I found The New College Classroom event to be extremely helpful and informative, especially as an aspiring academic and professor. Although the event covered a lot of different aspects of effective pedagogy, one phrase I would use to describe the main idea of the event “is shifting our educational system from ‘Subject (or Course) centered model‘ to ‘Student-centered model‘” (although none of these expressions themselves were used in the event).
What I here termed as the Student-centered model of education is what I believe to be the main idea that Professor Cathy Davidson and Dr. Christina Katopodis have shared. Both reemphasized the point of education and the importance of catering to the students – not just as a group – but also individually. This idea stood out to me, especially in the example of lesson planning and syllabus writing, where most professors – despite doing it for the students – rarely have the student in mind and plan it according to what is needed to be taught as per the requirement of the subject. And here, Dr. Davidson and Dr. Katopodis point out how we should include the student’s interest in this planning to best help them learn and hence center the student instead of the course. This, in fact, reminds me of the class that I took at LaGuardia Community College for a Philosophy of Love class, where my professor only filled in the lesson plan for the first two classes and left it open for the class. She called it an open syllabus where she wanted us to fill in the topics we would like to study for the classes to follow – each of us being assigned a topic of our choosing for the specific class. And during those classes, we would be in charge of the class where we have an open discussion about the topic, with the guidance of the professor, who would learn with us. This class, I believe, is a perfect example of putting the student in the driver’s seat and the instructor only guiding sturdily – hence maximizing the learning that takes place. This makes the classroom much more dynamic – with both the students and the professor learning.
Another class I remember in which the professor employed some of the methods discussed was my Non-Fiction Creative Writing class. On the first day of the class, the professor announced that we would receive an A – if we turned in all the work. She said she didn’t want us to worry about the grade but rather enjoy the class and hone our creative writing skills, which to her is an art for us to express ourselves. This class, in a way, freed me from worrying about the grades and logistics of the class. I really got to enjoy the process of writing and attending the class. Overall it really was fulfilling and fruitful. Hence, attending this event just confirmed my experience of how successful this new proposed pedagogy is, both for the students and the professors!
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