by Carl Conner & Sarah Norek

Back in December, Carl and Sarah (we) engaged in a loosely structured conversation over Zoom with a few other folks who hold formal support roles. We wanted to explore what it meant to support ourselves in support roles (you can read our article about it here).

In this article, we reflect on what it’s meant to continue to meet with, and expand on, this conversation group. We’ve gained much from these meetings and are grateful to those who have shared their stories and their time. Below, in an informal interview style together, we share some planning ideas as well as what we consider to be the benefits of such a group, in case other folks on campus are interested in or thinking about these kinds of conversation groups too.

What have you observed across meetings?

Carl: Going into the first meeting, I did not know what to expect! As someone who often struggles to maintain my energy levels, I was particularly surprised to feel so energized after the group met. It was also surprising to me how universal that feeling was, even throughout different meetings with new voices joining the group. I felt tremendous gratitude for the sense of connection and validation that these conversations offered, and I was doubly grateful to hear other members of the group reciprocate that gratitude. Given the range of backgrounds, roles, and professions we have in the group, to foster such a strong sense of reciprocity felt truly special.

Sarah: We’ve met a few different times now, and I think something I’ve noticed each time is that it feels okay to be quiet, and to engage in messy thinking, and to process out loud or inside or however. I’ve also noticed how folks are getting ideas from each other, or resonating with what someone’s just said. There’s a lot of energy there that feels curious and thoughtful and generous and replenishing.

Carl, you recently referred to the “recipe” for this experience – would you be willing to share a little about that and what you think goes into the creation/facilitation/evolution of a group like this?

Carl: Though I believe that we were very lucky in terms of how incredible our participants were, we did think intentionally about how we could set the group up for success:

Connect for the sake of connection

I cannot emphasize the power and importance of this ingredient enough. Bringing different people together who all want to authentically connect can impact how we show up and engage everywhere else.

Snowball sampling works for this setting

When we wanted to expand the conversation after our first meeting, we employed a “snowball sampling” approach wherein everyone invited another person who they thought would benefit from being in the space. This method was helpful for maintaining a sense of familiarity with each other while still including fresh perspectives and ideas.

Prepare some prompts ahead of time, but largely allow the conversation to flow in whatever direction it needs to

Allowing for a loose structure to the conversation gives the people involved a greater sense of agency and also means that folks do not have to prepare any content beforehand.

Honor contributions

We always invited folks to come as they were and participate as much or as little as they wanted, and we were intentional to share gratitude for folks being there and participating in the ways that they did. This created an unofficial routine of sharing gratitude across all group members, and that process alone created such an authentic sense of community even after one or two meetings.

Any big takeaways to share with folks who might be interested in doing something like this elsewhere on campus?

Carl: Absolutely! First off, do not underestimate the value of connecting as humans. The recognition of each individual as unique, multi-faceted, and nuanced was very important to the structure of our group. Regardless of whether we knew each other well or had any overlapping roles, there was still plenty of connection to be had around our experiences as people coping with the challenges of daily life – life at work and life outside work and how they interact with each other. Second, I would encourage people (especially introverts!) to be bold enough to take the first steps to initiate spaces for connection such as these. I know it can be scary or stressful to be the one to approach others and ask them for some of their valuable time, but it was oh so rewarding to have been gifted that time and make something meaningful of it. As an introvert myself, I would highly encourage anyone who may be thinking about establishing a space for connection with peers/colleagues to take that first step – it’s so worth it!

Sarah: I love what you’re saying, Carl! I think all I might add is that we’ve chatted a bit about how important a sense of safety and trust in these spaces is, and ways to achieve that, or set a space up for that, in such a brief span of time. One thing that’s stuck with me is that everyone knows someone in the space, has a connection to someone in the space. For folks who might be thinking about creating a group like this, I think this element is really important. Because being in this space and community together is incredible! It’s meant so much to share and hold space distinctly for connecting, with no real agenda other than to share and listen and normalize and validate, to be in community together, no need to prepare in any way other than to arrive and bring yourself, as you are in that day and moment(s) in time. It’s been rejuvenating and really impactful mentally and physically.

Wanna talk more? Have ideas? Be in touch! We’d love to chat with you about thoughts you have about this kind of meeting and space.

by Kelley Calvert

Please visit this document for an accessible version of this article.

