, it’s interesting that many employment based promises of academic freedom borrow the language of the American Association of University Professors, the AAUP, which we kind of source back to the American tradition, at least the early 20th century tradition, of academic freedom as well. And so the AAUP is a source for both academic freedom and then tenure as well. Then there is, for public university professors and instructors, the First Amendment source of academic freedom, and that applies again to public university faculty only, because since public university faculty are employees of the State, then the Bill of Rights and the Constitution applies to them when state law interferes with their rights. And so you can say that there’s a First Amendment right of academic freedom that all public university faculties have, which I would source to court cases on that. And the most important ones are out of the McCarthy era of the 1950s and then into the 1960s so for instance, the Supreme Court said this about academic freedom in a 1967 case, Keyishian versus Board of Regents, which is where the faculty at the State University of New York at Buffalo were fired, some of them, for refusing to sign documents swearing that they weren’t members of the Communist Party. So here’s what the court said about academic freedom, and I could just read a short quote, the Court said in the majority opinion, “Our nation is deeply committed to safeguarding academic freedom, which is of transcendent value to all of us, and not merely to the teacher’s concern. That freedom is therefore a special concern of the First Amendment, which does not tolerate laws that cast a pall of orthodoxy over the classroom.” End quote. And beyond that, academic freedom from wherever it is sourced and how far it extends, it includes what is known as extramural speech, which is when faculty speak on matters of what’s called a public concern. A public concern is a matter that affects the community, and so faculty have academic freedom that concerns extramural speech outside their class and outside their traditional work settings.

John: So, this last point you made refers to public faculty. Do tenured faculty at private institutions still maintain some rights to academic freedom.

Kent: Tenured faculty at private institutions maintain academic freedom in the same way that any faculty member at that institution could have academic freedom. Generally speaking, academic freedom doesn’t have layers of protection for those who aren’t tenured or who are tenured. It applies to everyone, whether you are a first-time part-time instructor teaching in a community college, or you’re a full professor at a tenure-track public institution or an Ivy League institution, or any other non-Ivy League private institution. But the source for academic freedom, particularly for those who are tenured, relates to either what is granted in their tenure policies or what is granted in binding employment policy or handbook policy. And I say binding only because there are some cases where faculty who have been… particularly tenured faculty… who have been disciplined or fired argue that handbook policy prohibited what was done to them. And courts have noted that the response argument by the university was, “If you notice, the preamble to our handbook policy says this doesn’t apply as binding policy on the university.” So the question about policy and its grant of academic freedom to private college faculty is, “D the policy have a binding effect on the university?” And that’s an important thing to think about. One way to notice that is if a person wants to look at their handbook online or any policy related to their behavior as faculty, check at the beginning if there’s any waiver-like language that discounts its applicability on the university, [LAUGHTER] even though it has applicability on the faculty member. And as it concerns private colleges, if I could make one additional point about religious institutions, because religious universities and colleges are protected by a separate part of the First Amendment that private faculty are not protected by, and that is the freedom of religion aspect of that clause of the First Amendment. And so religious institutions can restrict academic freedom, even on tenured faculty, but all faculty, on the grounds that restriction is part of their theological rights to enforce their dogma on their employees. And so a faculty member at a religious institution is likely to have less academic freedom than at a secular private institution. There is an exception that goes with that exception. It’s like an exception inside an exception, but there’s something known as the ministerial exception. So suppose you’re a faculty member at a religious university or college, but you don’t have any spiritual mentoring role or activity in your job, and perhaps you don’t have any theological interpretation or application in your life as a faculty member, there you would probably not qualify, from a legal standpoint, as a minister. Therefore, if a non-ministerial, like faculty member had their civil rights violated, you can find cases where courts have said you can’t treat them even though they’re at a religious institution, like a religious faculty member with spiritual guidance roles, and therefore they have a carve out known as a ministerial exception, which might protect them in certain situations where other spiritual formation faculty are not protected.

Rebecca: You’ve hinted at this a little bit already, but we often associate academic freedom with tenure. Does it only apply to tenured faculty?

Kent: That’s a valuable question. If you think about what tenure is all about. There’s generally both stated in policy on tenure at universities and generally agreed upon by those who talk and write and think about tenure and the two purposes of tenure. The first is academic freedom, stated. The second is economic security. And I won’t get into a separate podcast in this one on tenure and defending it, as I am happy to do. But the misnomer that tenure is a job for life is something that I just think needs to be addressed. Economic security for tenured faculty means that they are vested right in their employment, as opposed to a contingent right. That’s why, when I was a tenure-track faculty member, I was what is known as contingent faculty. My son is in my will, but he’s a contingent person in my will, because I’m still alive, but at the moment that I’m no longer here, then he has a vested right in my estate, provided he’s still in my will at the time I’m no longer here. So a vested right is a present right that currently exists. Tenured faculty have a vested right in continued employment. That doesn’t mean they can’t be fired, independent of post-tenure review. They can be, but they’re entitled to a higher expectation that is legally binding on their employer, that it is to be continued in perpetuity, unless certain things come into play. An analogy I would make is this, a person who is married can still get divorced. In certain situations, they can have their marriage annulled. That doesn’t change that the marriage comes with a vested right of continued legal relationship, and that’s what tenure is. So the reason why there’s economic security, in my view, is because of the academic freedom that is the first purpose of tenure. Every faculty member, like I said before, a part-timer, as I once was, to a tenured faculty member, as I am now, to full professors. They all have the benefit of academic freedom, particularly public university instructors. And there are cases, thankfully, where part-time faculty members have won lawsuits on the grounds that their academic freedom was violated. Generally, it’s violated because they’re fired over academic reasons. And so it’s valuable to realize that fact, but tenured faculty are the ones who can exercise, in my view, academic freedom most certainly because they can exercise it without that risk of loss of employment that untenured, particularly part-time faculty members, face. And if you look at the data, tenure is on the decline in America and contingent faculty, particularly part-time employment, has been on the incline. What does that mean for academic freedom? If you’re tenured, then you have the freedom to engage in the type of research or activities that might be very unpopular on your campus, where the political climate is where you live, to the Board of Trustees, and that’s the way it should be. That’s why there’s a comparison made to tenured faculty to federal judges, and that’s because federal judges have a tenure for their judgeship. Why is that? So they can engage in judicial activities independent of the pressures that come with politics. And so yes, all faculty have academic freedom, tenured faculty are in a better position due to the economic security that comes with tenure to exercise it in a way that I think benefits untenured faculty as well.

John: Speaking of the separation of politics from the work of the professoriate, we saw an article in the Chronicle that noted that the Florida State Legislature had passed a bill in 2021 that allowed students to record class lectures for the purpose of supporting complaints about the instructor to the college or as evidence in criminal or civil procedures. And it noted that several faculty had been fired based on the recordings that had been made in Florida and other states. And there are several groups out there that have been advocating that students play the role of monitoring faculty speech and then broadcasting that for the purpose of trying to alter the perceived bias of faculty. It would seem that legislative initiatives that encourage students to record and report on classroom speech would have some sort of a chilling effect on the exercise of academic freedom.

Kent: Without a doubt, I would agree with that as well, and that article, along with others and news stories that are out there are very sobering and they’re daunting as well. And to me, that article you referenced highlights what I think is an essential danger here, which is the simple and untested belief that generates these laws. And to me, these laws do more than allow for the secret recordings and complaints against instructors. They encourage those activities. To me, they deputize students to say, engage in sort of a semi-criminal investigation of your instructor or professor during your class. And that belief is that conservative students don’t feel welcome on public university college campuses. I was one of those students when I went to college a long time ago, so I would take issue with that premise to start with. But beyond that, if you assume that’s a true belief or a premise that’s accurate, which I don’t accept, but if you assume that it is, for the purposes of this discussion, it’s amazing to think that the first response to such a premise is an amazing broad brush stroke to restrict academic freedom and faculty speech rights as the first, yet most extreme, response. There are cases and ones that I absolutely agree with where students have successfully sued their professors for what the legal system recognizes as arbitrary or capricious actions against them, and that standard, the arbitrary and/or arbitrary or capricious standard; that’s a standard that’s been in the law for decades, and it provides students the right to sue their professors when they have been mistreated by them. And there are cases that exist, and it’s unfortunate they exist, but what to me is amazing is there’s so few of them, and they are one offs. They’re rare occurrences, and when they occur, students win lawsuits, and universities can be liable, and faculty can be personally liable as well. But this is not what we’re talking about here. What we’re talking about here is where students are emboldened to take down instructors with whom they disagree on matters that concern content or lifestyle, or, let’s say, professors that students just don’t like. To me, the analogy is this. Suppose you imagine an anti-sports legislature, and they pass laws that allow and encourage high school and college students to file complaints against their coaches for not playing them enough or running the right offense or defense, and they allowed students to record everything that all the coaches did or said in practice. That is never going to happen. And you know that’s not going to happen, because the refrain would be that coaches have the right to be in charge of their own teams, and athletes shouldn’t be the one to say who should play or what the team’s game philosophy or strategy should be. Furthermore, coaches would say that egghead legislators shouldn’t intrude into areas, in this case, organized sport, that they know nothing about. And yet, many faculty in America live in a world where despite doing things that many people would find is more important than teaching tackling or how to defend a corner kick, faculty have their livelihoods threatened because a student is, and there is no other way to put this, unhappy with something in their college or graduate class and have used secret recordings to try and ruin an instructor’s career. And to those legislators, I would say, are you aware of what George Will said at Ohio State University last November, November of 2025? George Will is, in my mind, the most influential conservative essayist in America. He’s won a Pulitzer Prize for commentary. He has a PhD in politics from Princeton. In his speech to students at Ohio State, if I could just quote a bit of what he told them, he said this, “A young person might come to Ohio State and hear an idea he or she had not heard before, and say ‘That makes me sad. It makes me anxious. It makes me angry. It harms my equilibrium.’ Now, I happen to think that the Ohio State University exists to harm people in that sense, to disturb their equilibrium. Why else would you pay the tuition?” End of quote. If George Will was teaching a class, let’s say in Florida or in my State of Indiana, and said something like that, particularly, since he is not a fan of Donald Trump by any stretch of the imagination, he might find himself the object of a student complaint and social media scorn. His father was a philosophy professor at a public university in Illinois. He might not want to do that for a living in today’s environment. To me, surreptitious class recordings are more than just intrusions of academic freedom. They implicate copyright law as well and just basic fairness. Because beyond the faculty issue, one might ask, “Why should students have to go to class not knowing if another student is surreptitiously recording what’s going on or being said?”

Rebecca: In a January 7, 2026, Tea for teaching podcast. David Laibson noted from Harvard University’s undergraduate handbook that, in an attempt to encourage the open exchange of viewpoints, now applies the Chatham House rules to class discussions, banning posting social media posts about class discussions attributed to specific individuals. Is this a policy that should be more widely adopted for this purpose?

Kent: That I’m putting on my birthday wish list. The Chatham House rules for my classes. So I’m writing that down for a birthday wish list. The Chatham House is, I think, more formally, the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London. I think the Chatham House rule maybe goes back to the early 1920s and I think it’s, to me, the best use of the term “safe space.” Harvard, as you mentioned, at Stanford, as well. I believe that they have a Senate faculty recommendation that their faculty at Stanford include this in their classes and put that in their syllabi as well. They, as a private institution, can do what maybe a cynic might call an intrusion of free speech, but it’s not. In my view, it’s a restriction on the unconsented to spreading of speech, not a restriction of speech itself. To me, it’s an encouragement of open speech, because that protects it from others using the speech as a weapon. Law schools have something more forceful, to the extent that more than a few of them prohibit the recording of class sessions altogether. That includes sometimes when students have to miss class. That sometimes includes missing class for religious reasons beyond health reasons. Harsh as that may be, that’s a protection of academic freedom, in my view, and the acknowledgement that classes that are grounded in open and sometimes spirited discussions should not be recorded, much less archived. So for example, the Indiana University – Bloomington School of Law does not allow, without Professor permission, the recording of classes or conversations with professors outside of class or even presentations made by professors or guest presenters. The University of Chicago Law School has such a strict prohibition on recording that whatever limited exceptions are allowed in the policy, instructors can still say no, and that includes ADA exceptions for class recordings. Where I am an alumnus of Penn State University Law School, I don’t believe they had this in effect when I was a law student, to the extent that it was never discussed at all. But Penn State’s Law School generally records class as a matter of behavior. It’s automatically recorded, but they prohibit students from recording the classes themselves, and there’s strict prohibition of students recording class even though the class sessions themselves are recorded. Now here’s something else to think about. There’s the issue of copyright, which is who owns the class recording if a student records it. I think Florida’s surreptitious recording law tries to thread the needle by saying that students can record classes secretly, but they don’t own the copyright. To me, the problem there is that state law can’t contradict federal copyright law, and so a state can’t say, we’re going to change copyright law, you don’t own what you otherwise would have recorded. So I think it’s an untested area, who owns that type of recording. But generally speaking, copyright protects the expression in a tangible medium, and it’s been put in a tangible medium when a student has recorded it. Sometimes, particularly in my state, which is known as a one-party state, but you’ll hear this, I can record anything I want, because this state is a one-party recording state. The problem I have with this is that those statements of one-party recording or two-party recording, they are in reference to wiretapping laws. And wiretapping laws are about the unlawful interception of an electronic communication. They’re not about the recording of a conversation. So you might say, well, that means I can record it, since it’s not covered by wiretapping laws. I guess I would say this, wiretapping laws don’t have any effect, so if you get a one recording belief that you can record a classroom borrowed from wiretapping laws, to me, you’re just wrong to start with. And secondly, it’s not a conversation. And so a student in a classroom, there are various sizes of classes based upon whether you’re a senior seminar or a freshman class or a graduate class, but if you just think about the average class size that I have, it’s not huge, but it’s generally about 30 in a class. Well, if I have one of those students recording the class, are they now owning what I’ve said in class? Because if I’m not recording what I’m saying in class, then I’m not really implicating copyright law. I can own my creativity in my PowerPoints. I can own my creativity in what I put on a board to the extent that I might take a picture of it. But there are all kinds of lawsuits out there where students take their own class notes and then sell them to publishing companies who provide canned notes to very large universities, and then professors sue the publishing companies and sometimes the students. That’s why some universities have policies that say you may not sell or give away your class notes. There’s copyright all over in terms of just conflict between students and instructors, and I just think the surreptitious class recording laws, or the behaviors that some students might engage in, I just think it opens up another can of worms, in this case, being copyright law.

John: Quite a while back, maybe 20 years or so ago, we were starting to look at the possibility of recording classes, or looking at recording options for classrooms, and one of the concerns that faculty raised was that these recordings could be used by students for the purposes that the Florida legislature was concerned with. One of the arguments I used at the time, and I still raise with faculty, is that students, even if there are prohibitions on recordings, can pretty easily record things with their technology. For quite some time, students have had easy access to recordings, oral recordings and video recordings, and today, especially, it’s so easy to manipulate audio or video. And I’ve suggested that if they’re concerned that students might misuse something that they said or misrepresent what faculty were saying, having their own recording would put it in a context so that that context would not be lost if students share selected excerpts from what a faculty member was saying. Given all these concerns, though, might it be better just to not record these classes?

Kent: I think it’s a very intriguing idea to have faculty in charge of recording classes, and it’s something that as of the last couple months, I’ve been recommending when speaking to faculty groups about these issues, because it may seem like I’m saying some for me, none for thee as it concerns students, but the difference is that faculty are in charge of the class first of all, and students are not, and students at public universities, just as an aside, they do have free speech rights, and they have the right to express themselves, and they have the right to disagree. They have the right to disagree with their faculty or their professors in class. There’s case law on that, and the line that they can’t go beyond is what’s known as a substantial disruption of the learning system or the learning environment. So up into a substantial disruption of the learning environment, students in public universities have free speech rights as well, and California is a state that has a law commonly called the Leonard law, and that applies to private college students, which says that they have the same speech rights as if they were public university students, with one exception, that being, if you’re at a religious College in California, the Leonard law does not apply to you. Secondly, it’s not an exception, it’s just not in the law. That law doesn’t speak to the speech rights of faculty at private colleges. It just speaks to the speech rights of students at private colleges. But thinking about that, students do have rights to speak in public universities, but realizing that students are being deputized in the way that I think they are to try to ensnare faculty in complaints that can result in them losing their jobs, I think it’s something to consider, which is, should I as a faculty member, as a matter of practice, record my classes? And I think there’s two good reasons for that. One is, even though, I guess everybody in front of a camera or recording gets used to it, I think the realization that you are recording your own class might help you be more alert to maybe a fringe comment that is harmless, but you don’t want others to know that you’ve said. And I prepare really hard for my classes. I take them very seriously, but I want to create an environment that seems extemporaneous. And the problem with that is that sometimes you are too extemporaneous, but if you say to yourself, I’m recording this class, let’s try to do our best to stay on a path, no matter how wide it is, that doesn’t get me too far off the path. So I think that’s a smart thing to think about. And then, more importantly, I think that when you’re the object of a complaint that a student files against you, that these recording laws provide, in my state, they’re known as intellectual diversity laws that allow students to file complaints against faculty over topics under the guise of intellectual diversity that they think don’t make them comfortable,you might say, then, if I’m recording the class, then I have the source of the complaint that I can defend more easily. And then if something is manipulated, and as you said, it’s not hard to manipulate or take out of context, then by having the recording, then I’m better able to defend myself against an accusation. So I really do think it’s something worth considering. Nobody wants to be Jim Carrey in The Truman Show. I get that, but there may be a reason why we want to have a bit of a Truman Show for ourselves that we control in a classroom setting.

John: And one of the other things I told faculty, because they were concerned that they may say something that is offensive to students or may seem inappropriate, and my suggestion is, well, if you’re being recorded, it may remind you that you should think carefully about what you’re going to say in class, which I think is consistent with what you were suggesting there.

Kent: Right. If I know that I’ve got to give a speech at a wedding, then it changes what I might say, as opposed to if I’m giving a speech at that night before party that I’m trusting nobody’s recording. But if it’s the speech at the wedding that everyone has their phone out or they’re recording, I’m thinking, Okay, this speech can still be interesting and it can be worth listening to, but let’s remember it’s being recorded. And so I think there’s a fail safe device that we all can have, that I think you’ve made a very good point about that.

Rebecca: There’s the added benefit too, that having a recording available for students could be good for learning, reference later.

Kent: That’s exactly right. I have not yet started, as a matter of practice, recording my classes, although I do think it’s worth considering. I’m recommending it to other faculty. In my MBA classes, the policy there is that those classes are automatically recorded in the room, and that is to help students who in an MBA setting might not be able to make it to class because of their work schedules or whatever. And so there I am reminded that even in a four-hour MBA class on business law and ethics, it could be hour three, but if I realize, yeah, this is being recorded, then maybe I don’t say something, not that I regret it because it was wrong or grievous, but it just might have been gratuitous in the sense that I would rather have it back, but now that I know that it’s being recorded, I don’t need to have it back. I’m just not going to say it.

John: And it’s also helpful for students for whom English is a second language, because it gives them a chance to go back and slow things down if need be, or to listen to it more carefully, or to look at the transcript, perhaps, if that’s not displayed in the classroom at the same time.

Kent: Yeah, that’s a very good point. We’re helping out students, and I speak really quickly, and sometimes I realize that the train has left the station and people are still waiting to get on it, and I better just back up. And so even though I try to say to people, if I’m speaking too quickly, please make sure that I repeat myself. But a non-native speaking person, particularly a foreign student, might not feel the courage to say, “Can you repeat that?” And then they’ve missed it all. And so if the class is recorded, then for those reasons, they can go back and get it. If I can add one more thing related to the idea of recording classes for the sake of self protection. One thing to think about, and it may be uncomfortable, is, “Should I just drop some content from my classes in light of the environment in which we now work?” And the reason why I say that is, there’s a legal standard that protects faculty. It’s called the germaneness standard, G, E, R, M, the germaneness standard, its been in the law for decades, and it is an academic freedom adjacent concept which says, no matter how controversial my statements or teaching techniques are, the controversy is not what we’re analyzing, it’s “is it related to the pedagogy?” And I think of it like a game of darts or horseshoes, whatever I’m saying in class or online that’s controversial that might offend people. The question is not, are they offended? It is, how close am I getting to the topic at hand. And so, for instance, in a class where I’m talking about sexual harassment law or criminal law that concerns rape law, I’m going to discuss things that may be uncomfortable or unsettling but are relevant to the topic. Okay, that’s the germaneness standard that protects faculty, protects them in court as well. But beyond that, there’s this question. Suppose it is germane, but I just think it’s not worth it. So sometimes we go through life thinking, is this a hill worth dying on? I’ve had some book groups related to my book, where I’ve had full professors say to me, I look through the chapter on academic freedom, and I decided for this particular subject, I’m going to cut this part out, because there’s other stuff that I’m using that is sufficient, and I think this is germane, but not necessary in light of the world in which we now live in. And I would compare it to like packing a suitcase to go on a really long trip on an airplane. I try to travel in a car so I can over pack, but if you got to fly, then there’s only so many outfits you can put in the suitcase. And the question is, not, do I look good in this outfit? It’s, do I really need this for the trip? And I think some faculty might want to ask the question as they think about controversial subjects, and mostly that’s arts and sciences types of classes, and that includes economics as well. Is this not unnecessary, but is it something that, for the sake of safety, I should just remove from my topic or discussion. I have done that in certain areas, even in business law, because I’ve just decided this is fitting and it’s germane, but it’s not needed for what I’m trying to do here, so for the sake of safety, I’m just going to remove it.

Rebecca: To kind of follow up and make sure we have a well rounded conversation. I was just thinking about how some faculty may choose to record their classes, but sometimes the conversations that occur in the class have maybe sensitive personal stories, and there might be reason to pause recordings and things to protect students and their experiences. Can you talk a little bit about that side of recording?

Kent: That’s a really important point, and I think every faculty member who’s sincere about what they do does not want to make a student uncomfortable or regret something they said in class. That’s the last thing I want to do, because I try to treat class engagement like an offering, that the basket’s being passed, what are you going to put in, as opposed to a tax, which is you’re being called on, now talk. And if you want to encourage participation and try to just build rapport and get engagement, then you don’t want to have students say something and then feel uncomfortable that they said it or wish they hadn’t said it. So that’s an extremely valid point. What I try to do in my classes, I tell people that If, for whatever reasons, the topic is uncomfortable for you, you don’t have to talk. Don’t ever feel compelled to talk if you’re uncomfortable. And then I just remind students that this is a place where I’m not going to use what they’re saying against them, and I do have a no recording policy in my syllabus as well, but that, again, doesn’t alter what you said about if the class is automatically being recorded. And I think there the best route is, if I’m aware of that situation, then I go to whoever, in my case, it would be an IT person on my campus, and I say, either cut that part of the class out or just destroy it. And I think academic freedom would give me the power to have a class recording no longer available, and if I’m recording it myself using my own technology, then I would ensure the student that either I will cut that part out of what they said and prove to them that I have in some way that’s reasonable, or assure them that I don’t use anything that’s recorded externally. And hopefully that would bridge a trust gap there.

John: So, given the widespread availability of AI tools that students are using to reduce some of the friction of learning, where they take complex readings, perhaps, and then have them instantly summarized through any number of possible AI tools, and they’re being marketed to students in that way. We really want students to be able to develop some critical thinking skills to be able to analyze arguments, and they’re losing some of that ability by relying on AI to summarize complex arguments that before they may have had to struggle with a little bit. Is it more needful than ever that there be vibrant class discussions to encourage the development of those critical thinking skills. 36:31

Kent: There is an urgent need for that in my work in the MBA programs at the dormer School of Business at Purdue Fort Wayne, in talking to prospective students about why they might want an MBA, I show them some data that shows both at the undergraduate hiring level and at the MBA level, the number one gap that employers are frustrated that they can’t find in prospective employees. It’s not technical skills, it’s critical thinking skills, and that’s almost always at the top, and that includes application skills as well. And so it’s sad to me having been a liberal arts student in a college setting as a student, that as liberal arts education is, in my view, just under assault as being unnecessary, that what we’re missing then is what liberal arts education provides, I think, better than almost any place else, and that is training and sharpening critical thinking skills, and that is done through conversation and vibrant conversation. Artificial intelligence, and I’m referring to large language model, generative AI. What it does is it predicts, by logic, the next word, or words it thinks you want based upon these factors. It has web scraped the internet for information, a lot of which I think is copyright infringement, how its algorithms have trained the system to get better and better at turning words into tokens and then using those tokens to put back into words to fill in this word game they think based upon the user prompt that you want. And what’s missing there is that you’re not thinking when you’re asking somebody else or some system else to give you thoughts. I can find any recipe for any dish I want on the internet that does not make me a chef any more than a parakeet as a public speaker and mimicking other words into concept and thoughts and feeding them to a student or any person, it’s going to save that student time, and we all want to save time, but it’s not going to do anything to help them be better at thinking. And that’s why here we go, old fashion may still be relevant, and that is having people having conversations that are challenging and vibrant and encouraging, and that gets us back to the issue of the risk of the surreptitious recording, because vibrant conversations that help people sharpen their thinking process can be uncomfortable. It can be challenging. It can leave some people unhappy. I know for a fact in certain classes in law school that some people were crying from what was going on in the law school environment. That doesn’t make it good, and I would never want to make a person cry in a classroom setting. But the point is, is that sometimes, just like your muscles hurt when you start a weightlifting program, and your calves hurt when you start running for the first time, sometimes sharpening critical thinking skills involves a bit of pain, but if you are told that you can record everything and then file a complaint when you’re unhappy with something, and then you’re using AI to take reading assignments and turn them into sort of Cheeto sized portions that you just ingest and you’re not actually. Digesting then students are now left in a world where they’re graduating and they may be unable to think for themselves because they’ve not been asked challenging questions in the traditional, wonderful classroom setting.

