New Faculty Intensive Planned for May 2009
As part of our Difficult Dialogues continuation project, UAA and APU are beginning to plan a new faculty intensive program that will focus on difficult dialogues related to Alaska Native issues and concerns. We expect to convene a cohort of faculty participants during the Fall of 2008 so they can get an early start planning their 2009-10 classes and projects and identifying the student learning outcomes they hope to achieve in their classrooms.
Fourth Difficult Dialogues Faculty Intensive Convenes in May 2008
UAA and APU held their fourth Difficult Dialogues faculty intensive in the Consortium Library in May 2008. Like the previous three, the program focused on basic but effective strategies for engaging in civil discourse based on multiple ways of knowing. The curriculum is broad rather than deep, and functions much like an introductory survey course, linking difficult dialogues related to race, gender, class, culture, science, religion, politics, and social justice with strategies and techniques for engaging in productive discussion.
Over 60 faculty members from both universities have now completed the basic Difficult Dialogues intensive.
The first 45 have also taken the next step of experimenting with the strategies or topics in their classrooms and on their campuses and sharing their reflections with their colleagues. Many of their reflections and experiences are featured in the Start Talking handbook, and we will be posting new materials from later participants to this site in the months ahead.
