· Web viewThe application is a 1-page (300 word) essay answering the following prompt: “What do you think should be the role of a student co-leader in Seminar? Explain your

The Seminar Co-Leader Program

Description

The Co-Leader Program gives outstanding students the chance to co-lead a Seminar course alongside an experienced faculty mentor. Student co-leaders receive hands-on leadership experience in the classroom, while engaging more deeply with the Seminar curriculum. Specifically:

Students further strengthen the skills and virtues cultivated in Seminar. Co-leaders hone their skills in oral communication and shared inquiry, and develop the virtues and habits of mind nurtured by Seminar. They also gain a deeper understanding of the Seminar texts.

Students learn to cultivate a professional relationship with a supportive faculty mentor.

Students learn to find their voices and relate to their peers in a new leadership role in the classroom.

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The program matches selected students to a Seminar faculty member who will mentor and support them as they continue to develop leadership skills. Every effort is made to ensure mutually beneficial relationships between student co-leaders and faculty mentors. Selected co-leaders help to facilitate discussion in a Seminar course they have already taken, typically Seminars 001, 002, 102, or 103.

Students who are selected to be co-leaders register in Sem 190, “Co-Leader Apprenticeship,” for a total of .50 credit and are asked to attend one or two training workshops. The course involves keeping up with the readings, attending classes, meeting with faculty mentors outside of class on a regular basis, and possibly holding office hours with students outside of class on a limited basis. Co-leaders do not do writing assignments or evaluate other students' participation or work.

Beyond co-leading in Seminar courses, the program offers a limited number of opportunities for experienced co-leaders to contribute to the Seminar Program by serving as student

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representatives on the Collegiate Seminar Governing Board. Student representatives attend monthly meetings and have full voting privileges. They may design an Informal Curriculum event and serve on other committees according to their interests. Chosen student representatives receive .25 credit for each semester of service.

Past student co-leaders have also drawn on their experiences in the classroom to apply to graduate schools and to work in other positions of leadership at Saint Mary’s and elsewhere.

Who is the Program For?

The program is open to motivated undergraduates who have excelled in their previous Seminar course(s). In particular, we seek students who can take responsibility for class discussions, and can help their peers learn from the texts and from each other.

Since Spring 2015, the program has attracted students from many backgrounds and majors, with a wide

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range of personal interests and professional goals. These include:

Students interested in careers in education

Students interested in careers in business

Students interested in applying to graduate and professional schools

Students who love Seminar!

Past student co-leaders have included majors in Archeology, Biology, English, Psychology, Business, Physics, Mathematics, Philosophy, and Environmental and Earth Science.

The program is ideal for students who have had a particularly transformative experience in Seminar, and who want to share that kind of experience with others.Work & Time Commitment

Being a co-leader for a Seminar course is a significant commitment. Co-leaders:

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Attend all classes during the semester

Read all texts for the class and prepare to facilitate discussions

Have regular meetings outside of class with faculty mentors, by mutual agreement

Possibly hold a limited number of office hours for students outside of class

Attend one or two training workshops

Applicants should carefully consider the work and time requirements before they commit to being a co-leader.Please note that the workload will vary depending on a number of factors:Seminars 001 and 102 have fewer readings than Seminars 002 and 103.Some co-leaders and faculty mentors find it helpful to meet as often as once a week for 15-30 minutes to debrief. Other pairs meet biweekly or as needed, and communicate by e-mail or phone. It is up to each pair to work out an arrangement that suits their schedules and approaches to Seminar.The office hours are strictly optional and

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it is up to you, in consultation with your faculty mentor, to decide whether to hold them.Extra Leadership Opportunities

The Collegiate Seminar program often collaborates and coordinates with other campus programs and services such as College Admissions and the Intercultural Center for events such as Night-n-Gael or workshop training. Student co-leaders are welcome and encouraged to contribute to these collaborative events, where student co-leaders will help give prospective students, incoming transfer students, and other members of the campus community a glimpse of the Seminar experience. By participating in these events, student co-leaders have an opportunity to share their skills and expand professional and leadership experiences. These campus activities and events allow for broader peer engagement, both extending and deepening community building beyond the classroom. Though not required, we encourage our student co-leaders to take advantage of these opportunities as they arise.

