The CME’s work is guided by the knowledge that teaching is a scholarly pursuit that can be developed over time. Educators of all experience levels can grow as teachers and continue to refine their pedagogy. Since each teaching situation is unique, there is no one right way to teach. The choices we make as teachers and the instructional approaches we use should be guided by our pedagogical goals, reflect our particular teaching contexts (content, students, environment), and be informed by the literature on teaching and learning.
The Center aims to promote effective teaching through a variety of complementary processes.
- We draw on and contribute to the body of scholarship on inclusive teaching and learning.
- We promote deep understanding of educational processes by helping others critically reflect on their own teaching and their students’ learning.
- We foster communities of teachers at Edgewood so that members of these communities can learn from and support each other’s teaching experiences.
- And, in collaboration with a network of partners across the campus, we foster institutional structures and resources that support effective teaching at Edgewood.
Grounded in educational research literature on diversity, equity, and inclusion—CME defines inclusive teaching as but not limited to the following:
Inclusive teaching involves intentionally creating a learning environment where all students are treated equitably, have access to opportunities to learn, and feel a sense of value, support and a sense of academic belonging. Inclusive pedagogy means valuing the social identities and actively working to disrupt the ways in which system inequities shape what we teach, how we teach, and the ways in which we interact in teaching-learning spaces. CME defines inclusivity as including students of color, international students, first generation college students, undocumented students, students from low socioeconomic backgrounds, students with disabilities, LGBQ students, transgender and gender nonconforming students, introverts, students experiencing emotional and mental health issues, students who practice a religious or spiritual tradition, students whose first language is something other than English—the center’s position on inclusivity is a recognition of the multiple ways in which students’ self-identify and the various ways in which such identities intersect to create lived experiences and realities.
Adapted from the University of Michigan