Note: Done well, peer assessment can remove the emphasis on grades and refocus energy on learning, shifting the instructor role from grading extensively to facilitating and coaching writing processes. In this post, I uphold the value of peer assessment as a point of departure and do not further debate the merits or shortcomings of this pedagogical approach. For more thinking on this debate, I encourage folks to check out the Headagogy podcast, particularly the episodes on ungrading and peer assessment linked here.

Once, in a time not-so-long ago, students schlepped to class, backpacks heavy with paper copies of their most recent essays, made notes on paper, scribbled in each other’s margins, and commented on the instructor’s questions. As a student, I always wondered how the instructor measured the quality of our feedback to one another and assessed how well we incorporated each other’s reviews–did they ever really look at those hundreds of papers piled on their desks?

Today’s digital equivalents of paper peer review include Canvas, Eduflow, Eli Review, and Peerceptiv, all of which permit greater efficiency and efficacy in responding to writing. These platforms allow multiple (often anonymous) peer reviewers, give writers an opportunity to rate feedback, and provide instructors with dashboard insights into student writing and feedback. As a result, instructors’ questions about peer assessment today differ substantially from years past, often boiling down to choice: How do we decide on a digital platform?

Considerations

An instructor might think about several issues when selecting a peer assessment platform, including supported assignment types (documents, audio, video), cost, data privacy, user options, functionality, and review types (anonymous, random, manual). Depending on one’s context, these criteria might take on varying degrees of importance, but generally speaking, the most important criteria seem to be functionality and cost. With this in mind, the chart below provides insights into the four most-widely used platforms on campus: Canvas, EduFlow, Peerceptiv, and Eli Review.

Platforms

Canvas offers instructors a free means of assigning peer reviews manually or automatically. Instructors can include a rubric and/or require comments in the review. Canvas allows TA access and allows both anonymous and known peer review. Canvas offers a great number of benefits, but compared to other options, it may be somewhat limited as other options provide stronger instructor analytics and scaffold students’ writing process.

EduFlow enables anonymous peer review assigned manually or automatically while also providing the teacher access to analytical data about student writing. If the instructor has “organization” as a criterion in the rubric, and this area consistently receives low ratings, they may decide to spend additional class time discussing how to structure the writing project. This platform also allows students to hold their peer reviewers accountable through ratings of their commentary.

Peerceptiv, similar to EduFlow, provides instructor analytics and student reviews of feedback. Students review one another’s writing anonymously in Peerceptiv. the platform then generates grades using automated grading algorithms. While some may feel uncomfortable with this idea, Peerceptiv holds that these scores are as accurate as traditional instructor grading, allowing for more efficient instruction.

Eli Review in comparison to Perceptive, focuses more on the learning process itself. Including instructional units on revision for instructors and students, Eli Review engages all members of the classroom in the learning process. It creates an environment for students that encourages debriefing, modeling of drafts and feedback, and creating/responding to revision plans. It does not generate grades but serves more as a “laboratory” for practice.

Ultimately, there is no perfect solution and one’s choice of platform might rest heavily on their purpose for seeking one. I find myself drawn to Eli Review due to its focus on the iterative nature of the writing process, but I’m also interested in Peerceptiv in the context of larger classes and Eduflow for its support of a variety of assignment types. Have you used any of these platforms? If so, please comment and share your thoughts.

by Clare Creighton

I’ve been a parent for six years now (longer if I count pet-parenting), almost as long as I’ve been in my current role at OSU. In some instances, the two roles feel at odds with each other as I experience a tension between working and being available to my kids. Certainly the 18 months of working from home blurred those lines considerably for me. But recently I’ve been trying to draw my roles as a parent and as a professional together in conversation. My orientation to listening and helping has changed as I consider how I relate to my very independent three-year old. She helps me see that I am quick to jump in and “help,” and most of the time that’s not what she wanted or asked for. It’s made me pause and clarify, “Do you want help?” and “What do you want that help to look like?” – a move that I am trying to flex more in other spaces as I check in with others about if and how they want me to engage.

I’ve asked a few colleagues to join me in thinking about how lessons learned from parenting impact who we are and how we approach our work.