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Application Process

Our highest priority is to ensure mutually rewarding relationships between student co-leaders and faculty mentors. The matching process takes into consideration the number of available spots and scheduling issues. The most important consideration is compatibility.

In order to facilitate the matching process, interested students apply to be a co-leader in the semester before they wish to take the course.

The application process works as follows:

Each semester (around midterms) Seminar faculty are invited to nominate students whom they believe are qualified for the Co-Leader Program. Experienced student co-leaders may also nominate students. Students may nominate themselves by writing to the program coordinator.

Students who decide they would like to be co-leaders submit an online application to the coordinator by the due date specified on the application

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link (typically during the 9th or 10th week of classes). The application is a 1-page (300 word) essay answering the following prompt: “What do you think should be the role of a student co-leader in Seminar? Explain your answer by giving an example, drawn, from your own experience, of something that went well or that went poorly in a Seminar class.”

Applications should also include your name, major(s) and/or minor(s), year at Saint Mary’s, and a list of previously completed Seminar courses along with your professors’ names. Lastly, please indicate the Seminar(s) you would like to co-lead.

Students will be notified of the status of their applications in two to three weeks.

Contact Information

Rashaan Meneses, [email protected]

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Responsibilities of Student Co-Leaders

Your basic responsibility as a student co-leader is the same as your faculty mentor’s—to help create the conditions under which Seminar students can learn from the texts and from each other.

So co-leaders are responsible for helping to foster free, open, respectful, inclusive, and meaningful discussions. They may do this in two ways:

They may model the kinds of skills and virtues a professor wants students to learn. For example: active listening, asking questions and follow-up questions, close-reading, quotation, occasionally offering their own insights, constructive disagreement, modeling a stance of respect and openness, etc.

They may help facilitate discussions by paying special attention to the dynamics of discussions and intervening accordingly; they may act as an extra set of eyes and ears

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in the classroom, seeing classroom dynamics that professors might miss, and consult with professors outside of class about what is and is not working well in a Seminar class. For example: calling on students who want to speak, refocusing or redirecting a discussion, encouraging quieter students to speak, etc.

Title IX SMC Consensual Sexual or Romantic Relationships Policy

In adherence to the Saint Mary’s College of California’s Consensual Sexual or Romantic Relationships Policy, the Collegiate Seminar Program expects student co-leaders to notify the instructor if you are currently in or have previously been involved in a consensual or sexual romantic relationship with any member of the class for which you serve as student co-leader. As a student co-leader, you will be expected to recuse yourself from any evaluative responsibilities over any student with whom you are or have been in a relationship. For further questions, you can contact Title IX Coordinator or Title IX Deputy Coordinators:

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Laurie PanianAssociate Vice President for Human Resources & Title IX [email protected]

Dr. Evette Castillo Clark (Students)Dean of [email protected]

What is the Co-Leader’s Role?

Student co-leaders are in a unique position, in that they are neither fellow students, nor teaching assistants or interns. They share some of the same responsibilities as their faculty mentors in the classroom, but they do not have the authority to set the syllabus or course policies, nor do they evaluate students’ performance. Co-leaders are not professors’ assistants or aides; they do not make photocopies, give grades, or run errands.

In general terms, the role of the student co-leader is that of an experienced Seminar student and discussion leader in training who plays

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a reassuring, encouraging, and supportive part in the classroom. The co-leader is like a friendly guide or tutor whose job is to help students shine. The co-leader is there to help students participate to the best of their abilities.

But the specific role that a co-leader plays can vary greatly according to the idiosyncrasies of the class: the personalities of the professor, co-leader, and students; their respective backgrounds, experiences, approaches; and their varying interests with respect to Seminar. For example, the same co-leader might play a very different role in a class with many vocal students than she might play in a class of students who are more reserved.