Rebecca: In the past, how have colleges and universities in the US and elsewhere been able to preserve academic freedom when under threat by political pressure. I’m just asking for a friend.

Kent: I’ll just answer for a friend. I think it’s courts that have preserved academic freedom when it was under threat more than colleges or universities have. The AAUP was actually born out of the firings, the political firings of professors over their views, over their disagreement of the political views of board members actually going back to Stanford a very, very long time ago. That’s why you have the 1915 AAUP declaration of principles on academic freedom and tenure, written by people who lived it So thankfully, many colleges and universities have used language from the AUP when drafting their own academic freedom and tenure policies. But it’s important to bear in mind that the final authority in a university is the Board of Trustees, and that’s particularly the case in a public university when often legislation officially grants to boards of trustees rights over curriculum and particularly tenure decisions as well. Nobody is tenured until Board of Trustees grants them tenure. Faculty are not granted tenure by colleagues or by department chairs, by deans, by Provost, by presidents. They’re granted tenure by boards of trustees, and so as board seats have become increasingly politicized in the last couple of years, that takes us back to where we were at the beginning, which is that it’s important that courts, notably federal courts, protect academic freedom by following the precedent that’s there, Supreme Court precedent, other federal court case precedent, and some State Court precedent as well, that preserves faculty’s right to study and to research and to teach and speak outside of class without consequences tied to tribal pressures.

John: So we always end with the question, what’s next?

Kent: For me personally. What’s next is I’m thinking about and hoping to maybe create a limited series podcast where maybe I would, in short burst, talk about some of these topics related to my book and my research on legal issues that affect faculty. I’d like to continue speaking to faculty groups, and when I do that, it’s always encouraging to realize that many faculty aren’t previously aware that the things they’ve thought about and wonder are their answers to there are answers to them, and not all the answers are positive. But I’d still rather know an answer and how to respond to an answer that might not be positive than just keep wondering, is there an answer to this situation I’m facing in my work life? So those are what I would say. Is what’s next for me?

Rebecca: Well, thank you for joining us. It’s always a pleasure to talk to you, and today we got snippets of parakeets and Cheetos too.

Kent: You never know. You never know. Thank you for paying attention and catching that.

John: Thank you. This is an issue that many faculty are concerned about, because academic freedom seems to be under more threat than at any time since perhaps the late 1950s or so in the US, and it doesn’t seem like that’s going to be going away for a while.

Kent: There’s an organization called the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education or fire, as they are known, and they do things like evaluate the free speech rights of faculty on campuses, and they give grades to campuses, but they also issue reports on things they’ve studied based upon surveying members or other faculty, and that 2024 report on freedom of speech in education, they came To discover that faculty were more self censoring about their teaching and their writing now than they were in the 1950s during the McCarthy era. So it does coincide with what you had just said.

John: And probably a larger share of contingent faculty has made that even more severe of an issue.

Kent: Absolutely. well, thank you. Thank you very much.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

John: Editing Assistance provided by Madison Lee.

[MUSIC]

432. Inside Mindful Teaching

Posted in attention, higher education, learning, metacognition, reflective practice, teacher training, teaching
February 11, 2026

In challenging times, it is very easy for educators to be distracted from what we value most in our work. In this episode, Roberta Schnorr joins us to discuss how mindfulness practice can help us bring our authentic selves to our classrooms.

 Roberta was, until her retirement, one of our colleagues at SUNY Oswego. Her professional career spanned 40 years, including nearly a decade in public schools, over 25 years directing a graduate program in SUNY Oswego’s School of Education, and she has been a mindfulness practitioner for 20 years. She has taught and facilitated mindfulness in community settings, including a prison and a public library.

Show Notes

  • Schnorr, Roberta (2026). Inside Mindful Teaching. Mantra Books
  • Roberta Schnorr’s website
  • Apps/websites recommended by Roberta:
    • Insight Timer – many choices, with an option to save favorites. Use the search tool to see topics in the library. Perhaps search for types, like Breath or Body Scan or Anxiety. A few to search for and try out: Relaxing your Mind (9 minute guided breath practice), Getting Grounded (15 min) by Kaira Jewel Lingo, A Pause for Presence (11 minutes) by Tara Brach, Basic Body Scan and Breath practice (11 minutes) by Tara Brach, Safe Place Imagery (10 min) by Dan Roberts.
    • Plum Village App – (Offered by Plum VIllage, Buddhist community, but most practices are focused on Mindfulness with secular language). Suggestions to explore: Meditations→Deep Relaxation→15 minute offering from Sr True Dedication, Meditations→Guided Meditations→Short Meditations→Mindfulness of the body by Br Phap Dung, Meditations→Guided Meditations→scroll down to More Guided Meditations→ Learning to be a Human Being by Br. Phap Dung or What’s Not Going Wrong? by Kaira Hewel Lingo
    • Tara Brach’s Website – free web-based guided practice
    • Happier Meditation (formerly known as 10% Happier) – Dan Harris – paid app
    • Calm – paid app
    • Sean Fargo’s Top Guided Meditations

Transcript

John: In challenging times, it is very easy for educators to be distracted from what we value most in our work. In this episode, we discuss how mindfulness practice can help us bring our authentic selves to our classrooms.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

John: Our guest today is Roberta Schnorr. Roberta was, until her retirement, one of our colleagues at SUNY Oswego. Her professional career spanned 40 years, including nearly a decade in public schools, over 25 years directing a graduate program in SUNY Oswego’s School of Education, and she has been a mindfulness practitioner for 20 years. She has taught and facilitated mindfulness in community settings, including a prison and a public library. Welcome, Roberta.

Roberta: Thank you so much for having me, John and Rebecca. I’m just delighted to be here.

John: We’re happy to talk to you. It’s been a while. We’re glad to reconnect.

Roberta: Yeah, it’s great to catch up.

Rebecca: Today’s teas are:… Roberta, are you drinking tea with us today?

Roberta: You bet. Yogi ginger tea, my favorite, in my favorite tea mug with the reminder from Lennon and McCartney to let it be.

Rebecca: Love it.

John: Very nice.

Rebecca: How about you, John?

John: I am drinking a ginger peach green tea today.

Rebecca: I am drinking an Awake tea right now.

John: …which is probably good. [LAUGHTER] It’s been a long day for you.

Rebecca: It has been.

John: So we’ve invited you here today to discuss your forthcoming book, Inside Mindful Teaching, which will be available around the time when the podcast is released. What do you mean by mindfulness, to set the stage for the discussion?

Roberta: Thanks for asking. It’s a term that’s become quite common this day and age, and I think it has many meanings. By mindfulness, I mean that I want to cultivate both my attention, to be attentive to my actual life and my intention of how I want to be in this life, it really is a way of seeing and being in life. Mindfulness practices help me to grow my presence and to notice when I’m present or when I’m maybe stuck in a story about the past, whether it was 10 minutes ago or 10 years ago, reliving a meeting I just came from, or planning too much and getting caught in worries about the future, and bring myself back to the direct experience of this moment right now. So that’s kind of my working definition.

Rebecca: Can you talk a little bit about the origin story of your book and how your own mindful practice maybe has led to or influenced your book.

Roberta: Yeah, so let me start with my own practice, because that was the piece that came first. Like many people that choose to pursue a mindfulness practice, mine was prompted by a period of deep suffering and confusion. Who was Bobbi before mindfulness, who was Roberta? I was fast paced. I was an over functioner. I was productive and rewarded for it. I was over scheduled. I focused on doing, doing, doing and to hold that all up, I was really focused on being in control of a lot of pieces. When I was nearly 50, something happened, and something came up that disrupted that, and I fell apart. It was really an emotional falling apart, and I couldn’t operate from that anymore, and I felt helpless, I felt terrified, I felt very ungrounded. So I did the wise thing and I went to therapy. And during that period, I began meditating on my own based on some reading I was doing, and within just a couple of weeks, I was experiencing benefits of the practice. I wasn’t cured by any means, but I would experience after a mindfulness setting, when, for me, there were no apps, I was just like trying to learn to sit with my breath for five minutes, and then 10, and then 15, and I would get some relief. So I kept doing it, and then I began having some experiences of shared mindfulness practice in yoga classes at that time. And I co-started, co-began a local mindfulness group that meets weekly. We still meet weekly, and had benefit from that kind of shared energy of mindfulness with others as well, and went on some retreats. So those were the beginnings of my mindfulness practice, birthed during this time of deep confusion and suffering. It’s interesting, when that question comes up, I realize now that the seeds of this book were also being watered during that period, that very early period, although I had no intention of writing a book. I was surviving my experience, and one element was my therapy. While my therapist used different language, he didn’t talk about mindfulness, essentially, he was inviting me to be more mindful in my life. He was inviting me to carry out what he called experiments in different spheres of my life, which were primarily my family life and my teaching, and asking me to see what happens if I just showed up without trying to be so in control. Could I just trust and show up and respond and see how that goes, see how people respond to that. That felt pretty vulnerable, but I really trusted this guy. He was a very skillful person, and he was helping me, so I was taking baby steps into these experiments, and interestingly, they went well sometimes. [LAUGHTER] So those were some of my very first explorations of mindfulness in my teaching. I hadn’t labeled it as that. At the same time, I was just beginning as part of a writing group. These were eight women, all professors in the School of Education. We still meet. We meet monthly to share writing, to respond to one another’s writing. And because I was in that writing group, I began processing my experience through writing. I’d never been a person who journaled, but I started to write short pieces, personal pieces, and journal type pieces about experiences I was having. And then I eventually became brave and floated one to writing group, and it was received so beautifully and so tenderly, and I felt so supported. That writing group became another place for me to share more of my authentic self and practice with this direction. And then, as I really made a commitment to focusing on mindfulness in my teaching, as I had done more healing, I continued to write about those experiences for myself. It was a way for me to pay attention to what was happening in my teaching and to document it. In a way, they were like field notes… I’m a qualitative researcher, just for me. And I would share those with writing group from time to time. And they were all teaching. They’re all professors, and they resonated with them, and they really encouraged me to keep going and just write and get it down, and eventually, really encouraged me to share it with a broader audience. So I would say you can blame writing group for the book. [LAUGHTER]

John: Writing groups can be very powerful experiences, very productive experiences in keeping people moving forward in their projects. So, as you adopted mindfulness practices, how did that begin to affect your teaching and your interaction with students and classes?

Roberta: This is going to be a long answer. There’s a lot to this, and I really want to share some details in a bigger picture with our listeners. So first of all, there were observable ways that my teaching changed. I was slowed down in my body, my speech. There were more pauses in our class, still within a decent pace and flow as I facilitated. Our transitions were less rushed. We tried to do one thing at a time and then have some closure. There was more space for student interaction, for student sharing. But the biggest change is that mindfulness really reoriented my relationship to my teaching, and out of this long process of writing and reflection and experimentation, three insights emerged for me that I understand are essential for my mindful teaching. One is my professional knowledge, pedagogy skills that I bring to this teaching world, this teaching life. The second is this mindfulness of my inner experience. This is about the body sensations I experience, and the feelings and thoughts that can emerge from those. And the third is something I call intention, and intention is kind of a compass that helps me to stay on track with making my teaching offering a wholesome one. So I’d like to take a couple of minutes and unpack each of those for you and our listeners. So let me just begin with professional knowledge and skills. Like many professors, teachers, this was in the forefront. This was my identity. This was what I was bringing to my teaching. It dominated my relationship with my teaching in some good ways, but now I realize also with some limitations, I was pretty attached to people getting [LAUGHTER] my stuff. I was preparing special educators. It’s a complex professional role, and my question about what I was offering for myself was, what do special educators need to know, understand and be able to do to fulfill this complex role? There’s an overwhelming amount of stuff that good special educators need to know and be able to do. Mindfulness helped me to distill that, to figure out what are the essential elements for beginning special educators. On a practical level, I really cut back on how much we were doing each semester and in each class session. I cut down on the number of assessments that were required of students. These actions created more space and lessened the anxiety for myself and for my students. So that’s the first one. Professional knowledge and skills, still a piece of my framework, still important, my relationship to it has changed. The second element is mindfulness of my inner experience. Well, this was new territory that began emerging in therapy. This is about me first recognizing, just being aware of this feeling in my gut or my chest or whatever, this tension in my neck that’s arising, and be conscious of whatever feelings or thoughts might be rising out of that. Be able to recognize it, allow it to some degree, not push it down, run away from it, and then grow the ability to be able to be with it, to work with it without being overwhelmed, distracted, or to have my decision making derailed and be pulled around by my anxiety and operate out of more reactivity than thoughtful responses. These emotions still visit me regularly, I’m sorry to say, [LAUGHTER] but I can now be with them, and I have a different way of relating to them, and I have practices. So one thing is, I learned they come up in the flow of your teaching. I can’t stop and go sit on the cushion and take care of them for 10 minutes. So it’s just a matter of naming that anger and letting it know I’ll come back to you, but we’re going to move on with class. It’s not a cure. Sometimes I have to tolerate there’s still some discomfort as I continue to teach, but I’m not going to let that take over and then later on in the evening, or the next time I get some time to sit and practice, I can get curious about that maybe, and say, “Whoa. Where did that anger come from? What was that about?” I’m not sure it was about that student’s remark. What was that about? And try to have a deeper understanding. I’ll tell you one of the ways I talked about this. In 2013 I was diagnosed with cancer. My daughters were then college students, and one of the things I said to them, as we were all kind of experiencing fear, was: ‘Your job is not to control fear. Fear is going to be on the bus. You don’t have to try to kick fear off the bus or prevent fear from being on the bus, it’s going to be on the bus. Your job is, do not let fear drive the bus.” And that became our way of talking about allowing and managing this thing that was part of our experience. So this ability to be connected to my inner experience and grow some skillfulness with it is really foundational to my mindful teaching. The third element that I call intention, was the last thing to fully emerge in this process. The first part was there, and that is about this question, how do I want to impact my students, learning both now and in the future? And I had a pretty good idea about that, and that’s a broad question. That’s a broad intention. It’s more than graduating and getting a college degree. It’s more than getting a teaching certificate. It’s more than passing an exam. My response to that in my teaching work was, I want to prepare teachers who bring both the will and the skills to help all students maximize their capacities in inclusive learning environments. That’s a high order. Special educators serve a wide range of kids with a lot of learning characteristics, but that was the vision and intention, the aspiration and the vision I saw for my students as they were teaching in their teaching careers. Over time, part two emerged, and it was a different kind of question. That question was, “Who do I aspire to be as a teacher?” The first question was about, what I know when all the professional content and pedagogy and skills. This question was about being, so my response to that question, as I reflected on it and worked on it in this mindful teaching journey, became, “As a mindful educator, I want to make my best offering to all of my students from a place of presence and connection.” I think each educator has to sit with those questions themselves and figure out what they are specific to their teaching role and their aspiration. But for me, if I stay in touch with those questions, they become more internalized and they kind of serve as a compass. When I reflect before in my preparation, or during or after class or a meeting, an interaction, I know right away when things feel right, when I’ve mostly met my intention, and I know right away when I was not able to meet my intention, it feels wrong. So the question is, can I still bring some kindness to that, especially for myself, so that I can reflect and have some curiosity and maybe learn something from that? Were there conditions that I could have worked with better to be better prepared, or was my capacity low that day, whatever, and the very least, can I then also kind of let it go and move forward and not get stuck in it, so that I can begin anew. So those are the three elements of what I think are my real reorientation to my relationship with teaching as a result of bringing mindfulness, making it central to my teaching.

Rebecca: Can you talk about taking time to reflect on your practice and digest those feelings that you were having, and then intentionally making choices about reducing the content that you’re covering, thinking more about the essentials and having more room in a class, and then also thinking about all the things that you’ve identified. How did that really change your relationship with students? What does that look like? How is that different than it was before?

Roberta: Well, I think the first word that comes to mind is it’s more authentic. It’s more human. Our relationship has to be framed also about this professional journey they’re on, and the standards and things about that, but it’s not defined only by that. I think we can see each other’s humanity, and I can allow more of my humanity to be seen and to be felt in this relationship. I can be more open to seeing them as people and hearing what’s going on in their life. It doesn’t change the criteria for what we need to accomplish on this path professionally, but I think it can create a more nurturing and supportive relationship for teaching and learning, but just as people on a path together, on a journey together. It’s really helped me be a better mentor.

Rebecca: How does that differ from the relationship many faculty have with students that are not doing mindful teaching.

Roberta: Well, I can only speak for myself, because there was a long period I wasn’t doing mindful teaching. I’ll give you some examples of what it was like before. And before, I think that many students were nervous about how I might respond. Some students could go with this energy I was bringing, and they were comfortable, quite a few, really, but some students probably found me scary and unapproachable, I think maybe rigid. And I think those things probably were true, and they were really the experience of some students. I don’t think most, but I think some, and each student’s experience matters. As I began to practice intentionally with mindfulness, my perception is students felt safer. They could take more risks. They’re teachers, and now they’re going to be special ed teachers, and they were in our program in real teaching situations every semester, part time and then full time, and what I saw as I was bringing more mindfulness, is my candidates could bring more flexibility and more intentional decision making to their planning, to their teaching, to their reflection and adjustments to their teaching. There was less focus on what they thought I wanted and more trust in their growing professional capacities to make decisions and try them out and notice and shift, whether they worked perfectly or not.

John: Now you’ve talked a bit about how this has affected your teaching and interaction with students. How did the adoption of mindfulness practices affect the rest of your life?

Roberta: That’s another great question, because this isn’t something you do in one sphere, which is what happened to me. I was practicing mindfulness, and then there was like, “Oh, I think I need to bring this into my teaching.” [LAUGHTER] Like, that’s part of my life. And a funny thing was, I was writing in this chapter, and I told one of my daughters about that, she said, here’s a title for your chapter, “Damn it, now I have to change my teaching.” [LAUGHTER] To have integrity, I needed to make a shift. But how has it changed me overall? For me, mindfulness practice has been deeply transformative, deeply transformative in every sphere of my life. Physically, I experience much more settled energy. My nervous system is regulated more of the time. I realize now I was like living in a pretty activated state most of the time, I think from the time I was a child, and that meant that I was always on the edge of my window and easily, kind of triggered into reactivity. So that physical calmness was really new to me, and it’s really quite pleasant. I mentioned being more authentic, and that’s absolutely been a gift of my mindfulness practice that comes more naturally to me. It comes naturally to me. I can allow more vulnerability, more tenderness with myself, first of all, which allows me to allow that with others, including students and colleagues. I experience a lot more stability, especially noticeable when life gets difficult, when the unexpected happens, when you get that information like, “Oh damn, the cancer’s back.” With my mindfulness practice that doesn’t have to be a total crisis. This, too is life. I can choose how to respond and participate as I go forward. So there’s also been a shift in how I view both my teaching and whatever it is I’m doing. It’s not always called formal work at this stage, and that is that I learned first in my teaching to shift and view it as an offering, an offering where I could let go, really practice letting go of how I might be perceived, how my offering might be judged or perceived, and just focus on it as an offering and the conditions that I could bring to make my best offering. So today’s an example where I’m practicing with offering. You two have done a lot of podcasts. I don’t do podcasts. This is my first, so I was experiencing some anxiety as this date came closer, and I got myself back to like, “Oh, it’s like my class.” Like, what’s my intention? My intention today is just like my class. I want to make my best offering to our listeners and to you from a place of presence and connection. I know what I need to do to prepare for that, the conditions I have control over. So I made some extra space yesterday and today. You were very helpful to me in preparing for the expectations, for the conversation and the context, but it was really my job to take care of myself and do more mindfulness practice, and to prepare with both the content and my energies, and to use some resources to get ready to take care of the things that might make this the best offering I could make today. It’s very freeing to me to have this shift of operating from offering, really freeing.

Rebecca: We have frequent conversations with faculty, and we’ve had conversations on the podcast about people feeling overworked or overwhelmed or kind of a lot of things on their plate, many of the things that maybe you were describing earlier [LAUGHTER] and sometimes adopting a new practice or thinking about something new like mindfulness can seem overwhelming, or that it’s going to take time or effort from other things. Do you find that you’re spending less time on other activities so that you can focus on these efforts? Or can you talk a little bit about time?

Roberta: Yeah, time rules all [LAUGHTER] of us, doesn’t it? So first I will say that I think I am spending less time on some things, and I was even still in my teaching life, because mindfulness helped me get clearer on how to spend my time, and I didn’t have to overbook and say yes to everything. I could choose where I was going to be able to make the greatest impact with my offering, and I could see where sometimes I was spending time on things that took a lot of time but were unlikely to make much of an impact. I don’t mean in my classroom, but I mean extra things. There’s still never enough time. Life’s very full. But initially I did think of mindfulness kind of in that way, like real mindfulness meant I had to have time to, like, sit for 20 minutes every morning and do this formal practice, or 30 minutes, and I had to make time for these very formal ways of thinking about practicing mindfulness. But as I have grown in my practice, I understand it now as an orientation, a way of life for me, that’s become much more integrated. And there’s a lot of ways I was practicing even early on, and you mentioned some of these before we got started, Rebecca, about your trip over here to start this conversation. So when I would arrive at the school where I was teaching, it was a public school, and my candidates were going to be tutoring a student, and we stayed right on for a grad class. I would pull in, and I would try to stay in my car for just a minute and take a breath or two, no formal practice. And then when I got out of my car and gathered my bag of materials, I was pretty good at this. I tried to just take mindful steps from the car to the entrance to the school, they weren’t super slow, but to be aware of my feet on the ground, to drop out of my head, to look at the sky, to feel the temperature, to feel if there was a breeze, to notice if there was sunshine… once in a while. And just kind of get in my body for that transition from the last meeting, or whatever, to this teaching context, and try to stay out of going through the list of things in my head that we were going to do in class. So that’s one example. I’ve got to walk from the car to the building anyway. It can be a mindful three minute walk, and that’s practice. Another thing I do every morning is I get to have one cup of coffee a day, and I love my coffee, so that’s become part of my mindfulness practice. These days, I sometimes only have 5 or 10 minutes in the morning for formal practice, but I make my coffee as mindfully as I can. I pay attention to making my coffee. It’s the only cup of the day I want it to be, just right. [LAUGHTER] And I sit in my favorite chair with my coffee, and I do not open my phone, and I hold that cup with two hands, and I feel the warmth of the mug. I inhale the scent of the coffee. There’s a little cinnamon in it in this season. I take sips, I hold it in my mouth, and I really taste it and experience it. I sometimes congratulate myself on I’ve made a really fine cup of coffee today, and I drink my coffee as much as possible without reliving something that’s happened before or starting to go into my to do list for today. It’s a real practice, because my mind wants to go there. But if I can give myself five minutes just me and my coffee, that’s a little mini retreat. That’s part of my practice, even if I only get five minutes for a more formal, guided sit or walking. Yeah, often midday, during what’s kind of my lunch break, I have maybe a half hour to an hour and I put on an app with a 15 minute body scan. And I do not usually go to sleep, but I get in a comfy chair, recliner, and I listen to this body scan take me to attend the different parts of my body. It’s very relaxing, and when I’m finished, I feel like I’ve had a nap sometimes. So there are little things that I can do through my day that are not about scheduling extra time. Those are a few examples.

Rebecca: I mean, you should have maybe drank tea in the morning, but… [LAUGHTER]

Roberta: Maybe. I switch to tea for the rest of the day.

Rebecca: Ok.

Roberta: I drink a lot of tea.[LAUGHTER] If this was a morning recording, there would have been coffee. [LAUGHTER]

John: …and that’s not uncommon on the podcast.

Rebecca: I know that’s why I had to tease. [LAUGHTER]

John: Now, you mentioned your work with your pre-service graduate students, and in your book, you share a bit about how you introduced some mindfulness practices to them. Could you talk a little bit about what you shared with them and how they reacted?

