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Welcome to our July 2023 Newsletter!
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Ramon Casas’ Jove Decadent (1899): Portrait of an exhausted dancer
or someone struggling to read on a hot summer day?
Like many of you, I look forward to the summer as a great time for tackling the titles that were recommended to me throughout the academic year. Of all the books I’ve read recently, two in particular have given me much food for thought about how we approach our work in higher education.
The first is 4,000 Weeks: Time Management for Mortals, by Oliver Burkeman. As a productivity nerd, I dove into this book anticipating I’d learn how to become more efficient. But the point of the book is quite the opposite: The problem is not limited time, Burkeman argues, but rather that “we’ve unwittingly inherited, and feel pressured to live by, a troublesome set of ideas about how to use our time, all of which are pretty much guaranteed to make things worse.” The book provides powerful reminders about the importance of living in the present moment and dispensing with the illusion that we can possess or control time. Burkeman closes with a great set of reflection questions, such as, “Are you holding yourself to, and judging yourself by, standards of productivity or performance that are impossible to meet?” and “In what ways have you yet to accept that you are who you are, not the person you think you ought to be?”
These types of questions often elude us in the culture of academia, which is predicated on competition, constantly seeking external validation, and “expectation escalation,” i.e. being plagued by the feeling that you need to be doing something bigger or greater. That environment is fertile ground for exhaustion, as Rebecce Pope-Ruark argues in Unraveling Faculty Burnout: Pathways to Reckoning and Renewal. Self-compassion and vulnerability, she contends, are not values that are easy to develop within academia. In the years leading to her own burnout, Pope-Ruark explains, “My entire identity was wrapped up in my roles as teacher, scholar, writer. It was an identity that hinged on constantly doing work rather than living a life.”
To protect ourselves from burnout, Pope-Ruark encourages us to actively decouple our professional self-esteem from personal selfhood. She offers four keys to building resilience in the face of burnout:
- Purpose: using your personal values as a check-and-balance system to guide your choices;
- Compassion: learning to see yourself and your achievements as enough;
- Connection: intentionally cultivating relationships that support your flourishing; and
- Balance: taking self-care seriously and prioritizing rest.
I am using these readings to check myself, reign in my self-doubt when it pops up, and let go of the pressure to relentlessly measure up and push forward. And I hope that you will, too. May it be that whatever you are up to this summer and wherever you go, you are using these summer weeks to do—as Burkeman describes—“whatever magnificent task or weird little thing it was that you came here for.”
Sincerely,
Magdalena L. Barrera
Vice Provost for Faculty Success
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Updates from the Center for Faculty
Development and eCampus
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Summer is a time to rest and recharge, and we hope you are enjoying yours, whether that’s exciting adventures, quiet calm, or strategizing next steps--you do you! If you have a little more flexibility in your schedule right now, we’d be glad to support you in preparing for the next academic year. This could be a good time to meet with one of our skilled instructional designers to try something new, reach out for an assist in strengthening one or more of those course materials Ally identifies as inaccessible, ask our videographer to create or edit engaging lecture videos or animations, or get a head start on your RTP dossier or range elevation case.
How we experience time can be different during the summer months, in ways that can give us a fresh perspective on what we do and why we do it. When you have a good idea or nagging question this summer, if you’d like to get planning now before classes begin, let us know: We’re happy to meet you where you are in your process!
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The
Certificate Program in Student Success Analytics
is an innovative and interactive professional development experience at the intersection of equity and evidence. With its data-based, equity-focused, and action-oriented curriculum, the CSU Student Success Analytics Certificate Program provides cross-divisional teams of higher education faculty, staff, and administrators the opportunity to improve student success on their campus.
Registration is now open for the upcoming cohort, August 25-November 17. Costs of participation for all CSU faculty and staff are covered as part of the CSU’s
Graduation Initiative 2025.
Register by Monday, July 31st
.
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The 10th Annual Academic Technology Expo (ATXpo) is a one-day, can’t-miss event, aimed at sharing, discussing, and promoting effective practices for teaching and learning with technology. This year's event will be held in person on Tuesday, October 3rd from 8:00 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. at the Soda Activity Center on the St. Mary's College campus. The event will continue to foster new collaborations between participants by showcasing projects, pedagogies, and practices that have improved teaching and learning in the Bay Area. This will be done via the IdeaLab, the centerpiece of the ATXpo.
Unlike traditional poster sessions, the IdeaLab will encourage exhibitors and participants to actively engage with each other through play, experimentation, and collaboration. Exhibitors will focus their presentations around the central teaching and learning challenge they addressed, and how their solution might be adopted by other participants. Each exhibit will be required to have materials available on site or online so that participants can begin to use that resource. Partnering with us on the event are faculty members, instructors, students, and staff from a variety of Bay Area universities, including: Cal State East Bay, Sacramento State University, San Francisco State University, Santa Clara University, Stanford University, St. Mary's College, University of California–Berkeley, University of California–San Francisco, and University of San Francisco.
