Previous Academic Learning Communities

This is a compillation of past Academic Learning Communities (ALCs.) ALC descriptions reflect the conveners’ goals at the time of each call. 

1. “Academic Integrity and the Changing Landscape of Higher Education” 

Conveners:  Jason Ciejka, Associate Dean in the Office for Undergraduate Education, & Blaire Wilson, Senior Associate Director of the Honor Council 

Academic integrity plays a central role in student learning; yet, institutions of higher education far too often treat academic integrity as a peripheral issue and tend to sweep any perceived issues around cheating under the rug. Recent developments in higher education, including the rise of artificial intelligence and contract cheating, the awareness of equity and inclusion as crucial values, and the renaissance of honor codes, all speak to the importance of engaging academic integrity as a campus-wide effort among students, faculty, and administrators. This Academic Learning Community focuses especially on the role of faculty and pedagogy in promoting academic integrity.  

To learn more and/or to apply, please fill out this form here.

2. “Building a Community of Healthcare Simulation Educators”

Convener: LisaMarie Wands, Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing

The need for and importance of interprofessional (IP) education of health care professional students is well-known. IP collaboration and communication is inherent to effective patient care, and students need the opportunity to build these skills during their educational experience and development. Using simulation as a teaching/learning strategy involves creating a situation or environment that represents a real health care event (Lioce et al., 2020). Use of simulation to support IP education has been shown to be an effective teaching modality by providing learners with contextually-realistic clinical situations. Students can be placed in simulated patient care situations and work together to solve problems and create collaborative plans of care for optimal patient outcomes. This Academic Learning Community seeks to connect health care professions educators in discussion and creation of opportunities for students to learn “about, from, and with each other” (WHO, 2010, p. 10) in IP simulation-based learning activities. We will discuss best practices, identify challenges, and formulate strategies for implementation. 

To learn more and/or to apply, please contact LisaMarie Wands at lisa.m.wands@emory.edu

3. “Creating Relational Accountability through Indigenous Studies”

Conveners: Malinda Maynor Lowery (Lumbee), Department of History; Laura Harjo (Muscogee), Distinguished Visiting Scholar in Indigenous Knowledge 

What is relational accountability, and why should it matter at Emory? Who should practice it? How does Native American and Indigenous Studies foreground this principle in its ethics, foundational knowledge, and intellectual commitments? When is relational accountability a useful framework for other forms of inquiry? When and how should we employ relational accountability in producing knowledge within and beyond the academy? 

“Relational accountability” is a term traditionally applied to research; in short, it is a state of exchange or dialogue between researcher and participants, where the researcher is accountable to those who participate in the research. 

This academic learning community seeks to engage this core question with faculty whose interests may touch on Indigenous peoples, colonialism, decolonization, and related areas of study. Faculty from all disciplines and focus areas are welcome, though the main content of the readings, speakers, and discussions will focus on Indigenous people in North America and critical Indigenous studies. We intend to investigate how relational accountability, as practiced within and in partnership with Indigenous communities in North America, can shape research and teaching at Emory. The discussions will produce proposals for course development and possible travel to the Muscogee Nation (funded by the Mellon Foundation) and assist in the development of Emory’s minor in Native American and Indigenous Studies. 

To learn more and/or to apply, please fill out this form here.

Fall 2023 ALCs

1. “Climate Justice” 

Conveners: bryn davis, Emory College of Arts and Sciences, Mindy Goldstein, School of Law, Kyle Lambelet, Candler School of Theology, Wesley Longhofer, Goizueta Business School 

Brief description: Many researchers are concerned with the disproportionate ways in which the climate crisis intersects with social, racial, and economic injustice. Yet, while climate justice may be a shared aspiration in our research, teaching, or community work, its meanings, uses, and implications vary widely across disciplines. This definitional challenge reflects a wider problem: how do we pursue climate justice when the term has been used for many (sometimes, incongruent) aims. This Academic Learning Community seeks to 1) develop meaningful, shared understandings of climate justice across disciplines, and 2) use that collective wisdom for guiding Emory’s research engagement on climate justice. Our proposed ALC sessions below will create a space for gentle curiosity and disciplined intention while locating concordance and discordance amongst individual understandings and collective discourse on climate justice.  