Roberta: Yeah, I’d love to talk about that. So first of all, slowly. I shared nothing with my students in terms of introducing them to practices, until I had cultivated a personal practice and I had really been exploring bringing it into my teaching for several years. I was a teacher. They were becoming teachers. The more I saw the benefits of it in my teaching, the more I felt compelled that this should be part of their preparation. The first reason was I wanted to support their well being. These are grad students that were, for the most part, doing daily subbing. They were getting up and teaching from seven or eight in the morning till three or four, and then they were coming to grad class from 3:30 to 7:30 or something, with their tutoring to seven. It was a long haul. They were stressed. They were tired. They were anxious. There’s a lot of anxiety anyway in life, but being a grad student for me was also kind of a peak time. So I knew that mindfulness was a way that I could support some of their well being and maybe relieve some of that stress. I also did share a little tiny bit about how they might explore it in their teaching, because they were actively teaching. And mindfulness is always mindfulness of something. And the thing we shared was about teaching. So here’s what it looked like in the last few years, and this evolved over five, six years, from me sharing a little bit to then getting clearer on how I could be more structured and share a bit more. So as I mentioned, the context was graduate class in this public school, they arrive, there’s an hour of tutoring a student that they stay with for the whole semester. I’m on site, supervising and supporting. Then we come back together as a class and have our graduate class in the same space. So the tutoring program did not start our first week of classes. So the second graduate class, I spent most of that class as kind of a mindfulness workshop with them. I facilitated and guided them through a number of experiences with mindfulness practices, but we did body practice, we did breath practice, we did mindful walking, we did mindful eating, we did mindful listening, give them tastes of different things and process a little bit, and sort of giving them a menu or two for like, where were their preferences and what was working for them. And then I invited them at the end of that class to practice 10 minutes a day, five days if they could, in the coming week. And we were using Blackboard at the time for course management, and I asked them to write just a little bit about their 10 minute practice each day, so I could tell if they wrote that wrote that day on Blackboard, and I intentionally didn’t respond to their daily postings about their experience. I wanted it to be their experience, so I waited and read them at the end of the week, and then we got back together on Monday for our next grad class, and we spent probably 20 minutes sharing and talking about their experiences, which were overall quite insightful and positive for them. This was all ungraded. It was very clear in the syllabus. All ungraded. Everybody did it. Then we got on with the business of the next day we had kids coming. We got on with the business the rest of that class of like, all right, what assessments are we doing tomorrow? What are you going to learn about this student as a reader so you can start teaching? And then the next day, when they started tutoring, eventually it became our practice every single time to first meet as a group for five minutes of guided mindfulness practice, which I facilitated. And then it was like, have a great tutoring session, see you in an hour. That was what we did. And then I asked them twice during the semester to write me like just two pages maybe, something about your mindfulness and your teaching. What are you noticing? The other thing I did do the first few weeks was I shared a few examples of my experience of bringing it into my teaching with some school age learners I worked with, and really inviting them to notice their inner experience. When does the anxiety come up? What does it feel like in your body? Can you be more in tune to noticing the anxiety coming up before you’re feeling overwhelmed or frozen, and then giving them a few go to practices that they could use in the moment. So you’re in the flow of a lesson with a seven year old, the lesson isn’t going as you planned, or the kid refuses to engage, the kid’s stuck and doesn’t know how to keep reading. You can’t remember what to do. So those strategies were like, take two or three breaths or look out the window. What’s the sky look like in this moment. Look back at your kid. Start again. One student I remember wrote about using self talk. I remembered Bobbi saying, like, “if I couldn’t remember what to do, just give them the word and nobody was going to die.” So these little things, but it tuned them in and in their reflections, I was just so so surprised that every single student could identify something that was relevant to mindfulness, and many of them wrote really rich examples of how they were kind of working it in their teaching and in their lives. The biggest and best surprise was a full year after I had them in the fall, this group of students went out for their full-time internship, and they didn’t have any more support around mindfulness from any other faculty member, and I wasn’t with them in the spring, and yet, in their journals that were required as part of their internship seminar, many of them were able to cite examples of how they were bringing mindfulness to their teaching in this very Intense, full-time placement. So, responses were overwhelmingly wonderful. And not every single student, but everybody kind of got what it was and tried it out, and many had these really wonderful responses. I just learned a lot from my students and their mindfulness journeys and the courage they brought to trying these things on in this kind of high-stakes graduate teaching and learning situation, it was very affirming for me, also, that the experiences I was having with some mindfulness in my teaching were supported by their efforts. It was also striking that they were getting this much preparation in mindfulness, and they were brand new teachers, and they could bring these brand new things together and do something with them, like, wow.

Rebecca: In some ways, you’re describing big changes in people’s lives where this intervention is occurring. Grad school is a big change for people, or being in the classroom for the first time with their students can be a big change. There’s a lot of changes and challenges that all teachers are facing currently. We’re thinking about, like changes in AI, thinking about political attacks on education. The list goes on, like a laundry list of things that are on all of our minds today. And I can imagine that like in that setting, adopting a mindful practice could help alleviate some of that challenge, if we can move in with this attention. Can you talk a little bit about the first steps someone might take if they want to adopt a practice like this?

Roberta: Yeah, so first of all, I’ll agree, we are indeed in very challenging times, and what I always kind of share with people now wasn’t available to me as a beginning practitioner, is I share apps. There’s a lot of resources now. There’s a lot of great apps, some are free, that have guided practices in many forms, and it’s a great support for beginning a little personal daily practice, even if you only have 5 or 10 minutes a day, either in the morning, midday, evening, whenever you’ve got that space. In fact, we could share a few suggestions in the show notes, if you like, for people to check out.

Rebecca: Yeah, that’d be great.

John: We always end each podcast episode with the question: what’s next?

Roberta: You know, for me, I really, really enjoy and find it very satisfying to share mindfulness practices because they’ve been so helpful to me, and especially in these times that are very unsettling for many of us, and lots of change and difficulty. So one way of doing that is sharing my experience in the book. And for people that are interested and have some mindfulness practice going, and are interested in trying to explore that in teaching. I hope my book will be a resource to them. And the other thing that I’ve been exploring that is less explicitly dissected in the book, because it came after, is trauma-informed practices, and how I’m really integrating more of that into my facilitation, and I’m about to start in a new study group to learn more about group nervous systems and our shared energies, and I think that’s going to be helpful to me, not only as a facilitator and a teacher, but every group I’m in, including my family.

Rebecca: So it’s great to keep learning, right?

Roberta: Yeah, it sure is.

John: And trauma-informed pedagogy, I think, is especially valuable in these times.

Roberta: Sure thing.

John: Well, thank you. We really appreciate you joining us, and it was great to talk to you again.

Roberta: It’s been my great pleasure to talk with you, to meet you Rebecca, and to have this opportunity to reconnect with my Oswego family and beyond. So thank you so much for this podcast offering.

Rebecca: Thank you.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

[MUSIC]

431. A Curated AI Framework

Posted in active learning, edtech, educational technology, evidence-based teaching, higher education, inclusion, learning, metacognition, pedagogy
February 4, 2026

Students can use AI tools to support or short-circuit their learning. In this episode, Tim Curry joins us to discuss how he uses AI tools to support students with diverse prior knowledge in a carefully curated framework.

Tim is a lecturer in the Department of Health Sciences at Northern Arizona University. He is developing AI applications for autism research and tribal health service while building Northern Arizona University’s Applied Health Analytics program. He’s also working on the completion of his PhD degree in health equity technology.

Show Notes

Transcript

John: Students can use AI tools to support or short-circuit their learning. In this episode, we examine how one instructor uses AI tools to support students with diverse prior knowledge in a carefully curated framework.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

John: Our guest today is Tim Curry. Tim is a lecturer in the Department of Health Sciences at Northern Arizona University. He is developing AI applications for autism research and tribal health service while building Northern Arizona University’s Applied Health Analytics program. He’s also working on the completion of his PhD degree in health equity technology. Welcome Tim.

Tim: Hey, John, it’s great to be here.

Rebecca: Today’s teas are:… Tim, are you drinking any tea today?

Tim: Yeah, I am, actually. I’ve got one here that is this really nice licorice root spearmint mixture.

Rebecca: That’s an interesting combination. I don’t know that I’ve heard of that.

John: And I have just a plain old oolong tea today.

Rebecca: A nice choice. I’ve swung back to old habits, and I have an English afternoon tea.

John: Must have been a tough day, huh? [LAUGHTER] Today, you’ve been doing some interesting work in which you’re planning to have students work through a learning portfolio constructed for each course module in a health science course in which they’ll complete a structured sequence of interactions with a chatbot tutor that you’ve created. Before we discuss the details of this course, can you tell us a little bit about the course? How large is it? What’s the course level? And who are the students that generally would be taking this course?

Tim: Yeah, absolutely. So this course that we’re focused on today is HS 300 which is our human diseases course. It’s quite an interesting course. A typical class is usually about 40 students, usually juniors, although I do get sophomores and seniors in there. And why I say it’s an interesting class is even though it lives within our department’s program of public health I would say, in the average term, I only have about half the class filled with public health majors. The rest of them are a mixture between students who want to go pre med, so nursing students or med school, DPT, biomedical engineering, and then also a smattering of psychology majors. So it’s quite a diverse group I’ve got in this class, to be very honest, with a range of different backgrounds.

Rebecca: Can you talk a little bit about your general approach to how you’re planning to address the class? A little bit about the portfolio and the structure overall?

Tim: Yeah, do the objectives of this class are for students, broadly speaking, I won’t get into the full curriculum guide here, but broadly speaking, is for them to better understand not only a wide range of human diseases across all of our systems, but also the application of that knowledge to both the clinical side, so think more like Western care and also the public health side. So we have this interesting mixture here. In terms of the portfolios, the reason I chose to start with this class with this concept was, as you can probably imagine, with the varied degrees I have in there, I have students walking into this class with everything from having completed anatomy and physiology I and II and maybe a pathophysiology course, all the way to students who haven’t seen biology since high school, because they just haven’t reached that point yet. That makes it a challenge. It’s a little hard to talk about congestive heart failure if they don’t know the anatomy of the heart. So that is the reason I chose this approach, is because, and I know we’ll get into this, really is focused around meeting the student where they’re at in their current process of learning, which I think is really the best approach, especially in a course like this, where background knowledge is so critical.

John: Could you walk us through the steps that students would take through in a typical module? And I believe each one of these modules is for one week?

Tim: Yes, that is right. So, the way I prefer to build my Canvas shells, and it’s the same in person or online for the general layout, is that I start off each week, beginning in week two, where they have to do the content first before we actually dive into the meat of the week. So the first thing that they have is they are given a portfolio to work from. And the way that these actually works is that they are handed a file, and this file is the thing that I have produced for each week, and it starts off with some core basics about that particular body system, and then we progress into the diseases, and then progress into more application of their work. And they’re going to take that file and not only work to fill out all of the spots that I have included in there, but they’re going to take that file and give it to this AI bot that I have built out, which is going to act as their own personalized Socratic form of a tutor to actually help them work through the entire file. So that’s the general layout with the portfolio. Once they actually go and turn that in, that actually unlocks the rest of the week’s work. So for an in-person class, this means they got to do the portfolio before they show up to class. For an online class, it means they have to do it before they can engage with the more advanced application we would be doing that week.

Rebecca: Can you talk a little bit about why you chose this approach and how this counters how a textbook is designed for a typical student?

Tim: Yeah, absolutely. I know I alluded to this briefly earlier, but when we have a course like this where in, effectively, I’ll call it 14 weeks, we’re going through every body system and covering well north of 100 different ways that we get sick, ill, and die.

Rebecca: Sounds really exciting, [LAUGHTER] all the ways you can die.[LAUGHTER]

Tim: That’s actually the way I kind of go and bring it in, was like, we’re going to go through so many things, and it’s going to convince you that nobody is normal. There’s just no possible way. But students actually really like it, and I hope not too many of them are freaked out by the time they [LAUGHTER] leave my course. So the reasons for this, I found that with a class like this, we really kind of have two options. The first one is, is that it falls into this very, what I’ll say is, traditional, classic style of a lecture class where we show up and we have to effectively spend the first day raising the bar for everybody so that day two, we can actually do some application work where we can challenge their knowledge. That is tough, because with the gambit of not only backgrounds, but also just experience levels in this class, I can tell you that any given week, if I were to do that, I’d be boring, probably about a third to half the class, because they already know about the systems, they’ve been through the courses, they work in the field, whatever it may be. So that is kind of the downside of that approach, and I’ll be honest, the textbook we had been using for this, which I think is a fantastic textbook, if… here’s the big if… if you have some anatomy and physiology under your belt. If you don’t, it’s a lot to swallow, like it is a thick textbook. It’s phenomenal, and it doesn’t adapt. It’s a textbook. So that was really the core reason why I went down this path, was I’ve been working with artificial intelligence chatbots since 2015 which was pre all of what we have now, and back then, it was a lot of work. [LAUGHTER] It was tough work to actually get them to where we wanted them to be. So I’ve been going and doing this for quite some time, and ever since openAI kind of broke the teaching world in November of 2022 it’s been really fun to start to begin to play and see where are these capacities going. And suddenly we’re at this place where we can use this tool that our students can access for free to give them this individualized approach. So my hope is going into this term, that what this will do is truly meet the student where they’re at, if they’re that student who has just one prior biology I course, no anatomy, and physiology, it’s going to spend more time going through the anatomy that they need to know to be able to comprehend the diseases and the processes that we actually care about in this class.

John: Now I have to say this, if the students do not have any anatomy and physiology under their belts, they’re probably a bot already. [LAUGHTER] But moving on, one of the things I noted in looking through some of the modules that you’ve created is that you put in suggested times. And this is an approach that I know Betsy Barre has suggested in terms of a couple of variants of student workload calculators that she’s created. And we’ll include a link to our podcast with her about that. Could you talk a little bit about why you’ve included that and how you came up with the estimates of how long students are likely to take with each of these activities?

Tim: Yeah, absolutely. So I am a big fan of providing estimates or ranges with the students. Personally, whenever I build a course or rebuild a course, I use the Wake Forest workload calculator that they have on their website. I love it. I think it’s fantastic as a way to just get a general scoping. And this also comes from… I have to think here… I believe at this point it’ll change after 5:30pm today, but at this point, I’ve taught 184 sections of courses, and this has been consistent feedback I’ve had from the students I’ve taught, is it’s really helpful. When I look at the list of things to do, if there are like numbers beside it, that even if they’re not 100% right, they give me a way to kind of calibrate my brain. And so I have some idea about how to schedule out my week. I don’t know about you, John, but our students here, just because Flagstaff, if they’re residential, it’s just an expensive place to live. They’re not only full time as a student, they’re working two or three jobs on top of that. So being able to tell, like, where should I spend my time, what should I do first, is really important to them. So the estimates in this I kind of went and derived a couple ways. The first way was I went through and tried to turn my beginner mindset back on. It’s a little bit harder when you spend a lot of time in the field, but I tried to go backwards and work through this and get a feeling for how many questions do I need to ask if I’m just that average student who maybe has done anatomy and physiology I but hasn’t gone further, which is kind of the bar I generally see as an average in this class, and then I will fully admit, I have some unpaid help, called family members, [LAUGHTER] who are more than willing to go and jump in and just like dive into it and go and tell me what worked, what didn’t work. They’re all individuals who don’t have the background, so they represent that one extreme on the far end of their really having to learn everything. So that’s the way I got this rough estimate for what I’m starting with this term. And then one of the things I’ll do is, this term, as they work through the portfolios, I am actually asking for them to report back as they go and turn into each one about approximately how much time did you spend on each one, and so that I can better calibrate this tool as I move forward. And so we’re on a grand adventure.

Rebecca: I had some activities that I did that with students, and had them kind of mark their time and track their time, and I think it was just as interesting for me as it was for them to understand how they spent their time, or where they might spend more time than they thought. I can also see how, having times broken apart, even if they’re not 100% accurate for each individual student, it does give you the idea that you’re going to spend more time on this activity than this activity. This is maybe more important, and therefore I want you to spend more time on it. And it’s a way of conveying some of that prioritization that needs to happen, that students have a difficulty doing if they don’t have expertise in the subject.

Tim: Yeah, and I’ll say as well, I know, because I have these students in class every term, and I love them, but there will be some of them that will spend way too much time on one part, it’s the kid who’s clearly gone into med school, will do great as a physician, or whatever they go and pick, and hopefully this helps them keep on track where they’re not spending five hours in the first bit that should be 15 minutes, and then they panic about the rest of the thing.

John: Yeah, those relative weights are important just in terms of showing how much priority students should place on each.

Tim: Absolutely.

John: We know that active learning approaches, as you’re planning for this course, tend to result in increased learning by students and longer-term knowledge retention and more transfer ability. Yet, when students are asked about how much they feel they’ve learned when they’ve been using active learning, they generally report that they learn more in lecture courses because they feel that they’re not getting as much because they’re struggling with things and any gaps in their knowledge is becoming transparent, while if they’re sitting in a lecture class, they can sit there and nod and smile and everything makes a lot of sense. How are you going to sell active learning to the students?

Tim: That is great. And to be frank, you bring up an item here that is one of my favorite, just bizarre oddities, that I get to explain to my classes. So I have a couple approaches on this one, the first one is on day one, which, as we record, this is a couple hours away, actually, this is one of the first things I actually go and bring up, is to explain, this is not a lecture class. We’re not doing PowerPoint slide decks the whole class. Here’s why. And I explain all these points about the fact that active learning actually does make you learn more and, more importantly, helps you develop these skills that you’ll actually need to make yourself career ready. And that’s really important, and it feels uncomfortable, because you’re going to get it exposed, you’re going to learn what you know you know and what you don’t know that you don’t know [LAUGHTER] and that can be frustrating. It can be anxiety inducing. So I think the first bit is just calling that out, bringing it up, and just acknowledging it from the start. So I think that is part one. Part two is I have built in, and this is an item I actually learned from some fellow faculty at a conference about a year and a half ago. I actually have required work at the end of each week, which is a very short self-reflection that they have to do. And it’s 10 questions, and it includes things around this area, about like, preparation for class, what’d you learn? What you feel like you had a hard time with? …all of that, and I have seen that with just even holding them, of course, the same, that inclusion, the feedback has been phenomenal in that they really enjoy being effectively forced to pause after they’re done with everything and really think about what did they do this week, and then how do I improve for next week? And then I do think the third and final bit, which I realize I might be uncorking a can of worms here on you, John and Rebecca, but I use ungrading for all of the courses I teach, and in fact, for this particular course, I use a contract grading style. And so I do think that that is one major component, is utilizing that style that supports this active learning, where they know that they’re in this effectively safe space to work in, where mistakes are expected, and I’m not as worried about the mistakes. I’m more worried about the mistake I see you make 15 times in a row and not learn. So being able to get that feedback and learn in real time is really the key. And when they feel safe about their grade, I found that they’re much more willing to take risks.

Rebecca: That’s a lot to unpack on that first day.

Tim: Yeah it Is. It’s a big first day. And really, I’ll be honest, it’s the first week. It’s not really the first day, because as much as I would love to dive into how do we diagnose disease on the first day, they haven’t done anything yet.[LAUGHTER] So we can’t do that yet. And so it’s really the first week, I should say.

Rebecca: Can you talk a little bit about the Gemini Gem that you created, that students are interacting with, maybe a little bit more about what their process looks like, how you’re going to coach students around hallucinations, what’s it allowed to do when it’s interacting with students, and what other kind of constraints and guardrails you have in place?

Tim: Absolutely. So Gemini Gems, just for those folks who may not know, this is effectively a, let’s say it’s a tailored version of Gemini that we can instruct to behave in certain ways, or we can give certain knowledge background to that allows us to make a customized chatbot without having to go through the hassle of fully training your own chatbot. So this particular Gem was a bit of a journey over the last approximately three months, where I abstractly played with a range of different models, and for my own work and myself, I work around not only the Gemini bots, but also ChatGPT and Claude, just being like our big three and occasionally Llama, but I don’t do a lot in there. So the creation of the Gem really came about when I went and sat down and said, Okay, if I were able to spend time with every single student, one on one, how would I approach tutoring them? Because that would be our dream. They would learn so much, and there’s just no way, unless I can clone myself a bunch of times. There’s just no way. And I came to kind of three broad, I’ll say, pedagogical points I wanted the tutor to do. The first one being Socratic style. So I don’t want it to just go and lecture. All of the students I’ve taught for years and years now have been very clear. They don’t like that. They want to be involved. So Socratic style. So we’re going to ask a question. I might give you a little bit of a knowledge point, and then we’re going to expand on that, but I’m going to ask you to really use your brain and engage. Point two is that we want to assess prior knowledge and learning. So does Rebecca know about cardiac anatomy and valves, or do we need to kind of back it up and maybe go and cover the basics. So when we dive into a new portfolio, that’s really the first thing it does is to go and ask you a question related to where we’re about to dive into. So again, the heart is my jam. I’ll be very honest. That’s what I do a lot of work in. And so if we’re talking about cardiac disease this week, we’re going to assess, do you actually know about the heart. How much do you know? Is this enough for us to actually talk about disease or not? And if it’s not, let’s back it up and start there, and then go for it. And then the final one is that idea of the zone of proximal development, that idea that ideally we want to be asking a question that’s they’re getting about 80% correct, and so they’re encouraged, but not overconfident, because if they’re getting 100% correct, they think they know this and they really know about half of that. So those were the three bits I began with, and from there, I built out this prompt. The things it is allowed to do, it’s allowed to act in these three ways, and it’s allowed quite a bit of freedom to be in this encouraging form of a tutor that supports work and tells the student when they’re wrong. Because I think all three of us have probably engaged with a bot, and I know that Gemini can be one of the more challenging ones, where it cheers you on, even though it’s blatantly wrong. [LAUGHTER] We don’t want that, so it is encouraged to constructively criticize, I’ll say, when the student is wrong and help them correct that. What it’s not allowed to do, though, is also really important. There’s a whole component to my system prompt that gives it a rule set of what it can’t do. It’s not allowed to just fill out the file for them. It’s not allowed to write their answer for them either. It can help critique their work that they’re going and putting in to kind of help them improve it, but it’s not allowed to just go and do that for them. Those are the guardrails in place, broadly, in this one. And then, for this particular class, I think you also asked about things like hallucinations and background knowledge. I’ll start with the latter. So background knowledge, given the fact that we’ve been studying human disease for quite some years at this point, to go and say it briefly, like at least 100, I found that when I played with this by giving it some RAG files, so some files it can pull from, it actually slowed the bot down and didn’t improve the answers. Because realistically, when we’re talking about human problems, sites like Mayo Clinic, Medscape, all these free sites are already included in the build of the AI, so it already has all that. So what it really needs is more fine tuning to make sure it’s focused on, which, again, is a guardrail, focused on accepted knowledge in this realm from reputable sources, versus trying to give it a bunch of specific files that it then has to go through and search and find what it’s looking for. Now, I will say on the flip side, I have a different course that’s exercise considerations for special populations. So this is a little bit more of my background, exercise physiology wise. How do we do activity with a cardiac patient or a cancer patient or a child who has autism spectrum level three. And in this one, I did provide files because I found that especially with a topic like autism, there’s just so much out there that it can inadvertently get onto the wrong things, that it was better to give it position statements from major fields and bodies to go and pull from to make sure it stays locked in on where I want it to go. So that’s effectively the building of this bot. I have found that I can generally use the baseline system prompt around how this bot behaves and then add in some of the details I want specific to a course to adapt it fairly quickly. Finally, hallucinations. And so I got to ask, what’s like a favorite for you that you’ve experienced around a bot hallucinating a fun thing for you.

Rebecca: I don’t know if it’s fun, but something I’ve seen a lot is hallucinated sources and students claiming that they really do exist. [LAUGHTER]

Tim: My favorite was… now, this was back in 2023, so it has improved, I will say that… But in class, asked it for a weight training plan for a adult who was 85, had never worked out in their life and just wanted to play with their grandkids, which was a example form of a client for that class. And it gave them Olympic lifts on day one. [LAUGHTER] It was like, we’re doing clean and power jerks, like, what are you doing? No, absolutely not. So hallucinations, as either or both of you may have seen, openAI released a white paper at the end of last year where they supported that currently, mathematically, hallucinations are going to happen, period. It’s not a thing that can be fully wiped out, and that’s just the reality we’re in. So what I actually do is they work through the portfolio, then their task two behind that is, by the end of the week, we are going covering that working content, I actually give them my key, and they’re in charge of actually reading through this key and going saying, were there any points where my answers weren’t quite correct? And I actually view that as a valuable skill, because we’re working on going and teaching them that hallucinations exist. Bias exists in these things as of right now. They always will. Hopefully, maybe there’s a way to wipe that out in the future. Right now, it doesn’t seem like there really is. So we’re going to not only use it for learning, but then we’re going to check ourselves against a known source to see where might it have led you astray. And I’ll be honest, that is one of the big unknowns, because, yeah, I’ve done some testing within a small group, but once we roll it out in this semester, it’s going to be north of 100 students who are going to go and do this. We’re going to see what is the actual rate of students having incorrect answers. If it becomes too great, then we have some tuning we need to do on the spot.

John: I hope that you’ve asked the bot to ignore anything coming from the CDC since January of 2025. But going back to the issue of assessing student work. You mentioned you’re using ungrading, but yet you still do have to assign grades, typically at midterm and at the end, but you do have students reflecting each week on what they’ve learned and their progress. So how are you connecting their assessments into those grades? And how often are you doing that?

