Welcome to Episode 126 of the Think UDL podcast: Students as Partners with Anastasia Williams and Lorena Perales. Anastasia Williams is the Assistant Director of the Center for Teaching at the University of Iowa. She focuses on inclusive teaching, course design, syllabus design, well-being, and universal design for learning (UDL). Lorena Perales is a sophomore at the University of Iowa, a first generation college student and a double major in social justice and criminal law who works as a student as partner for the Center for Teaching with Anastasia Williams on this project. In today’s conversation, we will talk about how they set up this fantastic project to get feedback on what has worked well and not so well in various courses based on real time student feedback through a variety of instruments throughout the semester. We will hear how the project was created and how it evolved and how students’ voices especially shaped the feedback to professors throughout, and also how receptive faculty were to this along the way! Stay tuned to learn about an ingenious way to improve teaching at your institution through UDL.
Resources
Find Anastasia Williams on LinkedIn and Lorena Perales on LinkedIn to contact them
To find out more about what they are doing at the University of Iowa, see:
University of Iowa Center for Teaching Newsletter Articles – Students as Partners’ impactful year
Student-Faculty Partnerships at the University of Iowa
Transcript
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
students, udl, learning, faculty, teaching, partners, engage, noticed, instructors, impact, observing
SPEAKERS
Lorena Perales, Anastasia Williams, Lillian Nave
Lillian Nave 00:02
Welcome to think UDL, the universal design for learning podcast where we hear from the people who are designing and implementing strategies with learner variability in mind. I’m your host, Lillian Nave. And I’m interested in not just what you’re teaching, learning, guiding and facilitating, but how you design and implement it and why it even matters. Welcome to Episode 126 of the Think UDL podcast, students as partners with Anastasia Williams and Lorena Perales. At associate Williams is the Assistant Director of the Center for Teaching at the University of Iowa. She focuses on inclusive teaching, course design, syllabus, design, wellbeing, and Universal Design for Learning. Lorena Perales is a sophomore at the University of Iowa, a first generation college student, and a double major in social justice and criminal law, who works as a student as partner for the Center for Teaching with Anastasia Williams on this project. In today’s conversation, we will talk about how they set up this fantastic project to get feedback on what has worked well and not so well in various courses. Based on real time student feedback through a variety of instruments throughout the semester. We will hear how the project was created and how it evolved and how students voices especially shaped the feedback to professors throughout and also how receptive faculty were to this along the way. Stay tuned to learn about an ingenious way to improve teaching your institution through UDL. And thank you for listening to this conversation on the Think UDL podcast. Thank you to our sponsor Texthelp, a global technology company helping people all over the world to understand and to be understood. It has led the way in creating innovative technology for the workplace and education sectors, including K 12. right through to higher education for the last three decades. Discover their impact at text dot help forward slash learn more that’s learn m o r e. Wonderful, I would like to welcome both Lorena and Anastasia to the think UDL podcast. Thank you for being here.
Lorena Perales 02:48
Thanks for having us.
Anastasia Williams 02:51
Thank you so much. I’m a big fan of your podcast. And it feels so wonderful to be here today.
Lillian Nave 02:57
It was so great meeting you Anastasia at a recent conference and then to have the chance to interview you and Lorena as my first student that I’m having on the podcast, which I’ve wanted to do for a long time that I’m really excited. So I’m going to start off with the question I asked all my listeners and that is. Lorena, let’s start with you. What makes you a different kind of learner?
Lorena Perales 03:22
Thank you. So I’m a first generation college student. And I’m on the pre law track. I have a double major and I have three jobs. Wow. So and as someone who has a pretty busy schedule, I think I definitely approach learning with a pretty unique perspective. I think that I often find that my own experiences outside of the classroom, like navigating my own family dynamics, and community involvement definitely influence how I engage with course material. I think that my background and my schedule definitely shaped my preferences within learning, and make me a little more attuned to real world and practical implications in applications. And because I have such a busy schedule, I definitely thrive in environments that have a little more flexibility in how information is presented and assess, which also aligns with the universal design for learning. And through my experiences in various clubs and activities. I think I typically learn best through hands on experiences and physical activities. And when I’m given the opportunity to engage in interactive learning tests that allow me more to understand the concepts through a direct sort of engagement. And I also think that because I’m so used to being part of a team I thrive in, in collaborative environments, where I can directly engage with peers to exchange ideas, discuss concepts See and solve problems together. I think that for me, teamwork and peer feedback are all really helpful to enhance my learning experience and helped me understand whatever the subject may be.