2. “Intersections: Humanity, Sustainability, and Computers + AI”

Conveners: Chinmay Kulkarni, Computer Science, and Azra Ismail, Biomedical Informatics

Brief description: We are bringing together faculty that are experts in AI, human-computer interaction, sustainability, Internet of Things and physical computing, data visualization, global health, and AI deployments in the developing world. Together, these experts will engage both in sharing scholarship (papers written by them and by other eminent scholars in the field) and engage in conversations with each other (and guest speakers, where appropriate).  

3. “Building Anti-Racist Community in Theological Education”(please note that this ALC is only for Candler faculty)

Conveners: Deanna Womack, Candler School of Theology; Helen Kim, Candler School of Theology; and Joanne Solis-Walker, Candler School of Theology

Brief description: The crisis of racial justice that continues unabated in the United States today also extends into the institutional structures and teaching patterns of higher education. As a seminary, one of Candler School of Theology’s tasks is to build an inclusive community of belonging while training clergy and moral leaders who will become agents of justice in the world. Our academic learning community focuses on one piece of this immense task: providing opportunities for anti-racist training and community-building for Candler’s growing early career cohort. This cohort has grown from a handful of faculty in 2015 to 13 junior or recently promoted faculty members and 4 postdoctoral fellows today. As such, this group will play a significant role in educating Candler students and in shepherding the institution in the coming decades.   

How can these early career faculty build an anti-racist community of solidarity together while also working for broader institutional and pedagogical change? What theological resources are available to support this work? 
To learn more and/or to apply, please contact Deanna Womack at deanna.f.womack@emory.edu or Helen Kim at helenjkim@emory.edu  

Spring 2023

1. "Ethics and community engagement"

• Kathleen Leuschen (Writing Program, English) 
• Elva Gonzalez (Spanish and Portuguese) 
• Kelly Duquette (PhD Candidate, English) 
• Mary Taylor Mann (PhD Candidate, English)  
   

Description: Before his imprisonment and untimely death in 1937, Antonio Gramsci insisted that intellectuals committed to justice “can no longer consist in eloquence … but [must exist] in active participation in practical life, as constructor, organizer, ‘permanent persuader’ and not just a simple orator.” Similarly, in The Activist Academic (2020), Colette Cann and Eric DeMeulenaere argue that “in an era of corporate media and ‘alternative facts,’ academics committed to justice cannot simply rely on disseminating new knowledge but must re-frame and reimagine their work as activist labor.” Historically, service-learning and community-engaged instruction are among the ways many academic activists have reimagined this work. Service-learning is a strategy in which students have leadership roles in organized service experiences that meet “the needs” of a community. Alternatively, community-engaged learning is a process that focuses on creating collaborative partnerships rather than transactional relationships; it focuses on a community’s assets and views community partners as co-creators and co-strategists.  

2. "Health Equity: Untangling the Web of Contributing Factors"

Conveners:

• Corrine Abraham (School of Nursing) 
• Bethany Robertson (School of Nursing) 
• Nate Spell (School of Medicine)  

 
Description: Achieving health equity is a wicked problem. There are multiple perspectives and opinions, debates about causes of inequity, and solutions not readily apparent.  However, this is a long standing problem with historical underpinnings highlighting the intersectionality of social determinates of health, health system structures, bias and racism. Access to health care, the experience of receiving health care, and health outcomes can differ dramatically based on one’s geography, health insurance coverage, income, social stratum, race, gender and other “social determinants of health”, all confounded by the the structures within our healthcare system. Why is this? How might we think about potential solutions? 

Participants in this academic learning community will have the opportunity to view health equity through the wide angle lenses of health care financing, history and racism and through the more tightly focused lens of interpersonal relationships and the effects of implicit bias, eliciting perspectives of ethics along the way. To quote Dr. Paul Batalden, “every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets.” We hope to source the collective wisdom of the academic community at Emory to learn more deeply about how the design of our health care system contributes to health inequity, to prepare to teach our students and colleagues, and to consider how changes in system design might improve health equity. 

