{"id":693,"date":"2023-01-27T14:10:55","date_gmt":"2023-01-27T22:10:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/teaching-in-dornsife\/?page_id=693"},"modified":"2023-02-06T14:40:59","modified_gmt":"2023-02-06T22:40:59","slug":"blog-post-46","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/teaching-in-dornsife\/faculty-blog\/blog-post-46\/","title":{"rendered":"Remembering to Talk to My Colleagues"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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Establishing Learning Communities<\/em><\/h5>\n

By Jessica Parr, Associate Professor (Teaching) of Chemistry – August 28, 2020<\/strong><\/p>\n

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I feel like I am drowning in a sea of emails, Blackboard posts and zoom meetings. I have to remind myself to turn off my computer at the end of the day and ignore the emails that I can see filling my inbox on my phone throughout the evening. They will still be there in the morning and can be better answered then when I am less drained anyway. I feel isolated and alone.<\/p>\n

Ding. Text message from someone I used to see everyday asking for advice on the exact same situation I was dealing just days before. We chat briefly and I realize that we are all in the same boat. Or at least we are all clinging to similar life rafts trying to navigate this crazy time. We plan to talk later to debrief on what we are experiencing and what has worked or not in the past week. I feel relieved, less alone, and a little refreshed.<\/p>\n

One way to combat these feelings and anxieties is to establish a group, or several groups of faculty colleagues who can meet occasionally to talk about their instructional experiences. These learning communities can be centered around a specific topic, such as setting up exams in Blackboard, or simply an opportunity to share general experiences.<\/p>\n

In January of 2020, when things looked very different, I brought together some faculty from a variety of schools in Southern California to talk about teaching Chemistry, specifically helping our students navigate the challenging transition from the first to second year. We had faculty from various community colleges, one from a Cal State, and a handful from UCs, as well as interested teaching faculty in the USC Chemistry department. We spent about half of our time together just on introductions and sharing the innovative things that we had tried in our classrooms. It was such an invigorating experience. I have been working to recreate it in various forms now that we have settled into pandemic life.<\/p>\n

The original group that was established has met virtually once this summer, is meeting later this week and I am hoping to establish a bi-weekly time that we can log on to zoom and chat with each other. I have also had some informal meetings with department colleagues, and others across USC. Every time I leave one of the meetings, I feel better and have a sense that everything will be ok.<\/p>\n

Reach out to your colleagues in your department, in other departments, at other schools, in completely different disciplines. You will be surprised how quickly people will jump at the opportunity to join a community. We are all craving it right now and this is a simple way to keep it going.<\/p>\n

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