UPTLC 2024

The COVID-19 pandemic underscored how intertwined learner and instructor well-being is, and how classes can be sites that support well-being for all amidst external challenges. Communities of care are built to be accessible and inclusive, promoting more equitable, human-centered practices. As feminist scholar bell hooks writes in Teaching to Transgress, “To teach in a manner that respects and cares for the souls of our students is essential if we are to provide the necessary conditions where learning can most deeply and intimately begin” (13). hooks also notes that, “teachers must also be committed to a process of self-actualization that promotes their own well-being if they are to teach in a manner that empowers students” (15).

This interactive workshop will demonstrate how one educator uses inclusive, feminist pedagogical practices to center learner and instructor wellbeing in online classes. The presenter will share their feminist praxis through a discussion of theoretical perspectives and concrete practices that can be integrated into any class. Instructor presence, streamlined course work, intentional community-building practices, and a culture of feedback are strategies the presenter used to co-create a community of care in online women’s and gender studies courses at a regional comprehensive public university and a community college.

The content and form of the workshop is informed by inclusive, feminist pedagogical practices that ask individuals to consider their own positionality (hooks, Teaching to Trasngress) and practice kindness, as described by scholar Cate Denial in “A Pedagogy of Kindness”. Following the models of reflection suggested by Stephen Brookfield in Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher, participants will consider multiple sources of feedback as they work toward co-creating communities of care in their online classes.