Raina Martinez (Educational Opportunities Program)

“I have been a parent for 15 years now and one thing I have learned about being a parent that I can translate to my work counseling students is adapted from Maria Montessori, an educator from the turn of the 19th Century. Each experience is a time to learn. Not all experiences are going to be awesome or causes for celebration, quite the opposite, but we take away from these experiences learning, understanding and, hopefully, sometimes, grace, forgiveness and empathy. I can’t and shouldn’t stand in the way of experiences, lessons or progress; nor should I insert myself in any of these. Rather, I need to stand aside, guide and point out blocks along the way; but I must let them drive.”

Gabs James (College of Science)

“My kids inspired my master’s degree research, which is about celebrating gender expansiveness. Through supporting their gender journeys and discovering my own, I have brought these insights with me to the work I do with undergrads. We are all on a journey. Sometimes those journeys intersect, sometimes they need support, or encouragement to a roadside attraction. What’s been rad about parenting while being a graduate student and full-time student services professional has been the realization that we are co-creators of these journeys, not the architects of them. So, in a sense being a parent informs my work, and being a practitioner informs my parenting.”

Anne-Marie Deitering (OSU Libraries & Press)

“We became parents by adoption – one day everything was hypothetical and the next day we were parenting an almost-teenager.  Now, the stereotypical narrative around parenting new teenagers is that parents go from the person with all of the answers to the person who just doesn’t get it. Of course, stereotypes can’t capture the whole of any experience (even when they contain some truth) and for our family, this one really didn’t. Adopting an older child means parenting someone who might not trust you enough to be honest with you. It can take a while before they will express themselves when they are worried or afraid, and it can take even longer for them to feel safe enough to full-on disagree with you. That lesson — that trust needs to be earned and that negative feedback based on trust is a gift – helps me every day in my work as a teacher, as a mentor and as a manager.”

Teresita Alvarez-Cortez (Office of Institutional Diversity)

“My daughter has helped me understand so much of the operating knowledge I take for granted. She often asks what things mean or why something happens the way it does. Most things I assume as common knowledge, like the fact you have to actually pay for the cool toy you want and not just walk out of a store 😊 But some knowledge is more subtle, like the fact that we need to take turns talking in a conversation. These are norms and expectations that are not always clearly “taught.” I think about this a lot when I am working with teams, especially as I help onboard new employees to a team. I ask myself: “What are the norms or expectations of our work environment that are unspoken or unclear?” Then, I try my best to be clear with my colleagues about how those cultural norms operate so they are able to successfully navigate our work environment.”

Conclusion

As a final note, I want to celebrate that knowledge can move in both directions. These roles in our lives are mutually complementary – growth in one area supports growth in another. It invites the question: what assets do parents bring to the work place? What assets do student parents bring to campus?

Summer often offers capacity for reflection and planning ahead. As we head into the last few weeks of spring term, we want to highlight what our colleagues from around campus are reading. Perhaps you’ll find your next summer read in the list!

We asked colleagues, “What have you read that has informed your work or resonated for you, and why? This can be reading in any form (e.g., books, articles, videos, podcasts, audiobooks, etc.)”

Liz Delf, Senior Instructor, School of Writing, Literature, and Film

You’re Not Listening: What You’re Missing and Why It Matters by Kate Murphy (Valley Library; Macmillan Publishers)

Oh man, listening is hard. I am a talker! But this book convinced me that it’s worth making the effort to listen more. Murphy argues for the value of listening in relationships, friendships, workplaces, and interactions with strangers… even when you disagree. While this is a valuable area for me to improve on as a faculty member, it also made me think about how to help students listen to a range of ideas and perspectives. Surprisingly varied and enjoyable read.

Know My Name by Chanel Miller (Valley Library; Penguin Random House)

Miller’s memoir of her assault by Brock Turner and the consequent trial is painful—but it is also nuanced, poetic, and powerful. Her insightful close readings of court transcripts are rage-inducing. It’s a fair and important critique of the institutions—including the university—that should have done more in the aftermath of the assault. Miller also lifts up the helpers. The nurses, the advocates, the detectives, the DA, her family. The thousands who wrote to her when her victim’s statement was published. The cyclists who stopped Turner and chased him down. An important story for all of us to hear.

Miguel Arellano, Assistant Director of Outreach, Office of Institution Diversity

Reinventing Paulo Freire: A Pedagogy of Love by Antonia Darder (Valley Library; Routledge)

Caring Democracy: Markets, Equality, and Justice by Joan Tronto (Valley Library; NYU Press)

Some central concepts are unmasking power structures and dominant values that tend to dehumanize people and limit our full potential, individual and collectively, and how we can start shifting our values and practice to create a world that is more just and caring. These books make us consider how care and love (defined as a verb) can be central to our work with students and larger society. P.S. Tronto provides a framework for us!