Every Seminar class is different and poses unique opportunities and challenges.

Just as faculty must figure out their role in each Seminar classroom, so too with student co-leaders. Just as no two professors are identical in their approaches to Seminar, no two student co-leaders are exactly alike.

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It is important to understand that there is no simple recipe for success as a co-leader. Student co-leaders are responsible for working out a role in the class that plays to their own strengths and that responds to the dynamics of the class they are in. Taking on this responsibility is an essential part of learning to be an effective co-leader.

In other words, a central part of the experience of being a student co-leader is precisely to figure out your own approach, your own style, and your own priorities as a discussion leader for a specific Seminar class, provided that they complement the example and goals set by your faculty mentor. You have a semester to learn your own and the class’ strengths and weaknesses, to work with your faculty mentor, to try different discussion facilitation strategies, and thereby to discover your unique voice and role as a co-leader.

Being a Good Mentee

Your faculty mentor will support your develop-ment as a co-leader in

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Seminar, and may also be able to write you letters of recommendation and refer you to other academic and professional opportunities. 

The relationship is comparable to (but not the same as) that of graduate student teaching assistants and their professors, in that you will work closely with your faculty mentor to plan, lead, and review Seminar discussions.

To make the most of this relationship, it is essential for you to be willing to learn from your faculty mentor’s example and experience, and to communicate as professionally, as clearly, and as thoughtfully as you can.

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You can expect to meet in person with your faculty mentor at least once before the start of the semester (or at the start of the semester) in which you will be co-leading, and on a regular basis once the semester begins.

At the first meeting, you and your faculty mentor will begin to get to know each other and talk about the upcoming semester.

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Be prepared to talk about why you want to be a co-leader. It helps to have specific examples in mind, drawn from your experiences, of what you think works well (and doesn’t work well) in a Seminar discussion. It also helps to be prepared with questions you would like to ask your faculty mentor. For example: How do you handle context (e.g., historical or biographical) in Seminar? How do you handle it when a student dominates discussion? How do you encourage students to read the texts closely? What are some things I can do to support your goals for the course?

Be prepared to talk about how you and your faculty mentor envision your role as a co-leader. For example, what role(s) have you played in previous Seminar classes? How do you think your role as a co-leader might be similar to and different from your previous experiences?

Faculty mentors should clarify any specific expectations they may have for the relationship.

It is a good idea, at the first meeting, to decide on a regular schedule of

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meetings at which you will discuss plans to lead discussions on specific texts, and to discuss how things are going in the course. We recommend in-person meetings once every two weeks for 30 minutes to one hour. E-mail or text communications can also work, depending on the individual preferences of each pair.Do bear in mind that your faculty mentor has taken on an extra responsibility—on top of teaching, service, and scholarly responsibilities—in order to have you as a co-leader and mentee.

Some rules of thumb for being a good mentee:

Be someone your faculty mentor can rely on. Attend every class and scheduled meeting. Be punctual. Let him/her/them know in a timely manner if, on rare occasions, you will not be able to be in class. Respond quickly to e-mails, texts, or phone calls. Don’t flake out.

Be prepared for class. Make sure to read (or reread) the texts before class. The better you know the readings, the more effectively you

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can facilitate discussion. Be ready to follow lesson plans, but also to think on your feet.

Discuss with your mentor what you think is working well and/or not working well in class. Offer specific suggestions to promote good discussions.

Tell your mentor what you want. If you would like to try to lead discussion of a text you know well, for example, just ask him/her/them. Your mentor cannot read your mind. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Be open to suggestions and trying new strategies.

FAQs for Student Co-Leaders

May I choose which professor I’d like to work with?

Yes, if the professor is willing to take on the responsibility, and is scheduled to teach a Seminar course you are qualified to co-lead.

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Do I have to buy the books for the course if I don’t already own them?

The Seminar office, next to Arcade 2, has copies of the textbooks available for co-leaders to sign out. Co-leaders are responsible to pay for any textbook that is lost or not returned by the end of the semester.

