2021-2022 Lecturer Teaching Fellows

We are pleased to announce the 2021-2022 Lecturer Teaching Fellows. These fellowships are designed for Lecturers interestd in enhancing their teaching by developing teaching and learning tools, templates, and resources for both their individual courses and for the larger teaching and learning community at UC Berkeley. Learn more about the Lecturer Teaching Fellows (LTF) program and past awardees.

Margaret Kolb & Mark Bauer, College of Engineering

“Peer Mentoring for Scientific Writing”

In our one-unit communications course for Engineers, we work with students whose writing abilities and confidence levels vary dramatically, but who hold in common a commitment to become better writers. Students thrive in one-on-one mentoring sessions. But with more than 180 students between us, mentoring our students individually has proven both rewarding and structurally infeasible. We aim to institutionalize peer mentoring, both within and across sections of the course we teach, to enable confident writers to develop beyond the confines of the course, and to offer fledgling writers increased support. We propose an eight-week training course for mentors in the fall, followed by ongoing mentoring of peer writing mentors for the remainder of the year. This project includes creating training materials for peer mentors, and envisioning syllabi that include this training and then mobilize mentors to engage their peers.

Amm Quamruzzaman

Amm Quamruzzaman, Interdisciplinary Studies Field (ISF)

“Developing Resources for Teaching and Studying Climate Change from an Interdisciplinary Persepective”

Climate change is an existential threat and requires an interdisciplinary approach to address it. Teaching and research are important ways to inform our current and future policymakers (i.e., students) on climate change. But much of climate change pedagogy and research is done in silos using a single-disciplinary approach. Given the current situation, I feel the need to develop an interdisciplinary research, teaching, and knowledge-sharing platform. This platform will be developed and used byinstructors and students from different disciplines to teach, learn, and study climate change from an interdisciplinary perspective. There are only a few undergraduate programs like Interdisciplinary Studies Field (ISF) Major that allow students to design their own research projects and courses of study from multiple disciplines. As a result, most undergraduate students do not get a chance to study climate issues from an interdisciplinary perspective. To fill this gap, I propose to develop an interdisciplinary forum and knowledge depository that will be composed of the following: (1) dedicated library resources and departmental web pages on climate change, (2) an online database of courses offered at UC Berkeley on climate and sustainable development issues, (3) an online database of research papers, working papers, course syllabi, data sets, and links of resources related to climate change, and (4) periodic conferences and seminars to showcase and present our research findings, pedagogical tools (e.g., course syllabi, readings, GIS mapping, and assignments), student works (e.g., data compilation, research papers, and brief reports), and policy briefs related to the field.

Lindsey Lanfersieck, College Writing Programs

“Enhancing Collaborative Learning in the Hybrid Writing Classroom”

With the forced isolation of shelter-in-place, we could say that building community through collaborative learning is important now more than ever. Even for those of us back in the classroom, this can prove challenging with the recent surge in new COVID-19  variants and the necessity of social distancing. For that reason, my project develops a framework for structuring collaborative learning in the hybrid classroom with a particular focus on collaborative activities and assignments. I offer practical advice on the implementation and design of group work in the blended or hybrid classroom with a specific focus on activities and assignments that promote cooperation and foster a sense of community in first-year writing or introductory courses. These collaborative assignments not only emphasize a student-centered approach but also transferable skills and real-world value.

Explore my teaching project here!

Sanchita Saxena, Haas School of Business

“Authentic Learning Modules: Harnessing the Expertise of Practitioners in Classroom Teaching”

Many of our classes already utilize the expertise of practitioners—those who are “doing” something in the real world and have an expertise in a particular area, topic, or subject. As a participant in the LTF Program, I would like to not only harness the expertise of our practitioners, but make their impact long lasting by creating modules on their particular topic to be used as a teaching tool and resource. These “plug and play” teaching modules will include a short video, one or two related articles, and teaching notes/guidelines. Instructors will be able to plug these models into their already existing course to enhance the content by incorporating these additional topics. These modules will be put into a virtual library and indexed by theme for use by those at UC Berkeley (and eventually beyond).

Explore the project here! 