The submission period for the IdeaLab is July 3 through September 1, 2023. The San José State University community is encouraged to submit an Idealab proposal, so have a look at last year’s IdeaLab sessions, and submit your proposal today! In addition to IdeaLab sessions, the ATXpo will feature lunch, faculty and student panel discussions, and an ice cream reception. I hope you can join us for the 10th Annual Academic Technology Expo (ATXpo) in October!
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Padlet is a fun collaborative tool that is integrated into Canvas. Students can post text, images, videos and links for ungraded ice-breaker activities or formal graded formative assessments. Important note: Students’ posts will not show in the Canvas gradebook. Any grading must be done manually. For more information see the eCampus Padlet webpage.
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Hypothesis
is an easy-to-use pedagogical tool that enables students and teachers to have conversations in the margins of digital texts. This social annotation tool is installed directly in Canvas and is available to you now. Adding Hypothesis to readings supports student success by placing active discussion right on top of course readings. Why use Hypothesis? Hypothesis helps students develop academic skills like deep reading and critical thinking, it helps instructors foster community as students annotate together, and it creates an inclusive space for students to engage in class discussion and develop ideas at their own pace. Interested in learning more? Register for a
Partner Workshop
or attend the
Hypothesis Academy.
In addition, explore
social annotation assignments
submitted by educators.
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July
20: Jump Start New Tenure Track Faculty Onboarding begins with asynchronous online programming
20: SJSU + Adobe Collaboratory, Cohort 2 Launch
21: SJSU Accessible Syllabus Workshop, 4:00 - 5:00 pm
24: Polling with Zoom and Poll Everywhere, 12:00 - 1:00 pm
25: Canvas II: Creating and Organizing Content with Modules, Pages, and Files, 10:00 - 11:00 am
25: eCampus Office Hours: Adobe Apps: Audition, Rush and After Effects, 12:30 - 1:30 pm
25: Collect and Manage your Data with Google Forms and Google Sheets, 2:00 - 2:30 pm
26: SJSU Accessible Syllabus Workshop, 10:00 - 11:00 am
26: Integrate Google Assignments within Canvas, 10:30 - 11:00 am
27: Explore More with Google Docs and Google Slides, 3:00 - 3:30 pm
27: Remote Teaching Series: Zoom 20 Minute Workshop, 3:30 - 4:00 pm
31: Adobe Audition for Podcasting, 12:30 - 1:30 pm
August
1: Adobe Audition for Podcasting, 10:00 - 11:00 am
1: SJSU Accessible Syllabus Workshop, 10:00 - 11:00 am
1: Polling with Zoom and Poll Everywhere,12:00 - 1:00 pm
3: Remote Teaching Series: Using Jamboard for Student Engagement, 10:30 - 11:00 am
3: Canvas I: Getting Started with Canvas for Beginners, 1:00 - 2:00 pm
7: Jump Start New Faculty Onboarding on campus programming begins (through 8/11)
10: Fall Course Prep Marathon, 9:00 am - 3:00 pm
10: eCampus Office Hours: Adobe Apps: Audition, Rush and After Effects, 11:30 am - 12:30 pm
11: eCampus Office Hours: Polling, 1:00 - 2:00 pm
14: AY 23-24 Chairs & Directors Welcome
14: 25: Canvas II: Creating and Organizing Content with Modules, Pages, and Files, 11:30 - 12:30 pm
15: Ally Accessibility Workshop. 10:00 - 10:30 am
16: SJSU Accessible Syllabus Workshop, 2:00 - 3:00 pm
17-18: Faculty Pre-Instruction Activities
17: Camtasia I Workshop, 11:00 am - 12:00 pm
17: New(er) Lecturer Welcome, 2:00-5:00 pm | Register
18: Badgr for Canvas, 1:30 - 2:30 pm
21: First Day of Instruction for Fall 2023
28: SJSU Accessible Syllabus Workshop, 11:30 am - 12:30 pm
30: Sabbatical and Difference in Pay Leaves Workshop, 9:00 - 10:15 am | Register
30: RTP: Deadline for Chairs to inform UP-Faculty Services of faculty seeking early review
30: Canvas III: Mastering Assignments, Grades, and Analytics for Student Success, 1:00 - 2:00 pm
31: Best Practices for Navigating Range Elevation Workshop, 9:00 - 10:30 am | Register
September*
4: Campus closed
8: Sabbatical and Range Elevation: Deadline for eligible faculty to inform UP-Faculty Services of intent to apply
12: Sabbatical: Applications due
21: Range Elevation: Candidate packet due
22: Sabbatical: Chair’s Statement sent to candidate
27: Public Voices Fellowship, Cohort 4 begins
28: RTP: Dossiers closing and submission date
* Please note: Sabbatical, Range Elevation, and RTP dates noted in September are projected deadlines, soon to be confirmed by UP-FS.
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Do you have a story, highlight, reading, or tip that you would like to share in this newsletter?
Please reach out anytime to
faculty-success@sjsu.edu
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Contact Us
Magdalena L. Barrera, Ph.D.
Deanna Fassett, Ph.D.
Jennifer Redd, Ph.D.
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