What are some of the highlights of being a co-leader?

Aside from the class credit and resume-building this position gives you, you get to sharpen your facilitation and people skills that are beneficial to other campus leadership positions or work after graduation. Co-leaders also get to deepen their understanding of texts that they may have previously read as a student or be introduced to new texts they didn’t get to read before.

Being a co-leader is truly a unique leadership role within the classroom setting. As a Student Leader within Student Life offices, I found that being a co-leader introduced me to various aspects of academic affairs. I also felt

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intellectually stimulated by the work that I was doing. I felt like I was helping students enhance their understanding of the text while I was learning something new from the students.

What are some of the most difficult or challenging aspects of being a co-leader?

One of the biggest challenges I faced was deciding how often I would contribute. I sometimes worried when I was contributing too much or not contributing enough during the course of the discussion. You can fine-tune the details of your contributions with your faculty mentor to make sure you are fulfilling your responsibilities and that you’re not overstepping boundaries by dominating the discussion. Monitoring yourself by taking tally of the amount of times you talk can also be helpful. Your engagement in the class can really be dependent on your relationship with your faculty mentor. My mentor and I would plan out the type of activities I would facilitate. I never came into the class being unaware of what I was doing. Whenever she went over a module, I would contribute by sharing a Seminar

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experience to better illustrate the concept at hand. On several occasions, I would start the class off with a particular question or idea.

I also found that coming into the class without serious expectations was beneficial because each Seminar class is uniquely different. While you can draw on your past Seminar experiences to build your facilitation style and share particular moments with the class, it’s important to remember that each Seminar class functions in different ways.

How can a co-leader conceive of his/her/their specific role as a co-leader?

It can take several weeks to truly find your footing as a co-leader. You can begin to conceive your role by establishing expectations and responsibilities regarding the position in a one-on-one meeting with your faculty mentor. I found that having an introductory meeting with my faculty mentor was a good way to create an initial bond and make sure we were on the same page with my roles and

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responsibilities. We also ended up preparing an agenda for the first class.

In the first few weeks, it can be helpful to step back more and observe the class to get an idea of each student individually and the way the class conducts Seminar as a collective. This can help you identify if the class will be more talkative or more reserved, which will allow you to tailor your facilitation style to the class. Once you feel comfortable with the group setting and have an understanding of each student, you can begin asking certain questions and bringing up textual evidence that steers the conversation in a much deeper direction. To make sure you are fulfilling your responsibilities, scheduling biweekly or weekly meetings with your mentor to check-in and discuss class progress can be beneficial.

Establishing yourself as a co-leader is a process that may take some trial and error! For example, I found that asking broader, more general questions about a text yielded more student contributions than more specific questions.

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What should I do on the first day of class?

The first day of class is a great opportunity for a co-leader to introduce basic facts about themselves (name, major, class year, hometown), use inclusive language when addressing the class to promote gender inclusivity (saying “you all” or “folks” instead of “you guys”), share contact information, explain a co-leader’s role in the classroom, and briefly discuss why they chose to become a co-leader. Co-leaders can even share a particular Seminar experience that inspired them to seek out this leadership position.

What are some discussion facilitation strategies that work well for co-leaders?

While every co-leader has a different leadership and facilitation style, I found that checking in with the class to make sure everyone has gotten their point across before asking a question to deepen discussion, proposing an opportunity for constructive disagreement, summarizing back points that students have made previously when adding my own point,

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observing each group during small group discussion to draw on student contributions for more reserved students, adding textual analysis to support a student’s point and to draw the class back to the text if they strayed away from it, and monitoring the amount of times I talked by writing tally marks on a piece of paper to make sure I wasn’t dominating the discussion was helpful.

How would you describe the kind of relationship that a co-leader can have with his/her/their faculty mentor?

While every relationship can be different depending on personality and facilitation style, both the co-leader and faculty mentor can assist each other through feedback and reflection. A co-leader can reflect on the direction and level of the class while the faculty mentor can provide constructive feedback on facilitation methods.