Fall 2022

1. "Models of Lab Science Instruction at Emory"

Doug Mulford

The goal of this academic learning community is to facilitate conversation between the different departments on campus that are teaching introductory level science labs. The idea is to be able to learn best practices as well as look for synergies and common language and experiences between departments. The hope is to allow each department to better improve their education but also to provide a more cohesive laboratory experience for Emory students as they take classes in different departments.

2. "Why Does Attending to Well Being in Course Design Matter?"

Susan Gagliardi

Prior to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, colleges and universities across the country grew increasingly concerned about student, faculty, and staff mental health and wellbeing. The viral pandemic has amplified the challenges our communities face. Our own institution has not been spared the devastating consequences of mental illness. In a 2021 report on graduate student mental health and wellbeing, the Council of Graduate Schools and Jed Foundation concluded: “The fragility of life that each of us has experienced over the past year is an urgent reminder that we must nurture our communities with compassion, care, and respect for difference. Let us use this moment to imagine—and create—more equitable and supportive environments where all students can thrive” (36). While challenges to wellbeing vary for each individual and campus group, this Academic Learning Community (ALC) for Emory faculty on attending to mental health and wellbeing in course design responds to calls to foster more supportive environments in which all faculty, students, and members of the campus community may learn and thrive. 

3. "Data Driven Diversity and Inclusion"

Dorian Arnold and Nosayba El Sayed

At all levels of the Emory institution, implicit if not formal and explicit agendas have been established to make our university holistically and intrinsically diverse, equitable and inclusive. It is imperative that, as much as possible, we use real and accurate data to characterize, analyze and improve our campus climates. Data driven approaches allow us to forgo sentimental or solely intuitive beliefs and admit quantitative measurement and evaluation methods grounded in objective facts. 

In this context, the ALC has three broad goals: (1) to understand what DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) data are being collected at Emory and how these data are being used, (2) to identify what necessary or useful DEI data are not being collected, and (3) to identify standardized or systemized data collection methods and practices that can facilitate the monitoring, collection, management and accessibility of DEI-relevant data across the institution. Our objective is to produce a document that comprehensively summarizes current Emory DEI data collection practices and, based on our survey and findings, prescribes effective, sustainable methods for Emory-wide DEI data collection and management as well as new Emory DEI data collections as appropriate. 

2020

"Data Literacy"

Conveners:

• Jen Doty (Research Data Librarian) 
• Sarah Morris (Head of Instruction and Engagement) 
   

This Academic Learning Community seeks to provide a space for discussion and exploration of data literacy, with a focus on interdisciplinary educational approaches, skill-building in data literacy, and data literacy as a component of undergraduate education here at Emory.  

 As participants in this ALC, you will be able to execute the following:

• Explore and discuss the complex topic of data literacy  
• Develop ideas for data literacy lessons and curriculum that can be used in a variety of disciplinary settings  
• Develop ideas for data literacy lessons and curriculum that can support undergraduates 
• Examine the challenges and opportunities of data literacy in the context of complex media, technology, and information ecosystems 

 
Fall 2019- Spring 2020

1. "Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL)"

Conveners:

• Bree Ettinger, Mathematics, Emory College 
• Jessica Barber, Psychology, Emory College  

Description: This ALC will introduce participants to the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) across the university and begin projects of their own. We will develop a taxonomy of SoTL questions, provide examples of SoTL projects, and discuss methods for investigation. Participants will learn about collecting and analyzing different types of evidence, conducting literature searches, navigating human subjects requirements, and selecting venues for presenting or publishing their work. Participants will collaboratively select and transform a teaching problem of their own into a question for scholarly investigation. This ALC is perfect for anyone looking to strengthen their teaching portfolio and diversify their scholarship, or for those who are interested in assessing student learning, teaching effectiveness, or curricular progression. You need not have prior expertise or even familiarity with the scholarship of teaching and learning to take part in or benefit from this ALC.  
 