Lillian Nave 05:14
Oh my goodness, what a brilliant understanding of a college students today. That is, man, that makes me think I should have been asking college students for years. Incredible. Thank you for such an articulate response. And certainly you have given me a portrait of many of my students at our university that now has two different campuses, and one is a commuter campus where students are living at home and have jobs and are exactly the kind of time flexible or not so flexible students that you describe as yourself. So thank you very much. And also like, oh, yeah, this is all Universal Design for Learning. Oh, my goodness, how much does this serve our students? So thank you for opening up our discussion this way. And Anastasia, I want to ask you the same question, what makes you a different kind of learner?
Anastasia Williams 06:11
And now you see how wonderful it can be to peer student student like Lorena, with our faculty as well. So answering your question. Coming to the United States as an international student, I was highly motivated motivation to learn to pursue grad school to expand my horizons was my main fuel as I left everything back home, my family, my friends, literally everything to study here in the United States. But they unfamiliar academic culture presented hurdles and unpacking this hidden curriculum. And decoding expectations was so overwhelming. For example, I did not know what the syllabus was, or office hours were. And so we didn’t use such things in the place where I’m from. So this tension between extreme motivation and dedication and constant need to check for clarity ask for help around various cultural academic norms, terms, procedures, and so does hierarchies impacted my learning very much, and it still does sometimes. So my experience as a fish out of water students shaped me into very persistent, adaptable learner and resulted in advocacy for transparency and learning and teaching for others.
Lillian Nave 07:39
Wow, you bring to mind something that continuously comes up in, in my teaching and in just in the work that I do with UDL. And that is, you said, you didn’t even know what a syllabus was like, yeah, like, we throw away throw out all these terms. And, and it reminded me just yesterday, so I’m continuously learning this, I’ve been teaching since 97, the you know, and I had another facilitator from our university to talk about study abroad, for my first year students. So these are just in their first year of study summary in the first semester, and he was talking about, you know, you don’t want to go, you can’t go your senior year, because you can’t do your capstone abroad. So you got to make sure you plan when you do it. And after she finished, I said, I, how many of you know what a capstone is? Zero, raise their hand. It’s just the, you know, terms that we use in the academy. And they’re all over the place. And we don’t stop to say, well, here’s what I mean, right? Or let’s define these terms. Right, what the syllabus and here’s what you can use it for, or what our office hours, am I even supposed to come to those. We can serve our students much better when we can define our terms. And, and, and take the time really to make it clear. So yeah, anyway, you just remind me that that we’re constantly we need to be doing that.
Anastasia Williams 09:09
I’m thinking how much we need a dialogue. Right? Yeah, even just simply asking this question. How many of you know or how many of you find can find it useful? And what are some potential ways to use it? Just having the conversation can be helpful?
Lillian Nave 09:25
Yes. And in that power dynamic to have, the students don’t want to ask their professor, right. They, they don’t want to feel stupid. They should know this. And there’s that power dynamic of I don’t want to look like I don’t belong, either. That we still need to work on quite a bit. That’s, well, you’re solving a lot of problems with what you’re doing. So let’s get into it. So, Anastasia, I’ll start this next question with you. And then Lorena, please jump in as well. I’m very interested in your implementing UDL. Well through a students as partners program that you have at Iowa, and I’d love for you to outline what the program is and how it came about at Iowa and how many faculty students and students as partners are involved so far.
Anastasia Williams 10:18
Our program is pretty new. It’s the first academic year we’re running it. One of the members who helped me to brainstorm this opportunity and propose this program to our institutional leadership was our graduate assistant, your corner Camorra, who is a great expert in accessibility, digital accessibility and UDL. Now she works at the Carnegie Mellon Eberly center as an assistant director, and she was my thought partner in proposing our program students as partners, and specifically thinking about implementing UDL through a students as partners program. This program leverages student perspectives to make courses more accessible engaging for students. Center for Teaching leads it and this is a semester long partnership, one where we match instructors with one or two undergraduate students who are not enrolled in the courses, who may be not familiar with the discipline content, and who provide feedback, specifically focusing on implementing universal design for learning principles in the courses. So the program came out came about to address actually demand and questions related to UDL from our faculty. And we started noticing extremely interest and UDL for about last couple of years, and also was so a potential of course with providing students perspectives and increasing students agency around learning. We’ve been by by the time we launched this implementing UDL three students as partners program. At Iowa, we already had three semesters of practicum course, the Center for Teaching. Bear collaborated with gender women’s sexuality studies department at Iowa, where we would have about five students each semester five undergraduate students working with the Center for Teaching and consulting faculty on their accessibility of the syllabus or Transparency in Learning and Teaching tilt, or creating resources, from a student’s perspective, so on embodied learning, or syllabus, design, and so on. And we’ve noticed that our faculty is way more open to suggestions provided by students, rather than literature evidence of faculty staff like myself, I saw enthusiasm I saw in need of this type of dialogue. So that has been very encouraging. And I’ve been learning a lot from experiences of other colleagues who have students as partners programs, and of course, Alison cook center. And I’ve noticed that in our institution, instructors would love to not only receive feedback on their teaching, but also specifically work with students to make the courses more access. So wow, you deal and forehand, more engaging and inclusive, so that we launched the program and we have four faculty working with us. So we have a total student partners. And I today counted the number of students who are enrolled in those courses. And this is about 3280 students in total. Were a part of this as students participating in those courses from this four faculty members. The impact is huge because we not only create this posture, this dialogue between faculty and student partners, but our students like Lorena, and up Pauling, the students in the course of arranging interviews, focus groups to test certain interventions, UDL informed interventions, and so on. So sometimes there is also a direct connection between our student partners and students taking those courses.
