[Summary: This message shares a document entitled “Guiding Principles for our Teaching and Learning Community” which describes a set of classroom expectations for FAS students and faculty for the fall semester. The document is an expression of common commitment to respect, community, and care. It outlines the steps we can all take, as students and instructors, to make sure that everyone in our classes is respected, included, and able to do their best work.]
Dear Yale College students, GSAS students, and FAS faculty,
We are about to embark on an unusual semester. Some of us are in New Haven; some are in locations across the world. Some of us are in our childhood homes; some of us are in homes filled with children whose schools are unexpectedly closed. Access to labs and libraries is limited; classes will largely be held on-line; most of our interactions will be virtual.
Against this backdrop, we will come together next week as students and teachers, for seminars and lectures and labs and language classes, studying art history and anthropology and applied physics; classics and cognitive science and chemistry; English and economics and electrical engineering. How do we join forces as a community to ensure that these classes capture the joy of teaching and learning that are the hallmark of a Yale education?
Earlier this summer, we appointed a small committee chaired by FAS Dean of Diversity and Faculty Development Larry Gladney, which included representatives of the faculty, graduate and undergraduate student communities. (You can find a list of members below.) The committee worked intensely over the summer months, consulting with hundreds of undergraduate students, graduate students, and faculty who shared their ideas on how learning together can sustain our community. The document that we share with you today, called “Guiding Principles for our Teaching and Learning Community,” represents your voices and reflects our shared vision of what our community needs in order to learn and flourish.
The document is an expression of common commitment to respect, community, and care. It outlines the steps we can all take, as students and instructors, to make sure that everyone in our classes is respected, included, and able to do their best work. We hope that you will read it and take it to heart.
Thank you to all those who completed a survey or sat down with the committee to share your views. Thank you to the committee for this powerful articulation of our shared values. We are inspired by your conception of what Yale’s teaching and learning community can be.
With thanks,
Tamar, Lynn, Marvin, Larry
Tamar Szabó Gendler
Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Lynn Cooley
Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Marvin Chun
Dean of Yale College
Larry Gladney
Phyllis Wallace Dean of Diversity and Faculty Development in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Committee membership:
Chair
- Larry Gladney, Phyllis Wallace Dean of Diversity and Faculty Development in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences; Professor of Physics
Members
- Michael Bochkur Dratver, Undergraduate Student, Jonathan Edwards College ‘23
- Emily Erikson, Associate Professor, Sociology; Member, FAS Faculty Senate
- Jenny Frederick, Executive Director, Yale Poorvu Center for Teaching and Learning
- Maria Del Mar Galindo, Graduate Student, Department of English
- Anjelica Gonzalez, Associate Professor, Biomedical Engineering
- Sarah Mahurin, Residential College Dean, Timothy Dwight College; Director of Undergraduate Studies, Special Divisional Majors
- Paul North, Professor of German
- Susan Sawyer, Senior Associate General Counsel, Office of the General Counsel
- Rebecca Toseland, Senior Lecturer, Economics; Director of Research Support, Tobin Center for Economic Policy; Resident Fellow, Morse College