\n<\/p>\n
I\u00a0get a good handful of requests every year to blurb forthcoming books in the education space, many from people I\u00a0know and some from people with whom I\u2019m unacquainted. I\u00a0turn down most of the latter category because of the pressures of time, but a book called Teaching for Slow Hope: Place Based Learning in College and Beyond<\/em> by Douglas Haynes grabbed my attention, and once I\u00a0started reading it, I\u00a0knew I\u00a0would be finishing it and offering my endorsement: \u201cThe transactional nature of college where students experience a system of indefinite future reward has now failed multiple generations. Teaching Toward Slow Hope<\/em> shows that there is a different path: one rooted in community, shared purpose, and mutual exchange. We\u2019d be wise to heed this call.\u201d<\/p>\n This is a particularly timely book as we think about what\u2019s essential for humans to nurture as the pressure for AI\u00a0automation is exerted on our labor and institutions. I\u00a0was pleased that Haynes was open to answering some of my questions about the genesis and execution of the book.<\/p>\n Haynes is a professor of English at the University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh. He is the author of a narrative nonfiction book, Every Day We Live Is the Future: Surviving in a City of Disasters<\/em>, as well as Last Word<\/em>, a chapbook of poetry. You can learn more on his website.<\/p>\n John Warner: I\u2019m curious about the roots of the book, what in your experiences as a professor, as a human being, directed you toward writing a book like this.<\/strong><\/p>\n Douglas Haynes: <\/strong>I\u00a0teach environmental humanities and writing, including a lot of personal narrative writing. I\u00a0get to know students well through their writing and through sustained conversations about their lives and concerns both in and out of the classroom. I\u00a0consider this a good fortune of teaching the subjects I\u00a0teach, and learning students\u2019 stories helps me teach them more effectively. <\/p>\n But it also presents pedagogical challenges. Many of my students at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh are one family, health or financial obstacle away from dropping out of college. Their lives are often peppered with traumas ranging from poverty to mental illness to the impacts of the opioid crisis. On top of that, most of them work long hours and\/or care for family members. I\u00a0need to take all this into consideration when I\u00a0teach, because the circumstances of their lives on any given day can dramatically affect their ability to engage and learn. But the way most college teachers (including me) were trained to focus on content delivery and assessment doesn\u2019t sufficiently account for that.<\/p>\n So, one root of this book is my recognition that I\u00a0needed to reimagine what matters most in my own teaching. I\u00a0wanted to better help my students thrive as whole people, both in college and beyond. And I\u00a0wanted to find paths to address a sense of disempowerment I\u00a0often hear from them. They\u2019re confronting a precarious future\u2014economically, socially, ecologically\u2014and I\u00a0felt like I\u00a0had been trained to help them understand these precarities but not to learn how to live with them meaningfully. I\u00a0had notions about how to do this, but I\u00a0felt like I\u00a0needed models, so I\u00a0went out looking for them.<\/p>\n In terms of my own life and the roots of the book, I\u00a0reached a sort of rock bottom during the COVID-19 pandemic through isolation and online teaching. No matter how hard I\u00a0tried to design engaging online courses, I\u00a0lost the joy of human connection and deliberative spaces that in-person teaching creates. This motivated me to prioritize learning how to build relationships through college classes. <\/p>\n I\u00a0remembered how joyful and transformative leading community-based study abroad courses was for me and my students a decade earlier, and I\u00a0wanted to recreate that locally to give more students (and myself) access to this kind of experience. As I\u00a0get older and the social fabric frays in American society, creating community through education matters to me more and more. Likewise, fostering attention to the physical world as life becomes more and more mediated by technology. My students are thirsty for this, and so am I. So, the book was a way of mapping possibilities for how we (and all educators and students) can meet to mutually create community and new forms of attention. <\/p>\n Q: As a whole, the book takes aim at and seeks an alternative to the \u201ctransactional\u201d nature of our education system. This is something I\u2019ve been thinking and writing about for years because I\u00a0first noticed the problem not in my students\u2019 writing skills, but their attitudes toward writing, where they put together a few moves or tricks in service of a grade. What are some of the specific signs of this system you saw in your work?