Lillian Nave 14:36
Wow, that is a huge impact. That’s amazing. The Reina, did you want to add anything to this? Yeah,
Lorena Perales 14:44
Anastasia kind of already touched on it. But I’d say in my role as a student as partner I more engaged in activities such as meeting directly with staff members and other partners. Observing lectures, we go to specific lectures and discussions and sit in and observe them firsthand, provide constructive feedback from those. We implement projects to enhance courses and student learning. And through this program, we also work very closely with faculty and staff members to identify various barriers in learning, and CO design instructional materials, and just overall evaluate the effectiveness of the various teaching strategies being used within their course. Wow.
Lillian Nave 15:31
So you’re doing like polling with students as well, that kind of interactions? That’d be amazing.
Anastasia Williams 15:39
Yeah, I think. And that is what Lorena and her other student partner came up with, right? First, they observed something, and they’ve noticed and they tested it talking to the faculty, partner and us. And then they said, Let’s go further and test this hypothesis. It wouldn’t be okay for Paul the students wouldn’t be okay if we have a arrange a focus group, or interview students and go into into depth to test this hypothesis. So that was amazing to see not only some specific, you know, intervention, created, but also moving forward and thinking creatively about problem solving or testing certain ideas. So I think that that was one of the biggest impacts of Alerion work last semester for sure.
Lillian Nave 16:36
Wow, rock on Lorena, how did you come up with that
Lorena Perales 16:39
love? Will we really wanted to get students involved in just structuring how their own education is being formatted, and having a say in what they’re doing and how they’re doing, they’re learning. And so we saw different various things that we just didn’t really understand if how they were working, or if they were working, how they were supposed to. And so we sent out, we thought it’d be best to hear from students, and how they felt that that was working for them. And if they were gaining more understanding from these practices, or if these forms of communication felt effective to them. So we sent out various polls, we also held various focus groups. And so from that we were able to hear directly from the students themselves. And it was really helpful because they even brought new ideas that we hadn’t even thought about. And they really helped us understand because none of us are in those classes that we are observing. And so we don’t take part in those practices. But hearing from a student who actually does take part in those practices, and how that affects them and affects their learning was really helpful, and helped us really guide what we were going to do throughout the semester. Oh, that’s
Lillian Nave 18:05
fantastic. This is amazing. I, I’m a little sad that you are not going to continue, like you’re actually going to like make a big difference and a law degree and whatever else. But wow, we would love you to keep working at a university. So what is it, Lorena that interested you in applying for and taking part in this program? Yeah, so
Lorena Perales 18:29
what interested me in applying for and taking part in this program was the opportunity to make an actual tangible impact on improving teaching and learning experiences on our campus as a social justice major. And just as a person, I’ve really always been passionate about advocating for inclusive environments, where all students are able to feel valued and supported in their educational journeys. And this program presented itself like the perfect opportunity for me to directly contribute to these kinds of environments. And being a part of this program allows me to leverage my unique perspective not only as a student, but also as a first generation student. And having gone through the challenges of being a first generation student and not having that traditional support system, and background knowledge that a lot of students have, I understand firsthand the struggles that come with it and the importance of having accessible and engaging learning environments. And by participating in this program, I can use those experiences to help shape initiatives and strategies that cater to the diverse needs of my peers and future generations of students. Also, being a part of this program has given me the direct platform to apply what I’ve learned as a social justice major, and advocate for inclusivity equity within education, which I truly believe has definitely contributed to a more supportive and enriching learning environment for everyone that’s been involved, whether that be staff or students. Plus, not to mention, it’s also been a really incredible opportunity for me to enhance my own personal and professional development along the way.
Lillian Nave 20:24
Oh, yeah, this is amazing. I’m interested, I’m gonna follow up with you for something. When you are talking about the kinds of things they were learning in the class, are you embedded in? Are you working with classes that you don’t usually take? Like, if you’re like a sim class? And maybe that’s not what you usually do? Is that? How does that work?
Lorena Perales 20:47
Yeah, so I’m a social justice major. And all of my classes are very much reading and writing based, but the classes I’m helping with are all very much stem base. So right now I’m helping with a math and business class. And so I am not familiar with that concept at all. I really have not like taken any of that. And so I think that offers a unique perspective, because we’re not looking at the understandability of it, but more of how it’s presented, and just the inclusivity of the practices being used.