2. "Creating Inclusive Educational Ecosystems for Minority STEM Students"

Conveners:

• Antonio Brathwaite, Chemistry 
• Dorian Arnold, Computer Science 
• Gillian Hue, Neuroscience and Behavioral Biology 
• Eladio Abreu, Biology 
• Juan Villeta-Garcia, Mathematics 
• Jon Lindo, Anthropology 

Description: Develop a plan for creating an inclusive educational ecosystem for minority STEM students at Emory 
 

3. "Artificial Intelligence and the Ethical Dimensions of Data Science"

Conveners:

• John Banja, Professor, School of Medicine 
• David Benkeser, Assistant Professor, School of Public Health 
• Lance Waller, Professor, School of Public Health  

Description: Data Science, Machine/Deep Learning, and Artificial Intelligence are rapidly emerging areas in research and teaching as well as ubiquitous in our daily lives.  At Emory, there are many strategic initiatives working together to propose integrated data science efforts across campus.   The interface of ethics and AI has captured attention in both research and the popular media.  Based on the unique opportunity presented within a university with a dedicated Center of Ethics as well as multiple initiatives relating Data Science at Emory, this multidisciplinary ALC will explore the unique ethical issues arising from Data Science, locally, nationally, and globally.  

4. "Mentoring Diverse Students in Lab Settings"

Conveners:

• Nicole Gerardo, Associate Professor, Department of Biology 
• Amanda James, Assistant Dean, Diversity, Inclusion, and Community Engagement  

Description: Mentoring students in research and project settings outside the classroom leads to a long-term mentoring relationship between faculty and students. Whether these students are undergraduate or graduate students, they are often part colleague, part student and part collaborator. To these collaborations, students bring their own identities and experiences, which are often not those of the faculty. While the traditional model was to apprentice all students similarly, this model may ignore that each student’s experience shapes the challenges that they will face and their expectations. Through this six-week series, we will broadly explore literature on mentoring students of diverse backgrounds and identities. 

2018-2019

1. "Mass Incarceration in the American South"

More details

Conveners: 

• Jennifer Sarrett, Lecturer, Center for the Study of Human Health, Emory College 
• Jay Hughes, Associate Director, Student Progress; Director, Jones Program in Ethics and Advanced Student Fellowship, Laney Graduate School 

Description: For this ALC, we will come together to discuss a wide range of contemporary issues relating to mass incarceration and explore these issues in the context of the American South. We will place the unique concerns of the modern carceral system into conversation with the South’s distinct cultural profile, including the area’s high rates of incarceration, historical and current race relations, distinct public heath profile, gender norms, religious diversity, and socio-economic disparities. 

2. "Synergizing Across STEM at Emory"

More details

Conveners:  

• Megan Cole, Lecturer, Department of Biology, Emory College 

Description: Certain concepts and skills that are core to introductory STEM courses can be taught in slightly disparate ways between Departments and there may be missed opportunities for building cohesive understanding of fundamental concepts and the overarching process of science. During this ALC we will share lecture and lab course learning objectives and formats to identify shared and distinct objectives across departments. We will then discuss ways to synergize content and how the increasingly interdisciplinary nature of science can be incorporated into the introductory research experience for Emory students. 

3. "Assessment in Action: Strategies to Improve Teaching and Student Learning"

More details

Conveners:

• Ulemu Luhanga, Assistant Professor, School of Medicine 
• Jennifer M. Heemstra, Associate Professor, Chemistry, Emory College 
• David Jordan, Director, Institutional Effectiveness, Office of Provost 

Description: This academic learning community (ALC) will explore student learning outcomes assessment and the benefits of quality assessment, with the goal of developing educators’ pedagogical content knowledge around assessment. Through ALC sessions, participants will debate controversies around assessment in higher education and professional education programs, identify assessment strategies that improve teaching and student learning, and share best practices for assessment across Emory programs and schools. For the purposes of this ALC, assessment (of student learning) is defined as “the systematic collection of information about student learning, using the time, knowledge, expertise, and resources available, in order to inform decisions about how to improve learning” (Walvoord, 2004, p. 2) 

4. "Bias-In Bias Out: The Injustice/Ambiguity of Algorithms"

More details

Conveners:

• Gillian Hue, Neuroscience & Behavioral Biology 
• Edward L. Queen, Center for Ethics 

