Greetings IRT Community!
Welcome to a new fall semester! I hope that the summer afforded you a balance of work and focus on your well-being.
I want to take this opportunity to offer my heartfelt appreciation to all who planned and participated in our summer planning and programming. It takes a vibrant and dynamic community to plan programming that offers a sense of belonging, is committed to having young people see reflections of themselves and their lived experiences in and out the classroom, and understands the need for centering one’s own wellness practices.
To that end and for example, with Heather Moore Roberson, IRT ’01, ’10 and Ryan Sermon, IRT ’10 Co-Curriculum Coordinators, we identified four pillars to anchor this year’s Summer Workshop courses, which include Current Climate in Education, Thriving in Graduate School, Wellness & Wellbeing and a Wildcard (free topic). Read more about the pillars in this post.
Utilizing these four guiding pillars our Summer Workshop faculty worked alongside one another to create courses that they lead individually and co-taught. Our hope was for the faculty to have an experience of designing and developing courses that were not in the norm of traditional instruction. Instead, Summer Workshop faculty were encouraged to lean into their expertise using innovative knowledge-making and instructional strategies as they worked with scholars to analyze critical texts and apply theory to practice. One of our IRT Scholars shares a reflection of their Summer Workshop experience;
“… I was struggling to identify a compelling way to frame my past experience and future objectives beyond simply saying I can do mixed methods. Yet, the introduction to exploratory sequential mixed methods during session 1 of the Educational Research Methods revealed an opportunity to use qualitative methods — my current skill set — to subsequently inform directions for quantitative inquiry — the skill set I see to develop through my PhD. And this felt like my “aha moment!”
As I take a break from updating my SOP to send this email, I recognize that gaining the language to clearly frame the relationship between my current experience and future objectives has considerably improved my sense of clarity and confidence. Thanks for the guidance!”
In addition to the Summer Workshop, IRT also hosted its annual Recruiters’ Weekend whereby we brought together scholars and our Consortium Deans and Admissions personnel. Our new RingCentral Events (RCE) platform allowed us to host a virtual event modeled after a live recruitment fair. Our Consortium partners were given the freedom to design the content for their booths and invite faculty, alumni, and current students to join them in engaging with scholars interested in their respective graduate programs. The booths were able to operate both synchronously and asynchronously thus providing broader access across geographic regions and time zones. Feedback from our Consortium partners and scholars included;
“One thing I was reminded of was how important these spaces are for breaking down barriers to grad school!” Consortium partner
“One thing that I appreciate about my time today is having the ability to connect with students individually in depth.” Consortium partner
“You don’t know what you don’t know! These conversations were extremely helpful for demystifying their [Consortium Schools] specific application processes and requirements.” IRT Scholar
“I appreciate how people shared their own paths to their professional work and their openness to letting life take them somewhere unexpected.” IRT Scholar
“One thing I appreciated was how so many of the school reps have been so transparent about logistics and life at their institution. It honored that we are whole people outside of just scholars!” IRT Scholar
Toward the end of the summer, several IRT alums and I attended a webinar led by Kevin Kumashiro, former interim Dean of Education at Hofstra University and former Dean of the School of Education at the University of San Francisco in advance of the release of the 20th Anniversary and 4th Edition of his book entitled; Against Common Sense: Teaching and Learning Toward Social Justice.
To open the webinar Dr. Kumashiro posed the following questions, “What does it mean to engage in education for democracy? Where are the places of hope during challenging times from your perspective in PK-12 or higher education? And, how do we become a rattling force for change?”
In closing, I invite you to ponder these questions and consider in what ways the IRT provides pathways to nurture your hope. I would love to hear your thoughts on this, please email me if you are open to sharing them. With deep appreciation for your collaboration.
Aloha,
Catherine Wong
IRT Associate Director and Manager of Programs
Institute for Recruitment of Teachers 