Lillian Nave 21:23
Yeah, I’ve definitely seen that. When I’m looking at another professor like in the business, I’ve got a great colleague, who is new to teaching came out of industry, he’s teaching in the business school, and wanted me to look at his assignment. And I had no nothing. And I’m imagining that some of the students probably don’t know, like, what the steps are, and, and that so being a novice, I think, is really, really helpful. And not knowing kind of what what else is going on, is really a good set of eyes on it. And I didn’t realize how helpful that was. And also, I think you’re hitting on something about, you know, students in those classes are probably, they’re just used to doing it a certain way. And so it’s probably, this is the way we do it. Like, for me, when I was in art history, you always just had to memorize these dates. And it was a lecture and you took tests. And it wasn’t until somebody else, you know, started looking at that, like, you know, you don’t always have to do it the same way, right? Business doesn’t have to be taught the same way. Or the STEM class doesn’t have to be taught the same way. There can be different ways. And it takes I think, those fresh eyes or somebody outside the discipline to say, oh, what’s really working? And what could be improved about how we teach this subject? Right? Yeah. Right. Um, okay, so you’ve got this pilot program going, and Anastasia, this questions for you? What have you learned so far from the pilot program and like what challenges opportunities have arisen so far, we are
Anastasia Williams 22:59
so happy that we will be able to continue this program. It’s been a fantastic experience. And now we received an HHMI grant with Xavier University to expand for next academic year. And I am, I’ve learned a lot personally, it’s been when we’re thinking about assessment, and my colleague, Tamara bernfeld, and Assistant Director at our Center for Teaching is engaging also very thoughtfully in assessing this programming regionally, where we’re thinking that will measure how those specific steps were implemented in the courses or some course experiences. But what I’m not, I’m noticing now that the most transformative part is change in perceptions, attitudes, and practices. For everyone who is taking part in this initiative. We see fantastic transformations in faculty mindsets around students experiences learning, even, you know, with learning the shared about Pauling students, for an instructor who was teaching multiple 100 students in the course, fully trusting students who are not majoring in their discipline who might be even new to stem to develop something like that to start a poll a focus group without controlling even the types of questions without a knowing what it might lead to, is already a very big outcome. In the same with students noticing how students share about compassion towards instructors and understanding the whole kind of ecosystem of education in higher ed including experience of TAs in those courses, or other students who might be involved in Iowa. We have wonderful learning assistants and other programs related to supporting those courses too. So and also transformation for us. For staff members being a part of this. It’s been tremendous and just fantastic. What I was thinking when I was thinking about challenges. One of the challenges is scaling the program. Knowing that 15 weeks of a semester is definitely not enough to understand the context and come up with those types of interventions that realize which UDL guideline or UDL principle we might be focusing on how to focus on them, what would be a maybe next step, and then assess if it worked or not. So we ended up in some contexts continuing working with the faculty to do to make it a year academic year long partnership, for example, especially knowing that some of our pairs of faculty and students are very interested in Sato projects on the ship in teaching and learning, especially focusing on UDL, too. And for that they need more than one semester, for sure. Now they’ve done their RMB. And now we’re looking forward to implementing this study. And I’m so excited that students are meaningfully involved in those types of research projects. But yes, when we are thinking about those partnership, partnerships, scaling is very important and thinking of timelines is intentionally thinking about timeline is also critical. What I’m noticing is our institutional contexts, context presents additional opportunities, like engaging TAs in this type of work. And not like Gloria mentioned, our student partners, go to discussions and labs and observe as well. But I’m looking forward to expanding this aspect to ensure that TAS also meet separately with students, they will also involved in this UDL and formed projects meaningfully, and so on. So I think that there are lots of additional possibilities how we can build upon what we already doing.
Lillian Nave 27:24
And it seems like there is that the different roles are very important, like the fact that Lorena is a sophomore undergrad, and she has no bearing on their grades, right or on their progress of the course makes her very open, you know, advocate and partner along with this seems like a really great, I guess, position to be in, right that you it seems like because of your position as as an equal with those students, and you don’t have any power over them or, you know, continue to say, whether they pass or fail or anything like that, that it really gives you a great entree into that work. Have you found that like Lorena, with your relationship with the students?
Lorena Perales 28:14
Yeah, I think just being another student, I’m able to relate to them on a level that a professor ta might not be able to, especially not being an expert in whatever that field may be. Sometimes people forget that. It might not be as easy as it seems to you like a concept that a professor is teaching my seem really easy to them, because I’ve been studying that for years, and they’ve become experts in this field. And it may seem like a really simple part of it. But for students, it’s way different. And the way they learn is way different than a professor who’s been studying this course or a TA who’s been taking these classes for years now. So I think I’ve just been able to really relate to the students and look at it from how I would in my perspective as a student and what would work best for me.