Description: Computers increasingly control our lives. While so self-evident as to be almost banal, the implications of this statement deserve greater social, cultural, intellectual, and political attention.  Computers, or, more precisely, the algorithms that they run, can determine if we are identified as potential terrorists, denied a mortgage, or even have our children removed from our homes. Additionally, the algorithms themselves are structured in ways that highlight conflict and disagreement, often with horrid consequences. Behind these facts lies a disturbing and woefully under examined reality.  Because these algorithms seem to operate rationally and mechanically, there exists an unexamined presumption that they are immune to bias and discrimination. Not only does that seem not to be the case, but also once an artificial intelligence program starts we remain unaware not only of how it learns, but even of why it makes the decisions it does. We are blind to the biases and prejudices the system teaches itself.  Do minor perturbations in a system (biases) at the beginning of the process result in massive distortions down the line or does the system learn to remove those biases? We simply do not know. This academic learning community seeks to engage the issues of potential biases in artificial intelligence with the goal of heightening awareness the centrality of artificial intelligence in our daily lives and its effects on all segments of society in order to enable faculty from a variety of disciplines to think and learn about this together and to find ways to incorporate this knowledge into their teaching and research. Topics to be addressed include: crime and Punishment—what role do AI-based systems play in decisions that determine punishment (broadly construed to include denials of jobs and loans, removal of children from a home, probation revocation or denial, arrest, sentencing, etc.)?, the exacerbation of bias—on-line sexism, racism, bullying, incivility, and memes leading to violence, privacy/Security—from on-line stalking to echo chambers to the dark web, and AI/machine based learning—the future is out of your control.  What happens when we cannot determine how or what a machine learns? 

Spring 2018

1. "The Many Faces of Public Scholarship"

More details

Conveners:

• Pamela Scully, Director, CFDE and Professor of WGSS 
• Allison Adams, Director, Research and Scholarly Writing (Center for Faculty Development & Excellence) 

Description: This academic learning community will explore the variety of modes in which Emory scholars connect with non-academic thinkers, readers, collaborators, and audiences. What are the pros and cons of these activities? Best practices and potential pitfalls? Lessons learned? Additional support needs? Each of the four sessions will focus on one of the following: Media Engagement, Long-Form Writing for Non-Academic Readers, Community-Engaged Learning, Teaching, and Scholarship, and MOOCs as Public Scholarship  

2. "Sexuality and Sacredness in Contemporary Black Culture"

More details

Conveners:

• Beretta E. Smith-Shomade, Associate Professor, Film and Media Studies
   

Fall 2017-Spring 2018

1. "Teaching and Contemplation: Nurturing the Teaching Self"

Conveners:

• Bobbi Patterson, Professor of Pedagogy in Religion 
• Joonna Trapp, Senior Lecturer, English 

 
Description: “To be awake is to be alive” (Thoreau). What does it mean to be awake as a teacher? How do we keep ourselves alive, thriving, growing, curious about our various teacherly enterprises? Our decisions to enter the profession of teaching might well have been guided by passion and fascination for our fields and for learning. Perhaps it was even guided by the desire to find that “place” where our “deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meets” (Buechner). Yet, in spite of a deep sense of gladness in teaching and learning, and in spite of realizing the great need for quality educational work in our communities and culture, teachers report burn-out, frustration, and the need for inner renewal. 

2. "Data Science Research and Education at Emory University"

Conveners:

• Lance Waller, Professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, Rollins School of Public Health 
• Vaidy Sunderam, Professor of Math and Computer Science, Emory College 

3. "Evaluation & implementation sciences for Public Health"

Conveners:

• Matthew Freeman, Associate Professor of Environmental Health, Rollins School of Public Health 

Description: Faculty in Rollins School of Public Health and throughout Emory are involved in implementation design, rigorous program evaluation, and the development and dissemination of research to improve and scale programs and support policy formation in public health. These activities encompass “Implementation Science,” a field that broadly encompasses the rigorous study of methods for documenting project and program planning, design, and roll-out; process and impact evaluation; and translation of research into practice. “Evaluation science” includes understanding the myriad methods that can be used to assess implementation effectiveness within different contexts. 