<\/strong><\/p>\n A: <\/strong>My answer to this begins with what I\u00a0see in my own students the first weeks of class. They are trained to sit quietly and passively absorb information. And many, they tell me, are terrified to talk because they would be ashamed to voice a wrong answer to a question. They\u2019ve been taught that education is about regurgitating correct answers. In this climate, open conversation, critical thinking, reflection and taking risks that lead to learning are difficult.<\/p>\n I\u00a0also see signs of the transactional nature of our education system in students\u2019 attitudes toward general education. Though many tell me they found a passion they didn\u2019t know they had in gen ed classes or enjoy learning more in humanities classes where discussion is prioritized, they also vocally resent classes that don\u2019t clearly contribute to their major or career. I\u00a0chalk up this contradiction mostly to the high cost of college, which forces students into seeing only return on investment in their education.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve also increasingly begun noticing and reading about the shift in students\u2019 expectations about education since the No Child Left Behind Act required mandatory, high-stakes standardized testing in 2001. I\u00a0think standardized testing has reinforced students\u2019 sense that education is about going through the motions to get a grade. And I\u00a0agree with Steven Volk and Beth Benedix, who say in their book The Post-Pandemic Liberal Arts College<\/em> that \u201cOur students are collectively burnt out. We have burned them out.\u201d<\/p>\n I\u2019m alarmed about this situation because it lends itself perfectly to the proliferating use of so-called artificial intelligence tools (as you\u2019ve written insightfully about, John). Of course, students want to use these tools to cut corners because they\u2019re emotionally and financially taxed and their schooling has taught them that all that matters is a right answer or [a] polished product. I\u00a0don\u2019t blame students one bit for using AI under these conditions. What needs to change is the conditions we ask students to learn in. That\u2019s one reason I\u00a0wrote this book. <\/p>\n Q: I\u00a0also want to ask about how and why you decided to root the book is what is really a kind of sociological\/ethnographic fieldwork. You go investigating. How much did you know about what you were looking for when you started? Were you looking for evidence of notions you already had or were you starting from closer to scratch?<\/strong><\/p>\n A: <\/strong>As a creative nonfiction writer and journalist, I\u00a0view research as firsthand observation and interviewing. My first book, Every Day We Live Is the Future<\/em>, is based on immersion journalism\u2014intentionally following people in their life and work, noticing, listening and asking questions. In Teaching Toward Slow Hope<\/em>, I\u00a0wanted to apply this same approach to higher education. <\/p>\n This would allow me to provide a felt sense of different learning environments and foreground student and teacher perspectives. This is a novel approach to writing about college, so I\u00a0thought it would add some helpful elements to national conversations about the purpose and value of higher education. I\u00a0thought it would add overlooked voices and experiences (especially from the kinds of regional institutions most college students attend), as well as the often-missing contexts of students\u2019 lives and emotions. On-the-ground reporting also enabled me to make the places of learning come alive as teachers in their own right, I\u00a0hope. This is essential, in my view, for writing about place-based education.<\/p>\n As for what I\u00a0was looking for, I\u00a0began with a broad desire to witness courses and programs that model how to foster hope and purpose through learning in college. I\u00a0wanted to have a better answer to my students\u2019 persistent questions about whether college is worth it given its financial and psychological costs and the difficulty of imagining livable futures. This meant looking for models that help students address concerns about equity, ecological crisis and well-being. I\u00a0wanted to learn from others thinking about the question of \u201cWhat is college for?\u201d in terms of what would help students thrive. <\/p>\n I\u00a0also wanted to learn more about how to center community and connection with the physical world in college classes. How much I\u00a0knew about what I\u00a0would find depended somewhat on the place and stage of my research. Early on in my research process at UW Milwaukee and UW Madison, I\u00a0was just soaking up these exciting ways of working with students outside the classroom and then sifting through what I\u00a0gathered for key practices and pedagogical principles. At the same time, I\u00a0was reading books and articles that influenced what I\u00a0was looking for. So, by the time I\u00a0visited Kalamazoo Valley Community College and Northland College, I\u00a0had a sense that I\u00a0was looking for vivid examples of collaboration and embodied learning and that these schools would fit the bill. They did and then some. But I\u00a0also want to add that all four of the programs I\u00a0reported on surprised me in positive ways and shared all of the teaching practices I\u00a0highlight in the book. <\/p>\n Q: The book is organized around what I\u2019ve come to think of as \u201ccapacities\u201d\u2014listening, reciprocity, collaboration, wandering\u2014that you see as ways to nourish hope. Maybe take one of them and help readers understand its specific importance and application. <\/strong><\/p>\n A: <\/strong>These capacities are interrelated and not neatly separable. But for the sake of organizing my material and detailing each capacity in action, I\u00a0focus on only one in each story of a place-based learning program in this book. I\u2019ll highlight one here, collaboration. <\/p>\n One way I\u2019m trying to reframe the purpose of higher education in this book is by showing how college can prepare students for what anthropologist Anna Tsing calls \u201ccollaborative survival\u201d in an age of intersecting crises. \u201cWithout collaborations,\u201d Tsing writes, \u201cwe all die.\u201d <\/p>\n In other words, collaboration, in both a social and biological sense, determines who we are. Yet most courses students encounter when they\u2019re trying to better understand who they are and what they can do in the world don\u2019t prioritize teaching collaboration. Instead, they focus on performance of individual cognitive tasks. As a result, the illusion of separateness students (and most of us in the U.S.) suffer from is compounded. This not only feels bad and lonely but can be disempowering. A logical response to a complex public problem in this situation is throwing your hands up and saying, \u201cI\u2019m only one person. There\u2019s nothing I\u00a0can do.\u201d<\/p>\n So what does training for collaborative survival look like in college? I\u00a0found a marvelous model at Kalamazoo Valley Community College in Kalamazoo, Mich. This college\u2019s decade-old Bronson Healthy Living Campus has become a national leader in hands-on education that integrates allied health programs, a culinary school and sustainable brewing program, and a food hub, urban farm and sustainable horticulture program. There, working together to solve problems is baked in not only to individual classes but to the whole campus and its work in the community. <\/p>\n The campus aims to improve public health in the area and create a sustainable local food system. Its programs are linked to local institutions including a hospital, senior center, farms and schools. This regional network of collaboration is mirrored by the daily work of students, faculty and staff. Culinary students learn about food systems by working on the urban farm and in the campus food hub. Nursing students learn to cook with crops grown on campus for units on food as medicine. Students and staff grow, plan and pack weekly free boxes of food for any student who wants one. <\/p>\n So, when I\u00a0discuss collaboration in this book, I\u2019m not just talking about assigning students to do more group projects. This, too, is important work that builds students\u2019 communication and listening skills, as well as empathy, organization and more. But I\u2019m trying to expand the scope of how we imagine collaboration in college. What if, for example, we designed campuses, classrooms and courses around how to create relationships, enhance wonder and address community problems rather than around how to convey information?<\/p>\n My experiences at Kalamazoo Valley taught me that this is possible and helps students feel invested in their community. Time and again at Kalamazoo Valley, I\u00a0heard students say they felt cared for at the college and wanted to stay and work there. This is powerful testimony for the importance of collaboration in creating belonging, which we know is also a key to student success.<\/p>\n Q: The book is set among three regional universities\/colleges, one community college and one state flagship (University of Wisconsin at Madison). Did you notice any differences among students in these different institutions?<\/strong><\/p>\n A: <\/strong>Students everywhere are often dealing with mental health issues, financial stress and difficulty imagining a livable future. However, the students I\u00a0encountered at UW Madison, which has become an elite public institution, stood out from the others I\u00a0worked with. They weren\u2019t all more privileged by any means, but they had access to a range of opportunities and resources that the students I\u00a0collaborated with elsewhere for the most part didn\u2019t have: scholarships, internships, volunteer experiences, a huge range of events and activities, robust student health and wellness services and facilities. Even nap pods and free transportation to community-based learning sites. One UW Madison student I\u00a0interviewed described college as \u201ca fantasy land of all these possibilities.