Anastasia Williams 29:11
And that’s what we’ve noticed when Lorena and her another team member and other student partner initiated a student chat for the course that the professor wouldn’t have access to, but students will be able to connect. That was also a virtual course Oh, not a virtual but zoom, course thought and zoom. So that was extremely important component that Lorena and another student came up with and the students who were who were actively participating in this chat. They were definitely far more open and honest. And I guess opening asking for help from other students, as well knowing that its instructor doesn’t have an access. Would you like to share a little bit more about that? Maybe he Loreena I do. Want to know from my details when you can actually share more?
Lorena Perales 30:06
Yeah, that I would say is probably our biggest impact we’ve had so far. At over the past semester, we worked with a teacher who taught primarily online, up through a zoom class. And one thing we noticed right away was that because the class was online and over zoom, it lost that sense of community, you typically get in an in person classroom where you can talk to other students or turned to other students. And to tackle this, my partner and I came up with the idea to establish a student led group chat. And the goal we had with this was to improve communication and understanding among students. And by creating this platform where students feel more comfortable asking questions, and learning from each other in a more casual setting where it’s not asking their professor but asking each other, we’ve really managed to build a sense of community and collaboration that I think goes beyond the traditional classroom environment. It also helps foster peer to peer learning and relationship building, which we found was really helpful and really great. And we’ve also been involved in shaping how the course is structured and how we communicate. And that’s where the focus groups in the polls came in, we found that sending out those polls and hosting those focus groups was really invaluable, because we really got to hear from the students themselves in the course what worked best for them, and what they felt like could be better. And it helped us identify areas for improvement and make changes. And that really enhanced the overall learning experience and empowered students to feel like they’re to say their own education.
Lillian Nave 31:51
Wow. Wow, you’re, you’re you’re like, already ahead of me, I love this. Because I was going to ask you to Lorena about the impact you’ve you’ve had, and your fellow students who have taken on this SAP role. So I guess I want to push this a little further. You’ve you’ve already made a huge impact. And this program is so well designed Anastasia and you’ve gotten really fantastic students as partners, I can see already by talking to Lorena. So with these changes and and the impact that you’ve had, are there things that have been like surprising or unexpected that have come out of this so far for you?
Lorena Perales 32:30
Yeah, one thing that I think was really surprising for me, was just how eager everybody was student and faculty to make things different and shake things up and work together towards the same goal. I think it’s just really blown us away how we build such a collaborative spirit and how everyone has played a huge role in making some really positive changes. In our academic academic community. I also think hearing from students was really surprising because one of the main sources, or one of the main goals our professor prevented presented to us at the beginning of the year was he wasn’t sure how his forms of communication were being perceived and received by students. He primarily used emails and the Zoom chat to talk to students. And he didn’t really get a lot of feedback from that or communication back from that. And so our polls told us that they actually did find them all very helpful, but just a little intimidating to us. Because reaching out to a professor and asking questions where an entire class of people can see your question is a little intimidating. So that really helped us to know that creating that group chat and hosting those polls and those feedbacks, and those sessions were really helpful and really useful.
Lillian Nave 33:54
Wow, yeah, that idea about communication is something that I as a first time online professor did not know. And so this is so helpful. And I remember this was a long time ago, this is way pre pandemic this like 15 years ago, and it was like my first online course. And I was trying to give feedback to students. And the way I figured out I could do it that was easiest for me was to write back on some things and to differentiate my feedback from theirs. I just wrote in all caps. Oh, my goodness, I had no clue 1516 years ago, that they thought I was yelling at them the entire time. It was all caps everything. And so again, that like miscommunication and no wonder, you know, I was trying to be helpful. And it turns out I was being very unhelpful and like turning students away from coming to me, because I was doing that. This is a great, it was a great question for your professor. And it sounds like were you a able to help, like create other forms of communication, then
Lorena Perales 35:04
yeah, I think that’s where our group chat really played a huge role, creating that informal sense of communication where it’s not as intimidating to speak up and where you can really learn from each other. Because I think learning from each other is often more valuable than learning from a professor, because it’s explained in wording and in a way that a student can understand coming from another student. And yeah, so I think that was a really huge part of that. And we also found just through the polls that they did read all the emails, and they did read all the announcements and everything, they just rarely responded back, because it’s very intimidating to.