Spring 2017

1. "Process Oriented Guided Inquiry Based Learning (POGIL) in the Biology Classroom"

Conveners:

• Patrick Cafferty, Lecturer in Biology 

Description: For biology faculty only. This ALC is part journal club part development of POGIL activities for faculty in Biology, Microbiology, Biochemistry, Anatomy, and Physiology 

 
2. "Religion and Public Health Collaborative on Contextual Learning"

Conveners:

• Mimi Kiser, Assistant Professor, Global Health 
• Ellen Idler, Professor of Sociology 
• Letitia Campbell, Assistant Program Director, Candler School of Theology 

Description: For Theology, School of Public Health, and Nursing faculty but also co-sponsored by the Laney Graduate School for its focus on strengthening interdisciplinary experiential learning for graduate students enrolled in theology, religion, public health, and nursing programs. 

3. "The Environmental Humanities: Methods, Challenges, Debates"

Conveners:

• Paul Buchholz, Assistant Professor of German Studies 
• Caroline Schaumann, Associate Professor of German Studies 

Fall 2016

1. "Blurred Boundaries: Prospects of the Human/Humanoid Engagement"

Conveners:

• Steven Kraftchick, Professor of New Testament Interpretation, Candler School of Theology & Laney Graduate School 
• Mark Goldfeder, Senior Lecturer, School of Law 

The news is filled with reports of technological breakthroughs almost on a daily basis. Self-driving cars, the internet of things, micro-sensors in almost everything we own, and soon to be part of our very bodies. Our relationship to the technologies is changing with rapidity, almost outstripping our capacities to understand these changes. In some sense, human beings are fast becoming “cyborgs” as changes in nanotechnology, pharmaceuticals, and genetic engineering reorient our social, physical, and mental makeup. These changes are affecting more than single individuals, they are making an impact on our society and our physical environment, raising fundamental questions about what humans are, what their relationship to the non-human might or should be, what their roles in the workplace will be, as well as how or if they should control their biological makeup and destiny. 

These questions cut across disciplines raising ethical and legal questions as well as moral and physical ones. This suggests that they are best discussed by a range of people, doctors, lawyers, anthropologists, public health officials, political science and business thinkers, as well as sociologists, theologians, philosophers, and historians. But the range of input is not limited even to these disciplines. Much of our most interesting and imaginative treatment of these questions occurs through literature, film, and the arts. The goal is to surface the fundamental questions and challenges that arise from this change in the human being’s capacities to control its destiny. 

2. "The humanities for health"

Conveners:

• Kylie Smith, Assistant Professor, Andrew W Mellon Faculty Fellow for Nursing & the Humanities, Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing 

• Andrew Furman, Associate Professor of Psychiatry, School of Medicine 

Description: This community seeks to bring together academics across Emory already working on diverse approaches to health and the humanities. The aim is to explore the use of the humanities in order to enhance approaches to human health, and to develop interprofessional collaborations in education and research, which draw on the humanities in their broadest sense. Critical theory, narrative, reflection, art, literature, history and film will all be explored to tease out new ways of thinking about the role of the humanities for understanding the illness experience, the patient–professional relationship, and posing new questions for humanistic education and research in health. 

Fall 2015

"The scholarship of teaching and learning"

Conveners:

• Donna Troka, Director of Diversity and Inclusive Pedagogy (CFDE) 

Description: Do you love teaching? do you want to learn more about the educational research that informs and supports teaching? are you curious about ways to share your teaching innovations with other teachers? This Academic Learning Community on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (often called SoTL) will consist of four meetings in the fall semester and will focus on the following topics: an introduction to SoTL; data & evidence in SoTL; engaging students in SoTL work; and 4) how to “go public” with your SoTL work. We will also discuss and begin research on specific content topics for SoTL workshops in Spring 2016. Some examples may be: “Engaging Students in Large Classes” or “Best Practices for Bedside Teaching in the Health Professions.” The readings in this ALC will be empirically-grounded, and are intended to generate discussion among members of the group.