A faculty mentor can also become a resource for recommendation letters and graduate school application assistance. Thus, the relationship between a co-leader and their faculty mentor can be mutually beneficial. For

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example, I would let my faculty mentor know if a certain activity could’ve worked better differently while she would let me know if the way I phrased a question may have caused confusion.

This relationship can extend to the Seminar students. As a co-leader, I really made an effort to observe each student to assist my mentor in assessing student progress. This allowed my faculty mentor to understand something about a student they might have missed while facilitating the class.

What additional advice is helpful for a co-leader?

Talk to other co-leaders! You can seek advice from past co-leaders or share facilitation ideas with new co-leaders in your cohort. Shared inquiry goes beyond the Seminar classroom. Attending co-leader and Departmental Seminar events is also a good way to meet other Seminar students and engage with the Collegiate Seminar Department outside of the classroom. You can make an effort to let your class know if and when you’re attending an outside Seminar event to

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set-up a meeting time and spot with class members before the event begins. This can encourage more reserved students to attend.

Am I supposed to hold office hours or schedule meetings with students outside of class?

In consultation with your faculty mentor, you may arrange to hold a limited number of office hours, or schedule meetings with students to go over the readings or discuss ways in which individual students can participate in discussions. Do note that questions about writing assignments, any kind of evaluation, or policies should be referred to the mentor, CWAC, or TASC. These office hours and meetings should not exceed 15-30 minutes per week, or 3.5 to 7 hours per semester.

Can I repeat the co-leader course—Seminar 190? That is, can I be a co-leader for Seminar 001 in one semester, and a co-leader for Seminar 002 in another semester?

Yes! Seminar 190 may be repeated for credit.

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What other leadership opportunities have past co-leaders been able to take advantage of?

Past co-leaders have gone on to other positions of student leadership: student representative on the Seminar Governing Board; member of the Seminar Diversity Task Force; Student Ambassador for the Admissions Office; tutor for TASC; and RA. Past co-leaders have also drawn on their experience to apply to graduate schools and professional programs.

Responsibilities of Faculty Mentors

Your job as a mentor is to help your co-leader grow as a student, a leader, and a person.

Perhaps the best way to do this is to give them chances to help you with Seminar, and then give them candid feedback on their work.

Ask for their thoughts: What can be done to break the ice at the start of the semester? How is the class going?

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What has worked well, and what has fallen flat? What can be done to rein in domineering students, or to encourage students who are reticent? Are there activities or techniques they have seen other faculty use that you could try or that you ought to avoid?

Ask them to see the readings from an instructor’s perspective. How can each text be best introduced and approached? What questions might come up? What difficulties might students have?

Ask them to constructively disagree with you in class, if they feel you are asking a misguided question or misdirecting the attention of the students.

Ask if they would like to lead discussion on a specific text, while you focus on the dynamics of discussion.Students learn to be responsible by being given real responsibilities and then being held accountable for what they do. Give them enough room that they can succeed or fail, but not so much that failure would traumatize them and hurt the class.

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Faculty mentors have almost always found their co-leaders to be genuinely helpful. In my Seminar classes that have had co-leaders, I’ve noticed that students start making eye contact with each other much more quickly (instead of only addressing the professor). My co-leaders have been able to point out things that I wasn’t able to see, and introduce energy and fresh approaches that I wouldn’t have tried on my own. They have also picked up on dynamics in the classroom that I have missed, and have served as an extra set of eyes and ears in the classroom.

Being a mentor is extra work, but it can be very rewarding and not that onerous if you give thought to how you can best help your student co-leader to shine.

FAQS for Faculty Mentors

What should I discuss with my mentee at the first meeting?

The first meeting is an opportunity for you and your mentee to start to get to know each other and talk about the upcoming semester.

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I would talk about my experience of leading Seminar and ask my mentee about his/her/their experience. You might ask: What makes a good/bad Seminar discussion? Why do you want to be a co-leader? What would you like to get out of the experience? Would he/she/they like to try leading a discussion of a specific text?