Lillian Nave 35:47
Yeah, if if there were only like a Like button, or like, you could get read receipts, you know, that, that somebody read it, I would feel a lot better to knowing I send it out to everybody. And then it’s just crickets, I don’t know, I don’t, I would love to know if they could just heard it, you know, on a group chat. And
Anastasia Williams 36:04
you know, what we notice with partnerships, like when we asked instructors why they’re interested in this type of work, who realized that often it feels so lonely to teach hundreds of students in those courses, right, and it just having students partners there who are checking this, let’s say, idea if students were reading emails or not, or providing feedback after observing the lecture, or just discussing, what’s been how students have been responding to certain, let’s say, assignments, or so can be so helpful for faculty can be so reassuring can be rewarding, and provide a deeper insight and students experience. So just even learning that yes, extra students find your emails helpful. But yes, you are not just sending them to the void. But, you know, they all share that they read them, and they’re important for them. It’s been also reassuring, even simple things like that. But yes, Lorraine has worked goes way beyond that. But instructors find that so, so helpful. Yeah,
Lillian Nave 37:16
absolutely. When I was teaching a lot in 2020 2021, early on, there were a lot of black boxes on that Zoom screen. And it was just, you know, it’s a, it was a crazy time in the early 2020s. There. And it was, it was that disheartening thing, like, I feel like as a, as an instructor, you’re, you’re giving a lot you’re like you you have this energy, almost like you’re on stage, you know, but there’s, you have no audience. And, and just seeing the nodding heads or smiles or something, you know, back. So I tried to put as many interactive things as possible. Because, I mean, it’s helpful for students to know that, that their instructor needs that feedback. But But students wouldn’t know that. And they’re afraid to write and they don’t want to be the one person writing on the Zoom chat when it sees your name. And then they could all it’s embarrassing. It’s just like raising your hand and a, you know, a class of 200. So, gosh, it’s really like, it’s like you’re taking all parts of this and really paying a lot of attention to all that social learning. It seems. Yeah, that I think we don’t spend enough time. I mean, you’ve just mentioned several times Lorena, how important that peer to peer part is. Yeah, and I remember more things I’ve learned from my peers than professors as well.
Lorena Perales 38:41
I was just gonna say, I think, just from my experience, I learned best from working with others. And that just may be from me and my experiences being a part of a team. But I always learn the best when I have the opportunity to discuss what I’ve learned with another student, or to go back over what we discussed with another student and have it explained not in just a professional and Professor language, but from a student who can have understandable and approachable language and way of articulating the subject.
Lillian Nave 39:20
Absolutely. Anastasia, were you going to add something there?
Anastasia Williams 39:25
What I’ve wanted to share that Lorena and another student partner noticed and that chat, sometimes students will just ask questions regarding the deadline, study groups, upcoming exams, and what kind of questions they might be, or what kind of material part what you know what material would be important for this exam, and so and so. So thinking about not only learning peer to peer learning related to the skills or content of the course, but also just supporting each other. Well, and also Oh, yes. So like thinking about next steps next potential study group together to prepare for an exam or so. And that has been, I think, a very good impact that come you can sense of community sense of belonging, especially for a course that was taught primarily on Zoo. Right now Marina is working on courses that are taught in person in on site. And it’s also a very, I think, different learning experience for students like Lorraine unright, also to critically engage with different types of settings and compare and analyze learning environments from from that perspective. And I think that’s a such a unique perspective, because there is no one else sitting in this classroom just to observe just to think about how we can embed some UDL and formed guidelines and UDL principles, enter into learning and see all different types of classrooms, at least I can say, from my perspective, when I observe different learning environments and courses, this is one of the my favorite parts of my job, I love seeing what’s possible, what’s out there, and maybe translating those across disciplines, different strength, translating different strategies across disciplines. And I know Lorena has been bringing her experiences as learner and as student partner from that course, to the courses as she is working on now. So it’s been wonderful.
Lillian Nave 41:39
This is great. I’m, I’m really impressed by just the kind of the, the setup of this program, I think our listeners would benefit a lot from this. And I, of course, I love the UDL focus I, I’ve heard of some others with, with students helping out and as partners in this kind of program. And it seems that that student voice is the so much more powerful than if, let’s say a member of the Center for Teaching were to come into a classroom because there are lots of instructors who will think oh, no, Have I done something wrong? Right, or that that type of idea, you know, it’s an it’s an attitude, but it’s erroneous, that that Center for Teaching might be like, Oh, you’re, you’re in remedial teacher training. Now, that’s not it at all. But there is sometimes that idea or understanding it’s a misconception. And I think coming in with students is such a better way to do it. Because it brings so many things including a fresh perspective, challenges and demands of today’s students, not the students were 20 years ago, we have different students today, as we know, you’re very busy. You’ve got lots of demands on your time. And
Anastasia Williams 42:55
this is what we’ve been trying to do intentionally to drop hierarchies and elevate student voices. And we’ve been partnering with our students access to academic support and retention and their first gen student kind of group, first gen student program and recruiting folks with those types of experiences and with minoritized identity status and specifically thinking of first gens folks in Iowa. And yes, acknowledging that students have so many commitments and multiple jobs. And that is what those voices matter so much and perspectives from those very busy students can be so critical for our professors as well. So thinking about Yeah, thinking about intentionality around not only things like learning environments and building those types of learning environments, but also how do we build relationships between students and faculty so students feel confident enough, providing suggestion suggestions, how to improve the courses and make them more universally designed. Professors would feel eager to incorporate those suggestions that would have been noticed we have been noticing from professors would share that this our student partner told me yesterday that in my 300 Student lecture course I can still use think pair share activities and faster and allow more processing time and use one minute papers and then like why the White Bear share what right pay or share activities. And I did it next next day and have been looking back and I’ve been thinking how we’ve been telling it’s directors that you actually can do enlarge, you can use active learning strategies and large lecture courses. But I don’t think that was useful enough coming. Those suggestions coming from students have been so much more effective and received, not only with support, but motivation and enthusiasm, as has been so rewarding.