Tim: Yeah, there’s a couple things I do, so starting with the smaller items in class, let’s pretend like we’re about to walk into week two. So you’ve done the week two portfolio. The moment I go and hand that in, I can immediately get to the key, which is the goal is they can go and get to it right away and see, were there any problems there? And now we’re in class. The first thing we do every week, day one in class is we start, they get into their groups that I pre assign. And to be very honest, until week six, it’s just random. I want them to work with a bunch of people in that class. So they get into these preset groups, and the first thing we do is a tRAT or team readiness assessment test. Now I’ll kind of pause here, because I know it’s a mixture here, John, I’m going seeing a nod and a smile. I feel like you’ve used this. Is that right?

John: I haven’t used it myself, but I do know how it’s used in team-based learning.

Tim: And Rebecca, is that a thing you’re aware of, or would you like me to kind of walk through like, what is a tRAT?

Rebecca: I think for our audience, we need to walk through.

Tim: Awesome. So a tRAT is probably one of my favorite tools for in-person classes, because I effectively get to trick my students into taking a quiz in class that they like taking, which is quite an experience. So this is a multiple choice quiz that you can use these cards that are pre-keyed. I will admit that I’ve actually moved to running a Google script on this. And the idea is basically they work as a small group. So I do groups of three or four, no larger than four in my classes, and what they have to do is, as a group, they go and decide, hey, for question one, we think the right choice is B, and they go and click on it, and if it’s wrong, it will go and turn red and say, try again. So they have to reason their way through and every time I’m wrong. I’m reducing the amount of points I could earn for that one. So because I use four choices in mine, if I get it right on the first thing we choose, it’s worth four points. If I don’t, it goes down to two and then one and then zero, because if you clicked on all four, you truly have no idea what was right or wrong there. Now for my classes, for this term, because I want them focused on their knowledge, and what do they know, and what do they not know? All that they have to do is report what they got, and if they’re there in class and do it, they get marked as all done with that. With that, I know I’ve heard feedback from other faculty being like, “Well, if that grade doesn’t go in the book, don’t they just not try?” And I actually go and say, like, “No, that’s actually the opposite of what I see is, they know how they did, they don’t like not doing well [LAUGHTER] in the class, especially if they spent all this time engaging.” So what they do is, I see from effectively week 2 to week 14, the grades just keep increasing, week over week over week. And what I actually do with these is, instead of just regurgitating what they just learned through the portfolio, we actually take one step more advanced, and I have 15 questions organized, usually around anywhere between four to six major conditions we’re going to cover. And we ask questions that are more advanced and more case application work, where if you don’t understand the background, you’re not going to get this right. And because it’s forcing them to do peer-to-peer engagement and reason through what is right or wrong, it requires them to really assess their own work and knowledge. So that’s a bit of it is, in class that goes and gives me a timestamp, because every single attempt I see live… that goes back to a Google sheet. So I see everything, I can see where we are right on the first attempt, where are we not. Where might we need to refresh on day two, and then the really big bulk of it is around that what happens after the tRAT? And what actually occurs in my class after that is we’ll spend that last hour of that first day and then an hour fifteen on our day two doing some quite advanced application work. So as an example, one week when we talk about pulmonary conditions, they go straight from the tRAT into learning what a SOAP note is. So, for those who don’t know, this is a way that we write a note in more of the clinical medical field. So they learn about this way of writing notes, and then they, as a team, actually work with a bot that I will assign them that acts as a patient, and they have to produce a SOAP note for that that they then have to present to the class on day two. So it’s all, can they pull out the right information? I f they think it’s problem A, they think it’s pneumonia, what other questions do you need to ask about that? And that’s our weekly work. And all of this at the really end of the term leads up to the culminating project in our class, which is three parts. For this class, this is where I’m really assessing them on what do they know? And they can revise and improve. They pick a disease that exists today. So as much as smallpox is fascinating, it doesn’t exist, except for in labs and hopefully never out in our globe again. And so they pick a thing that they find intriguing. The first bit is they have to do research and write me a historical overview of this disease and how it has impacted our health over time, including, how has it affected our clinical past, how has it affected our public health past, our policies, all of that stuff. So it’s this really overview, big scale idea. Number two, they go and take what they just went and wrote there and turn it into fact sheets. Now a fact sheet, I guarantee both of you have seen before, because if you’ve been into a physician, they have those things like: “Get the flu shot, now. Here’s why.” That’s a fact sheet. So they have to write one about their thing that they picked for a general adult, one for a physician, and one for a person who might be in Congress and might be making policy. So it requires them to take this knowledge and turn it and go and say, “What does this general adult need to know? What does maybe a physician need? What does a policy maker need?” And then the last of it is, and we’re ramping up into this, is they’ll actually give a presentation in week 15 of our term, where they have to propose a potential public health program that would help within a certain group of people for this thing and improve their health, which requires them to really thoroughly not only understand the disease, the processes behind but also the populations affected. How might we reach those groups? How do we help them, like, what are they lacking? And then, how would we actually go and reach them? And for this group, that’s usually their first time they’ve ever done this, so that’s a big ask, but they have the knowledge they can do it successfully on that. So really, a lot of it is around the projects, but everything builds up to those projects.

Rebecca: So it sounds like, with all the project-based learning that you have in here, you’ve certainly been thinking a bit about student use of AI and its potentials for cognitive offloading and academic integrity that we know come up in many conversations around AI. Can you talk a little bit more about the reasons why you chose some things and how that might relate to academic integrity issues?

Tim: Absolutely. So I think this is the core of a conversation we could have for hours on here. I have students every term who it’s very clear that a paper and assignment was written by AI. I don’t think that’s going away anytime soon. And [LAUGHTER]] the reality as well is there was, and I would have to go find it again. But there’s been quite a bit of work that’s shown that the majority of employers are expecting them to walk out of a college with some generative AI skills. So we need to be going and teaching this. And part of that is we need exposure. So for myself, I think there’s a couple parts to this question. The cognitive offloading is an item that, again, I do address in week one or week two, just kind of, depending on how week one rolls about just having kind of a very open discussion at the start of a class for about five minutes. About these are the risks if you, for example, try to acquire foundational knowledge and you just offload that to the AI writing the assignment for me. These are the risks that are run, and here’s why I don’t want you to do that. This bot that I am getting you to work with is specifically designed to force you to learn and think and then actively engage in this to help prevent that. So that’s the first bit. The second bit as well is we do actually go and talk about throughout a class like this, we go into a little bit, and I will fold this in maybe the first five minutes, kind of threaded throughout the term, we go and talk about more of this ethical or philosophical component with AI usage, because it goes beyond just things like power and water that is used for going and training these bots. And we do go and talk about that, but we’re beyond that here, and we go and talk about things like, “Well, what is the purpose of learning? When do we use these as an enhancement versus using it in a way that’s going to go and detriment your learning and your skill development? How do we avoid that?” And I’ll be honest, this is not the first term I’ve gone and spoken about these. I’ve done this for a couple terms now. And the feedback I’ve heard, which I suspect both of you will have heard if you have gone and done this before, is that students actually really appreciate it, because a lot of our kids, especially right now, they were in high school during the rapid pandemic lockdown era, and then maybe hybrid, and then maybe [LAUGHTER] back into lockdown. And what I’ve heard from them is they were threatened, and they were told by a lot of the folks in high school, and then moving into being freshman and sophomore, “If you use this, I’ll fail you out of the class, you’ll get expelled.” And so they’re afraid to admit any type of use. And nobody’s talked with them about, how do we develop this as a tool for your toolkit versus replacing your brain. And once we actually get into that, then we can actually explore this region in a much more effective way. So I think we need to have an open talk about this, and then as we build out parts of the class providing the guidance they need. So for example, for the paper that we just spoke about, that historical paper, they’re allowed to use an AI, and I have this built right into that. I’m fine with them if they want to go and use it for brainstorming, for helping them outline the paper, feedback on their own work, feedback on the paper. And I want to hear their voice. I want to hear their writing. So it’s not allowed to write the paper for them. I want them to write it. So I think it’s both the education and then being very clear about what you want them to do or not do, and then why.

John: And given the nature of the assignment, they’re already seeing how AI can be useful in assisting them in various ways that can carry on into their future careers. And the ungrading aspect of it also takes a lot of that pressure of grades off, allowing them to focus on learning. So, those are approaches I’ve recommended to many people trying to do these things. If we can show students how AI can be useful, and if maybe we shift their focus from getting the highest grade to learning the most, it can have an impact.

Tim: Yeah, well, and that, and I’ll go throw out a third one here, building them a box and allowing them the freedom to explore in that box. So I’ve told them what parts they need in the paper, but I’m allowing them to pick a disease that they actually want to research out, and that is a huge help, because when they want to do the work, I’ve had some phenomenal work done where I read it, and I’m like, man, you’re a couple reviews away from being able to publish this as like an undergraduate, like this is phenomenal.

John: That can really tap into intrinsic motivation. I know when I give students freedom in the choice of their projects or topics, they get so much more engaged than if they’re given a list of things they have to do.

Tim: Yeah, totally.

Rebecca: There’s a lot of steps week to week. There’s a lot of things that students need to do. In my experience, people don’t always read all the instructions [LAUGHTER] and maybe don’t follow through in the ways that we’re expecting them to. How are you hoping to prevent some of this? Especially because there’s a lot of steps in “this unlocks that” that can prevent someone from making progress during the week.

Tim: Yeah. So first one is, I have, unsurprisingly here, I’ll say I do have very clear instructions on like, what to do each week. And as you just said, some students just don’t read that. And the first thing that they do is, “oh my goodness, I can’t see the week,” email the professor. So the first bit is, I have learned how much instruction is enough versus how much is too much, because if it’s just pages and pages, they just won’t read it. So how to be succinct there? Part two is, for example, for the first portfolio, we’re going to actually start that in class. So that’s our day. We’re going to actually spend about half the class, and we’re going to sit there and work on it in class. So I’m available right then and there, and I make sure that anytime we have something new happening in a course, and this is the exact same in person or in an online course, is that I, at the start of class, I’m very, very clear both of the days about this is exactly what you need to do. And yes, that will not catch 100%. I still get a student or two out of 40 who are like, “Oh my goodness, it won’t open up. What am I doing wrong?” And I just have to go, remember to turn in your portfolio and that will unlock over the weekend they’re like, “Oh yeah, I recall that now.” So that has been kind of the path I found that works well, is to introduce complex things in class, including the projects, allow some free time where I can help them immediately, and then follow up with regular reminders of what to do.

John: Northern Arizona University, as Oswego does, has a site license for the use of Gemini. Would this work as well if all students didn’t have the same equitable access to a platform?

Tim: Yeah, that’s a big question. And in fact, I’ll say to throw a complexity here, we not only have the Gemini, we’re a Google, and we also have Copilot. I have no idea why, but we do. [LAUGHTER] So, we have lots of fun stuff. Without that, I think that even if you were to use the Gemini free version, that still gives you sufficient usage and space to be able to do a thing like this. The big asterisks I throw on there is making sure that we’re 100% transparent with our students about the fact of, “Hey, we don’t have a license. We’re going to do this. We’re going to do it through the Gemini bot, because the context window… for those of you who maybe that’s a new phrase, that’s basically the memory like in quotes for the bot… is gigantic, and the usage terms for the free tier are quite large enough to do this task. That anything you put into this bot, they could use it to train so don’t put anything that’s personal information into this bot. And I think that is a very good thing that we just need to teach in general, because there are a lot of students I teach who, one, they haven’t been told that they actually have this Gemini license for Ed that we pay for and that it’s all private. They’re going and using the ChatGPT free version, and they have no idea that they’re training on their data, unless they go to, like, flip off like a switch. And so that’s the first one, is we need to go and explain that, because there are students who, once they go and learn that are like, “oh my goodness, I put some very private stuff into here. I had no idea.” And then also thinking about the use in the class, for this class, for this purpose, we’re not asking them to reflect on anything. It’s straight disease and some biology learning. There’s nothing there that should put any personal information at risk. So I think it is 100% doable with the free license if I don’t have it. I think you just have to pick your bot wisely, because I’m a Claude person. I love Claude, and their free tier is very restrictive on the amount of use you get each day, so that’s not a good pick for this.

Rebecca: So we mentioned at the top some of the other ways that you’re using AI in your research. Can you talk a little bit about what that work looks like?

Tim: Yeah, I’ll try to be brief here. So I am a researcher on what’s called the ASD3 project, which is a joint project between the Oregon Health and Science U. and our institution. We have a PI here that I work under, and under that I work on the machine learning and deep learning, I’ll say, arm of the project. This is a multi-million dollar piece of work that looks at better understanding the autism experience for children, specifically around the disparities in the diagnosis and access of care. So a lot of data work. We work on several big code sets, so my work is mainly around using these advanced models to better understand where are these present, and how do we address them? So that’s that work. On the tribal health part of it. This is actually what I am planning on doing for my own doctoral research, is around trying to expand the availability of, specifically, heart care. So the cardiac rehab that I am trained in working on to individuals in a tribal space. The reason for this is that, based on some research we have, not only is heart health a major health burden within this space, but the relative risk of death from a heart-related problem in American Indians is somewhere around 53% higher than the average white adult’s, which is shockingly high. It’s the highest of any group. So, within this space, we also know that rehab is a thing that if we can get people into it, it dramatically drops the rate of a first event being like a heart attack, or if they’ve had their first one, their next event. But the problem is this, this is usually done in a hospital. And if you look at Navajo Nation, this is an area the size of West Virginia, they only have 13 hospitals total in that entire space. It’s very difficult to get to this, especially if you’re working full time, especially if you happen to be a farmer or you ranch or do both. So it can just be non feasible. So my work is focused around developing the foundational knowledge that I’ll take forward after I’m done, into the actual building of a generative AI that can supply this as a service within this space, and that is based on a very engaged approach, where we are working with folks from this space to help drive what does this AI look like? How does it engage? What do we do with cultural adaptation work? Because this is not my lived experience. It’s where I have knowledge, but it’s not my experience. It’s a different form of, a culture, a background, than what I am. So I am working on working with the tribes to be able to better drive what does this AI look like that we eventually build? How does it engage? And so that we’re not trying to walk in and propose a thing that doesn’t actually work because we don’t know what needs to be done yet. And so that’s, briefly speaking, the forms of AI that I do research on.

John: Some very valuable areas of research.

Tim: It’s exciting and frustrating at the same time. [LAUGHTER]

John: So we always end with the question, what’s next?

Tim: Yeah, in two hours, I’m going to go and see how this learning portfolio lands. That’s really what’s next for me is in two hours, we’re gonna dive into this for the first time for the entire class, and it’s no longer a trial. It is on the ground running. And yeah, I would love to do like a follow up, maybe in the summer or the fall, and we’ll actually have some figures and data and student feedback on how did the portfolios go? How did they change the class?

John: That would be great, and we’re looking forward to that conversation, so we’ll keep in touch.

Tim: Yeah, for sure. And I would just like to say, I do appreciate the time to chat, because I’m very excited about what we could do with AI in our space,

Rebecca: And it sounds like you’re finding ways to use it in all your spaces.

Tim: Absolutely.

Rebecca: So thanks for joining us. We appreciate your time and expertise.

Tim: And thank you, both of you.

John: Thank you.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

[MUSIC]

430. IDEAS for International Collaboration

Posted in access, authentic learning, coil, collaborative learning, faculty-led travel, globalization, higher education, international collaboration, international education, learning, STEM education
January 28, 2026

In an increasingly globalized and networked economy, it is important to help students develop intercultural competence. In this episode, Josh McKeown and Christina Lee join us to discuss how two institutions are working together on a grant-funded collaborative exchange experience involving STEM students and faculty in the U.S., South Korea, and Taiwan.

Josh is the Associate Provost for International Education and Programs and the Director of the Office of International Education and Programs here at SUNY-Oswego. Christina is the Director of Global Education and International Services at Monroe Community College.

Transcript

John: In an increasingly globalized and networked economy, it is important to help students develop intercultural competence. In this episode, we explore how two institutions are working together on a grant-funded collaborative exchange experience involving STEM students and faculty in the U.S., South Korea, and Taiwan.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

John: Our guests today are Josh McKeown and Christina Lee. Josh is the Associate Provost for International Education and Programs and the Director of the Office of International Education and Programs here at SUNY-Oswego. Christina is the Director of Global Education and International Services at Monroe Community College. Welcome, Christina, and welcome back, Josh.

Josh: Thank you.

Christina: Thank you.

Rebecca: Today’s teas are:… Christina, are you drinking tea with us today?

Christina: Yes, I always have tea. The tea I’m drinking today is a Korean roasted rice green tea.

Rebecca: Oh, that sounds nice.

Josh: That does sound good.

Rebecca: …having good tea choices today, John. [LAUGHTER]

Josh: I’m having gold blend black tea from Rwanda.

Rebecca: Nice.

John: Very nice. More geographic variety than normal.

Rebecca: Yeah. [LAUGHTER]

John: And today I am drinking a ginger peach green tea.

Rebecca: And I have switched to a Scottish breakfast tea.

Josh: That’s your go to. [LAUGHTER]

Rebecca: It is, although earlier today, I was drinking a Swiss tea, but I drank it all up. [LAUGHTER]

John: We’ve invited you here today to discuss the grant funded international education projects that you have arranged in South Korea and Taiwan. These projects were both funded by the federal IDEAS grant program. Can you tell us a bit about this program?

Josh: Sure, and definitely thank you, John and Rebecca, for having us on the show. We’re really proud of this project. The IDEAS grant program is funded by the United States Department of State, so it’s a federal program, and it’s been in place for nearly a decade, and its main purpose is to broaden and improve access to international education, particularly education abroad, or also called study abroad, for disciplines, students, and parts of the world that have not had as much study abroad activity over the years, and this one, in particular, the Chips and Science Act, it was a special track, actually a higher funding amount, focused particularly on the Chips and Science Act.

Rebecca: Can you tell us a little bit about the nature of the specific projects that you proposed under this grant application?

Josh: Definitely, and I’ll invite my colleague Christina to comment as well on this part, because in order to qualify for this grant, and they’d been around, like I said, for a while, and I’d always seen it, but this was called a consortium grant, so it required a university and a community college to partner together. So I’ll give my perspective, and then Christina can share from the community college perspective. When the grant was announced, I almost couldn’t believe it, because its focus on Chips and Science Act was something I had been thinking about literally for the previous two years. This part of New York State, those of us here in Rochester or in Oswego know this like the back of our hand now, but for other listeners, the investment by micron technology, one of America’s largest semiconductor manufacturers in a industrial site about 20 miles from Oswego is going to literally transform the economy and probably the larger society of Central New York for decades to come. It’s a project of that scale. They’re talking potentially at its peak of, I think, $100 billion of total investment, up to 50,000 new workers, and, of course, all the economic activity. When this was announced two years ago, I had two initial thoughts. The first was, “Wow, this is going to change things.” I live about 10 minutes from that site. But then the second thing I thought was, “Oh, wow, we’re going to be part of the global semiconductor ecosystem.” And in my work, I thought immediately about particularly Taiwan and South Korea, two countries that SUNY Oswego has really well-established university exchange and other partnership agreements with, but we had not worked with those universities about this topic of semiconductor. So that’s what got me interested in this. And shortly after, I met with Christina, who has a long record of international education within SUNY as well, and she agreed to join me in the project.

Christina: I was really excited when Josh reached out to us to partner on this grant. As a community college, our students don’t often have the opportunity to study abroad, and so building something with SUNY Oswego, who has a very robust and long time sustained study abroad program, was really appealing to me, and also helping us think about partnerships. I think SUNY Oswego has good partnerships in Taiwan and Korea that was also appealing to me. And I’m always thinking about ways to bring global education to our students, whether it’s utilizing virtual internships, virtual exchange, virtual online learning, lecture series, and also grant partnerships for our faculty and to assist with student travel. So I thought this was a really great way to partner with another SUNY school and give opportunities to our students. Rarely will they do a semester abroad, but if we could do a short- term faculty led program out of this grant partnership, I thought that would be important for our students, who often have responsibilities here in Rochester, at home and with work, so I was glad we could do that. Here at MCC we have some unique programs. We’re the only community college with an associate’s degree in precision optics, and we also have a very strong Geospatial Information Systems Technology program. And so I have been really interested in how to incorporate some kind of global exchange with STEM fields in our college. I think it’s important in terms of training technicians in the global industry. I would like an opportunity to find a way so that we can also incorporate understanding of global interdependence on the global economy through, ideally, some kind of exchange that will come out of this program. We’re equipped to do it virtually, which is wonderful. A lot of our classrooms are already Zoom capable. So we do collaborative, online, international learning already. We do some virtual internships. We do some Zoom teaching as well, for students who are interested in our programs but aren’t here in person. But I think this is a great opportunity, again, for us to think about other ways to bring the globe to our college, whether it’s something we do online or whether we do something in person.

Josh: I’ll pick up on what Christina was saying about workforce development. The grant parameters did not tell us, or presumably, the other universities that would have applied for it, they didn’t tell us what they wanted us to do, but we had to somehow satisfy the reviewers’ focus on the Chips and Science Act. But this is where Monroe Community College and SUNY Oswego, I think, were really aligned. And that is, and our President talks about this all the time, that we are going to be one of the institutions in Central New York closest to Micron, but also critical to Micron’s success. But currently this region does not have the workers for that fab. And by the way, I’ll just go take a step back and say I am not a computer scientist. I’m not an engineer. The only thing I knew about chips before this project were Doritos and Lays. [LAUGHTER] When I went to departments to talk about it, I would say it that way, but I’ve learned some things about it, and I’ve learned, including from our summer trip to Korea and our upcoming trip to Taiwan, that the precision that goes into the construction of these fabs, the clean rooms, water treatment, they are really just sites to behold in terms of cleanliness and readiness for work, but they’re also highly technical places, and students need the right experiences, the right education, the right exposure, to get jobs working in these fabs, and so Monroe and SUNY Oswego are really aligned on the need to prepare teachers in the region, to prepare students, and to contribute to Micron’s success. From my lane, though, what excites me about this, and this is where I thought it’s a transformative project for the region, but also whoever that individual student is, who eventually studies abroad in South Korea or Taiwan with us, whether from Monroe, from Oswego, from any other institution, that individual, when they go to work at Micron, I know that they are going to interact with co-workers or supervisors or teammates or vendors and suppliers. Someone in that ecosystem of semiconductor will be from Korea and Taiwan, I know it, because those countries have produced major companies like Samsung, like Taiwan semiconductor manufacturing, TSMC, both of which we have visited or will visit. And I always think about that kid from New York, whether upstate, downstate, that person who is going to go work for Micron or one of the ancillary industries involved in the semiconductor ecosystem, they’re going to have that cultural exposure. They’re going to have that experience. They will have worked, maybe as a research intern in Taiwan or Korea. They will have gone with faculty on a faculty-led experience like Christina was describing, they’re going to have that confidence which study abroad can give you, but particularly that cultural exposure in those two places. So when they enter that team meeting and they’re on a Zoom with people from Taiwan or Korea, they’ll be more prepared. And really, that’s what motivates me.

Rebecca: So you’ve talked a bit about why you chose South Korea or Taiwan as partners or locations, and that SUNY Oswego had some prior relationships to lean on there. Can you talk a little bit about what these partnerships actually will look like? What will students be doing in these countries? You’ve hinted at a couple of ideas, Josh.

Josh: For starters, we had to identify faculty who would be good fits for this. SUNY Oswego has a long tradition of education abroad. International education, really back to our founding, to Sheldon himself, but in the last couple of decades, probably anywhere from 15 to 25 SUNY Oswego professors literally bring students with them on international programs abroad, including yourself, Rebecca, you know exactly what I’m talking about. What we set out to do in both institutions was identified faculty who’d be the right fit. Of course, a lot of faculty, whether it’s in art or music or education, participate in international education. But for this, we really focused on two key areas. One was in the STEM fields. So we have faculty in electrical and computer engineering, computer science, and chemistry from Oswego… Christina has her own STEM faculty involved… but also career and technical education, which is going to be a huge aspect to getting the workforce ready for Micron. By the way, that’s what our grant was called, “Getting Ready for Micron.” So we didn’t tell the faculty what type of programs to be involved in, but the proposals that I got in, and it was a competitive process, many faculty applied to go on these trips, but we selected the ones that were really the best fit. They proposed things like, in the career and technical education area, a boot camp exchange, for example. And this comes from our CTE department Professor Ben Ogle, who proposed his work with teachers and trainers in the region. He does what were essentially boot camps to get them prepared to do teaching and training in this field. And what we found, for example, in Korea and will in Taiwan, they have very similar workforce readiness challenges, very similar issues of schooling and preparation, of demography, of having enough young people to take over jobs and careers as the older generation retires. So that’s one example of how this grant is supposed to work. Yes, it’s going to be a great experience for students. They’re going to learn more about the training and education system in Korea or Taiwan, hopefully good for the Korea and Taiwanese counterparts who come here on a type of exchange to learn how we do it, but ultimately it’s serving the regions and the industries as well. So that’s what I see. But there are probably other examples too I could mention.