Srijani Ghosh, Theater Dance and Performance Studies

“Pursuing Social Justice through Conversations between Course Readings and the Real World”

In my discussion-based R1A and R1B classes, I have frequently noticed that many students feel that issues such as racism, or gender inequality, or Islamophobia, happened “back then,” even when Black Lives Matter, the #metoo movement, or President Trump’s “Muslim ban” were the leading news headlines. This outlook that we live in a post-racist, post-sexist, or post-feminist world leads to the mistaken assumption that diversity, equity, and inclusion have already been achieved in the socio-cultural spaces that we inhabit and no further individual or community initiatives are particularly necessary. I would like to develop a website as a cross-disciplinary resource that will include activities and exercises that educators in the humanities and social sciences could use to stimulate students to make connections between their course readings and the real world and be cognizant of the ongoing need for our collective efforts to actively work towards social justice in our communities and foster a culture of equity and inclusion. This project will also aim to develop students’ critical thinking, research skills, and argumentative writing skills, boost peer interaction, and also contextualize student learning.

Explore my teaching project here!

Jhonni Carr & Román Luján, Spanish & Portuguese

"Developing a Linguistic Solidarity Curriculum in the Language Classroom"

In recent years, linguistic discrimination—along with racial discrimination—has led to increased attacks on individuals who speak a language other than English in public. These discriminatory events are often filmed and shared online where they “go viral.” Despite their pervasiveness, there is very little discussion on how to prevent the occurrence of these episodes in the future; as a society, we remain without a coherent response. To address this, we propose the concept of “Language Solidarity,” which entails concrete strategies that linguistic allies can implement to engage in preventative measures to protect speakers of languages besides English and their freedom of language choice (Carr & Luján, 2020). For our collaborative Lecturer Teaching Fellows project, we seek to further develop the concept of Language Solidarity and create instructional materials and assignments that allow us (and other language educators) to help our students achieve the following objectives: 

1. Learn about the concepts of language justice and language solidarity in their academic endeavors and daily lives.

2. Discover and put in practice strategies to address language discrimination through preventative measures in the public space.

3. Propose new strategies to promote language solidarity outside of the classroom, including through the use of social media.

Explore my teaching website here!

Ivy Mills, History of Art

“Designing Hybrid Museum Assignments for History of Art Instruction”

Museum visits and the in-person examination of objects from various collections are integral to History of Art instruction, at all levels. When the pandemic struck and we switched to remote instruction, we scrambled to find remote/online alternatives to scheduled museum visits that would be of comparable pedagogical value. Since March 2020, many museums have developed new online materials and virtual experiences that are more engaging than the simple viewing of 2-D images of objects. As a Lecturer Teaching Fellow, I have been developing models for hybrid museum assignments that I am beta testing in my courses on African arts, but that will also be of use to all instructors who assign museum visits in the History of Art Department and other departments across campus. My project identifies new online/remote museum resources, devises ways to link in-person visits to remote/online experiences, and develops engaging all-remote alternatives to in-person experiences. These resources will be especially helpful if we have to revert to remote instruction in the event of a serious outbreak or extreme weather. They make the in-person History of Art classroom more inclusive and accessible, as students who find themselves unable to visit museums in person can complete an alternate assignment that provides an equally rich learning experience.  They also enable the entire class - whether the instruction is in-person or remote - to explore collections outside the Bay Area we couldn’t normally visit.

Patina Mendez, Environmental Science, Policy, and Management

“Developing Research Models for Environmental Sciences Senior Thesis Projects”

Explore Previous LTF Projects

Lecturer Teaching Fellows Program Facilitators

LTF program facilitators design a curriculum of professional development sessions on topics related to Fellows' projects and key themes in teaching and learning. Program Facilitators also support Fellows in refining and implementing their projects. As a peer-led program, Program Facilitators foster an inclusive environment by leveraging shared teaching and learning experiences and the expertise within the community of Fellows.

Ryan Sloan

Ryan Sloan, College Writing

Along with his work in the College Writing Programs and the Haas School of Business, Ryan co-facilitates the Lecturer Teaching Fellows Program. He works with a number of campus initiatives, including the Koshland Graduate Student Summer Fellows, the Haas PreCore Transfer Program, the College Writing Research Festival and the Berkeley Changemaker Program. Before he was Co-Facilitator, Ryan was also an LTF Program Fellow; his project Tumblr as Artist Studio: Digital Intervention for Student Writing can be found at https://sloanstudio.tumblr.com.

Michelle Douskey, College of Chemistry

Michelle is a Senior Lecturer in the College of Chemistry and has been co- facilitating the Lecturer Teaching Fellows Program for over 10 years. She also co-facilitated the Faculty Learning Program for Transforming STEM Teaching. Michelle was part of a team that completely reformed the general chemistry laboratory experience to an award-winning curriculum that teaches green chemistry and sustainability. Michelle also teaches the pedagogy course for first time GSIs in the chemistry department which she designed with a project-based curriculum focusing on inclusive practices.