Lillian Nave 45:26
Yeah, just fantastic. It’s a really great, I think it’s a really well designed program. And for all the reasons you’ve just mentioned.
Anastasia Williams 45:34
So what I’ve noticed, in our context, it’s been for me, it’s been so important to analyze our tuition and contexts. For example, being in Iowa, and r1 institution, I’ve noticed that the buy in from faculty would be connected to concrete, measurable outcomes on the course, and research based project. So for example, that’s why we see so much interest in partnering with students around SOTL projects for UDL and inclusive teaching into courses. And we’ve noticed that that like just providing feedback on ongoing classes and observing would not be enough for our faculty to for this such a kind of intensive commitment in the courses. But when we were establishing this program, I think that there were two key considerations that we had. One was scaling it and thinking about what are some specific first steps that we can take, for example, I mentioned already our practicum course, that we’ve been running since 2021. When, for this credit bearing course, students work with a center for teaching, and we’ve been trying to see where are there opportunities to ensure we can partner with our undergraduate students and elevate the voices. And we learned a lot from that experience. So we were ready to establish students as partners program focused on UDL, we’ve been also trying to engage in collaborations across the campus. I already mentioned our student success team that have been sharing with us, what can be important for students? What can how to connecting us with students, and so on, we’ve been also working with our accessibility team with our instructional technology team, to think about various aspects of learning and UDL as well. So and also with our kind, of course improvement partners as well, instructional designers and in those dialogues in those communications, we were able to, to launch something like this understanding the needs of campus better. And of course, with our Collegiate leadership, and office of Bravo’s support, who were also very into the enthusiastic about both ideas, UDL, and students as partners programs, pedagogical partnerships across the country as well.
Lillian Nave 48:30
Wow. And it sounds like also that your university values, you’ve mentioned sodalite, the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. So that is probably also a factor that would be important for anyone who’s going to implement that is that one would get sort of credit and their tenure and promotion, or would be recognized for that. Would you say that is also important? Yes,
Anastasia Williams 48:56
I think that especially for research intensive faculty for research, universities, that can be very important. SOTL is a part of our strategic plan tactics. So it tends to recognize that the University and I’ve noticed that conversations about Sato organically happen when we brainstorm with faculty and students, what’s next, like we are first trying to see how this course is working understand this course. Then we see what are some barriers to students learning, or how can we, you know, leverage some new opportunities to make the course more engaging, accessible, inclusive, and then how to test it how to share how to move forward with this and that, that look subtle was never a primary goal or a goal, initial goal of faculty when we asked them like, why would you like to Be to serve as faculty partner, how do you envision the project no one mentioned. So they don’t know yet they are not familiar with being a partner, they are also experimenting. And then we see how this interest after meet sometimes, after a month partnering with students originates, and then we see the readiness to author a study together with a student with an undergraduate student, not from your discipline. And that has been also so I think so rewarding to think partner with students truly right to to engage in a very meaningful research study that can be helpful for these instructors as well. So I think that yes, subtle is definitely a factor. And it’s actually originally it was very surprising for me that how fast faculty would bring it out that they want to actually conduct the study together with the student. But now I’m not that surprised. No, when the institutional you know, context, knowing how research is one of the primary values of the institution, evidence based practices are very important. And also, how, yeah, well, how it might impact how it may become one of the main outcomes of a partnership, something that you can actually share, and maybe created posters, presentation or conference presentation with the students. So that’s what I’m what I’m hoping to do to support those types of partnerships even more and share some resources.
Lillian Nave 51:41
So Lorena, are you then part of this research as well, that’s going on.
Lorena Perales 51:49
Um, I think I’m more like the hands on of it, like, seeing how that can actually play out, and how the practices of incorporating students into learning can pan out.
Anastasia Williams 52:04
What we are hoping we’ll have one more instructor now who is interested in this program, and we’re hoping to connect her with Lorena. And specifically think of a potential study she mentioned interest, though it’s something that might unfold. Within a couple of weeks, we might start having those conversations. But yes, for sure. This is something that we’ve been noticing more people reach out and more people want to be a part of this and think of, yeah, learning more about the courses that ends up being a solid research so soon, I hope that Elena will be also part of this. Yeah.