Christina: The faculty for this program was a faculty in geospatial information technology systems and biology, so they’re both really interested in sustainability in the semiconductor industry, and I really have enjoyed the interdisciplinary teams that we’re bringing between SUNY Oswego and MCC.

Josh: Rebecca, to amplify your question about the partner universities, both in Korea and Taiwan… everybody is super busy, and everyone has so many projects they’re working on… but when we proposed this, and the two universities in Korea, Kyungpook National University, located in Daegu, and the other was Busan National University located in Busan in the south, both are excellent universities, national universities, and we have productive, ongoing exchange student relationships with them. But when we proposed this, bringing a faculty delegation particularly focused on semiconductor, they jumped at it. There was no lack of understanding. They knew exactly what we were trying to do. And in both cases, in Korea, and I suspect we’ll hear the same in Taiwan when we go there, this fits their agendas as well, because, for example, in Korea, just like here, industry works closely with the universities and the public school sector. Ours is called the Chips and Science act. Well, in Korea, they have something called the K-Chips Act. So the idea of using national policy, a little bit of grant funding, and trying to get universities and school systems focused and aligned on a common experience or curriculum that serves this industry, it’s really global. There aren’t that many countries that do this. In the case of South Korea and Taiwan, these are friendly countries, allied countries. They’re places that Americans love to travel to and are free to engage with. And I’ll repeat, this grant was funded by the U.S. Department of State. So there’s obviously a foreign policy goal to this type of project, and I think we all understand, especially in central New York, more and more all the time, that semiconductors really are part of the economy, yes, but also a national security issue. And they view it the same way over there. So we have a lot to learn from each other.

John: From what I’ve seen, the students who are most likely to participate in international education programs are disproportionately from humanities fields, and it’s much less common for students in STEM fields to participate. Is this one of the reasons, perhaps, for focusing on this to bring more STEM students into international education.

Josh: Absolutely, absolutely. In the case of the universities that we’re working with in Korea and Taiwan, again, these relationships were established already, but we had never imagined this type of engagement with them. So again, the disciplines that our faculty represent, electrical and computer engineering, computer science, chemistry from SUNY-Oswego and Christina, I think you have someone from biology coming on the next trip.

Christina: Yeah.

Josh: Hopefully the faculty return from this motivated and active, and are the ones who can really encourage their students, including, to take a full semester exchange if they want to Korea and Taiwan, perhaps knowing that the curriculum are so well aligned, because that’s one of the projects we’re working on to make sure that our engineering curriculum is aligned with the ones in Taiwan, for example, and likewise, their students can come here, and all of that over the course of many years, I hope, will really create a fluid and really mutually advantageous relationship between SUNY-Oswego, Monroe Community College, and the universities that we’re working with in that part of the world.

Christina: One of the things I’m excited for on this trip that we didn’t have in our trip to Korea is that we will have a representative from Micron, from their Virginia office, join us for the entirety of this trip, and we already have a working partnership with him here at MCC, with our workforce development staff and faculty. So I think it’ll be a great opportunity for us, for SUNY Oswego and for us here at MCC to brainstorm with him, to think about ways that we can partner once we’re back in the States, and perhaps think about ways that we can partner at some of these M icron locations globally, just having his knowledge and information on how he builds programs, I think will be great. I’m looking forward to that.

Josh: Yeah, that’s super exciting. So we didn’t tell them this yet. Christina, but when we were in Korea, besides visiting the two universities, one of our partner universities, Kyungpook National, arranged for a day- long visit to an industrial park near the city of Daegu, and we were allowed in for a tour of Samsung semiconductor facility, as well as seeing one of the clean rooms, one of the clean room demos at the university itself. So being allowed into Samsung, I mean, it was one of those places that… remember Christina, we had to check our phones at the door, like very secure place. This industry is really so high tech and proprietary, but they let us in for a great tour. We learned a lot about Samsung and the development of Samsung semiconductor. Similar, we’re going to do the same with TSMC or Taiwan Semiconductor in Taiwan, and Micron itself, because Micron operates a fab, actually, we learned two fabs, in Taiwan, and so we’re going to be able to see a Micron facility as well. So that industry partnership, both here and abroad, it seems to be crucial to the success not only of the industries, but of the universities that work with them. So I totally agree with what Christina says. It’s going to be really exciting for our faculty and for us to see how we can develop international education programs, not only at partner universities, but partnering with industries in all three countries.

Rebecca: You’re expecting for the student experience to start with faculty- led opportunities, where it might be short term opportunities to go to one of these two countries, explore some things with the guidance of a faculty member first, and hoping that grows into longer exchanges. Is that the model that you’re thinking about? or all the things, at the same time? [LAUGHTER]

Josh: You’re right, I think the faculty led opportunity is the most likely, and I say that for a couple of reasons. Again, we have great relationships with the universities in South Korea and Taiwan, similarly in Japan, and other places, but those places are far away, and most of our students do not have direct experience halfway around the world, in places where English is not spoken and cultures are quite different. Even though they’re safe and they’re wonderful places to go and explore, they’re culturally quite different for many students, and so having the faculty leader with that direct experience who can motivate and excite but also provide the trust and guidance necessary, I have a feeling, yes, that’s going to be the most popular. But if someone wants to go for a semester exchange or year long, they’re welcome to. We’ll have that for them as well. I’m not sure, Christina, if your student population would be similar in that sense.

Christina: The best fit for our students here at MCC is really a short-term faculty led program. 10 days is a good fit for the schedule that our students keep, since most of them work part or full time, they have family responsibilities, and so we have been able to use some of our COIL learning to launch some grants into faculty-led short term programs. Both the faculty chosen for this trip have had opportunities to create faculty-led programs. So I am thinking that that would be what I would like to do with SUNY Oswego in partnership, if we could do that. I think our faculty are excited to lead a trip back to Taiwan and Korea with students. So, I’m looking forward to doing that with a combination of, again, some kind of virtual exchange, some COIL, collaborative online international learning.

Josh: That’s a really good point, because a lot of students at SUNY Oswego as well want to study abroad, or want to travel abroad, but cannot for a variety of reasons, including costs, time to graduation, other responsibilities, like Christina says, and that’s a huge issue. We’re proud of the proportion of students that do study abroad, but it’s still quite small. Probably in our best year, it might be 20% of our population, which is really good, but that’s still 80% who don’t. So those students who cannot take part in that experience, we can develop, whether it’s COIL or something like an exposure to that industry. There’s all sorts of things going on in this field that I was not aware of, things like virtual clean rooms and virtual experiences, or just joint projects focused on semiconductor that our students can work on with students from Korea or Taiwan. But for the students who do go, and that’s one of the big main goals and purposes of the grant. I just think about when that person who graduates and is going for a job interview or filling out an application, and they got the opportunity to travel to Taiwan and actually do a research project or a placement, or maybe we’ll get to the point of an internship at Micron or at a semiconductor fab overseas, that that student will have a competitive edge in the job market. They’ll be more prepared for their career, but we want to be a career- ready institution at SUNY Oswego and I know Monroe is the same, and so we feel that these programs will have direct career benefit for students: more likely to get the job, and then, once they’re in the job, and again, they’re more familiar with the global semiconductor ecosystem. And importantly, they’ll have had some exposure to this part of the world that maybe some of their peers won’t, and that’ll help them in their career.

John: And I would think that there would be some advantages, particularly in STEM fields, for relying to a greater extent, perhaps on virtual exchange or for short-term visits, because most STEM majors have very extensive degree requirements that are already difficult to fit into the curriculum. But by doing things virtually or by having short-term visits, I would think that would make it a little bit more feasible for students in majors with more barriers, because of any of these reasons that you’ve mentioned, or just the number of courses required specifically.

Josh: I think that’s why Christina and I got this grant. I mean, we thought really creatively in the proposal, and to its credit, the grant parameters required community college. I think they were thinking that exact way is, how do we get STEM students? How do we get more career oriented students who also have barriers to study abroad, more involved? Again, they didn’t tell us what to do, but we got creative, and we talked to faculty, and again, each professor who’s going had to put a proposal together of what they could imagine doing in terms of the international experience. And yeah, to your point, John, it really forced all of us to be more creative and more inclusive.

Christina: So here at MCC we have a wonderful workforce development program. And I often do think about how our STEM majors can do some kind of global exchange, because their degree requirements follow a very specific pathway. And there are some that I have been able to find where students can do some semester-long or short-term programs. But our college is unique in that we are often training the workforce in sort of technical careers, and so trying to think about how we do that as a global experience is something that this grant has really helped me think about how we can do that. Most of our students have state and federal funding for school, which requires them to stay within their degree required courses. And so I think we’re trying to think creatively how we can create a capstone that will be part of their program, that could also incorporate some kind of short- term exchange.

Josh: Christina mentioned one of her colleagues from Monroe was in geospatial technology. One of our colleagues in the first delegation was in global international studies. There are a lot of angles that you can take with this topic… site selection. I know that was something that the geographer was particularly interested in, is how a site gets chosen. The footprint that Micron is talking about with its fabs, it’s enormous, so people saw how huge the track of land is that they’re using. And of course, it’s close to the lake and there’re wetland issues involved. So there’s a lot to that from the geographic and the sustainability angle, but also from Global Studies. I’m interested in the topic. How is it that United States and Korea and Taiwan, in this case, are all friendly nations, all allies and strongly aligned with each other. How we interact politically, diplomatically, economically, is of interest to me, especially in such a sensitive technology. And I think we know there are some restrictions on this technology export in certain parts of the world, but also the nexus between education institutions, public education, university, higher education and industry, and how that’s managed, and how governments facilitate that. I think we’ve all seen in New York state how the federal government, state government, local county governments have gotten involved with the Micron project. And sure enough, they have similar approaches on this overseas. So even just understanding how societies are getting ready for investment in technologies like this, all that’s fair game, as well as business and logistics, packaging and shipping these things, and controlling that. So there’s a ton of areas that I think we’re going to be able to explore over the course of the years that we’re involved in getting ready for Micron.

Rebecca: I can imagine that the industry alignment piece of this international project’s a bit different than some of the other projects that you’ve worked on in that it brings industry together, international partners, as well as our institutions. Just from what started to unfold, are there some lessons that you’ve learned that you might share with others that are exploring some similar opportunities?

Josh: That’s a great question. I’ll give my take. We’re still right in the middle of this project, so it’s hard to think fully. But I guess the thing that really has stuck out for me, again, not being an engineer, not being really too familiar with the technology behind it, is how open minded people are about this, at least with the partners we’ve chosen and the types of educational exchanges we’re talking about, all fit with their interests to both the universities that we’re meeting with and the industries. It’s like we’re all open minded about this. And my take on this, I’m not sure what Christina’s is, my take is that we all are in the same ecosystem. And you realize very quickly that something as crucial as semiconductors and other industries, I think, like this too, they all kind of rely on each other, and so working with an educational partner in the United States who has relationships in Korea, Taiwan, that makes sense to our industry clearly, and I sense the same from our partners in Korea and Taiwan as well. It’s like we’re eager to share, we’re eager to learn, and we play a crucial role in that as educators.

Christina: So when we were in Korea, I was really impressed by their national priority to make sure that their students are globally educated. And in several of the colleges that I visited there, they made it known that a requirement was for their students to do some kind of global exchange, whether it was studying in a different country, outside of Korea, and then coming back to inform the Korean industry about the global landscape in technology or in whatever field the student was studying. So of course, I think that’s a priority for our students as well, for MCC and SUNY Oswego, but I also am thinking really deeply right now about the importance of global education as a pathway to diplomacy around higher ed institutions, and how important it is for our students and for us as faculty and staff to continue to develop these global relationships across boundaries, so that global education is a strong skill that our students have. I would also like to say that I was really excited that we got this grant together with SUNY Oswego. I think it’s a great partnership, and I’m very happy to be part of it.

Josh: Yeah, me too. Monroe has been a terrific partner, and their technologies and their facilities for training students and workers are really advanced. They’re incredible. One more thing comes to my mind, Rebecca, about this project, is a lot of us in higher education or education in general, probably don’t interact with industry very much. And when I said about being open minded, I found the industrial partners that we’ve worked with in all the countries we visited so far, I’ve learned something amazing every time I talk to them. And I feel that if we’re going to be the type of institution, and I believe both Monroe Community and SUNY Oswego are, but for others out there who very much want their students to graduate and get good jobs and be able to manage student debt and all the things that we’re concerned about in higher education today, there’s nothing like direct interaction with employers. And I agree with Christina, this could apply in other industries as well. This is just semiconductor, but direct interaction with employers and hearing what they’re looking for, and hearing the kinds of issues that they’re dealing with, and in this case, governments explaining it as well. It’s eye opening. And I think it’s good for us. I think it’s good for me, it’s good for higher education overall, to have that exposure and really to maybe check your assumptions about what a university education is going to lead to for students, because a lot of things are changing, and something as crucial as semiconductor industry, it’s really highlighted to me that these folks can’t wait. They really need the right workers and the right fit and the right skill set. And it’s globally competitive, but also globally one ecosystem that they all interact with. It’s fascinating, and very important too.

Christina: One of the priorities here at MCC around global learning is to understand the impact of global processes on the local economy and vice versa. And so I’m hoping that any programs that we bring to MCC will highlight how connected we are to the world, and we have a very global campus, and also educating the students on the importance of understanding the global workforce is something that I think is important for me to highlight in what we do here.

John: So we’ve talked a bit about the benefit to the institution, the benefits to the region, and so forth. But this is a federally funded grant. What are the benefits to the country of the Chips and Science Act, and what was the motivation behind this act?

Josh: So yeah, we take that responsibility very seriously. It is a federal grant, and it allows two institutions, SUNY-Oswego, Monroe Community College and 10 of our faculty colleagues to have this incredible experience. So it is funded by the American people, and we take that responsibility very seriously. For me, I think it’s partly about global competition, making sure that the United States is competitive, remains competitive, in a crucial industry like semiconductors. I think it’s also the federal government, kind of putting its money where its mouth is, to say that we have the best universities in the world. We have the best technical talent, the most innovative creators and founders in the world, and many of them come to the United States from outside and start businesses here. But at the same time, we can’t rest on our laurels, and that there’s a huge sector of society, regional public universities like SUNY- Oswego, community colleges like Monroe, who maybe don’t have that level of research, because that’s not our focus. But yet, we have incredible faculty, incredible facilities, and our students are ambitious, they’re bright, they’re hard working, and they have a place in this global semiconductor industry as well, and it’s our responsibility to get them ready for it. So to me, that’s what it says.

Christina: One of the things that I have been thinking about as some federal grants have ceased, is how important it is for our students, who are often employed regionally. And I think it’s similar at SUNY-Oswego that students are employed regionally after their education about providing more opportunities to students through any grant agency so that they can have a better understanding of the world, the globe, how their work here is impacted by things happening around the world, and the interdependence of our community, our industries, our workforce. And I’m also like, I’ll say before, the diplomacy aspect is really important to me in terms of creating partnerships around the world. And also, I know this is an interest of Josh’s as well, but that intercultural understanding when we are working in partnership, whether it’s in a collaborative base in the classroom, or if we’re working across industries. I think that intercultural knowledge, that understanding with intercultural communication, all of that, is really important in the work we do around global education, and really important that these grant opportunities that we get help support that sort of worldview.

Josh: Yeah, preparation… definitely agree.

Rebecca: So, we always wrap up by asking: “What’s next?”

Josh: Oh, I know, this is my third time on the show, and I always think to myself that next time, I’m going to prepare and have a better answer. [LAUGHTER] But no, I love the spontaneity of it. Two things are, for me, what’s next, and by the way, I would like to say that I’ve worked in international higher education for over 30 years now. I think this is the highlight of my career, this project, because it ties in so many things that are important to me, the intercultural development that Christina spoke about, crossing borders in general, and how challenging that can be for students and for institutions to do it safely and productively, but also the importance of it, the importance of the project overall, for the reasons we’ve spoken about. So I think about two things about what’s next, developing really innovative and strong education abroad experiences that result from this. We talked a little bit about faculty-led short-term programs, and a little bit about COIL exchange, but I’ll view this as being truly successful and transformational when SUNY-Oswego students are doing internships in Taiwanese semiconductor companies, and we are hosting visiting faculty from Korea and Taiwan on our campuses, and they’re teaching seminars and courses on this topic. What I’m trying to say is when the level of relationship is that deep and that fundamental in this industry, but in the meantime, we got to build one step at a time. The other thing I’m thinking about is, where else we do this? The countries we chose for this grant are ones that SUNY Oswego had good partnerships with, but there are other places in the world too that are crucial in this industry. Japan is a leader in this. There are companies in the Netherlands and Germany that are very strong. All of these places, we have partnerships. So it’s possible that we can even expand this further.

Christina: So I think the what’s next for me is that I’m always thinking about ways for our community college to partner with other institutions, and also thinking about how our students can have a global perspective, a world view in anything they’re doing here, whether they are working in the semiconductor industry, in nursing, as a GIS technology systems student, sustainability. I think all of those things are important for me to think about. How our students, even if they remain local, if they remain in our region, that they will enhance what they’re doing with a world perspective. So I’m excited to bring an opportunity to the students with these partnerships that we create with SUNY-Oswego and in Taiwan and Korea, and really excited to bring that perspective here to MCC.

Josh: And Christina, we’ve been so focused on our international outlook on this project. I think Monroe Community College and SUNY-Oswego are going to work a lot more closely together in this field. I don’t think we quite know, and that’s not necessarily our responsibility to do that, you and me, but I see our two institutions really gelling well with this project, and as the workforce needs of the region continue to grow and get more sophisticated, I think this project will help even beyond our offices.

Christina: I think that’s true. I’m really looking forward to that

Rebecca: Well, thank you so much for joining us today and sharing some insights into your project.

Josh: Thank you for having us, and I appreciate this program. I’m a regular listener, and I always learn something. I hope we shared something of value today, too.

Christina: Thank you so much for having us on this podcast, and thank you to SUNY-Oswego for this partnership.

John: Well, thank you. This is a wonderful program, and it’s one that perhaps many other institutions should consider participating in.

Josh: Thank you.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

[MUSIC]

429. An Educator’s Guide to ADHD

Posted in access, accessibility, attention, classroom community, diversity, engagement, equity, higher education, learning, metacognition, pedagogy, teaching
January 21, 2026

Each student brings individual strengths and challenges to our classroom communities. In this episode, Karen Costa joins us to discuss ways to help students with ADHD thrive.

Karen is a faculty development facilitator specializing in online pedagogy, trauma-aware teaching, and supporting ADHD learners. Karen holds graduate degrees and certificates in education and education leadership; trauma and resilience; trauma-informed organizations; and neuroscience, learning, and online instruction. She is the author of 99 Tips for Creating Simple and Sustainable Educational Videos, and has served as a facilitator for the Online Learning Consortium, the Online Learning Toolkit, and Lumen Learning. Her most recent book, An Educator’s Guide to ADHD, has just been released by Johns Hopkins Press. Through her business, 100 Faculty, Karen offers supportive, fun, and engaging faculty support and development to faculty from all over the world.

Show Notes

  • Costa, K. (2023). 99 tips for creating simple and sustainable educational videos: A guide for online teachers and flipped classes. Taylor & Francis.
  • Online Learning Consortium
  • Lumen Learning
  • Costa, K. (2026). An Educator’s Guide to ADHD. Johns Hopkins University Press.
  • 100 Faculty
  • Clear, J., & Clear, J. (2018). Atomic habits: Tiny changes, remarkable results. Penguin Publishing Group.
  • Costa, Karen (2022). Systems Aren’t Scary. Medium. October 31.
  • Hallowell, E. M., & Ratey, J. J. (2022). ADHD 2.0: New science and essential strategies for thriving with distraction–from childhood through adulthood. Ballantine Books.
  • Dr. Ned Hallowell’s TikTok channel
  • Fehmi, L., & Robbins, J. (2008). The open-focus brain: harnessing the power of attention to heal mind and body. Shambhala Publications.

Transcript

John: Each student brings individual strengths and challenges to our classroom communities. In this episode, we explore ways to help students with ADHD thrive.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

Rebecca: Our guest today is Karen Costa. Karen is a faculty development facilitator specializing in online pedagogy, trauma-aware teaching, and supporting ADHD learners. Karen holds graduate degrees and certificates in education and education leadership; trauma and resilience; trauma-informed organizations; and neuroscience, learning, and online instruction. She is the author of 99 Tips for Creating Simple and Sustainable Educational Videos, and has served as a facilitator for the Online Learning Consortium, the Online Learning Toolkit, and Lumen Learning. Her most recent book, An Educator’s Guide to ADHD, has just been released by Johns Hopkins Press. Through her business, 100 Faculty, Karen offers supportive, fun, and engaging faculty support and development to faculty from all over the world. Welcome back, Karen.

Karen: Thank you. I’ve been here before a couple times. It’s been a while, and I just want to say I’m so impressed with your continued work, that you are able to put these incredibly helpful podcasts out into the world. I think the first time we talked was around COVID lockdowns, about trauma, and you’re still doing this, and I find that so impressive. Thank you for all that you do.

John: In fact, your first podcast with us during the pandemic was our most popular podcast ever, and it remains so, it’s still number one on our hit list of the most popular podcasts.

Karen: Well, that wasn’t me. That was because people were trapped at home and desperate for some kind of simulation. So I can’t take credit for that.

John: You provided some help that they desperately needed during that time.

Karen: I’m glad you said that. I do get nervous about these things, but I think you all are my first sort of podcast stop. I’m talking about this book, and it’s a little different, because the book’s not just about helping students and helping teachers, but it’s about me and being somebody with ADHD and late diagnosed and all that comes with that, and I speak pretty openly about it, but there is an element of vulnerability to that. So I gave myself a little extra TLC this morning, reminding myself that it’s normal to feel that vulnerability. I’m really glad to be having this first initial conversation with the book with you two who are so kind and welcoming and making me feel right at home.

John: And speaking of TLC, do you have tea today?

Karen: I don’t think I’ve ever had tea when I’m with y’all.

John: You’re one of many.

Karen: I don’t pretend, and I like to think I’m a truth teller. So I’m drinking a nice, crisp, cool, Polar lemon seltzer, because when I do podcast interviews or talks, I do tend to get warm, and there’s a non-zero chance these days that that could lead to a hot flash. So there’s no tea, and I’m keeping things cool. So to our listeners who also need to keep things cool, you are seen and supported.

Rebecca: You can have iced tea.

Karen: Iced tea, yeah, I have to limit, while this is another ADHD story for another day, but yeah, I got to be careful about the caffeine. There’s probably a decaf. I’ll explore it.

Rebecca: Maybe next time. Today I have a Kenilworth pekoe tea.

John: Very nice. Was this one you picked up in England too.

Rebecca: This is from Scotland.

Karen: You went to the UK recently.

Rebecca: It was last summer, but I stocked up.

Karen: Oh, I’m sure. I lived in London in college for study abroad, so I never made it to Scotland. That’s on my list. I’m jealous.

John: And I just have a mint tea, which I picked up in the local Wegmans.

Rebecca: Still important. All right, now that we’re all hydrated, we invited you here today to discuss An Educators Guide to ADHD. Can you tell us a little bit about the origin story of this book?

Karen: I always find that an interesting question, because we could go pretty far back, generationally speaking. There’s some stories there, but we don’t have that much time today, so [LAUGHTER]I’ll come into the nearer future. A few years ago, I read a book called Atomic Habits by the author, James Clear. I love reading nonfiction. I’m usually reading, because I am ADHD. The way I read nonfiction, I usually read four or five at the same time and sort of cycle through them, because that’s how my brain works. I really enjoy self- development type books. I know how to take what I need from them and leave the rest, because they often have things I don’t agree with and things that aren’t helpful, but I can usually take a nugget or two, and the message I took from Atomic Habits was to focus on systems more than habits, which is something I had already been doing, but it kind of named that for me in a new way. I got excited about it, and I talked about it a little on social media, and I got some, not a lot of, pushback, but some of the pushback was of the don’t do that, don’t read books like that. You’d be better off taking a nap and resting, sort of like people who don’t really support or like that, quote, unquote, business bros, type of advice. And I found that sort of pushback really concerning, because systems for people with ADHD are really life saving, sort of like assistive devices. And so I wrote an article about it called “Systems Aren’t Scary,” and I think it came out on Halloween, which is we’re recording this the day before Halloween. That’s why I called it “Systems Aren’t Scary” because I’m so clever. And Jim Lang and Derek Krissoff, who were at the time, at West Virginia University WVU press. I was talking to them about writing another book, and they saw that article, and they said, “Oh, can you write this book instead?” And I said, “Okay, sure.” Long story short, a lot went down at WVU a few years ago, and Jim and Derek moved on, and I moved on, and was really happy to end up through the leadership of Greg Britton at Johns Hopkins University Press. The book is coming out. At the time of this recording, it’s October, so I think you’ll be hearing it, right around comes out January, 20, 2026 it’s been a long and winding road, changing publishers like that. For somebody with ADHD who struggled with finishing things, it was interesting. I’m proud of myself that I stuck with it. Writing a book is an incredibly long process, slow process. I like to do things like immediately and quick. So book writing is sort of out of my comfort zones, but I really want to have this in the hands of people. I want the generations coming behind me to have it better than I did, and I really want people to understand ADHD for what it is, and to make the world a better place for my fellow ADHDers, so I’m glad that I stuck with it and got it out into the world.