When I first had a co-leader, I was upfront about the fact that I’d never had a co-leader, and that the experience was going to be a learning process for me. I was lucky in that my first co-leader had already done it once before, so I asked him about what worked well and didn’t work well in previous Seminar discussions.

It helps to go over the role of the co-leader in Seminar and to specify any expectations you may have.

I would also use the occasion to set up a regular schedule of meetings during the semester.How often should I meet with my mentee to discuss how things are going? What should we talk about at these meetings?

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In past practice, a schedule of biweekly meetings of approximately 30 minutes to one hour has worked well, and that is what I would recommend. However, some pairs have found it useful to meet more often (e.g., once a week), and/or to communicate by e-mail or text. It is entirely up to you and your mentee to make mutually agreeable arrangements to discuss how the course is going.

I’ve used these meetings to discuss plans to lead discussions on specific texts and classroom dynamics. I’ve also used these meetings to discuss the role of the co-leader and to give my mentee feedback on how I think he is doing.

I think it is especially helpful to ask your mentee to give you his/her/their impressions of how the class is going, and to invite suggestions and constructive criticism.

How can I be a good mentor and help my co-leader be a good discussion leader?

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It helps to understand that your co-leader, especially if he/she/they is doing it for the first time, will go through an adjustment process in which they will have to figure out their role as a co-leader (think about your own first experience of leading Seminar!). Past co-leaders have reported feeling awkward or strange, especially at the beginning of the semester, and being challenged to relate to their peers in a new way. I would reassure him/her/them that this is completely normal.

It helps to explain the role of the co-leader in general terms—that it is similar to but different from being a graduate student teaching assistant or intern. Their role is that of an experienced and discussion leader in training, or friendly guide, who plays an encouraging and supporting role in the classroom. Whereas, in their previous Seminar classes, they may have been “Seminar superstars,” as co-leaders, their job is help other students shine.

It also helps to explain that the task of figuring out their specific role in your specific Seminar class is an essential

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part of learning to be an effective co-leader. Just as Seminar professors have to go through “formation” and figure out how to teach in Seminar, and continually adjust their teaching for specific Seminar classes, so too must student co-leaders go through a similar process. They must discover their strengths, weaknesses, style, and priorities; they must get to know the texts and the people in the class, and be able to think on their feet and learn from their experience.

I would make sure to discuss with my co-leader his/her/their role in the class on a regular basis, and offer specific suggestions and encouragement.

Can the co-leader be responsible for setting a full day's facilitation?

I think it helps to have co-leaders lead discussion occasionally or even more often, in order to role model the kind of skills and engagement you would like your students to learn. It can also help de-center the authority in a Seminar class for students to see the co-leader leading discussion early on in the semester.

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How might the co-leader help with writing development?  

Strictly speaking, the co-leader is not supposed to be responsible for helping with writing development or evaluating writing. Both CWAC and TASC have tutors whose job it is to help Seminar students with writing development.

Does the co-leader help with grading?

No. Co-leaders are not supposed to be responsible for evaluating students.

How should I evaluate my mentee?

Co-leaders should be evaluated on how well you think they have been able to fulfill their responsibilities as co-leaders. Specifically:

How well have they been able to foster free, open, respectful, inclusive, and meaningful discussions as a co-leader?

How well have they been able to learn, and learn from, their role as a co-leader?

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Have they been reliable? Have they attended all or most of the classes? Have they been prepared for class? Have they attended all or most scheduled meetings outside of class?

How professionally, clearly, and thoughtfully have they communicated with you?

Do keep in mind that the experience of being a co-leader is supposed to be part of a learning process as opposed to something that is results-oriented. So I personally would emphasize how well my co-leader has learned to be an effective discussion leader over time. Moreover, in most cases, co-leaders devote more (in some case much more) time and energy to the course than the minimum required for a .50 credit course.

Testimonials

Co-Leaders

“The Seminar Co-Leader Program is the complete embodiment of the Saint Mary’s College liberal arts tradition.

