Anti-Racist Pedagogy Conversation Series (2021)

Taking Action Against Racism
Winter 2019 Diversity and Democracy

During the 2021 Spring Semester, faculty and staff gathered every other Thursday for conversations with colleagues about various aspects of anti-racist pedagogy. These conversations were co-hosted by the Faculty Equity and Inclusion Officers and the Center for Teaching and Learning; they were co-facilitated by faculty and instructional staff. These conversations were intended to focus on cooperative learning and problem-solving as opposed to being presentational in nature. Participants brought questions and lived experiences to these discussions so that together, they could better understand how to create an anti-racist classroom and teaching and learning culture at Amherst College.

Link to the CTL's Commitment to Anti-Racist Initiatives

Link to addtional information about this series

Image: Diversity & Democracy article: Being Human in STEM: Moving from Student Protest to Institutional Progress; by Sheila Jaswal

Reflections on Teaching Series

A woman at a podium speaking to a group of people
During the 2019 Spring Semester, the CTL invited four senior members of the faculty to reflect on their practice-- to show us not only what they do, but also to take us behind the scenes and explain why they made the choices that they did over the years that they have been teaching.  We provided the following question prompts for their reflections:

  • Why have you made the pedagogical choices that you have while teaching at Amherst?
  • Has your teaching changed over the course of your teaching career at Amherst, and if so, why?
  • There is an understood expectation that Amherst College teaching should be "challenging but supportive." Do you agree, and if so, what do these adjectives mean to you? Do you see any hazards with this expectation?
  • How would you define good teaching?
  • What do you not emphasize in your teaching that others seem to think is very important? What do you emphasize?
  • Where do you hope that the college will go with its teaching mission in the next 25 years?
Link to additional information about this series including podcasts of the 2019 speakers

Additional Past Events