\u201d <\/p>\n This sense of possibility in college also translated into a sense of possibility for meaningful careers, even amongst first-year students. I\u00a0heard some of this from students at UW Milwaukee and Northland College, as well, but their sense of self-efficacy was not generally as well developed, and their campuses were not nearly as stocked with seemingly endless supports. <\/p>\n The percentage of first-generation and low-income students at UW Madison is also significantly lower than at the other campuses I\u00a0visited. Knowing this and seeing the possibilities offered to UW Madison students that my own UW Oshkosh students up the road could never dream of was difficult. The amazing community-based learning, first-year seminar I\u00a0observed at UW Madison had two instructors, a teaching assistant and a team of community collaborators for 15 students. At UW Oshkosh, first-year seminars have 25 students with one instructor. Required community-based learning classes with 50 students were just eliminated from UW Oshkosh\u2019s general education curriculum due to their cost. <\/p>\n This is just one example of how the inequalities in higher education are stark and growing starker. And these inequalities typically impact the students who are least prepared for college the most. <\/p>\n That said, the resources Kalamazoo Valley Community College was able to offer its students\u2014many of them nontraditional\u2014impressed me. Many students there told me the college found ways to keep them enrolled during the COVID-19 pandemic when they had no income. And the community partnerships the college maintains provide abundant opportunities for experiential learning in real-world settings. I\u00a0left there inspired to see predominantly low-income and first-generation students given a great sense of possibility as well.<\/p>\n Q: Last, we should talk about the importance of \u201cslow\u201d here. Why should we acknowledge and even embrace the idea of slow<\/em> hope?<\/strong><\/p>\n A: <\/strong>First, I\u00a0want to acknowledge the German historian Christof Mauch, who wrote an essay called \u201cSlow Hope.\u201d This essay argues that we too often overlook the hopeful progress toward social and ecological change around us because it typically unfolds slowly in fits and spurts. To appreciate how, in Mauch\u2019s words, \u201cvisions of a better world have become reality,\u201d he says we need to appreciate how hope gathers \u201csometimes invisibly and often despite great setbacks.\u201d<\/p>\n This perspective resonates deeply with my experience of education, both as a student and teacher. Education, at its heart, is a story. Lessons unfold through actions, characters, dialogue, thought and more, all linked to an overarching plot of ways to enact what our society (or any given school) thinks is important. <\/p>\n Like all stories, education slyly inculcates values. It does this through gradual and cumulative reinforcement. We could have a long discussion about what these values are and how they\u2019re imparted. But no matter what ideological angle you view education from, it\u2019s a process of slow social transformation. I\u00a0find this empowering, especially in an age of speed-obsessed techno-austerity. Embracing slow hope in higher education returns it to one of its original purposes: cultivating whole people who can shape their society together for the better. This process never finishes. Sometimes it sputters. But college can jump-start it and nurture it for a life.<\/p>\n There\u2019s another importance to slowness, especially important right now as higher education navigates setbacks. Fast facilitates destruction, as we\u2019ve seen in national politics recently and in the politics of austerity playing out in higher education (\u201caggressive timeline\u201d has become a catchphrase in the University of Wisconsin system, for example, that indicates system administrators want to quickly force through a far-reaching change without much discussion). <\/p>\n Slow is the speed of deliberation, reflection and democracy. It takes time to build relationships that enable communities to work together. The educational models I\u00a0observed writing this book showed me that teaching this kind of slowness\u2014against the tide of technological and institutional disruption\u2014is life-affirming and motivating for students.<\/p>\n Finally, on a more personal level, my students tell me regularly they need slowdowns. I\u00a0think creating educational settings that encourage students to practice paying attention to something other than the next task or the next image in their feed is essential work. This requires slowing down to connect with each other and connect with place. This, too, is part of exercising slow hope. It fosters resilience to keep going. That\u2019s what slow hope is all about.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I\u00a0get a good handful of requests every year to blurb forthcoming books in the education space, many from people I\u00a0know and some from people with whom I\u2019m unacquainted. I\u00a0turn down most of the latter category because of the pressures of time, but a book called Teaching for Slow Hope: Place Based Learning in College and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46482,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[1980,496,495,3831],"class_list":{"0":"post-46481","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-education","8":"tag-book","9":"tag-education","10":"tag-higher","11":"tag-points"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46481","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46481"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46481\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/46482"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}