Spring 2015

"Community-engaged learning: Liberal education in the health sciences education at Emory"

Conveners:

• Jenny Foster, School of Nursing 
• Weihua Zhang, School of Nursing 
• Erin Lepp, School of Nursing 
• Vialla Hartfield-Mendez, Director of Engaged Learning (CFDE) and Professor of Pedagogy in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese 

Description: Community engaged learning has been the subject of previous academic learning communities.  This proposal, however, is the result of a successful collaboration between faculty in the Schools of Medicine and Nursing who participated in the Faculty Fellows Program within the Center for Community Partnerships (CfCP) during the 2013-2014 year, and thus it has a specific focus in the Health Sciences.  Increasingly, health professions’ education emphasizes the value of interprofessional education. As part of the Faculty Fellows Program, three faculty are currently creating a series of online videos to be used as an open access online resource to be piloted during the Fall, 2014 semester, as part of a course in the Professional Nursing introductory course. This series of self-directed learning modules will allow faculty and students interested in participating in community-engaged learning and community-based participatory research (CBPR) to develop a shared understanding with community partners how to develop processes for evaluation of successful partnerships. These modules will serve as the basis for further exploration and discussion with the participants in the learning community.  

Recent literature highlights the development of specific standards of rigor in community-based participatory research, based on the epistemological principles of social justice and co-constructed knowledge.  An initial pilot of interprofessional CBPR with the Center for Black Women’s Wellness in 2012-2013 underscored the complexity involved in interprofessional participation in community-based projects while upholding these principles. Based on the learning from this pilot, faculty will endeavor to create common readings and other learning materials to help all participants (faculty, students, and community partners) to approach community-engaged research and program projects with shared understandings and mutual goals. 

Fall 2014

"Building a sustainable farm and food system"

Conveners:

• Peggy Barlett, Anthropology 
• Amy Webb Girard, Global Health, RSPH 
• Mindy Goldstein, Law 

Description: Across campus, Emory faculty and students are studying various aspects of this farm and food system. This Academic Learning Community seeks to foster a series of conversations about the status sustainable farm and food system scholarship, teaching, and service at Emory. We seek to: provide a platform to share relevant scholarship and community engagement; identify collaborative research and teaching opportunities, cross-unit programs, and new initiatives; identify ways to build, foster, and maintain a food studies community on campus, which could include the development of a lecture series or research symposia; and explore development of a university-wide, team-taught course on Food, Environment, and Health. 

Spring 2014

1. "Climate@Emory"

Conveners:

• Daniel Rochberg, Rollins School of Public Health 
• Eri Saikawa, Emory Collge 
• Stefanie Sarnat, Rollins School of Public Health 
• Justin Remais, School of Medicine 
• Jeremy Hess, Rollins School of Public Health  

Description: The Climate@Emory Academic Learning Community seeks to foster a series of conversations about the status of climate change scholarship, teaching, and service at Emory, with the goal of enhancing Emory’s engagement in the field of climate change at multiple levels. Proposed core outcomes of this effort include: near-term outcomes that will assist Emory’s teaching, research, scholarship, and student and community engagement on climate change (e.g., Climate@Emory website, catalog of current course offerings, new research projects or grant proposals, etc.); and strategic analysis, discussion, and recommendations of mid- and long-term steps that the Emory community or members thereof might consider for further shaping the Emory climate change community, including collaborative research and teaching opportunities and cross-unit programs and initiatives. 
 

2. "Teaching International Students"

Conveners:

• Stacy Bell, Senior Lecturer in English and Director of Multilingual Writing, Oxford, Oxford College  
• Benjamin Hary, Professor of Hebrew, Arabic and Linguistics and Director of the Program in Linguistics, Emory College  

Description: Open to faculty, graduate students, and staff, this Academic Learning Community will examine the resources that are already available to international students, what resources are needed, and what are some best practices when working with international students in our classrooms. The main outcome of the ALC is to develop best practices and a training that will help faculty to better serve international students.  