John: You begin the book with an analogy between ADHD and living in a house that’s open to the elements, in terms of both the advantages and the disadvantages. Could you share this analogy with our listeners? Because I thought it was a great introduction to your book.

Karen: Oh, thank you. I changed that introduction 17 times. It’s lovely to hear that. It’s such a funny thing. Book writing is such a solitary process. So just starting the stage where I get to hear from learners who’ve read the book is very exciting. So give me a minute here to be like, “Oh, that’s so cool, John read my introduction.” I like analogies. The analogy is, imagine that you’re living in a house with the windows thrown open, no screens. You are just sort of at one with the elements. You have a certain layer of protection, but you can hear birdsong. Maybe birds even fly into your house. Maybe the cute, adorable forest animals come into your house as well. You sort of got like a Snow White vibe. Your neighbor walks by the house. You can call out to her while she’s walking her dog, and say, “Come over and have a chat. Have a coffee.” You can pass her coffee through the window. We can imagine sort of this combination of those really lovely positive aspects, but also you’re going to have the not cute forest animals and the mosquitoes in your house. It’s probably going to be noisy. You’re much more exposed to the elements. So it’s this combination of strengths and challenges. We can imagine the neurotypical house as being more similar to a house with the windows closed, so you have certain protection from those elements. There is sort of a more fixed or closed or rigid nature to it. I’m not using those terms as positive or negative, just trying to describe that experience. And there’s positives to that, right? It keeps out the pests. However, you’re not going to get to hear the bird song either. There’s pros and cons. Another analogy, I don’t think this is in the book, but I’ll share with people that I often have been thinking about lately, is if you want to cook spaghetti, you use a pot, and that’s where you boil the water and you cook the pasta in the pot, and then you want to drain the water out of the pot. So you use a colander or a drainer. And one of the ways we can think about ADHD as like the colander or drainer, and we might think of the neurotypical person more like the pot. You wouldn’t say, like, oh, the colander is better than the pot, or the pot’s better than the calendar. They’re different. They have different benefits and different drawbacks. You’re not going to cook the pasta in the colander. You’re not going to drain the pasta in the pot. So there’s lots of metaphors that we can think of ADHD, but this more sort of open fluidity. And a word I’m using a lot lately is porousness, because I think that word has less, sort of like goodness or badness attached to it. It’s kind of more like it’s just the nature of the item. So thinking about the ADHD brain and neurotype as more porous, which comes with challenges, but it also comes with strengths, so that more fluid or porous brain or neurotype or experience has a lot, a lot of benefits, which I talk about in the book, and it has a lot of challenges. And that’s where we can meet folks with ADHD.

Rebecca: A growing share of students are diagnosed with ADHD. Can you talk a little bit more about whether or not this is because more people are being tested?

Karen: When I wrote the book, I didn’t expect ADHD and autism to be in the news, as they have been recently this past year, in quite that way. There’s a lot of conversation happening on this, a lot of interest, and that boggles the mind. We don’t have any evidence, despite what you may have read or seen on the news, we don’t have any evidence that ADHD is growing. It’s kind of presented as like this monster that’s out of control and we have to contain it. That’s not what’s actually happening. We are seeing things like a decrease in stigma. A lot of that is due to social media, and a lot of that is due to specifically conversations that happened during the pandemic where a lot more folks sort of came online and came onto social media and were speaking more openly about some of those challenges. We also know that, particularly later in life diagnosed folks, crises or massive changes will often precede a diagnosis. So a lot of the people who [LAUGHTER] were in a structured work environment and then got sent home with all their stuff one day, [LAUGHTER] and had to live in a very unstructured environment that is often cited as one of the reasons a lot of people realized something’s going on here, because that external structure of the workplace went away. So, that didn’t create the ADHD, It revealed it. We have no data, and there’s no evidence that this is something that is growing because of… I don’t even know. I try not to listen to these people. I don’t want to give them too much attention. But there’s no evidence that it’s growing. It is likely due to an increase in awareness, a reduction in stigma. Social media is motivating people to realize things about themselves, and many folks have been saying, “I want to get tested,” or folks are self diagnosing. So we’re seeing sort of a rise in awareness about ADHD, which I think is a really good thing, because I talk about diagnosis as a map in the book, and whether we can talk more about this formal clinical diagnosis or self diagnosis, diagnosis can be a map, and it typically can be a map to support ,whether that’s through medical treatment, through lifestyle design, or to community. And for me, that was one of the biggest pieces of the puzzle, was finding people like me who I can talk to about this experience and know that I’m not alone in that. So we see that, when done right and supported, diagnosis can lead to a massive reduction in shame, which is one of the biggest challenges for people with ADHD. Diagnosis is increasing more because of awareness and access, and generally speaking, it can be a really good thing because it connects ADHD or their communities.

Rebecca: Folks feel less stigmatized who have ADHD is becoming evident in university environments because people are speaking out more openly about such a diagnosis and also asking for supports and having really healthy conversations. I know that I’ve had some of those conversations with students in ways that I wasn’t having previously, because the students brought that conversation to the table, which I think is really great.

Karen: I think that’s great, and two things can be true. So I think we are seeing a decrease in stigma, and I think like [LAUGHTER] we were starting from a really, really bad place. So like, any improvement is good, but I will tell you, I get messages from people all the time, private messages, like through social media or email, and it’s from people who are working in higher ed who either are ADHD or suspect they’re ADHD, and they’re coming to me privately to ask for advice because they don’t feel they can speak about it publicly. I talk about it because I try to use the privileges that I have to, again, make things better for people who don’t have the privileges and protections. I like to be honest, the biggest reason I’m able to talk about this is because my husband has a stable job that provides me access to quality healthcare. As an adjunct. If I didn’t have that access, would I be speaking about this publicly? I don’t know, because I can’t live without… I don’t really think anybody can, but I have chronic health issues, and I need a lot of support with my various diagnoses, so if I didn’t have that, I wouldn’t be able to do this. Yes, I think two things are true, and we’ll never be bored, because we have so much work to do and so many areas of opportunity. So we won’t be bored, is the good news.

Rebecca: I really appreciate you also just addressing and drawing attention to the differences of experiences often that students might have from faculty and staff too. This is true around accommodations and all kinds of things related to disability.

Karen: I want to speak on the accommodations piece. That was one of the most intense parts of the book. There’s a page in the book where I write about the process to get a diagnosis. Because right now in higher education, our accommodations model, in order to access learning through formal accommodations, students have to come in with a formal clinical diagnosis. And I forget exactly how many steps I wrote out in that process, but it was like 18 steps. That made me feel pretty sick about that, that that’s the model that we’re using, and obviously a lot of folks are designing around that, through Universal Design for Learning and focusing more on accessibility. That’s how I teach. I know so many folks listening to this teach that way. But the idea that the system that we, who claim to be some of the brightest people in the world, have developed has 18 steps in between students and access to learning is preposterous and infuriating. So again, though, the good news is no boredom, because we have plenty of work to do.

John: And your book is a nice, important part of that. And the issue you just mentioned results in a lot of inequity, because those steps take time, as well as some diagnosis that’s not free, typically. The people who are more likely to get diagnosed are people who do have the privilege of good health insurance and more free time and other things. So the impact is quite inequitable on students.

Karen: Absolutely, it’s not just the fact that you are asking somebody who has executive function challenges to go through an 18-step process, which is again preposterous. It’s that even if the person with ADHD can get through that, we know that there are massive inequities around race, class, and gender in terms of access to a formal clinical diagnosis. Girls and women are massively under diagnosed. I was one of those girls who slipped through the cracks until I was diagnosed at the age of 40. We know that black and brown kids are less likely to be diagnosed. They are more likely to be misdiagnosed, often with personality disorders, or they are funneled into sort of like the punitive discipline process, instead of getting access to their actual diagnosis that can lead them to community and to support. You’ve got this incredibly inequitable system that’s just people are getting misdiagnosed or not diagnosed at all. You get into higher education, and you say, in order to access what you need to learn, there’s all these barriers in place, and a formal diagnosis can cost upwards of $3,000 if your insurance doesn’t cover it. In addition, the most recent diagnostic appointment I had was eight hours long. I had to find somebody who could do the work. I had to drive into Boston, which is, as the crow flies from where I live, it’s like 30 minutes, but Boston traffic, it’s like two hours. So eight hours out of work and life, and go in and making the appointment. I can go on and on here. So just the casualness of how people talk about like, “Oh, you just need a diagnosis,” is just so wrong. It’s so, so wrong, and we’ve got to do better.

Rebecca: You talked a little bit already today in our conversation about how diagnosis can provide a little bit of a roadmap. Can you expand upon that a little bit, maybe from your own experience and how that provided you with a roadmap?

Karen: I have had the experience my whole life of feeling like an alien. This is actually a pretty common thing among folks who identify as neurodivergent. There’s some writing on this, which I learned about after I was diagnosed. And I was like, “Oh, that’s cool.” This feeling of wrongness, of this deep shame, of like, why can I do these things but not these other things? One of the things I talk about in the book that’s really challenging for people with ADHD is personal care and dental hygiene. This is the vulnerability I was talking about earlier. One of the things I struggle is remembering to brush my teeth, and not just remembering to brush my teeth, but remembering if I brushed my teeth. So if I leave the house, which I don’t too often, because I work from home, but anytime I leave the house, I don’t know if I brushed my teeth. I can’t remember. Speaking back to James Clear, I have a system that I’ve learned to create, and if my husband’s home because he works from home, I’ll text him and I’ll ask him, can you check my toothbrush to see if it’s wet? And he knows how to help me, so he’ll check. And most of the time, he says “yes,” but sometimes he says “no,” and I drive with a toothbrush and toothpaste in my car and a bottle of water. If I didn’t know that I had ADHD, that’s a really, sort of, like, scary and demoralizing and shameful thing of like, what’s wrong with me? Why can’t I figure this out? Right? Like, I just wrote a book, I have a master’s degree. I speak publicly, and most of the time I think I know what I’m talking about, but I can’t remember to brush my teeth. And that’s one of like, a million examples. When you get the diagnosis and you learn to understand your brain, and I understand now why I don’t remember to brush my teeth. And I understand how to design a system, and I understand that the most important part of that system is if I remembered or if I didn’t. I say to myself, “Karen, I’m so proud of you. I’m so proud that you checked with your husband and now you have your toothbrush in the car. I’m so proud of you,” or if I did remember I say “I’m so proud of you that you were…” like either way to learn how to speak kindly to myself. It was just so confusing before when I didn’t know what was going on. And those skills have been learned through therapy and working with coach and doing tons of study on ADHD and things like that. There’s work involved in that, but yeah, I think that shame reduction piece is so powerful, and you find people like yourself, like one of the books I talk about most in my book is the book ADHD 2.0 by Ned Hallowell and John Ratey, and they’re both medical doctors, but they both also have ADHD. And Dr. Ned, when I was first diagnosed, seeing him say… he would do these little TikToks about what people with ADHD, and then he would say, people like me. And when he said people like me, this doctor who has written multiple books, little pieces of me would start to heal. It was the “people like me,” not even the content that he was talking about. It was when he said, “people like me.” And that is, for me, the beauty of what diagnosis, whether clinical or self, can do, is it can help you find people like you.

John: So you received some really nice support from those videos. What can faculty do to better support students who do have ADHD, and you mentioned in the book that faculty need to unlearn what they think they know about ADHD. Could you talk a little bit about some of the misconceptions that people have?

Karen: The first problem we have in front of us is the name. ADHD stands for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and I’ve had very lovely sort of people who are ingrained in the clinical or medical model say to me, “that’s not deficit based,” and this has happened to me, so it has the word deficit in the name disorder. Yeah, so that’s not what it is. I still use the term ADHD. I don’t use the term attention deficit hyperactivity disorder because it is obviously deficit based, but it’s just we’re learning now that it’s incorrect. ADHD is not a deficit of attention. It is now increasingly being understood as an abundance of attention. And Hallowell and Ratey are on the leading edge of this. But we’re also seeing this influx of researchers who have ADHD coming into the field, and the framing of research studies and how you approach them, obviously impacts the outcomes. I know I’ve got a lot of research folks that are listening, and when you bring folks in who’ve actually lived with this neurotype, you open up this whole world. We are learning so much more about what ADHD is and isn’t, and one of the biggest misconceptions is that it is either deficit or superpower. So I use this model of strengths-based, challenge-aware, which I think is a much more middle path. It is not fully a deficit; i t does include challenges. I don’t like when people say it’s a superpower, because my family and I are fans of superhero movies, and all the superheroes are intensely miserable, and it has ruined their lives. I talk about Tobey Maguire Spider Man meme in the book, where he’s just the most miserable human on the planet. Superheroes are not generally healthy and happy, well-balanced people. So I like to really bring people into this middle path. This is a neurotype. Another way we can think of it as a brain style. It is part of the natural, vast variety of life and ways of being in the world, and it comes with challenges, and it comes with strengths. And I go into this in the book. We are taught that there’s one right way to be, the neurotypical way of being, and that anybody who diverges from that is both weak and threatening. The reason we do that is so that we can then deny those people resources, its not rocket science. So it’s really quite a radical thing for folks to say, “Wait a minute, I’m not weak or threatening. I’m part of the vast variety and natural neurodiversity that is part of the entire world.” And if you, as an educator, can shift your mind into that, you will not only be better supporting your students, but you’re really also sort of working toward a brighter, better future where we can move beyond some of those limitations. The biggest thing is to also bring in those strengths. And I want educators to know this is like a win-win. Your ADHD students are the creative geniuses of the world, and they are little engagement fireworks that you can be igniting in your classrooms. That’s the number one thing educators tell me that they want to do in their classroom is to engage their students, and your ADHDers are just like human vacuum cleaners who love to consume information, love to learn, have so many ideas, they’re gifts and assets to our world and to our classrooms. The most important thing that you can do as an educator is to get your mindset in check about what ADHD is. Get rid of the deficit. Get rid of the idea that there’s something wrong with us. We are part of the natural variation of the many neurotypes and ways of being in the world. We have challenges. We need help, we need support, but we also come to your classrooms with so many strengths. So if you can come into your classroom with that mindset, you’re going to reduce shame, and you’re going to design inclusive learning experiences for your ADHDers.

Rebecca: Can you talk a little bit about some practices in the classroom that can help lean on some of those strengths and help address some of the challenges.

Karen: The first rule of supporting folks with ADHD is externalize everything possible. Our working memory, as ADHDers, I mentioned this word before, is very porous. An example of that is if I leave this room of my house that I’m in now, and I go into another room with the intention of putting on a different pair of socks. When I get into that other room, I will have no recollection of why I’m in there. If I need to do that, what I will do is I externalize it. As soon as I say “I need to change my socks,” I will walk into the other room and I will repeat to myself, “change shocks, change socks, change socks.” I’m making it external, because I’m not able to hold change socks in my working memory, so that when I get to the other room, I can take that action. This saying “in one ear and out the other.” is how my working memory works, [LAUGHTER] or doesn’t, for that matter. It’s porous. The thing is that, I want to say this quickly, that porosity is the reason behind our creativity. Let’s go back to the open windows. So that’s why we’re getting birdsong. That’s why we are getting to play with the squirrels and have all that fun. That flowing creative energy is Hallowell and Ratey, call it “the paradoxical pairs.” The flip side of that is we can’t hold things in our working memory. So this is what you got to do. Everything is external. Everything gets written down. What you don’t want to do is like, if you’re on site and your students are walking out of class, time is up, you yell out the door, like, “Don’t forget, I want you to read pages 72 to 77 next week,” or whatever, in one ear and out the other. The second it’s out of your mouth. It no longer exists to me. Things need to be put into emails, put into task lists. We need to be putting things in multiple modalities so that it’s something that we can see and touch. I use multiple alarms. So I use like things that I can hear, things that I can see, things that I can touch. And there’s always multiple layers. Task lists are really a lot of bang for your buck. What do you want people to do this week? And it’s got to be something I can see and touch. Couple other things I’ll mention, metacognitive, or what I talk about in the book, is meta learning. So metacognition is learning about learning. Meta learning is sort of just like a more expansive way of not being quite so brain bound. Giving students a chance. I’ll name the elephant in the room, the AI elephant in the room. I’m seeing a lot of folks who are linking metacognition to some of the pedagogical strategies we can use in the AI era, having a greater focus on process rather than product, and metacognition and meta learning is great for this. So asking students, how do you plan to do this? And then after they do it, what did you learn from what you did? It’s great for everybody, but it’s particularly great for ADHDers, because we get to explore our process and what works best for our brains, and then the reflection afterwards, we get to see if it worked, and then we can redesign as we go. That’s a much better process than you imposing what you think your ADHD students should be doing. You’re putting them in the driver’s seat of your learning. This metacognition should really be much more intensely built into all our courses, but it’s a particularly powerful strategy for ADHDers. Fun fact, somebody who got their hands… I didn’t end up having to work with this person …[LAUGHTER] on an early copy of my book, who was from the clinical field, said pretty much word for word, “ADHDers can’t do metacognition,” and there’s reams of data of how good metacognition is for ADHDers. We absolutely can do it, and it benefits us, but there are still so many people out there who have this idea of like ADHDers can’t do that. That very ableist mindset is alive and well. But read the book. There’s tons of research in there to support this. The beauty of this is you’re not trying to make them be a neurotypical student. You’re empowering them to figure out what works for them. I could keep going, but I know we don’t have all day, so I’ll stop there. Read the book for more ideas.

John: Those techniques you’ve talked about are good for everybody, and they’re parts of inclusive teaching practices, which suggests that a lot of inclusive teaching practices will work for a wide variety of students with a wide variety of backgrounds [LAUGHTER] and needs, desires, interest and motivation. This is really good advice for all students. One of the things that you’ve talked a little bit about is that deficit mindset, and one of the things you suggest is that, as you have already mentioned, the term ADHD is a misnomer. And you suggest an alternative ON, or the open neurotype. Do you think using a more neutral term like that might help shift people from the deficit model to a more accurate representation of our students?

Karen: I thought I would have some fun with it and say, If I could rename ADHD, what would I name it? And I landed on open neurotype, because ADHDers, we are often “on,” I don’t know if we have an offsetting that’s one of the best parts about us. We have what the French would call a joie de vivre, a joy in life. One of our challenges is never turning off. It can be quite exhausting. “On” worked for that reason, but it also worked in that idea of a neurotype is one of the words I use to describe these, I don’t like the word conditions, but some folks are still using the word conditions. It’s a better word than conditions. It’s not a disorder, and it’s not a condition, it’s a neurotype. It’s a brain style, and then open is talking to that fluidity, that porosity, that flow, that is the best part of our ADHD learners, and it’s also the root of many of our challenges. I don’t know how we get from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder to something like ON. I do know that if the word deficits in the name, then it’s deficit based. So again, the way I’m doing it is I’m very transparent about my language choices, and I talk in the book and I say, like, I’m going to use ADHD, I’m going to tell you what it stands for, and then I’m not going to use that term again, and that’s what I do in my work. And I hope that, again, as we have this influx of ADHD researchers coming into the field and a lot more advocacy going on, I hope that we start to lean into more inclusive terms, just as one other example in the ADHD 2.0 book, they use the term VAST, variable attention stimulus trait, that is their alternative term for ADHD. And you’ll notice variable attention is speaking to the fact that ADHD is, once again, I’ll say it, not a deficit of attention. And stimulus trait is a much more flexible way of looking at this, not as a disorder, but as a collection of traits.

John: And the use of the VAST term, too, points out that there’s a whole spectrum in which people may have their attention. It could be very narrowly focused, or it could be much more open. And we have a wide variety of people, and we should be trying to address the needs of everyone.

Karen: I talk in the book about there’s this relationship between neurodiversity and biodiversity, which I find very fascinating, because we’re seeing that biodiversity is under attack, and a big part of some of the worst climate outcomes we’re seeing are related to the loss of biodiversity. And some of the original creators of this term neurodiversity were modeling it off of biodiversity. And the idea is that if you look around the world, you see millions of ways that life expresses itself. There’s not one way to be alive, and neurodiversity is lined up with that, there’s not one way of being a human being and expressing yourself and experiencing the world. There’s a seemingly infinite number of ways. So that vast variety is why life persists. Life didn’t put all its eggs in one basket, [LAUGHTER] sort of like why life is here. It’s a good thing. There is strength in diversity. I want to say the word diversity like 100 times a day, because we’re being told we’re not allowed to say it. It’s why we are here. Diversity is strength. So whether it’s neurodiversity, racial diversity, gender diversity, diversity is strength. And I just want to say it a million times, because people don’t seem to get it. And neurodiversity, biodiversity, we need to celebrate it all.

Rebecca: I wanted to circle back to the idea of attention. One of the phrases you used earlier and you use in your book, is that, like abundance of attention, I find really delightful. But we also hear a lot from faculty of concerns about paying attention or distraction or focus, all those kinds of words. Can you talk a little bit more about this range of attention and why maybe this narrow focus on how the term is used is problematic.

Karen: This one could probably be a book in and of itself, one of the first things that people can do if they want to explore this, a fascinating exploration is look at the different words and terms we use across various languages to describe attention. So I’m studying French later in life, which is a very ADHD thing of me, and the French translation is not to pay attention, but to make or do attention, which is a very different way of looking at it. Isn’t it interesting that in America, attention is something that we pay, so there’s a little like, “Hmm, let’s be curious about what’s actually going on here.” There’s a book I talk about in my book called The Open Focus Brain, by this guy, Les Fehmi, and his argument is that this idea that attention, it should be this very like you’re zoning in on one thing, is very much tied to capitalism, and that’s how you are efficient. That’s how you’re a good worker bee. That’s how you produce the most, is by zooming in on one thing. Zooming in on one thing is also what we want to do if we are like under threat. And he argues that by really cultivating a single pointed type of attention, we are training our brains to believe that we are under threat whenever we are sort of in that super- focused type of attention. He presents this alternative called “open focus.” And anybody who’s listening to this, who’s gone through meditation, I’m like a lifelong… this is another podcast… yoga student teacher and meditation student teacher. When you go through the meditation process, you often learn to start with single pointed meditation, focusing on an anchor or your breath, and then you learn to expand out, and you learn to sit in meditation and be open to all of the experiences and all of the noises and all of the sensations. One of those isn’t better than the other, so open focus is the idea that we are able to be taking in everything that’s happening around us: the other students in the classroom, the sound of the air conditioner, the smells in the room, ADHDers tend to have that sort of more open focus that can make it more challenging for us to be in that sort of productive, efficient mode, but it offers many gifts as well. That’s why we’re so creative, and why we are able to connect seemingly disparate ideas in really interesting ways. So it’s, again, that blessing and a curse. The other thing that we will do, ADHDers, when we’re in a setting where you’re saying, I’ve got to zone in and my focus is open, is that we will do something called stimming, which is things like doodling or fidgeting or turning around in our chair, things like repetitive motions, rocking. Both ADHD and autistic folks do this. We’re not doing that because we’re distracted. Doing that helps us to focus. So that’s one of the big messages I guess I’ll leave folks with is whatever you want to call it, you don’t know when people are paying attention. Attention is very complex. It’s very personal. It’s very diverse. Stop trying to police other people’s attention. The way that I pay attention. I mean, my desk is like covered with little toys and gadgets that I use behind the scenes [LAUGHTER] in Zoom meetings to keep myself focused. If you think attention looks like sitting still and not moving, you’re going to say she’s not paying attention. I actually am. I’m deeply paying attention because I’m doing all of those other things that give me those external structures that I need to focus in on what you’re saying. So stop trying to police people’s attention. Know that open awareness and open focus is another way of being in the world, and incredibly valid and important, and we probably need a lot more of it, and trust your students to do what they need to do to be present in your classrooms.