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The program calls upon those with different leadership backgrounds and challenges them to think critically as well as creatively to help build their Seminar-focused minds. The experience challenges its participants to dive deeper into texts that may or may not be familiar to them. In my own experience as a co-leader, I found joy in discovering new concepts and beliefs about texts that I had read before. I felt reinvigorated to learn more about how I perceived things in the text and in the world, simply by being in direct intellectual contact with brilliant minds. The program is more than just about getting credit and retaking a Seminar course. The experience is rather a full circle realization that Seminar at Saint Mary’s College is something very special. It’s the coming to terms that not all people are the same and that not all thinkers conceptualize identically. The co-leader experience is where leadership meets deep thinking, and helps to create the conversations we have and will continue to have after we leave Saint Mary’s. It was truly an honor to help pioneer and grow such a program” (Alexander Drake, ’16).

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“I enjoy helping the Seminar Program because it is my belief that [student] co-leaders are the reason why so many discussions go so incredibly well. It is our job to help students thrive in Seminar, not only through discussion, but also through finding deeper meanings in the text. We get to watch them find things in the text that we’ve never even thought of, and it is one of the most rewarding experiences seeing a student who hasn’t talked much most of the semester make an amazing comment that is received well by their fellow classmates. The validation in their face is enough to make the harder parts of co-leading worthwhile” (Holly McAdams, ’17).

“I firmly believe that my experience as a Seminar Co-Leader was one of the most important things I have done with my time here at Saint Mary’s. I got to see how Seminar can transform students into scholars, and how to become confident in their own wisdom. It was amazing having the opportunity to take part in this transformative experience and to give support and encouragement to my students. Being a co-leader is more than just being a tutor or second teacher; it is about showing your fellow

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students that they are capable, that they are wise, and that you get to bridge that gap for them between student and teacher and become something more. You get to become a guide, illuminating the way and still allowing your fellow scholars to discover things that you never saw before” (Brian “Bee” Pinner, ’17)

“The Seminar Co-Leader Program is a great way to continue to develop both your leadership and Seminar skills. As a co-leader with Professor Kathleen Tierney, I was able to help develop student ideas by asking questions and supporting a student’s contribution to class discussion with textual evidence. At the same time, I spoke about my previous experiences taking Seminar to provide a student perspective for students taking the course for the very first time. Professor Tierney and I had weekly meetings outside of our Seminar class to speak about how students were progressing and what various methods we could both employ to make use of the co-leader position. We used our meetings to plan out classes, discuss possible questions from readings, and speak about ways to develop student ideas. This was also

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a chance for me to get some feedback about what I was doing well and what I could be doing better as a co-leader. My main suggestion for co-leaders is to dedicate some time for office hours where you’re willing and able to meet with students outside of class who can approach you about struggling with a difficult text. A co-leader should serve as a resource for students to develop critical thinking, communication, and shared inquiry skills both inside and outside of the classroom” (Gabriela Rodkopf, ’17).

"Student co-leading in Seminar is foremost a challenge and a responsibility. Once you become a co-leader, you become responsible for the learning of everyone else in the Seminar, and it is your goal to put everyone in the best position to develop shared inquiry organically within discussion. The challenge of co-leading comes with finding your position within the Seminar. Think of a Seminar discussion as a balloon that gets inflated by everyone within the discussion; a co-leader is responsible for ensuring that the balloon won't pop and will eventually reach its maximum size. Poke the balloon too hard and it

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pops—don’t pass it around enough and it doesn't reach its full size. Eventually, the balloon grows until everyone in the Seminar is in awe at the sight of its collective blossoming, and thus, everyone can take pride in the fact that they contributed to work of the whole. A co-leader is a hand that moves the discussion along towards fullness, but doesn't force it. It requires a level of awareness, both of yourself and of those around you. Being a student co-leader for Seminar forced me to grow as a communicator, student, and educator, and would be an invaluable experience for anyone wanting to do the same" (Elijah Soria, ’17).

