News – Page 2 – LAHC Dean's Blog

ACC Honors Partners with UT: Civic Leadership Training for Honors Students

“There is no power for change greater than a community discovering what it cares about.”
Margaret J. Wheatley, “Turning to One Another”

As I consider my education thus far, I often recall the question that haunted my grade school classrooms: “When will I use this in real life?”

While I heard this in nearly all subjects, liberal arts courses were particularly judged for an apparent (to my group of high school peers, at least) lack of pertinence. I did not think about how my liberal arts courses played a role as I waited in line to vote last month in the same way I know I’ll apply algebra to halve tonight’s dinner recipe. However, civic engagement, the effort to understand and address the values and needs of our communities, is a prominent example of how aspects of the liberal arts are present in our daily lives. Civic engagement plays a unique role in a liberal arts education as an opportunity for a student’s personal context, their academic training, and their community’s needs to all intermingle to produce new understanding and potentially, new solutions to problems both personal and global.

The pandemic has put significant constraints on the ability to engage one’s community, yet many incredible people have fought to keep our networks together and, despite it all, even new connections and opportunities have been created. Among these is a new partnership between the ACC Honors Program and the University of Texas which facilitates civic leadership training for ACC Honors students.

Taught by nationally-recognized UT faculty members Dr. Molly Wiebe and Dr. Lorna Hermosura, UT’s Youth and Community Studies program is offering 40 ACC Honors students free online workshops centered around community building, restorative practices, and civic leadership. Students who complete all five workshops will receive a certificate of completion and transfer advising, as well as an invitation to apply for a paid internship with UT GEAR UP.

UT GEAR UP’s one-week internship serves as an opportunity for students to apply their newly acquired analytical skills and techniques for community building and engagement to guide students from high needs schools as they explore career and college readiness. ACC interns will lead workshops, lessons, and team building activities throughout the camp while working alongside UT faculty and staff and will receive a field-based learning certificate for their work.

Online workshops will be conducted on the following Fridays: January 29^th, February 5^th, March 5^th, April 2^nd, and May 7^th. All will take place from 1:00-3:00 pm, with the February workshop being slightly longer. The deadline for ACC Honors students to apply is December 10th, 2020. Students must have taken at least one Honors course or be registered in an Honors course for the Spring 2021 semester.

This opportunity will only be available for a maximum of 40 applicants, so apply to become a YCS Fellow and join the program today here! All majors are welcome!

Conflict Transformation Fundamentals: A 5-Part Webinar Series

Among the words used thus far to describe 2020, there are two that capture it well: tense and illuminating. As our values as a society are brought into question, what we are being asked as individuals is inherently uncomfortable. For better or for worse, these questions of who we are and what we think seem inescapable. As we attempt to reflect on not only on our own behavior, but extend the conversation to our families, our friends, our neighbors, and our leaders, it won’t take long to reach someone (if that someone isn’t also us to begin with) who has already raised their walls and entered a moral fight-or-flight mode—challenges to our values create a visceral discomfort so strong that is hard to set aside, analyze, or (if you can imagine!) eventually appreciate this discomfort. Instead, it can be easier to protect ourselves, lash out, or dig deeper into the ground where future challenges to our ideals cannot affect us so strongly again. We are in daily conflict not only with those of opposing values, but with ourselves and our own prejudices, decisions, and actions.

Announcement concerning COVID-19

Echoes and spaces

Echoes and Spaces, New Paintings by Shawn Camp and Lana Waldrep-Appl

From the February 2, 2020 press release:

“We walk around in a world filled with little moments of clarity amongst a dense fog of existence. Tiny bits of connection, something that feels like déjà vu, arise and form echoes in our experiences.

Detail from Camp’s “I Take Everything as a Good Sign,” 2020

“In Echoes and Spaces, Lana Waldrep-Appl and Shawn Camp explore the feelings of the sublime that happen in those moments when you allow yourself to completely reside inside of the space you are
in. These paintings feel like daydreaming, an activity that takes place primarily when doing nothing. Both artists are interested in exploring the something-ness of nothing. Camp makes paintings of air and space; imagery devoid of solid forms. That nothingness is framed through subtle geometric divisions and contradictory hints of color. Through translucence and refraction, the shimmering surfaces convey a sense of atmosphere and explore the mystery of light, matter, and space. Waldrep-Appl makes paintings of nothing spaces—places of waiting, landscapes that drone by during a commute, visual white noise, the places between places where things happen. These spaces are never flat. A gray is never just gray. Varied chromatic grays, near whites, and unanticipated pastels invite viewers to see there is more to these ignorable spaces.”

Exhibition Dates: February 28, 2020 – March 28, 2020
Opening Reception: Friday, February 28, 7-10 pm
Canopy: Friday, March 6, 7-10 pm

Gallery Hours: Fridays & Saturdays, 12-6 pm or by appointment
- For appointments: email info@icosacollective.com, or call 512-920-2062
ICOSA Collective Gallery
- 916 Springdale Rd, Bldg 2, #102
- Austin, TX 78702
http:www.icosacollective.com
icosacollective@gmail.com

Free opera tickets!

First, in case you haven’t heard about Excursions, let me catch you up. Each semester the LA Gateway hosts events that are the opposite of extracurricular: These are events designed to move students from the study of liberal arts in their classes into a larger world where liberal arts forms the foundation for intellectual and creative work.

