Karen Costa (she/her) Profile picture
Oct 6, 2020 8 tweets 3 min read Read on X
What is everyone planning in their courses for election week? How will we take care of ourselves, each other, and our learners? Let's brainstorm and crowdsource ideas?

#HigherEd
#AcademicChatter
I'll share my two cents from the standpoint of #traumaaware teaching, diminished executive functions, and severe stress/overwhelm...
Reduce uncertainty. Create a simple plan for election week, and start gently communicating it as soon as you can. Let students know what they can expect.
As always, my best #traumaaware teaching tip is to take care of yourself. Put your oxygen mask on first. In addition to a voting plan, do you have a mental and physical health plan in place for election week?
Balance structure and flexibility. That will look different for all of us. In general, I think students will appreciate having an extremely low-stakes/no-stakes week with a place to connect with other humans.
Choice. Some students will come to our courses to take a break from the madness and chaos. I think offering an assignment focused on the election is great. I would also offer an alternative in case students have had it.
And I can't emphasize this enough: healthy boundaries. Our students are going to be bringing an immense amount of emotions, fear, anger, stress, and yes, trauma, into our classrooms. Know where you end and your students begin.

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More from @karenraycosta

Oct 31, 2022
I wrote about ADHD, #AtomicHabits, ableism, Ungrading, and all the things.

#HigherEd
#ADHDTwitter
#AcademicTwitter

karenraycosta.medium.com/systems-arent-…
TLDR: ADHD is a life-threatening condition. Systems, routines, and structures keep me alive. Ignorant critiques of these strategies are ableist. Let's do better. Happy Monday!

#HigherEd
#ADHDTwitter
#AcademicTwitter
If you'd like to learn more about ADHD, there's a podcast for that!

#HigherEd
#ADHDTwitter
#AcademicTwitter

theadhdgallery.com
Read 5 tweets
Mar 31, 2022
Low attendance is understandable as we continue to recover from a global disaster while simultaneously experiencing repeated impacts/surges.

We have to design/adapt for this reality. Not for the fantasy of “back to normal.”

#HigherEd
#TraumaAware https://www.samhsa.gov/sites/default/files/images/fema-ccp-g
collective trauma: “a cataclysmic event that shatters the basic fabric of society”

#HigherEd

karenraycosta.medium.com/is-covid-a-col…
Faculty, staff, and students should not be left in the wind like this to wonder why this is happening. It’s infuriating tbh, and #HigherEd continues to be its own worst enemy.

We have to prioritize well-being and talk about trauma.
Read 4 tweets
Feb 3, 2022
Okay here goes nothing. A new thread 🧵about #CourseHero.

My name's Karen, I've worked in #HigherEd for 20 years, and this is the absolute last thing I want to talk about today. But, I'm compelled in the face of what I see as immense harm being done to students.
Yesterday, I wrote a piece about Course Hero. You can read it here:
karenraycosta.medium.com/we-dont-need-a…
I want to be as transparent as possible and encourage you to take nothing I say at face value. Don't trust me. Trust what you see.
To that end, here's how I've profited thus far from talking about Course Hero, for any who might wonder about my motivations. $1.19. Profit report from Medium s...
Read 16 tweets
Jan 24, 2022
great #OnlineLearning isn't necessarily media-rich. it's connection-rich.

the LEAST engaging online courses I've taken have been media-rich and connection-poor.
I see a lot of #HigherEd LD postings that seem to misunderstand this. That worries me.

pedagogy before tech
people before pedagogy

#OnlineLearning
btw all of this is covered in the research on effective #OnlineLearning particularly the work of xu and jaggars scholar.google.com/citations?user…
Read 4 tweets
Nov 19, 2021
so I woke up thinking about the "rigor wars," as one does
and I kind of feel like the debate over rigor, not to be dramatic, but it feels symptomatic of a (the?) battle for the soul of higher education
I want to give this "what do we talk about" a v.2. -our own educational trauma -the way we were taught -lack of
Read 10 tweets
Nov 18, 2021
I don't disagree with anything in this piece. What I find really interesting is the assumption that those of us who are advocating for caring pedagogy, grounded in a balance b/t support and challenge, have at any point become less rigorous.

#HigherEd
#ToxicRigor
And that to me is the mark of #ToxicRigor. When someone points to flexibility, humanizing, and support and says, "You're dumbing things down" or "You've sacrificed rigor," there's just no evidence of that, so something else is up.

#HigherEd
Read 8 tweets

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