Fall 2013 - Spring 2014

"The changing landscape of higher education"

Convener:

• Pamela Scully, Director, CFDE; Professor, WGSS, Emory College 

Description: It is clear that the landscape of higher education is changing rapidly in ways that we can identify, although the results of all this change are still hard to fathom or predict with great accuracy. Some of the changes that seem evident: the cost of a college education getting out of the reach of many students; the decline in state funding for education; the growth of online learning; the rise of For Profit colleges; the growing dominance of an idea of education as being only about competencies and predictor of employment, and yet the enduring popularity at the same time of the four year residential college model.This Academic Learning Community on The Changing Landscape of Higher Education will meet once a month in conversation to educate ourselves about the changing contexts of higher education. The long-term goals of the ALC are to think through Emory’s place in this changing landscape as well as to help us articulate to the outside world what it is that we do best.  We are particularly interested in engaging a faculty from different schools and disciplines in this academic learning community, including faculty from the humanities, who have an important role to play in articulating the values of a liberal arts education. 

Spring 2013

1. "Brazil, A Growing Global Force: Beyond Soccer and Samba"

Conveners:

• Dabney Evans, Rollins School of Public Health 
• Uriel Kitron, Rollins School of Public Health  
• Jeffrey Lesser, the Halle Institute 

Description: The eyes of the world will focus on Brazil as it hosts the World Cup in 2014 and the Olympics in 2016.  Brazil is the largest country in Latin America and one of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) countries. A Goldman Sachs report suggested that by 2050 the combined BRICS economies could eclipse the combined economies of the current richest countries of the world. Brazil is investing substantial resources in academic research and in academic faculty and student (undergraduate and graduate) exchanges. For example, the Brazilian government began the “Science Without Borders” program that aims to fund travel scholarships for “100,000 Brazilian students and researchers in top universities worldwide by 2014” and provides funds for American scientists to lecture and research in Brazil. This opens enormous opportunities for collaborations including “sandwich” studies which are short term research exchanges funded entirely by the Brazilian government.  The goal of the seminar is to develop a 5-10 year strategic plan for Emory relationship to Brazil with special attention to the identification of strategic institutions which offer either existing or potential for two-way faculty, staff and student exchanges, joint scholarly projects and opportunities for  funding. 
 

2. "Student Learning Outcomes and Assessment"

Conveners:

• Hiram Maxim, Emory College  
• David Jordan, Institutional Research 

Description: the goal of the seminar is to develop participants’ understanding of how assessment can be a meaningful and useful process for improving learning and teaching in their respective programs. Topics will include: formulation of effective learning outcomes, assessment in online, hybrid, and flipped classroom formats, writing assessment (guest lecture: Gerald Graff, Professor of English and Education at University of Illinois at Chicago), and peer assessment techniques. View a presentation by Gerald Graff and Cathy Birkenstein on "Assessing Student Writing While Avoiding the Laundry List Trap" (iTunesU) 

Fall 2012

1. "Emory and the Future of Hispanic/Latinos in Higher Education"

Conveners:

• Vialla Hartfield-Mendez, Director of Engaged Learning (CFDE) and Professor of Pedagogy in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese 
• Karen Stolley, Emory College 

Description: The goals of this ALC are: to come to a nuanced understanding of the very complex population that is collectively called “Latino” in the United States (see the Pew Hispanic Center report, "When Labels Don’t Fit: Hispanics and Their Views of Identity");to better understand the role of institutions of higher education like Emory with regard to current and future students from this population, and to proactively create an institutional framework for Emory University’s research and teaching mission (at all levels and in all units) to address the realities of a nation in which people of Hispanic and Lusophone heritage make up a significant portion of the total population and in which Spanish is the de facto second language. 

2. "Online Teaching and Learning at Emory"

Conveners:

• Steve Everett, Director, CFDE; Music, Emory College 

Description: The goals of this ALC are: to discuss the dynamic discourse on online learning in higher education circulating throughout various publications like The New York Times, The Chronicle for Higher Education and Inside Higher Education, to outline and evaluate the various companies (like 2U or Coursera) that work with universities to get their online education programs up and running, to begin to strategize about how we would like online teaching and learning to unfold at Emory University. These conversations will help to pull together the many approaches to online learning already in practice as well as propel the discussion forward into a formal strategic plan for online teaching and learning at Emory. 
 

3. "Complex Networks"

Conveners:

• Monica Capra, Emory College  
• Edmund Waller, School of Medicine