Lillian Nave 52:47
Well, fantastic. So I’m gonna I’m gonna go into like my my last question about this. Like going forward, you did tell me some of those surprising things about that SoTL research that came from the project. So an essential I’ll start with you about what advice do you have for others who might want to undertake such an endeavor? And how would you advise faculty and faculty developer colleagues who want to implement students had partner program and then Lorena, I’d love to hear your advice for other students who might want to partner with professors to improve their courses and in their program like this. So I’ll start with you, Anastasia, and then Lorena just go ahead and take it.
Anastasia Williams 53:29
What I’ve been building this program I’ve been keeping in mind, the plus one approach suggested by Tom Tobin and Kristen Behling and for me, it’s been very reassuring to think what can be one additional thing that can actually create an impact. So we started back in the day with the just bearing students, with faculty to for one off case based consultations and seeing how that how we see how faculty receives the suggestions of students, then we’ve noticed that when students come up with a number of strategies, let’s say how to how to make your syllabus more inclusive so faculty receives it within to the enthusiasm as well. So for me it was building and scaffolding and thinking about what can be next and then launching this program, trying to also support folks in understanding the plus one approach. So instead of writing a goal of I want to make my meaningfully incorporate let’s say student choice in a in a course. Instead thinking about very specific area very specific measureable end goal, for example, rethinking some of the specific assignments or, you know, final assessment or so. So thinking about thinking about, you know, one more way that might be, might make a difference for the course. And so and, and not there. Another idea that was helpful for me was to think of collaboration already mentioned. But I was thinking how the way we talk about the program with different stakeholders was slightly, we had to pitch it in various ways, I would say. So, for some faculty, UDL was the main main buy in because they already learned about it. They, for example, read the book that I already mentioned today. Everyone teach everyone. And I’ve noticed that we were able to pitch it to them that now you can incorporate that with a student student who will be providing meaningful feedback and will be observing your course. And that was very useful for them to know. For other in other cases, it was great to share that how meaningful that experience can be for students. And it’s not necessarily talk about UDL, but most of the conclusive teaching or active learning or other terms. So for me, it’s been very interesting to think, what motivates people in supporting this spark, and what motivates our leadership, for example, institutional leaders to help support us in writing this type of collaboration. And I’ve noticed how those are like there is a scope of ideas, and they are already well developed like UDL, and students as partners, both concepts and that have been out there for many, many years. And how to how it can be integrated to unite to unite them and synthesize them in a sense, and how do we how we talk about it? I guess, that is probably one of the topics that I keep thinking about, how do we share about this information? What can be helpful for folks, of course, the way people talk about pedagogical partnerships for let’s say, liberal arts institutions can be so different from our current context. And I know that that is why, like I mentioned to you Dale can be a buy in for faculty, they seem to be very, very encouraged to redesign the courses that they can, you know, teach next time next year. And what Lorena for example, already done with the scores already sibling how she consulted the instructor would affect many more hundreds of students next academic year, too. So this seems to be yes, very impactful, very rewarding. And faculty understands this, I guess, and our leaders to
Lillian Nave 58:22
it’s great advice. And Lorena, I’ll say the question again, the about the advice you would offer students who might want to partner with professors to improve their courses, and in a program like this.
Lorena Perales 58:35
Yeah, so my advice for students considering partnering with professors, especially in to improve courses with UDL, I would encourage them to embrace their role as active participants in the educational process. And just remember to be proactive and actively look for opportunities to contribute your own insights and perspectives within the course and remember that your experiences as a learner are really valuable assets that can really inform meaningful change in teaching and learning experiences and practices. I would also suggest embracing the opportunity to learn from one another, whether that be other students, other students as partners, or professors or TAs, everyone has really been able to bring something really valuable to the table. And so if you can approach the partnership with enthusiasm, an open mind and a willingness to learn from one another and collaborate with one another, I think you’ll really be amazed at the impact you can make.
Lillian Nave 59:40
Wow, it does seem already you’ve made a huge impact and from what Anastasia said, it does make me think, you know, next semester, these professors are going to have a lot more you know, arrows in their quiver to get that information and to teach to the students and to teach better And it’s because of your really great feedback. So that’s impressive. And that’s that is when at the beginning and said you said around 3280 students are already being impacted by that. That is a huge amount of students. And so yeah, I really appreciate learning about this and telling others about it. And thank you so much for coming on the think UDL podcast today. I really, really appreciate you spending the time with me. So thank you.
Lorena Perales 1:00:31
I just wanted to thank you all for like giving me this opportunity to present from a student perspective and present this project.
Lillian Nave 1:00:45
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