Funmi Amobi, Instructional Consultant, College Liaison, Center for Teaching and Learning

Ungrading: Why Rating Students Undermines Learning (and What to Do Instead) edited by Susan Blum (Valley Library; West Virginia University Press)

The pandemic brought new attention to an assessment culture that focuses on assessment as learning and for learning, not just as summative measurement of student learning. The accountability paradigm of assessment with its emphasis on using grades to measure student knowledge and ability came under scrutiny. The learning-centric focus of the meaning assessment gained prominence. In Ungrading: Why Rating Students Undermines Learning (and What to Do Instead), edited by Susan Blum, the contributors unequivocally identified grades as the real problem in the assessment of student learning. They advocated for qualitative rather than quantitative assessment of student learning.

Steve Weber, Coordinator of Circulation Services, Library Experience + Access Department (LEAD), Valley Library

That’s Not How We Do It Here!: A Story about How Organizations Rise, Fall—and Can Rise Again by John P. Kotter & Holger Rathgeber (Valley Library; Kotter Inc.)

That an organization needs both innovation and structure to succeed over the long run isn’t novel. However, it isn’t unusual for someone to have an affinity for one approach and a mistrust for the other. Having the concepts presented as a fable made for an enjoyable listen on my commute and suggested new ways to explain why one approach needs the other to thrive to colleagues who might respond better to analogy than charts and graphs.

Marigold Holmes, Assistant Director for Sponsored Programs, Office of International Services

The Good News Network

The Good News Network highlights positive stories from around the world. As an international educator, knowing about political unrest, economic turmoil, natural disasters, etc. is important to offering timely and nuanced support to those I serve. But all too often, people in crisis get defined by the crisis, and I have found that knowing and appreciating the positive stories are equally important, especially in preserving their dignity. At a time when the news is overwhelmingly negative, this site offers a balanced view, reminding us that there is much good in the world and hope for a brighter future.

Many of us have a variety of interactive team-building exercises or activities that we’ve experienced or facilitated during meetings. We also know that getting to know each other in fun and easy ways can take time—and it’s not always easy for everyone to attend the same meetings. Below are a few ideas from for engaging team members asynchronously in fun activities to get to know each other and build community.

1. Share on a common prompt: Posting a prompt on a whiteboard, Jamboard, or on MS Teams gives people the option to weigh in on a prompt when they have time. Writing consultants recently asked each other about Myers-Briggs Personality categories, and then consultants made a chart showing the percentage of the team in each category. We’ve also had prompts for team members to post pictures of pets, share their favorite fall beverages, or weigh in on Oreo flavors.
2. Host a taste test: Our Academic Success Center & Writing Center teams have done this a few times with foods like cupcakes and Girl Scout Cookies. You can create a plan for what to taste test, design a rubric, or post a few prompts on a shared whiteboard, Jamboard, or MS Teams. Keep in mind it can be helpful to ask about any food allergies to ensure folks are able to participate. E.g., you may want to identify vegan, dairy-free, and gluten-free options.
3. Write a story together: Set up a typewriter in a central location that all staff have access to or start a Teams thread or Canvas discussion board with an initial story prompt. Have people reply in the thread and add to the story over a week or two. Give folks a little warning near the deadline so someone can wrap up the story for the team. Once the deadline has passed, share/post the full story with the team.
4. Create a playlist together: Have team members contribute to a playlist that captures the spirit of your team or group. You could also offer a theme as a prompt like “celebrating the end of the school year,” “songs for when there’s snow in April,” or “Sunday afternoon study jams.”
5. Plan for friendly competition: Invite team members to sign up for competitions individually or as teams. For example, the Academic Success Center had a gingerbread house building contest, and student staff across programs signed up for days/times that worked for them. Once all the houses were built, team members and visitors to the space were able to vote and score houses based on criteria like “most delicious looking,” “most likely to survive an earthquake,” and “curb appeal.” Recently Writing Center consultants created a bracket for consultants who wanted to participate in a typing challenge, with deadlines for recording high scores from a typing speed website. Consultants advanced team members until they were left with a final round and top typing score of 134 wpm!

Have other activities that your teams have enjoyed? Leave a comment to share more ideas!