Pedagogy Reading Groups
The CTE organizes occasional reading groups open to instructors interested in delving into a particular author’s work or into a timely pedagogical text. Meetings are informal and are meant to provide an opportunity to share reactions, questions, and thoughts about how to implement the principles introduced in the reading.
Facilitated by CTE staff, these groups provide instructors the opportunity to connect across disciplines about a range of teaching topics. Past participants have mentioned “the diversity of the group - in terms of field, experience, and class type” and the “free-form conversation” as some of the benefits of the program.
Accommodation Requests
The Center for Teaching Excellence is committed to providing equal access to its events and programs. Individuals with disabilities who anticipate needing accommodations or who have questions about physical access may contact centerforteaching@bc.edu.
Spring 2025
This reading group will examine how biases manifest in AI systems, with the goal of identifying methods for inviting students into critical reflection on AI in coursework. The group will read a well-regarded, accessible book on AI bias that builds on what Ruha Benjamin raised in her 2024 ETD talk: how algorithmic bias can impair our ability to imagine the possibilities obscured by limited datasets. The book, Meredith Broussard’s More than a Glitch: Confronting Race, Gender, and Ability Bias in Tech (April 2024), explores how AI mirrors the biases manifest in society, and provides a framework for collective action to build awareness of such biases and develop strategies to educate the public.
All BC instructors–faculty and graduate students–are welcome to join the conversation. Those who are able to commit to all three sessions will receive a physical copy of the book. The ebook is also available for download via the BC library. The group will meet from 12:00-1:15 pm three times: Wednesday, February 12, Thursday, March 13, and Tuesday, April 1. Each session will be held as a hybrid meeting with a maximum of 20 in-person participants per session.
Past Reading Groups
Spring 2024
In anticipation of Ruha Benjamin’s Excellence in Teaching Day keynote lecture, the CTE is organizing a couple opportunities — one in person over lunch and one on Zoom — to discuss the chapter, “Imagining the Future,” from her latest work, Imagination: A Manifesto. Building on her earlier work on the ways technology can exacerbate racial divides in the name of bringing people together for common cause, her latest book examines the emancipatory power of the imagination.
All BC instructors are welcome to join the conversation. Everyone who registers will receive a free copy of the book. Either join us in person on April 23 from 12:00 - 1:00 or on Zoom on April 24 from 4:00 - 5:00.
Reach out to centerforteaching@bc.edu with any questions.
Fall 2023
In the CTE, we’re hearing from more faculty who are looking to revise their grading practices in order to bolster student motivation, cultivate curiosity and intellectual risk-taking, and gain confidence that grades are reflective of in-course learning rather than access to previous resources, amongst other things. Continuing a conversation from Excellence in Teaching Day 2023, join us for a reading group on Grading for Growth by David Clark and Robert Talbert.
Open to faculty and any one who has served as a teaching fellow in a previous semester, participants will get an introduction to alternative grading frameworks—from small adjustments to a fairly traditional framework to a complete overhaul of a course grading schema—while talking with peers from across the university about opportunities and challenges when implementing an alternative grading system in a particular course.
The group will meet three times with participants having the option to join in-person or on Zoom. Participants who can commit to attending all three sessions will be able to pick up a copy of the book. If you’d like to join us, please email Kim Humphrey by September 29, 2023.
Meeting #1: October 13, 3:00-4:00 pm
- What this book is about (pp 2-9)
- Why we grade (pp 10-22)
- A framework for alternative grading (pp 23-31)Does alternative grading work (pp 32-47)
Meeting #2: October 27, 3:00-4:00 pm
- Standards based grading (51-63)
- Specifications grading (64-81)
- Optional: Large classes (98-122)
Meeting #3: November 10, 3:00-4:00 pm
- Hybrid systems (81-97)
- Partial conversions (139-145)
- Optional: Lab classes (123-138)
Summer 2023
Teaching to Transgress, bell hooks’s foundational work of critical pedagogy, helps frame questions that are still vital for transformative teaching and learning. How do we engage students authentically, confront oppression and center joy in the classroom, and fulfill the promise of educating as the
“practice of freedom”? Join us as we read selections from Teaching to Transgress over four sessions this summer. This reading group is open to all BC instructors. If you are interested, email Sarah Castricum to learn more.
Spring 2023
The CTE & Intersections are co-sponsoring a faculty listening group on Seeing White a documentary podcast from Scene on Radio on the historical origins of “whiteness.”
We invite into this conversation faculty who are interested in understanding how history has shaped our contemporary racial context and the racism embedded in U.S. culture and structures. Participants will have the chance to consider what it means for them to live in a way that is attentive to that still-unfolding history given the particularities of their context. During meetings, participants will explore what historically-conscious anti-racism involves in scholarship, teaching, and advocacy in higher education. We welcome faculty to bring their most pressing concerns for their work at BC into our conversation, whether that’s about teaching, mentoring, scholarship, or something else.
As the title implies, this podcast and program are primarily aimed at supporting white people in taking an active role in dismantling white supremacy. Interested faculty of color are also welcome to join. If you are thinking about joining but want to know a little more before deciding if the group is likely to work for you, you can contact Kim Humphrey with any questions.
The group will meet seven times over the course of the semester and participants who can attend every session will receive a $500 stipend. The group will meet on the following Wednesdays from 2:00 - 3:00 in person at the CTE: March 15, 22, and 29; and April 5, 12, 19, and 26.
The CTE is offering a graduate pedagogy reading group led by graduate student instructors. If you are a graduate student or post doc, you are invited to join us for a series of five meetings to discuss the book The Spark of Learning in the CTE’s Innovation Lab (O’Neill 250). No prior teaching experience is necessary.
Meetings will be held on five Tuesdays: 2/28, 3/14, 3/28, 4/11, & 4/25 from 2 p.m. - 3 p.m. Participants who can commit to attending all five meetings will be able to pick up a copy of the book; space is limited.