December 2, 2025

In this issue:

Commencement Dates
My Neighbor's Voice
End of Term Reminders
Lab Faculty Information and Resources
Learning From Experience Update
Faculty Spotlight

2025-2026 Academic Calendar

Upcoming Dates

Dec 8-13: Exhibition Week!

Dec 13: Last day of Fall Semester classes

Dec 14 - Jan 10: Winter Break

Dec 18: Fall Sessions 2 and 3 Grades due

Jan 12: Spring Semester 1 and 3 Sessions begin

2026 Commencement Dates

Announcements will be sent to students this week.

Rhode Island – Friday, May 8, 6 p.m. EST
Philadelphia – Saturday, May 16, 12 p.m. EST
Chicago – Sunday, May 24, time TBD
South Carolina – Sunday, May 31, time TBD
Washington – Sunday, June 7, 1 p.m. PST

Faculty shared resource!

My Neighbor's Voice

My Neighbor's Voice is a resource that can be used to help approach emotionally charged topics. My Neighbor's Voice uses Listening Cards and a Facilitated format, to provide a safe and hospitable space in which everyone is invited to share their personal stories, thoughts, and opinions about how to best live together. It’s through deeply listening that we deeply connect, and when we are connected, we are resilient. My Neighbor's Voice can be likened to our Storyircles. They are hosting an Online Story Table in January and February 2026 if you are interested. Feel free to register if you think it would be helpful to see the method in action.

Learn more here

End of Term Reminders

Final Evaluations

Please complete final narrative evaluations for your students. Guidance on providing feedback is available from the Faculty Support Site.
Remind students to complete final course evaluations. Links to submit a final evaluation is in the last week of your Moodle course.

Final Grades

Grades for Session 2 & 3 courses are due in Campus Cafe by 5pm EST on December 18
Instructions on entering grades in Campus Cafe
Note the Incomplete Policy in the Academic Catalog and use the form here to submit an incomplete for a student

Review the Grade and Evaluation Submission Guidelines.

All Faculty Reminders

Faculty Absence and Late Arrival

Review important processes for what to do if you are going to be absent or late for a scheduled class.

These processes include:

Instructions for lab faculty
Instructions for instructional faculty
Procedures for inclement weather impacting classes
Important contacts & forms for notifying CU staff of alternate class arrangements

Your feedback is needed

- Moodle Usage Survey

For continuous improvement of our Moodle training materials we ask you to take a 5 minute Moodle usage survey.

Lab Faculty

Public Exhibitions!

Week 16 Exhibitions are public! Students should be inviting guests to attend and be a part of their learning journey and continued project development.

Staff also join and participate in Exhibitions. Please confirm your plan for final public exhibitions via this form if you haven't do so already.

A few tips for successful exhibitions facilitation

Encourage your 'hype person' for each presentation to bring up the energy. Show these videos in preparation:
Magic Man!
Everybody deserves this kind of hype!
Students feeling nervous about Exhibitions, share this video!
Choose your Feedback process: (Hype person should be facilitating this for the presenter!)
Liz Lerman: Statements of Meaning, Artist as Questioner, Neutral Questions, and Permissioned Opinions

Melorah: 1. Quick & Specific appreciation of work then a 2. Question, connection, resource or permissioned opinion to move work forward.
Student generated tips from the Project Push Week site

Learning from Experience Condensed

OLC220 Learning From Experience will now be offered in an 8 week format (formerly 16).
Multiple sections of ELT250 Learning In Public Portfolio Development will be offered to support students through this transition.
OLC220 is a prerequisite for ELT250.

Please encourage your students to enroll in ELT250 Learning In Public Portfolio Development if they would like additional guidance completing Big 10s and LIPs after finishing OLC220 Learning From Experience.

Big 10 Assessment

Big 10s to Assess in your Inbox?

This resource page will help refresh your memory around Big 10 assessment!

Student/Cohort Resources

Registration & Advising Sessions

If you are a new lab faculty member with advising questions or a returning lab faculty who wants to deepen your understanding around advising, please join us for one of the upcoming Advising Sessions. All lab faculty are invited to join either session.

January 15, 6-7 p.m. EST

January 29, 6-7 p.m. EST: TEP focus

Lab Faculty Drop-ins

Thurs, December 18, 6-7:30 p.m. EST

See the full Faculty Support calendar here.

Visit the Lab Faculty Page of the Faculty Resource site

Faculty Spotlight

Dr. Hannah Jardine, Instructional Faculty

What do you teach at CU?

Special Topics in Science courses: Food Justice and Teaching Methods in Science

Why do you teach at CU?

I love working with CU students because they have such rich personal and professional experiences to bring to our courses, and these experiences greatly enhance class discussion and the projects they do. For instance, in my Food Justice course they work on "Wasted Food Solutions" Projects where they explore a problem or issue related to wasted food in their community and work towards solutions. The projects they do are so incredible! For instance, former students have started composting or share tables at the schools they work at, transformed cooking and food storage practices at home with their families, or worked with local retailers to set up food redistribution.

What teaching strategies have worked for you?

I always start and end my courses with a personal journaling assignment where I ask students about their ideas, beliefs, and experiences coming into the course and leaving the course. It helps me to get to know them and understand how the course is impacting their learning and it helps them to be more metacognitive and self-aware of their learning and growth. I let them know in the syllabus "Guided reflection will help you to recognize how what you are learning in the course is impacting you and provide you with the language to share that impact with others."