photo credit: quoteswave.com
I value relevant, deeply ingrained literary experiences at every step of the educational process—from formal beginnings in K-12 environments through the self-directed learning opportunities that continuously present throughout our lives.
My goal is to make sure the value of literature, language, and communication underscores everything I do as a designer, educator, evaluator, and trainer. When teaching or writing, I maximize my understanding of and passion for the English language to create thought-provoking, teachable moments. When training and evaluating, I seek out opportunities to optimize the role of communication and critical thinking in identifying and addressing the needs of an organization and key stakeholders. When mentoring and relationship building, I strive to empower and encourage my peers through modeling emphatic, equitable dialogue and composition skills.
In short, I strive to communicate that words matter.
But I cannot achieve this goal individually. At each step of the process—formal or informal—one must consider the presence and influence of community. The community not only acts as an initiator of the educative process by spurring action in response to a need or perceived absence of subject matter, but, just as importantly, the community reflects back the target population's values and preferred learning styles. Education is shaped by the people we want to become and the kind society in which we want to live.
As an educator and designer, I recognize the symbiotic nature between education and community cannot be underestimated.
The dynamic, collaborative learning environment created through the intersection of community and education represents a continuum of empowerment: vigilance in seeking out and improving educative experiences is necessary for social justice and personal growth. Neglect of this continuum leads to social apathy and unmitigated denial of the importance of critical thinking and constructive criticism. And so my professional focus also centers on creating equitable, inclusive, accessible educational opportunities to strike a balance between education as a catalyst for change and education as a necessary foundation for empathy.
I strive to build connections between all stakeholders in the learning continuum.
Examples of ways in which I incorporate my beliefs into my professional practices run the gamut from designing collaborative teaching models to the promotion of multimodal multiliteracies to rethinking the realms of academic motivation. But I prioritize strong pedagogical decision-making first and foremost to promote a collaborative growth mindset at all stages of the educational process and throughout all organizational levels.
While no one educator or evaluator can be responsible for ensuring the development of a community-based educational philosophy, the ultimate challenge and reward of a collaborative, growth mindset-oriented learning environment generates a momentum that reaches far beyond one generation of teachers and learners.
It is my mission to be a driving member of this positive force.