John: A friend of mine is an autism researcher, and we’ve talked about it quite a bit in terms of the type of focus that people with autism have. As I was reading your description of ADHD, I was seeing so many connections in terms of the different types of attention, and you mentioned that there’s an emerging recognition of an overlap between ADHD and autism. Can you talk a little bit about the ways in which they’re connected, or the similarities that occur in autism and ADHD,

Karen: I can. So here’s a fun little story for the listeners. In the middle of writing this book, I got a second diagnosis. After getting late in life ADHD diagnosis, I then got a late in life autism diagnosis, so am doubly blessed. And remember the winding journey of writing the book I mentioned earlier? Didn’t see that one coming either. So yes, I can speak to this from both lived experience and the research. AuDHD is sort of like this new wild frontier that we are seeing rise up. I’m really excited for this understanding of the overlap between autism and ADHD. I think we’re going to be hearing that term, AuDHD more and more and more in the coming years, there’s a lot of unknowns. So I have seen data that up to 80% of autistic folks would also qualify for an ADHD diagnosis. At that level, [LAUGHTER] you start to wonder what’s going on. And there are some folks who are saying, “Are these like the same thing, and they’re manifesting in different folks differently.” There was a time, up until several years ago, where you couldn’t get both an autism and an ADHD diagnosis through the DSM. They said these two things cannot overlap, and now they’re saying 80% of folks with autism have ADHD. So we are learning a lot. There are days when I feel like these are the same thing, and AuDHD is like a thing in and of itself, and there are days when I can feel them as separate entities [LAUGHTER] inside of my head. And it’s hard for me to explain that, unless you’ve lived with these neurotypes, it’s a very sort of fluid situation. I don’t know if it’s a question we’ll even be able to answer through research. I think it’s more something we’re going to move through and have to experience and really listen to people’s lived experiences. But you’re going to see a lot more AuDHDers in your classes, in your meetings. The joke is in our community that if you got a late in life ADHD diagnosis that you can just chill out for a couple years and then you just go and pick up your autism diagnosis as well, because there are some folks who believe the reason that they mask each other, and that’s why folks are getting late diagnosed. One of the ways [LAUGHTER] that I’ve heard it talked about is ADHD is the gas pedal and autism is the brake. So you’re driving a car pressing down the brake and the gas pedal at the same time. It makes for an interesting ride, but there’s some evidence that they’re masking each other, no less challenging for people. They are no less in need of support, but there’s some interesting overlaps going on there. If you’re listening to this and this is something that interests you, we just need a ton more research on this, a ton more support. We need people who are diagnosed and have lived experiences leading the charge on this. But yeah, AuDHD is going to be pretty big and very interesting for us to continue to learn about.

Rebecca: So earlier, you mentioned about Universal Design for Learning and also accessible design. Can you talk a little bit about how those methodologies, frameworks, might really help all students, but ADHDers in particular?

Karen: Yes, absolutely. So. I am a student and a facilitator of UDL, a practitioner of UDL, a wonderful approach that helps us address those accommodations, limitations, fantastic. Two things can be true. My concern about UDL is that sometimes I feel like it’s used to ignore disability or ignore difference, and I’ve heard sometimes UDL practitioners say things like, “We don’t even need to talk about your disability or your ADHD in the classroom, because we have designed this accessible learning experience.” Well, those are parts of me, so UDL is not intended to wipe that away. When done well, it should be inviting that into the experience. So what I think might be helpful, I’ll give an example. For me as an educator, I feel like I’m on the right track when I hear from a student who says I have accommodations, and I look at their letter and I am able to respond to them and say, “I’m so glad you sent me this. All of this is designed into the course already for all students,” that feels like I’m on the right track. And I will often disclose, depending on the situation, and let them know that this is something I live with, and I’m proud and happy to be a role model for them, and I am there to do anything I can to support them. I am not a mind reader, so please keep me updated on anything I can do. So that’s my approach to it, like I want to notice and I want to celebrate their identities and reinforce that throughout the course. I teach, primarily online, asynchronous, so it’s woven into my discussions, into the conversations we’re having, into my grading, into the types of resources I share with students. And it’s not disability I want to eliminate, it’s the need for that letter eventually, right? Like everything is built into my course already, I feel like I’ve done the right thing when I’m able to notice and celebrate and thank that student for sharing that with me and let them know it’s baked into the course for all students. The last thing I want to say about this is one thing I don’t like about UDL is when we say, here, “We can do this for ADHD students,” and people say, “Oh, and Isn’t it lovely that it’s good for everybody.” Two things can be true. Let’s let it be just good for ADHD students, that’s good. That’s good on its own. It’s great on its own. And I recognize that we want to motivate people to see the many benefits of this. And it’s good for everybody is a lovely thing. But I also want us to say that, like, “If it was just good for ADHD students, that would be wonderful, too.” So those two things are happening at the same time for me, and I think that’s important to mention when we talk about UDL.

Rebecca: I appreciate you pointing out these complexities, that multiple things can be true at the same time. Now that comes up a lot in the accessibility work that I do as well. So we always wrap up by asking, what’s next?

Karen: This is coming out in January, so I’m really excited to get the book out into the world, and hearing how people are going to react to it and use it will be exciting for me. The other thing I’m working on now is I’m shifting a bit from climate change mitigation to adaptation in my focus, which is to say, I’m always very mindful when I talk about the climate stuff. We need folks who are working to prevent climate change, and I want people who are doing that to keep doing that. I am feeling called to focus more on adapting to some of the worst impacts that we’re seeing already happening. And I’m really feeling curious about things like the fact that we have hundreds of colleges in coastal areas that we don’t know if they will be able to stay there. So I’m starting to take some classes on things like forced migration related to climate change, because my sense is nobody in higher ed is talking about this, or very few people, which is very understandable. I feel called to do that. I want to support campuses that might need to relocate, students who might need to relocate due to climate change, and I very much want to, in particular, help support disabled folks who are part of those changes, and to recognize that our ADHDers are, I think, the creative folks that we need to be leading a lot of the changes that we will need to be making in the next few decades, in this very volatile era. So one of our greatest strengths is that creativity piece. We don’t just think in terms of what has already been proven. We design and create new worlds and new ideas. I think that’s why I’m able to do that work well, and it’s a little disconcerting for some people, but I feel like it needs to get done, and it’s something I’m feeling curious about. So leaning into that more as well.

John: Certainly an important issue to be focusing on in a country where we need far more of a focus on climate change right now. Well, thank you. I very much enjoyed reading your book. I think it would be a great book for reading groups, for any faculty member to learn more about a non-trivial share of the students they’re working with.

Karen: The number that I use in the book is 5 to 10% but I’ve had classes where up to 40% of my students disclose ADHD, so I think that 5 to 10% is the tip of the iceberg, and I also think the vast majority of our students stop outs and dropouts are probably undiagnosed ADHD. If I’ve got anybody out there who’s connected to enrollment management, I think you’ve got a huge opportunity here to help students persist and complete by considering that lens of undiagnosed ADHD and higher ed’s failure to adapt to that as a big, big opportunity.

Rebecca: Well, thanks so much for joining us. We always enjoy talking to you, Karen, and sharing your work.

Karen: I am so grateful for both of you, again, the fact that you are able to persist and keep doing this is such a testament to who you are, and so needed in our world and our very rapidly changing higher ed so thank you for doing the work that you do. Action is the antidote to despair. So everybody’s got to find their small actions or medium or big actions that they can take to help make a difference. You don’t have to save the world, you just got to do your part.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

John: Editing Assistance provided by Madison Lee.

[MUSIC]

428. The Science of Learning Meets AI

Posted in active learning, cognitive science, diversity, edtech, educational technology, engagement, equity, evidence-based practices, feedback, higher education, inclusion, learning, pedagogy, teaching, universal design
January 14, 2026

The widespread adoption of and the rapid evolution of generative AI platforms have created substantial challenges for faculty in how we assess student learning. In this episode, Lew Ludwig and Todd Zakrajsek join us to discuss a new resource they have created that is designed to help faculty use AI to efficiently support teaching practices based on the science of learning.

Lew is a Professor of Mathematics at Denison University, where he served as Director of the Center for Learning and Teaching from 2020 to 2025. Much of his recent work has focused on innovative methods for utilizing generative AI. Todd is an Adjunct Associate Research Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, from which he just retired a few months ago after 17 years. He is also the Director of the International Teaching Learning Cooperative and the Director of four Lilly conferences on evidence-based teaching and learning. Todd is the author of many superb books, and has published six books (so far) in the past five years.

Show Notes

Transcript

John: The widespread adoption of and the rapid evolution of generative AI platforms have created substantial challenges for faculty in how we assess student learning. In this episode, we explore a new resource designed to help faculty use AI to efficiently support teaching practices based on the science of learning.

[MUSIC]

John: Thanks for joining us for Tea for Teaching, an informal discussion of innovative and effective practices in teaching and learning.

Rebecca: This podcast series is hosted by John Kane, an economist…

John: …and Rebecca Mushtare, a graphic designer…

Rebecca: …and features guests doing important research and advocacy work to make higher education more inclusive and supportive of all learners.

[MUSIC]

Rebecca: Our guests today are Lew Ludwig and Todd Zakrajsek. Lew is a Professor of Mathematics at Denison University, where he served as Director of the Center for Learning and Teaching from 2020 to 2025. Much of his recent work has focused on innovative methods for utilizing generative AI. Todd is an Adjunct Associate Research Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, from which he just retired a few months ago after 17 years. He is also the Director of the International Teaching Learning Cooperative and the Director of four Lilly conferences on evidence-based teaching and learning. Todd is the author of many superb books, and has published six books (so far) in the past five years. Welcome, Lew, and welcome back, Todd.

Lew: Thank you.

Todd: Thank you, Rebecca,

John: Our teas today are:… Lew, are you drinking tea?

Lew: I am. I’m usually a coffee drinker, but I have a lovely Cha Atiso. This is a Vietnamese artichoke tea, which a student brought back for me from the summer, and I’ve really, really been enjoying that. So that’s my tea for today.

Rebecca: What does it taste like?

Lew: It’s got a little sweetness to it, which I like. I don’t put anything in it, but I really enjoy it. And it’s supposed to be healthy, no caffeine, all that sort of stuff.

John: And Todd, are you drinking tea?

Todd: Yeah, I went with a roasted dandelion spice tea. It says detox on the package, and I can always use a good detoxing. So I’m doing that and sipping it from my favorite cup. Mmmh.

Rebecca: That’s right, the tea for teaching mug.

Todd: I have my tea for teaching mug here. I never leave home without it. Actually, I never left it home. [LAUGHTER]

John: And Rebecca?

Rebecca: I have a Swiss Breakfast tea, John.

John: Very nice… on a chilly morning here in upstate New York. And I have a ginger peach green tea today.

Todd: Wow. Quite a variety.

Rebecca: Nice, this big variety. So we’ve invited you here today to discuss your newest book project, The Science of Learning Meets AI: A Practical Faculty Guide to Purposeful Integration, Student Engagement, and Ethical Practice. Can you tell us a little bit about the origin of this book?

Lew: Yeah, sure. I can get us started on that. So as you know, Todd and I both have backgrounds in teaching centers of faculty development. And our national conference is something called POD, Professional Organizational Development Network. And in 2024 we were at that conference, and here ChatGPT had already been out for about two years, and we were still kind of struggling with the idea of, how are faculty supposed to use this? A lot of the questions we were getting is, “Hey, how can I use AI in my classroom?” And it wasn’t until this conference was up in Chicago in 2024 where we realized we were asking the wrong question. It’s not really how to use AI in the classroom, but instead, maybe we should be thinking about, why are we using AI?

Todd: Yeah, and actually, I’ll jump in too, because Lew went right to that technical part and everything. Another thing that happened, which is why I love it when people get together, is Lew asked me if I would help out or just talk to him a little bit about some of the science of learning, because he wanted to really work on this project with bringing AI into this, explaining why it’s important to use it. And I said, “Well, that’s interesting, because I just started to outline a book that I want to do on AI, and I was going to check with you about the AI part, because I got the learning part down.” [LAUGHTER] So we just said, “What the heck, we’ll do it.” And Lew didn’t know me very well at the time, so he said, “Yes.” [LAUGHTER] Anyway, we made it through. But the big thing was that we really wanted a book that would teach faculty and help them understand the learning theory behind why the learning happens and everything else, and use AI to augment that. So this isn’t like using AI to do things, it’s using AI to help us do the things that we’ve been doing.

John: You start the book by acknowledging that faculty didn’t ask for this AI disruption or for any of the evolutions of this. Why start with this instead of with excitement about AI’s potential?

Lew: Oh, it’s called learning from one’s mistakes. So again, ChatGPT came out in November of 2022, by August of 23, I remember on my campus, we had a fairly large across the board faculty meeting about AI. It was about a half-day session. So administration was there, IT was there. And as the Teaching Center Director, I gave probably a 90-minute session on, “Hey, here’s this new technology and how we might be able to use it in our classroom.” And what happened was, just by saying, “Hey, here’s how we might be able to use it,” some folks labeled me as AI pro. So I was just pro-AI, hey, you talked to Ludwig, and he’s just going to be all in on AI. And that was almost like my scarlet letter [LAUGHTER]that I was wearing around campus to some folks. So I learned from that. So any of the workshops, any of the things I do since then, I start off with this exact phrasing, just to kind of level the playing field here, I say “You didn’t ask for this. You didn’t request an unregulated, untested, and rapidly evolving technology to suddenly upend education and nearly every other sector of society.” Now, I’ve been delivering that, like I said, quite a few workshops. I did it back in August for a group of high school teachers in Richmond, Virginia. They applauded me. [LAUGHTER] So it’s just kind of getting it out there and acknowledging it that, yes, this is a disruptive tool. We kind of have to acknowledge that grief and then kind of move on from there.

Todd: Yeah, I would say too, is really, I really thought Lew had a good handle on that part of it. I wouldn’t have put that in there, quite frankly, for the book here, and Lew was pretty insistent that it go in there. But as we started talking it through, I realized I always started any COVID workshops this way. When we were doing emergency remote teaching, if you just started talking about emergency remote teaching and didn’t acknowledge just all of the stuff that happened with COVID at the time, on the number of deaths, for instance, you can’t just jump into something and ignore it. So I think that Lew had a really good point here, and then I started pulling together what I did with that, with what he was talking about. And I think the whole concept is we started thinking within the book of, how do we do this? To recognize people are grieving, that they’re struggling, and we say it’s hard that we see you there, the frustration is real. Teaching is changing, just as it did with COVID. We don’t have a choice of that, and AI isn’t going to go away, so let’s recognize what’s going on, and recognize even some of the impact of AI, and then from there, then move on with a sense of acknowledging what’s going on.

Rebecca: It’s almost like you’re modeling some good teaching practices there. [LAUGHTER]

Todd: Kind of. Periodically it happens.

Lew: We try.

Rebecca: This adapt, create, embed, progression, the ACE model, is used throughout the book. Can you talk a little bit about what this looks like in practice for a faculty member who’s never used AI?

Lew: Yeah, so this work kind of, again, developed that starting point back in November of 24 after we had that initial meeting in Chicago and started to realize we needed some early wins for faculty. So we got a lot of faculty out there who are kind of hesitant about this new technology. And if you gave them something like a prompt or something that didn’t work, they’d be just like, “See, I told you, this AI thing, it’s a disruptive thing. So we’ve been workshopping this quite a bit early January onward, and refining the model. Originally, you ready for this? It was, instead of adapt, create, embed, it was improve, create, integrate, which, as an acronym, is icky. [LAUGHTER] We didn’t think that would land very well, so we went with ACE instead. So for example, the adapt, that’s kind of the easiest win. So what you do is, you take an existing assignment, you have that assignment that it’s a big project, but for some reason, it just doesn’t land with students. They always hand in something a little bit different than what you asked for. Well, that assignment’s begging to be TILTed, right? So Mary-Ann Winkelmes has this idea of transparency in learning and teaching, and it’s a technique that you can do for your assignment to make sure that your students understand why they’re actually doing the assignment. And it’s a kind of a three-step process. And AI is great at TILTing your assignment, and faculty members can take an existing assignment that they have. They’re experts on that assignment. AI can help them TILT that with this framework, and then they can see how that might better fit into their language for their course, and help improve what their students are doing. And the TILT framework has been really good. It kind of raises all student boats. But in particular, it does well for underrepresented and first-gen students do exceptionally well with this. So again, just kind of an early win with the adapt model.

Todd: Should mention quickly that we kind of started out and we based a lot of this on Ruben Puentedura’s model of SAMR, which is the substitution, augmentation, modification, redefinition for all of technology. If you have any new technology out there, you started with substituting it. How can we do this instead? You can augment it. And that’s a really interesting model. Didn’t quite work with what we were after. And so Lew had lots of workshops he had been doing. And so we kind of used that as a foundation. But as Lew just pointed out, the adapt, which would be similar to that original substitution, is to get you rolling. And I’m going to go ahead, Lew and take I’ll take the other two real quickly. So next is create. And essentially, it’s looking at how you can do something that you really couldn’t do before. And there’s lots of things that are out there that we could use for this one. We’ll talk a little bit more about those, probably later on, as we’re looking at some specific examples. But when you think about what you can do and couldn’t do before, one quick thing is a daughter, one time, was struggling with something, and she said, “Can you help me?: And I said, “I’m busy right now. I can help you a little bit.” 15 minutes later, I said, “I can help you now.” She said, “Oh, took care of it.” I said, “How’d you do that?” She says, “Oh, I just got on a group, a small online group, and then we solved it together.” And I said, “Who was it?” And this was years ago. And she said, “Oh, there was a student from Germany, one from South America, somebody from Nebraska, and myself.” That was never possible before. And so many things in AI do things like that. They’ll set up things we could never do before. So the “create” is, how can we do things different? And then once you’ve adapted it and created it, the next thing is, just embed it. Just make it part of the regular aspects of your course. How do you do that? And what we like to point out over and over again is that, you do this wherever you’re at. If you’re just getting started, you just adapt some things you’re doing. And that’s where Lew is really good at setting some of those things up. If you’re a little bit nervous, just take something you’ve always done, do it with AI, do a little bit better, faster, and then just get started, but don’t get overwhelmed with it.

Todd: And the other thing about doing with something you’ve already done is then you’re the expert, and you can critique what AI is doing for you. I wouldn’t go off and learn a brand new subject you learn using the AI, because I’d have no idea. But again, coming from that wheelhouse of your own expertise, don’t forget you are the expert with the content as well as your students and context. So keep that in mind whenever you’re dealing with AI.

John: And that example you use of the TILT model is a good one. I’ve given workshops to faculty about it, and a lot of people were reluctant to put in the effort to make all those changes. But when you show them how AI can do that, or better yet, if you share perhaps a prompt, or if you share a GPT or a chatbot tool that they can plug in their assignments to and their learning objectives, and it can do it for them, or at least give them a starting point on it, it makes it so much more likely that people are going to do that. So you talked a little bit about the ACE model, which is used throughout the book. But could you tell us a little bit about the organization of the book?

Lew: Yeah, sure. So the book’s kind of broken up into three parts. The first part, we call it “Creating your own Gen AI roadmap.” And again, chapter one, you didn’t ask for this, but here it is. So just kind of, again, acknowledging that situation that we find ourselves in and how to move forward with it. Then in chapter two, we start talking about what it means to think about shifting our teaching in the world of generative AI, so the idea of being transparent with our students and how we’re using it and setting up good communication with them, and then also the idea of as faculty members, as we’re embracing this, we really have to be curious and flexible as we work with this technology. We’re always pushing our students to take risks, be flexible, be curious. Well, guess what, that shoe is going to now fit on our foot as we try to move forward with this model.

Todd: So that kind of got things up and running, and then we kind of ran right into the learning aspect of it. Just to give you an idea of the book, I guess is probably the easiest way to do this is. Chapter four is on universal design. I’ve been a long time advocate of universal design, and I think AI can be now done to do things that were really challenging before. So we did dedicate an entire chapter to universal design. Then chapter five, we really thought community was important. So chapter five is about building classroom community and trust, looking at belonging, engagement, and integrity, kinds of issues. Chapter six comes into backward design, a huge aspect of teaching and learning, kind of knowing where you’re going as your goal. And then chapter seven is looking more at learning science of cognitive load, attention, spacing, interleaving, retrieval practice. And that’s the “building the foundation section.” And the last section of the book, section three, is for kind of deeper learning. We looked at some things about teaching and learning that just we know works well. So chapter eight is guiding students from novice to expert. We put together in that section zones of proximal development, scaffolding, and the gradual release of responsibility as ways of helping students kind of go into deeper aspects of learning. Chapter nine is on strategic learning. So we looked at transparency, TILT, cognitive apprenticeships, metacognition and those types of issues. And then we wrapped it up with chapter 10 of persistence and motivation. So there we pulled together the concept of self efficacy, growth mindset and self-determination theory. So the chapters have two or three strong learning principles to them, but they’re put together in ways that not only help explain the individual things, but also overall this concept, like persistence and what kinds of things go into that. And then the last thing I’ll say, since I’m on a roll right now, is overall, I think we really thought it to be helpful, repetition is just helpful for learning, right? We know that. And so we did is we built a book that has strong repetition. So chapter after chapter, we basically started with chapter four, and then we go all the way through chapter 10, and it’s set up so that there’s always an opening story or anecdote to set it up, which we’d want to do for just getting the learning focus there. Then from the model, there’s an improve activity, and then we look at the science components, and from there we might be looking at metacognition or Bloom’s taxonomy or something. So that comes into the second two parts of the model. Here we have a create and then embed, those activities are in there. And then we talk about the ACE model, and we have more activities that come into there. Then we look at risks and guardrails. And again, we’re going to acknowledge everything has risks to it. We’re not going to just pretend like it’s all great. And then we have a conclusion, pull it together, and we finished every chapter with discussion questions and reflection questions. So if you’re a faculty developer and you want to use this as a book group, for instance, we’ve got your discussion questions already built in, but for having faculty work through it, there’s reflection questions in there. The last thing I’ll mention is that we talked really extensively about how to cite this stuff, big APA kind of person, but we really wanted this readable, and so we went with a model where we put everything in as end notes, so as you read through it, you don’t get the standard citations with dates all the way through it, it just reads like a novel, almost, and I think it’s really easy to read. So you don’t have to read it cover to cover, although you should, [LAUGHTER] maybe three times. You can just go through and pick out what you like, but if you do go through, we’ve actually built it so that you start with simple kinds of examples and move to more complex ones. And Lew is masterful at putting together how to like, ask questions and do prompts and specifically with a separate font in there, we just have paste this in and add your components, and it spits out the answer. Pretty cool.

Lew: So what Todd’s explaining there is, we have a lot of different techniques. We have things called activities as well as examples. So each chapter has six activities, which are kind of page-long discussions of how you might use AI. And it’ll start off with some prompting, like he said, in that different font, but you put it in your context. We don’t do this: “Oh, a biologist would do this. Now you do it for yourself.” You actually, in the context of this thing, put in your information so you’re directly dealing with it. So we have, like I said, six of those for seven chapters. So 42 of those things. Each one could be a workshop. And then also we have smaller examples for seven chapters, we have 12 smaller examples, which is another 84 prompts. Those aren’t prompts, those are just more ideas. But Todd mentioned this idea of meta prompting. We give you a way to turn those examples into a prompt for yourself. So you’re using AI to create your prompt for you, and I think it’s called meta prompting, so that’s what he was referring to there.

Rebecca: There’s a lot written about the science of learning and Todd, obviously, you’ve written some books on the subject. How did you decide what science of learning concepts to include?

Todd: I just put a whole bunch of stuff in there. And then Lew started saying, “Nope, nope, nope.” [LAUGHTER] No, we got along great on these things. It basically boiled to Lew does tons of workshops, I do workshops, I think I’ve been at 300 campuses so far. So I looked through the different presentations I’ve given, and when things kind of hit and when they didn’t hit. Cognitive load is something a lot of people just don’t quite understand, and is a huge foundation of learning, because within cognitive load, you’ve got automaticity and schema activation and all kinds of different things that are practicing retrieval kinds of things. So I just went back to the warehouse of stuff and picked the things that worked, which is what I still think is really, really valuable about the book, is that these are things that work, and it’ll help explain them as you go. Big things like the metacognition, Bloom’s Taxonomy, cognitive load, automaticity, practice, retrieval, interleaving, the kinds of things we’ve heard. And it was hard, I will say, Rebecca, it was really hard. There’s a lot out there. I mean, obviously I got what is it a 270 page book on learning. So how do you just fold in some of that? And so, it doesn’t have everything, but I think it has the big things.

John: So you mentioned before that AI allows us to do things that we couldn’t easily do before. Could you give us an example and walk us through that in terms of how AI could be used to create learning activities that could not be done as easily in the past.

Lew: Sure, individualization of instruction. I’m at a pretty small school here at Denison, but I could imagine, wow, what if I was teaching a class of 400. So I might end my class here at my small school with, you know, a muddiest point, I get 20 responses. I look those over, what did students struggle with that day? And then next class, I can kind of address that. Imagine if you had 400 students, what could you do with that? Well, now, with AI, you can take this classroom assessment technique of muddiest moment and, on the spot, have students type their prompt into, say, a Google form or something like that, and as maybe the students are off working on some kind of project or discussion together, within two or three minutes, you could use AI to organize those muddiest points and give me the top three things that these 400 students are struggling with, something that was just was not even feasible before. So I think you know, at scale, this thing can be really useful for those types of examples. And with regards to CATs, the classroom assessment techniques, Todd’s got a book of like, 50 of these things, right? So there’s so many things that you can kind of do on the fly that AI can then help you with, kind of the managerial stuff, just the paperwork thing of keeping track of that stuff so you can respond in the moment for what your students are doing.