This spring, the theme for our Excursions series is “Art and Adaptation,” using James’s novella, The Turn of the Screw, as a case study. Here’s the announcement on our Gateway site:

http://gateway.acclahc.org/2020/02/01/announcing-spring-2020-excursion/

We’re encouraging Gateway faculty and students to read James’s novella and experience two additional works of art inspired by that “original,” a film and an opera. Our first Excursion experience is coming soon, at the end of February. The opera workshop of the Butler School of Music is performing Benjamin Britten’s chamber opera, The Turn of the Screw, and I have 20 free tickets, courtesy of the Butler School of Music, for our Gateway students, for the performance Thursday, February 27, 7:30 to 9:45 PM. The performance will be in the McCullough Theater on the UT Campus. (There are two other performances; see the Butler School of Music announcement for details.)

I will be holding a drawing for these 20 free tickets on Monday, February 17. If you have students who are interested in one of the free tickets, please have them email excursion@gateway.acclahc.org on their ACC student email account and include the following information:

Subject heading: Britten Opera Excursion

Student’s name

LA Gateway course

Phone number

Entries must be received no later than Monday, February 17 at 12:00 noon.

I will notify students of the ticket winners the evening of Monday, Feb 17. Students must confirm with me within 48 hours that they are able to attend the performance. I will continue to draw names from the entries if students do not confirm, until there are no more tickets.

Thank you for supporting the LA Gateway!

Announcing: Spring 2020 Excursion

Collier’s Weekly, illustration by John La Farge – Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Yale University

Join us for an exploration of the ways in which a work of art in one genre can inspire a work of art in another genre. In this spring’s series of LA Gateway events, Henry James’s novella, The Turn of the Screw serves as a case study, as we examine the relationship between the “original” and its “adaptation” into two “new” works of art, the 1961 film, The Innocents, and Benjamin Britten’s 1954 chamber opera, The Turn of the Screw. Are these “new” works of art imitations? Adaptations? Or might it be appropriate to call them translations? Join the discussion!

We invite you to read James’s novella, which is easily available (here at Gutenerg, for instance) and join one of our discussion panels. We also encourage you to see Britten’s opera, which will be in production by the Butler School of Music opera workshop Feb 27 through Mar 1 at UT’s McCullough Theater. And stay tuned for the movie, which we will show in April — followed by a discussion led by a film historian.

Dates and places to follow!

Bats to Bevos!

Hey, Riverbats! How about becoming a Bevo? UT’s College of Education may be just the magic you need!

Join us Thursday, January 30, 4:00 to 8:00 PM, for a recruitment fair at the Highland Campus, building 4000 Courtyard. Meet department reps, hear from UT Ed students, get admission info, find out how to transfer seamlessly to the C of Ed—everything you need to know about becoming a Bevo!

Spread the word. Tell your friends and fellow Riverbats!

Planning to come? Let us know on Facebook.

What is the Liberal Arts Gateway?

Now that LA Gateway-designated courses are appearing in the course schedule, people are asking: What is the LA Gateway? Here’s the philosophical framework, distilled.

The Liberal Arts Gateway

Aspiration

The Liberal Arts can save civilization by equipping students to thrive in a pluralistic society through deep engagement in our disciplines.

Guiding Values

Student centered course designs
Equity and inclusion build into all facets of the course, from recruitment to materials and assignments and beyond
Responsiveness to downpath stakeholders: What needs will our students face in next course, the degree plan, transfer institution/employer, career, family, community, and ultimately, The Good Life? Have those needs in mind when you build your course.

Five P’s of Intellectual Character

Build opportunities to practice these verbs into your course, talk about them explicitly, and model them every class period.

Persevere: Don’t give up — in this assignment, in this course, in a conversation, in a line of inquiry, in the pursuit of truth, or in the work of saving civilization.
Progress: Learn how to gauge progress for yourself — benchmarks, indicators, self-reflection, honesty (with yourself, above all). We stand on the shoulders of giants, but give yourself credit for climbing up there to have a look.
Produce meaningful intellectual work — and challenge yourself to do better work every next time.
Promote the fruits of your work to others — both as a courageous attempt to say something true and as an invitation to hear others critique your work.
Perpetuate these traits, deepen them into habits of mind, and expand them to encompass more and more of your intellectual life.

A few course design suggestions

Talk to your colleagues! This philosophical framework keeps us focused on student needs and the student experience, but saving civilization requires encountering the disciplinarity of our disciplines.
Organize your course around a theme and meaningful questions
Explicitly talk about a toolkit for your discipline
Use (real) case studies
Include at least one self-reflective assignment (a moment for students to step back and take stock of the transformative experience in your course)

Collaborate and Celebrate

Today is a day to celebrate for our Communication Studies department! As a result of efforts to integrate SPCH1315 with workforce program requirements, we have a “combined” course so students can take either SPCH1315 or COMG1009.

Even better, we just registered our very first workforce student!

This is a great example of the way we can serve student pathways when we think outside the academic box.

Thanks to Theresa and the CommS gang!

Cultural Benefits of learning French

Attention ACC! Our French program is growing to meet the demands of the digital world. For the first time, we’re offering French 1411 online through Distance learning in Spring 2020. We’re also creating an online 1412 for the following semester for those looking to go further into the program. This program is being built from the ground up for all students.

Reasons to learn French are immense. On top of the overall benefits of learning a 2nd language does to our brains. French is the 6th most spoken language and the 2nd most learned language in the world after English. French is the official working language of the United Nations, NATO, UNESCO, EU, OECD, UIA, the International Olympic Committee, the International Labor Bureau, & the International Red Cross. If you’re looking to get into the Tech world, France is a major exporter of High-end technological products to the U.S. French is also a fast-growing language as Africa is projected to expand into an economic powerhouse. French is spoken in 31 African countries as a 1st or 2nd language.