A new pilot project at the University of Washington called “Five for Flourishing” is meant to help tackle both issues. I learned about this effort from Penelope Adams Moon, who directs the university’s Center for Teaching and Learning. Moon wrote in response to a recent newsletter where Bonni Stachowiak, producer and host of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, identified the biggest shifts she’s seen in a decade of that work. The first issue on Stachowiak’s list: mental health.
The pilot is a joint project between the university’s teaching center and its Resilience Lab, which promotes well-being on campus, and has support from the vice provost for academic and student affairs.
Starting this fall, instructors in the pilot project will incorporate five interventions grounded in research and best practices that are intended to shift the way students see the university, professors, and themselves. They are meant to convey care, foster social connections, and normalize needing and seeking support.
The interventions are:
- A syllabus statement that conveys care. The project provides sample language stating that college can be difficult and the instructor is there to help, but professors are encouraged to adapt it. They’re also asked to reiterate this message verbally.
- Moment to arrive. Once a week, professors will run a provided slide show — think of the ads that run before a movie in the theater — that highlights campus events and resources, and encourages students to interact with their neighbors while they wait for class to begin. This addresses one of the biggest challenges in supporting well-being on campus: letting students know about the support that’s available, said Megan M. Kennedy, who directs the Resilience Lab.
- Growth mindset reminder. Ahead of an exam or assignment, professors will share a statement emphasizing that how students perform is not a reflection of their intelligence or value. The statement mentions that assessments check what students already know and what they still need to learn, and reminds them that they can continue to improve.
- Learning groups. Professors will put students into small groups that meet outside of class to talk about something related to the course — but not to complete a project or other assignment. The idea is to build social connections.
- Mid-quarter check in. Professors will have students complete a brief survey to get feedback and demonstrate care.
Thirteen professors who teach large-enrollment courses are participating in the pilot. They come from all three of the university’s campuses and represent a mix of disciplines and jobs, including part-time instructor and tenure- and teaching-track positions across the ranks. Participating professors have agreed to use the whole set of interventions twice in the next two years (a schedule that recognizes that not every professor teaches their large course every quarter).
The project’s leaders plan to survey students and collect data on their academic performance. If the pilot is successful, they will scale up the effort.
Regular readers may recall that I’m fascinated by large-enrollment courses and efforts to make them feel smaller. Whatever size courses you’re teaching, I wonder what you’re doing to help students feel more connected to one another, and to you, as a new term begins. Have you found a way to signal care and build social connection without creating a bunch of extra work? Let me know at beckie.supiano@chronicle.com and your example may appear in a future newsletter issue.
Time management
Recently I asked if you track your time, which can be a first step in drawing some boundaries. A couple of readers provided interesting examples, which I’ll share here:
Kari Morgan, a teaching associate professor in the applied human-sciences department at Kansas State University, writes:
“Yes! I have tracked time! I did this one year — I believe it was 2020 — after Covid. It was SO INTERESTING to see patterns in how I spent my time. Turns out, there are days/weeks that I feel like I have worked FOREVER, but in reality, I worked 40 or so hours. There are also many days where I work nights/evenings, but tracking also reminded me that sometimes I do this because my day started ‘late’ (i.e., 9 a.m.), and was broken up by phone calls from my daughters, ‘home’ things to attend to, lunch w/ friends, etc. It was super helpful! It has helped me be very mindful of how I spend my time, my energy levels, etc.
“I am also a person who works from home quite a bit — for me, it allows me to focus, and be very efficient. When I go to work, my time tends to be very broken up — so many good, but random, hallway conversations, people popping into my office, etc. These conversations are typically very helpful and beneficial for a variety of reasons. BUT, time tracking has also made me very aware that time at the office is often not spent on the things on my to-do list, directly, it is often spent on the tasks that are hard to quantify, including building community and connecting with my colleagues (and students).
“I also do not start my day with scrolling my email — that waits until I am at my computer. If I did start with a morning time-in bed-scroll I would be very careful to count that.”
Laura Le, a senior lecturer in biostatistics and health data science at the University of Minnesota, writes:
“I have been tracking my time since 2019 (via Clockify, which is a free app). It all started because we were upgrading one of our online courses and I asked our amazing instructional-design team (who we have an proactive, regular partnership with in creating courses every term) how long it takes, on average, to create a quality online lecture (not including recording and production time) and they didn’t know.
“So, being a statistician, I figured I could collect that data and share it with them so they could inform others on what it takes. (Answer: It’s between six to 12 hours per lecture that is between 10-20 minutes long.) It then sparked my interest in wondering how long I was working per week and on what. So I track all of that and I can monitor my hours per week (or per term), but also can track WHAT I’m working on: Am I spending too much time on service-related things over teaching and research? How long AM I spending on each course? How much time AM I spending reading emails (this goes in my Daily Grind category)? etc.
“Having those insights allow me to reflect on how I’m spending my time and if I need to adjust in certain areas (e.g., can I carve out more time for writing? Am I spending the appropriate effort on tasks based on what is in my departmental expectations?). Without them, I’m not sure where my time goes or how long I’m actually working each week.
“The other advantage to tracking time is forcing me to focus on one task and not multitask. I want my data to be as accurate as possible, so I want to be ‘clocked in’ to that one task and not bounce between multiple things.”
Office hours
How can professors get more of their students to take advantage of office hours? Derek Bruff offers a few suggestions in a recent edition of his newsletter, Intentional Teaching, and invites readers to add to his list.
Bruff’s suggestions are:
- Call office hours something else, or at least explain what they are, to avoid student confusion.
- Have students work together during office hours.
- Consider holding office hours somewhere more convenient and friendly for students, or make coming to your office less intimidating.
Thinking of tweaking your approach to office hours? You might also want to revisit a story I wrote last year on the time’s often-unrealized potential.
Thanks for reading Teaching. If you have suggestions or ideas, please feel free to email us at beth.mcmurtrie@chronicle.com or beckie.supiano@chronicle.com.
—Beckie
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