Todd: And Lew, I appreciate you mentioning that book, it’s interesting, got me thinking real quickly here. So that book is Classroom Assessment Techniques, which not too many years ago was like the standard. Everybody had a copy of this thing, and they did because the first edition was 1988 I believe it was, second edition was 93 though, and in 93 was right about the time we started talking about learning versus teaching, and how would you know if students are learning? And along comes Angelo and C ross, their book was out, I guess, already, and so it explained it. I mentioned this quickly because I then worked with Tom Angelo to do the updated version, the third edition, which is now out 30 years after the second edition. And the second edition was still selling, but we were removing things like “hand out papers to the students, have them respond on the muddiest point, and then take them home, but make sure you don’t ask questions that you don’t have time to respond to. Don’t ask elaborate things because it will take too much time.” Lots of stuff about CATs was about being careful not to overwhelm yourself. And if you think about that in the old days, that’s what you do. Pieces of paper were handed to, you’d read through them and everything. So we took out things like “share your results on the overhead protector,” and those are gone, and then we replace them with things like Lew was saying is, just put your students into a small think-pair-share, have them respond to this thing with a PollEverywhere or something, and then while they’re talking, then come up with the four muddiest things going on, and then teach those in the second half of class. And so, all of those classroom assessment techniques that we’ve been using for 30 years can now be made easier with AI. So I’m really excited about this.

Rebecca: You mentioned earlier about the chapter on Universal Design for Learning, and I know you’ve been a long time advocate, Todd. Can you talk a little bit about how faculty can use AI to design courses that are better for diverse learners and really have kind of access in mind, rather than retrofitting accommodations.

Todd: Yeah. So number one, I think the thing to point out here is, so I teach, this Lilly teaching conferences. They’ve been around for a long time. There’s different types of sessions that I’ll include in the program, and some of the sessions, and I talk to the presenters about this all the time, some of the sessions are just hot topics that you know are just going to go: engaging students in asynchronous classes, it’s going to fill a room. How to do active learning strategies, going to fill a room. They always have. Sometimes you have topics, though, that you put on the program because you have to talk about them. And if you don’t put them on the program, even though they’re not popular, then it doesn’t get picked up. And I remember putting sessions in the late 1990s, early 2000 about diversity that would have four people in a room, and individuals would say “there’s only four people in there.” And I’d say, “We’re still putting it on the program.” UDL was another one, anything on universal design, I can tell you I’d put in the smallest room in the conference, because it would be a great session, but it would draw like seven people. And one of the reasons it didn’t draw many people, and quite frankly, across all of higher education, people might love the concept, it’s really hard to do. If we’re going to do things like multiple means of expression, which is a key factor of universal design, it can’t just say that you can share your results in one way. What if you’re not good at putting text together, but you really have the idea down. So maybe you create a video, or maybe you have a play, or maybe you get in small group and have a discussion. Multiple means of demonstrating the information, so presentation, how do I explain this in a way that people can get it that’s always been hard, it is now being made really easy because we can go to AI with the correct prompts, and we can come up with multiple ways of expression, multiple ways of presentation. Lew was talking about having a class of 400 with the students in there. You could say to the students: “Here’s what I want to do. We’re teaching metacognition. Everybody think of something you love to do now, type into AI. I love to blank. And I want to learn more about metacognition so that I could explain it to my friend.” So I could type in I love long distance bicycling, and I want to learn metacognition. Rebecca might put in that she loves rock climbing. John might put in like he likes baking, and Lew might probably put in there he likes street fighting. [LAUGHTER] So you put those prompts in there, and then what pops out is everybody in the class gets to learn it in their own… I mean, what could be more universal than that? And so I’m just really excited about it. And we did the whole chapter, and Lew and I talked about it, and I think at the beginning I wasn’t even going to do a whole chapter, and he said, “Yeah, we need to do a whole chapter.” And so I think AI will open the gate so that people can finally do universal design in a way that’s meaningful without overwhelming them.

John: Faculty have been overwhelmed, first with COVID and now with AI, and many other things that are happening externally. How does your book address the reality that faculty don’t have enough time or energy to learn a whole new technology on top of everything else they’ve had to learn in the last several years.

Lew: Fair point. I think the thing we need to start with is the idea that we want to be careful and not this chase the technology, because if you do that’s going to make things worse, you’re going to get frustrated. What you want to do is try to use the tool to make things better. So I often talk about there’s 2, t-w-0, too many shiny objects out there. And one of the ideas with the too many shiny objects is there’s all these little prompts that people: try this, try that, try that, and that’s really frustrating for faculty, because it’s just a little bit beyond their skill set of what they want to do. It’s a biology example, and they have to bring it down into what they want to do. The other thing is, with the shiny object, is the idea of treating AI like this big shiny hammer, and then you’re running around trying to find all these curricular nails to try to beat down of how I’m going to use AI to do that, that is just such the wrong way to address AI, letting the technology lead first, you’re just going to make things worse and you’re going to stress yourself out even more. So what we want to do is we want to go back to basics. We want to think about backward design: at the end of this course, what should my students know? What should they understand? Then how am I going to assess whether they understand that? And then finally, how would I go about teaching that? And that’s where we decide whether AI might fit in or not. So again, it’s not the idea of trying to get AI in the classroom. I think as faculty members, we want to be really careful about how do we use it to be a creative assistant for us and kind of level up and improve our existing teaching practices. And the thing is, the book, all these teaching practices that we’re doing, these are well reasoned research techniques that have been laid out in chapters four through 10, backward design, ZPD, TILT, all the fun letters, UDL, all that stuff. But again, it’s trying to use that in a practical way, trying to develop your teaching skills more, and then just using AI as the tool to help you with that guidance along the way.

Todd: I wrote an article years ago. I was like, we just want to be well, that’s all we want. [LAUGHTER] So this concept of what we’re doing, if we think about what we do as faculty members out, as Lew pointed out, we’re chasing things a lot of times, and that’s just a problem. And this goes back to… remember when clickers came out, student response systems. Everybody’s like, “Oh, I want to use a student response system because my colleague’s using it,” and as faculty development directors, we are constantly trying to talk people out of using technology unless they actually needed it. Backward design. Why do you want to use it? Student response systems are always fun, because it’s like, I want to use student response systems and my friends and I would say, “Okay, so why?” “So we can gather student responses” and I’d say, “Okay, you know, you could just have them raise hands. Like, how many of you think this?” They say, “Well, yeah, but I want to know like anonymous.” I say, “Okay, have them close their eyes and raise their hands well.” “But I want to tally them.” “Alright, well have them close their eyes, raise their hands and then count them.” I mean, these things are not necessary. But then when they start to say, “Okay, but I want to know some qualitative aspects, what are they thinking and why?” Now we can use the technology. So I think that’s helpful. And so when you go back and look at what really takes time in teaching, those types of issues do, I can’t, like have everybody talk about muddiest point, because I don’t have time to read through those. Now you do, because AI can skim through those quickly for you. If you’re prep timed, you put in exhausted in there. I was exhausted because when I taught history and systems of psychology the first time, I would be up from 10 o’clock at night till two in the morning putting together a lecture. And I knew the stuff generally, but I had to go look for it. But I spent all my time looking. I was looking for the information. Then I’d find it, and then I would embed it. With AI I’m going to get the same kind of information, I’m just going to get it really faster, and because I can pull that together with the knowledge base I have, then I can put it out there. So prep time is going to drop, grading time is going to drop in terms of figuring out how to read through these types of things. Underpaid, by the way, I think you might have mentioned that one, just so we can’t do a lot about that. So sorry, yeah, for the underpaid part. But I want to finish with one quick thing here. There’s a book that I did actually get accepted for publication that I have never written. The contract was signed in 1994 and the reason I mentioned this is that what I wanted to do was take a stats book, but I thought we’re teaching statistics without kind of framework. So what if we took the old psych studies that were really the cool studies, took the data set, retrofit a data set basically that would give you the same data. Have students analyze the data, come up with what they’ve got, and then talk about what the data means, and then explain to them how that fits into like, that was the Bobo doll experiment, where Bandura had models hit a bobo doll, a blow up doll, and then they give the same doll to kids and see if the kids would do the same thing. You could replicate these studies while learning statistics. And I was told I couldn’t write that because most faculty members teaching statistics don’t know those studies. And so at the time, there was no way to do it. Now, with AI, you actually could, it would be very easy to say, I want to know more about Bandura’s Bobo doll study. And so I think that’s some changes that we’re going to have that are really going to be helpful.

Rebecca: One of the things that you’ve both underscored is leaning on the faculty member’s expertise because they can validate what’s coming through the AI tools. [LAUGHTER] So you’re not worried about the reliability, because you have that expertise, and the things that you’re suggesting people use are relying on that expertise to some extent.

Todd: Yeah, and that’s the thing. They’ve got the expertise. How can we help them with it? And help them by putting together a book that’s very modular. You can just go through and work through these things. Actually, the activities are set up, and Lew did this, I thought it was fantastic, they’re put in boxes. You could pull the whole thing out and make a workshop out of it. Very, very easy to pull this stuff out and do that, but by making these things very consistent, we know that reduces cognitive load, which is going to reduce some of that exhaustion and extra work.

Lew: And the other thing is, the examples were set up in a way, again, that they relate directly to what you’re doing in your classroom, your assignment, your example, not something that, again, the cognitive load that you have to translate from somebody else’s existing example. And again, that’s one of the neat things that AI allows you to do. Because now, instead of me saying in a book, do this example, I can put a little bracket there and say, insert your example from your discipline here, and all of a sudden you have individualized learning, individualized application for the teaching technique that you’re trying to do using the power of AI to do that.

John: And one of the things I’ve seen is that we have a lot of people attend workshops on AI just to learn how they can block it and how they can ignore it. But when the focus is on activities that actually allow them to do their work more productively or more easily or more efficiently, they get a bit more excited about it and then start thinking about how they could be using it to improve their courses and to improve their lives in general. And I think that’s a nice way of introducing people to AI who are initially somewhat resistant to it.

Lew: Yeah, it’s critical. I don’t think you can walk into a classroom and say, okay, students, we’re going to use AI today without understanding it yourself. And you hit the nail on the head there, the best way to do that is to do something that you are the expert in, and then learn to explore this technology on your own. It’s going to take a couple years for us to kind of get used to what’s going on. I think in a few years, we’ll be ready to think about how we might use this with students and things like that. But as a faculty writ large, we’re going to have to have a better understanding ourselves of just how to use those tools. And I think to your point about students misusing it and things, we can now have better conversations with them if we better understand how to use the tools ourselves for our own work.

Todd: And how people learn. [LAUGHTER] So we have tht published in the book too. That’s what it does. It helps you understand how these processes work, and so you learn about things like cognitive load. So then you can not teach cognitive load, but using that, build assignments that have lower cognitive load. That was one of the things that Lew came up… I love that one assignment that you came up with, Lew, is basically it’s you load the assignment in and says, “Where are students going to have high cognitive load in terms of really struggling with this assignment? And then AI says, “Oh, they’re going to stumble here, here and here.” And then you start rewriting it. It’s not a lot of extra work for you, and it helps the students. You don’t have to go through examples and have all those students lined up outside your door in office hours, saying, “I don’t understand why this thing works.” And so yeah, I think it’d fantastic.

Rebecca: I appreciate the idea of meeting people where they’re at, for sure. You mentioned something about a couple of years, maybe we’ll be ready to really integrate it with student learning. In five years, maybe, what does good teaching with AI look like?

Todd: This is kind of a fun one. I actually was asked to do a workshop recently that they were looking for a speaker, and they said they were interviewing different people, and they said, “We just want somebody come in and talk to us about what teaching will look like in 5 to 10 years.” I said, “If somebody tells you that they know what teaching would look like in 5 to 10 years, I would not ask them to give that presentation.” Because I don’t know, we used to talk five years out. Tom Angelo’s book with CATs was good for 20 years and still kind of worked. That stuff’s not going to handle anymore, because just in the last three to four years. Can you imagine, just before AI took off, go back just a few years and predict that it would look like this? So I don’t think we have a clue about what overall it’s going to look like. I do think we can look at some trends, though, and we can look at some directions we’re taking, because we can’t just throw our hands up and say “we don’t know,” but we want to be careful about what it’s going to be and it’s just going to be difficult, but there’s lots of good stuff coming out. And I’m going to actually ask Lew to do this, because earlier today he was explaining to me an article he’s reading. I think this stuff is fascinating that’s coming out.

Lew: Sure, I’ll jump in. So one of the things, not only do I keep an eye on higher ed and what’s going on with AI, but also the K through 12 space, and I follow a lot of folks on substack, it’s interesting. I think a lot of the discourse right now is going on in substack, as far as with AI and teaching and learning things. But anyway, there’s a fellow I’m going to try to pronounce his name, Nick Potkalitsky from Ohio, and he’s working with our Ohio Public Schools and writing about that. So the state of Ohio has mandated that by July 1, 2026 all school systems are supposed to have some kind of AI policy in place. So Nick is working with some of the larger school systems, Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleveland and things like that. And in this article he talked about on substack, he’s like, “Listen folks, this is going to be a three to five year rebuild. This is not going to be a quick policy fix. Rebuild means rethinking instruction, assessment, and curriculum, basically from the ground up. And how might we support teachers to make that happen and things like that. But teachers clearly need to be in that conversation. They need to be in that room.” This is the K through 12 space, and I think that’s only going to translate to higher ed as well. So the sooner faculty can get out there and start engaging in this technology and seeing what it works for them, then they will be able to kind of think down the road of how that’s going to affect their students in their classroom.

Todd: We have an epilogue in the book we did too after chapter 10, there’s a section in terms of what we think is coming along. And I just want to add one more quick thing here, when I think about what good teaching is, throughout my career… so I started teaching in 1984 so I’ve been teaching for a minute… and the concept here is that throughout all of that time, when I think about things I wanted to do, and what frustrated me were things that I couldn’t do because I didn’t have time or I didn’t have a way to do them. Universal design was just one example of that, but lots of things. With 400 students, I would love to ask them an essay question, but there was no way to look at that, even to get a sense of what they were writing. I would like to put students in small groups and looked at multiple versions of what they were talking about. There’s so many things out there. And now, as I start looking at what the future of teaching might look like, it’s kind of like one after another we just remove those barriers. So I don’t know what it will look like, but I know it will look better because it is removing things that we can’t do. And I will just end with my chunk of saying this is that we so quickly, when this came out, went right to cheating. Just immediately, the first articles out were, how are we going to stop students from cheating? How are we going to stop them? Students were cheating before AI came along. Don McCabe did a lot of work on this, and the proportion of students cheating in some way was off the chart. It made it easier, no doubt about that, and it does create a real problem, because if students can just jump in and do AI, then there’re many that will do that. But I don’t think we have to go there. And Lew and I talked a lot about this too, is that we shouldn’t just go there. We should start looking at opportunities. And I just talked to someone the other day who said, like, “How are we going to know when we can fully trust AI when it gives us an answer?” And that’s the kind of stuff that just drives me nuts, because when we talked about hallucinations, and so many faculty immediately say, “Oh, I put that in and it made a mistake.” So do I, sometimes. There are times when I make mistakes. I’ve heard my colleagues say stuff and I say, “That’s not true.” And so it’s no different than humans in that respect. We’re going to be able to trust it when we can look at it and we know it’s right, but it is getting better all the time. And Lew said it earlier in this discussion we’ve had here today too, is we can’t focus on what it was. We have to focus on what it can be. And I think looking forward for teaching, there’s some really cool stuff coming.

Rebecca: I think one of the things that you’re highlighting, both in your book and how you responded, is it remains anchored in the science of learning and just how we’re using the technology, and things might shift, but if we keep focusing on good teaching and learning practices [LAUGHTER] and just get them better, it’s not a surprise.

Lew: Well, it’s interesting, especially at the higher ed. We’re all trained in a very specific discipline, a very specific area. We’re experts in that field. We were never trained to teach, or very few of us maybe had that one course as we were TAs or something like that. And again, what the AI is allowing us to do is to further our expertise and our teaching and to kind of push the boundaries where we just didn’t have that training before. So I think, as Todd pointed out, I think there’s going to be a lot of opportunities just to make things better, hopefully.

Todd: Before we wrap up this question too, I’m just going to kind of put a charge out there, because Lew mentioned a little bit earlier, but in the model we have for adapt and stuff, for those of you who are listening, if you haven’t done it yet, just try dumping one of your assignments in for a topic or an area that you know students struggle with a little bit put into the AI. And the book’s got some examples on how to do this, but you could just say, “Where will the students struggle with this?” When I teach statistics, distribution of sample means, always give them fits. It took me years to figure out how to get around that, but if I was a brand new teacher and never taught before, I could put distributional sample means in there and say, Where will my students struggle? And it will tell you, here’s some places. And then, if you want to set that off to the side and then teach it and see where they struggled and make a comparison. And if it kind of lines up a little bit, you know it’s a gateway to kind of figuring out where the problems are going to be before they emerge. Wouldn’t that be cool?

John: So this is the first time you’ve worked together on a project like this. Could you talk a little bit about the working relationship and how that evolved?

Todd: Yeah, let me jump in there real quickly. Number one is writing a book is hard. I mean, it is really, really hard. And AI actually has helped us out with this too. So I wrote a book, this New Science of Learning first edition took two and a half years to write that thing. This book was nowhere near that, six, seven months, and we put a lot of time and energy into it. But the point is, it’s hard. Working with somebody is even harder because now you got to talk about what you’re doing and look at different points of view and everything else. And I think what was really cool with the way Lew and I kind of set it up is that we were coming from different directions. I had the learning theory. He was coming in from the AI, I would write a bunch of stuff, and he’d say, that’s really cool about all that metacognition. Maybe we can change it from like 3000 words down to, I think, 42, one time. And I said, I’m not explaining metacognition in 42 words. And then he gave me like 150 so we had to compromise and go through that. I would just say, working with him, he gets stuff done fast. He is really, really good at things in terms of understanding AI component. His prompting was amazing. I don’t know he’s a little mathematician-ey for me sometimes, but, you know, it was alright working with him. So all in all it was a positive experience. And I think Lew would say the same thing. So what’s the next question? [LAUGHTER]

Lew: No, it was a lot of fun. I really appreciated, as you’ve already mentioned, Todd is a very prolific author, so he was able to help us navigate all of those rough and challenging waters. So I was so much appreciative. But I think we complemented each other well, as far as what we brought to the table, and it’s exactly you know, what the book needed. And in particular, I remember Todd that GLCA, the Great Lakes College Association talk that you gave, what was the title of that? You remember something about neurodiverse learners?

Todd: It was basically how AI can help neurodiverse learners to be better learners. The title is way better than that.

Lew: Right, and Todd, he graciously used himself as an example, I will say. So a lot of things made sense to me [LAUGHTER] after that presentation Todd, [LAUGHTER] I’ll just leave it at that.

Todd: So, let me just say this. Yeah, I explained a little bit about ADHD and some of the characteristics of people who have ADHD, like time blindness, where you think something’s gonna take 40 minutes, but you don’t have a clue? Might be 10 minutes. Might be 17 hours. Who knows. You set up your task list, but you’ve never, ever finished a to-do list. I have never finished to-do list. And yeah, I went through all of those types of things and a couple of other things that I kind of struggle with. And then Lew when we finished, he says, it’s been great working with you, but I’m not sure if I’d heard that presentation first I would have signed the contract. [LAUGHTER] Well, you did it.

Lew: No, it was fine. It was fine.

Rebecca: So Todd, some of our long-term listeners might be curious what role opera played in this book. Didn’t you listen to a lot of opera last time?

Todd: Yeah, you know what? Let’s just throw this in there real quickly, because this is part of the ADH stuff that I’m learning, to whatever extent this fits in with this whole interview here. So ADHD is one of those things that, much like dealing with gluten intolerance and several other things, people think, if you’ve really got it, you must have known it your whole life. There are people who find out later in life that they have this thing. I always knew that kind of general things with ADHD which always struggled with a little bit. And I knew I had some of it. But, I mean, I was 60 years old when I was diagnosed, and so that concept there is suddenly I started to realize and read bunch of books about things like time blindness and some other things, but I had a terrible time writing. And a person, Tamara Rosier, who wrote a fantastic book, Your Brain’s Not Broken. It’s been reviewed in the New York Times and stuff, she said, “listen to opera, like, crank it up. Don’t do ear damage, but crank it up and do that while you’re writing.” And I said, “that will never work, because I have to have it quiet.” And she said, “Just try it.” And I put opera on and cranked it up, and I churned out work like I’d never turned it out in my life. And she pointed out to me that my brain’s always looking for stuff. Part of it would settle on that, and then it just kind of left this focus for the rest. Still had to have absolute quiet when I read. But for writing, that worked. I got put on some ADHD medicine, and two days after I started the medicine, I cannot listen to anything while I write. [LAUGHTER] To me, that’s fascinating, because what it now means is my brain’s actually kind of slowed down enough that that becomes a distraction. But that to me as a cognitive person, that differentiation is fascinating.

Rebecca: That is fascinating,

John: And that’s a nice preview of our next podcast that will be coming out next week. We’re talking to Karen Costa about ADHD and her experiences with that.

Todd: She’s really good.

Rebecca: So we always wrap up by asking, what’s next?

Lew: So I’m a mathematician by training, and I was just at a recent large gathering of many of our professional organizations, and for years now, they’ve been calling for, especially in like the high school setting, that we need to teach more statistics, data analytics, modeling, in other words, creating mathematical pathways, kind of beyond the calculus curriculum. The rub is, is that the way folks are trained, they’re basically trained for the calculus curriculum and not these other things. So what I’m doing is, I’m actually working with some organizations like Math for America to consider how we might take frameworks to increase the number of teachers that were able to develop these courses in these different areas. So what we’re doing is we’re looking at something I like to call AI-assisted retooling, so teachers are learning new content alongside an AI partner to expand their mathematical pathways. So, that’s kind of a really exciting thing that I’m starting to work with. We got a few case examples that we’ve been doing. I’ve been a case study myself of doing that. So, I’m really excited about that. And of course, you know, I’m continuing to work with teaching centers on workshops and things around the book.

Todd: Nice. For me, so I got another book started, because why not? These are always fun. This particular one’s going to be different, though. So I’ve probably said about as much as I can in terms of some of the teaching tips and kinds of things we do. I really think that what’s going to happen pretty soon is there’s so much stuff coming out with AI, real life stuff is going to become something I think people are going to cherish. So the project I’m working on right now is looking more at how I’ve taught in different aspects of it, but what it really is going to boil down to are things that I experienced in the classroom. They’re really kind of unique, interesting things, and then how it played out and how it could be different. And so I had a student one time have a grand mal seizure in my class. And the quick example here is I quickly ran down to a nursing station. It was just around the corner. I ran over there, got somebody, brought them back, and the nurse came back, and we came into the classroom. And I, right now, would tell you… that was my first year of teaching that happened… I would never leave a classroom when an emergency is going on. I should have said to somebody, “Hey, go to the nursing station.” So what I want to do is talk a little bit about what I’ve done, some of the ways I’ve done it, how I would have done it differently, and then how that ties into learning and different aspects. So I really want to make more of a personal story. I don’t know if anybody will be interested in it, but, you know, we’ll give it a try.

Rebecca: Sounds like an interesting book. I’d read it.

Todd: Good. I just sold one. Oooh.

Rebecca: Yeah. [LAUGHTER]

John: Maybe two. [LAUGHTER]

Rebecca: Yeah, maybe two.

Todd: No worries, but thank you, appreciate that.

Rebecca: People have anxiety about, like, what if X, Y and Z happens in my class, and hearing personal stories about how those sorts of things have been addressed and strategies for addressing them, I think eases some worry for folks, so it could fill a gap.

Todd: Yeah, I appreciate you saying that, and I think one of the big ones is that it’s been about 40 years of teaching, and the 40 years of teaching, I think the framework I’m gonna go with, I’ve made almost every mistake you can make, and I still am seen as kind of a person who’s written these books. I do know a lot about teaching, and I’ve learned a lot about it, but you don’t become a better teacher without making mistakes along the way. I don’t think anybody can. And so I’ve done that. And I probably should point out, too, as Lew said, I run around some campuses. I love meeting people and going to campuses. I’ll still keep doing that.

Lew: So Todd, three years ago, I did a column for the MAA, it’s the Mathematical Association America. It’s called Still Learning From My Misstakes. And mistakes was spelled with two S’s, anyway, but yeah, exactly that, that idea of, I think, showing your vulnerability, especially at the part in the career that he’s at, like, oh, Todd Zakrajsek does everything perfect. I think peeling back the curtain and showing the mistakes that we made for the folks who are coming up, that is so refreshing to see that and what we did well and what we didn’t do well, and then kind of examples of moving that forward. So yeah, maybe three books, you might sell three. [LAUGHTER]

Rebecca: Definitely worth the investment now. [LAUGHTER]

Todd: Lew, that will cover my next tea. [LAUGHTER] But thank you, appreciate that.

Rebecca: Well, thank you both for joining us and for sharing your work.

Lew: Thank you so much. Appreciate it. It was fun.

Todd: Appreciate the opportunity.

John: Well, thank you.

[MUSIC]

John: If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast service. To continue the conversation, join us on our Tea for Teaching Facebook page.

Rebecca: You can find show notes, transcripts and other materials on teaforteaching.com. Music by Michael Gary Brewer.

[MUSIC]