Early Career Religion Faculty Teaching Undergraduates (Hybrid)

Description

This hybrid workshop invites early career faculty from diverse scholarly specializations and institutional contexts to join a relational community committed to creating a collaborative learning cohort. We will focus on:

• navigating the intersections of identities—e.g., race, class, gender, sexuality, ability, age, religion, and political affiliation—in and outside the classroom
• designing strategies for effective teaching and advising within one’s institutional context
• negotiating career and personal trajectories, especially in the wake of pandemics
• forging counter communities for surviving and thriving in the Euro-American academy.

The hybrid workshop will gather for seven online sessions and an in-person summer session at Wabash Center. Sessions will include small group and plenary discussions, structured and unstructured social time, and time for personal and communal growth, relaxation, restoration, and shared meals.

Goals

• To build a community for collaboration and conversation around teaching and learning
• To reflect on outside realities that shape educational environments for faculty and students
• To examine the politics and pressures of teaching and learning in higher education
• To consider the conditions that enable flourishing in professional and personal life

Participant Eligibility

• Tenure track, continuing term, and/or full-time contingency 
• 1-6 years of teaching experience in a full-time, tenure track or other continuing position
• Job description or contract that is wholly or primarily inclusive of teaching 
• Teaching religion, religious studies, or theology in an accredited college or university in the United States, Puerto Rico, or Canada 
• Doctoral degree awarded by January 2023 
• Tenure decision (if applicable) no earlier than January of 2024 
• Institutional support and personal commitment to participate fully in all workshop sessions.

Application Materials

Please complete and attach the following documents to the online application:

1. Application Contact Information form 

2. Cover letter:  

• An introductory letter that describes your teaching context and addresses why you want to be part of this collaborative community, including what you hope to get out of it, and what you might contribute to it. (Up to 500 words) 

3. Brief essay:  

• Describe a critical moment that pushed you to think more deeply about the intersections of identities within your teaching. What happened and how did you respond? (Up to 250 words)
• Describe a strategy that you developed for surviving the pandemics of the past few years. (Up to 250 words) 

4. Academic CV (4-page limit) 

5. A letter of institutional support for your full participation in this workshop from your Department Chair, Academic Dean, Provost, Vice President, or President. Please have this recommendation uploaded directly to your application according to the online application instructions.