Application Dates:

Opens: August 1, 2024
Deadline: October 1, 2024

Schedule of Sessions

• March 5, 2025, 3-5:30 pm ET
• April 2, 2025, 3-5:30 pm ET
• May 7, 2025, 3-5:30 pm ET
• June 9-13, 2025 in-person (held at Wabash Center, Crawfordsville, IN)
• July 2, 2025, 3-5:30 pm ET
• August 6, 2025, 3-5:30 pm ET
• September 3, 2025, 3-5:30 pm ET
• October 1, 2025, 3-5:30 pm ET

Leadership Team

Participants

Xenia Chan, Augustana University
DeAnna Daniels, University of Arizona
Dorcas Dennis, University of North Carolina, Wilmington
Haley Gabrielle, Greensboro College
Timothy Gutmann, University of Southern Mississippi
Raleigh Heth, Purdue University
David Justice, Baylor University
Minjung Noh, Lehigh University
Ludwig Noya, Valparaiso University
Kathryn Phillips, Defiance College
Chanelle Robinson, College of the Holy Cross
Kelsey Spinnato, Texas Lutheran University
Joseph Stuart, Brigham Young University
Sara Williams, Fairfield University

Description

This hybrid workshop invites early career faculty in their first five years of full-time teaching, either on the tenure track or in a continuing term position (lecturer, instructor, teaching scholar, postdoctoral fellow) to join a community of peers who value being imaginatively and critically reflective and increasingly skilled teachers. The workshop will gather participants who demonstrate a commitment to joining a collaborative learning cohort for seven online sessions and an in-person, five-day, summer session at Wabash Center. Sessions will include small group and plenary discussions.  For the in-person gathering, there will also be structured and unstructured social time, and time for personal and communal discovery, relaxation, exercise, meditation, restoration, and shared meals.

We will grapple with such questions as:

• Who is the self who teaches? What is agency in the classroom and in career?
• What knowledge and guidance are required to accurately read institutional contexts, cultures, and politics?
• What are the advantages and challenges regarding difference (not only among students but also between instructor and students) that are present in the classroom?
• What kinds of self-care do we need to be, in an ongoing way, healthy, generative, and passionate teachers?
• Considering the seasons of a teaching career, what are some practices of good teaching and the good life that we should develop in the early years? How can we remain imaginative, creative, and, if it is important to us, spiritual in our teaching?
• What pedagogies might strengthen teaching in early career?
• What are the challenges for which a peer conversation might be beneficial?

Goals

• To form a collaborative and cooperative cohort of teacher-scholars who, in a generative space, can reflect on craft of teaching and envision career development trajectories
• To develop ourselves as critically reflective and imaginative teacher-scholars
• To understand our teaching lives in the context of our institutions and the changing landscape of higher education
• To reflect on practices that help teacher-scholars to flourish and to care for self, family, students, and communities to which we are committed

Eligibility

• Full time tenure track and continuing term
• 1-5 years of teaching experience in a full-time, tenure track or other continuing position
• Teaching religion, religious studies, or theology in an accredited college or university in the United States, Puerto Rico, or Canada
• Doctoral degree awarded by January 2025
• Institutional support and personal commitment to participate fully in all workshop sessions
• Tenure decision (if applicable) no earlier than January of 2026

Application Materials

1. Application Contact Information form 
2. Cover letter: An introductory letter that describes your teaching context and addresses why you want to be part of this collaborative community, including what you hope to gain from it and what you might contribute to it. (Up to 500 words)
3. Brief essay: Describe a critical moment that pushed you to think more deeply about your teaching. What happened and how did you respond? (Up to 500 words)
4. Academic CV (4-page limit) 
5. A letter of institutional support for your full participation in this workshop from your Department Chair, Academic Dean, Provost, Vice President, or President. Please have this recommendation uploaded directly to your application according to the online application instructions.