Flowers’s thread, which went on to describe how such co-creation could give students both agency and accountability, kicked off a ton of discussion.
The idea is hardly new. For Flowers, it’s a natural outgrowth of his interest in contract grading and ungrading, and in the work of thinkers like Paulo Freire, John Dewey, and Audre Lorde. He also sees a link to the Buddhist idea of hoben, using “skillful means” to lead people forward in their understanding.
Still, he called the suggestion “radical” for a reason. College students aren’t typically invited to help set course policies, and plenty of people regard an education as something you’re given, not something you engage in.
Some professors who replied to Flowers’s tweets applauded the idea or said they follow it in their classes. Others said they’d tried it but it hadn’t worked well. Some instructors worried especially about how co-designing course policies would affect students with disabilities — something Flowers, who has ADHD, had considered. The idea isn’t to let students create any policy they can dream up, he underscored in a recent interview. “The structure was designed together with students, so that I could hear what worked best for them,” he said.
“Once we sat down together and figured out what the structure was going to be,” he continued, “my responsibility then became to hold students to that structure.”
I imagine Flowers’s thread caught on in part because so many instructors are struggling with attendance and participation right now — and because of the strong differences of opinion, on campus and beyond it, about what today’s students are like, and what they need.
I delved into those issues in a recent article about the tension between providing students with flexibility and structure, both of which they need. It occurred to me that, for the many professors wrestling with course policies on attendance and late work, the kind of co-design Flowers suggests might provide one path forward.
I also wondered whether Flowers had ended up co-creating the policies in his own courses this semester. Yes, he told me, though he couldn’t start the discussion with a blank slate. His university requires professors to make course syllabi available in advance, so Flowers used his existing policies as the starting point.
How did it go? The discussion wasn’t as robust as Flowers might have hoped, he said, for a few reasons. His courses are designed to be inclusive, and already had built-in flexibility, with policies like an automatic 72-hour grace period after assignments were due. If the course policies were more traditional, he figured, students would have requested more adjustments.
But also, Flowers noted, most students just weren’t prepared to have this kind of discussion. They’d never been invited to before. Many seemed unsure of what sort of policies they could propose, and a few floated wild ideas, like not having any assignments.
What, Flowers asked, would a course with no assignments look like? It would just be a discussion, the students said. Then it would be crucial to do all of the reading in advance of each class, the professor said. Some of the students chuckled. Maybe having assignments wouldn’t be so bad after all.
Given all the trouble getting students to follow course policies, perhaps pushing them to really think about why they’re there is a good first step.
Have you invited students to co-create course policies before? What happened? What advice would you have for other instructors thinking of trying it out? Let me know, at beckie.supiano@chronicle.com, and I may include your example in a future newsletter.
The Right Amount of Help?
I recently got a question from Craig Gibson that I thought might elicit good responses from readers.
“I work as a fellow in our Drake Institute for Teaching and Learning here at Ohio State, and often am responding to very specific questions from faculty who mentor other (new) faculty on teaching issues,” Gibson wrote in an email. “One very specific question that’s come up recently from one mentor is: how to help students who struggle, are challenged in a course, without coddling them or giving them too much help.”
What advice would you give another instructor about determining where that line is? What’s the right amount of help to give students, and when have you gone too far? Share your thoughts with me, at beckie.supiano@chronicle.com, and they may appear in a future newsletter.
Crash Course
Beth and I have been pleased to see a bump in newsletter subscribers on the heels of our Keep on Teaching webinar series. Welcome, new readers!
We’d like to take this opportunity to familiarize — or refamiliarize! — you with Teaching, and with The Chronicle more broadly.
Beth and I take turns writing this newsletter, which you receive on Thursdays. We often pose questions and ask readers to weigh in, and we hope you’ll respond when you have an experience or expertise to share. Your observations often appear in future issues of the newsletter, and also inform our reporting.
Here are some recent newsletters that resonated with readers:
What Really Helps With Burnout? A New Project Investigates.
Will ChatGPT Change the Way You Teach?
‘What Teaching Looks Like’
Beyond the newsletter, you can find more in-depth articles at chronicle.com and, in particular, on our Teaching & Learning page. One easy way to keep up with our coverage is to subscribe to the Academe Today email, which is free and links to all of our stories. You can see and change which Chronicle newsletters you receive here.
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Although we’ve wrapped up this semester’s two-part webinar series (you can view Part 1 and Part 2 on demand!), Beth and I often moderate other Chronicle virtual events related to teaching. You can see coming events here.
Two more good resources for you, written by some of our outside contributors, are a series of Advice Guides here and our Advice Finder (searchable by topic) here.
To learn a bit more about The Chronicle, check out our About Us page. While this newsletter does not accept submissions, you are welcome to pitch opinion or advice pieces to our editor colleagues — guidelines here.
Finally, Beth and I interview instructors and others in the world of higher ed on a regular basis, and if you share an idea with us, we may ask if you’d like to talk more. As for what to expect in an interview with a Chronicle reporter, this brief guide will fill you in.
Thanks for reading Teaching. If you have suggestions or ideas, please feel free to email us, at beckie.supiano@chronicle.com or beth.mcmurtrie@chronicle.com.
—Beckie
Learn more about our Teaching newsletter, including how to contact us, at the Teaching newsletter archive page.