“My advice to someone who wants to be a co-leader is DO IT! It is so fulfilling and really does benefit you as a leader and as a person who will continue their Seminar education. It is also really great to have a faculty mentor because not only can you get feedback on how you are in a leadership position, but also you begin to develop a relationship that can if you wish last far beyond the Seminar” (Sophia Buscher, ’18).

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Faculty Mentors

“My student co-leader connects well with the students in Seminar 1; they see her as their peer so she is approachable and in tune with their concerns.  She has been helping some of them with their essays and giving strategy tips to those who need some help with participation in class. She has spoken in class, commenting on discussions and articulating ways to improve in seminar skills.

I for one am grateful for the things she does, especially keeping track of students' participation (on a spreadsheet!): who hasn't spoken, who looks like they are about to speak, who is hesitating, who's talking too much; the quality and quantity of their contributions.  On my own, I miss some of these because I'm too busy keeping track of two things, the participation element of seminar and the quality of what is being said. So having my student co-leader in the classroom helps the two of us focus on individual students and their skill level. I think the students are better for it, because they get one-on-one conversation with either the student co-leader or with

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me.  Afterwards I see students re-adjust, do things differently based on our conversations. Furthermore, I like to bounce off ideas with her. I email the prompts that I'm about to distribute to the students. It's always reassuring for me to have another set of eyes. She speaks her truth, and that to me is always helpful in evaluating what I send out to the students. She's very straightforward. I appreciate her honesty.” (Margaret Pagaduan, Collegiate Seminar)  

“I had the delightful experience of having a student co-facilitator for SEM 001 in spring of 2018. I cannot say enough about my support for this mentor program and the co-facilitator model! My work with my student co-facilitator helped me to be even more reflective about my teaching, which is not only a goal of Collegiate Seminar but a strong value in the mission of SMC. I found the handbook materials to be very useful as I prepared for my role as a mentor to a student co-facilitator, and I especially appreciated the flexibility in the handbook, which allowed me to develop an

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individualized approach to my work with my co-leader. I am fortunate to say that my co-facilitator exceeded my expectations in every way. She was always prepared for the discussion, contributed regularly, developed her own method for noting and tracking the students’ participation, actively encouraged them to share in class, held office hours before each paper was due, celebrated their progress as the semester went on by giving them verbal feedback in class and written feedback on Moodle, and offered valuable guidance on their papers. She never stepped into an evaluative role but always played a supportive one with the students. She volunteered to facilitate the discussion on several days when we did not have a student facilitator, and prepared a thoughtful approach to help the students to engage with the readings. I thoroughly enjoyed working with her, and I think it was a formative experience for her as well. I especially liked thinking about creative ways to allow her to have more agency and leadership in the class experience, and supporting her original ideas for being actively involved in the class experience. I think my student co-facilitator would make

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an excellent teacher, and I am grateful to have had the opportunity to participate in this outstanding program!”(Suzy Thomas, Education)

“There are as many ways to collaborate and practice the Seminar co-leader partnership as there have been past mentees and mentors, and this range, this diversity makes the experience for the student co-leader, faculty mentor, and the class as a whole, unique for everyone who participates. This freedom to collaborate allows both student co-leader and faculty mentor to build off one another’s strengths and goals, negotiating individual and shared aims and purposes, so that they may coincide and complement one another. In the best of collaborations, both faculty mentor and student co-leader will base their partnership on trust.

The program affords both faculty and student co-leader experiences they might not have otherwise have had. Through the student co-leader, the class has a peer model and mentor, and student co-leaders have the opportunity to build skills as a leader, a

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mediator, and a facilitator. Returning to the texts also allows student co-leaders a chance to revisit authors, ideas, and concepts to find deeper meanings and different angles from previous interpretations and assumptions. Conversely, faculty mentors get the rare insight from a student perspective, and the regular weekly or bi-weekly meetings allow the faculty to see how the class is progressing from the ground level. The co-leader program adds an extra dimension and added dynamism that most seminar classes rarely experience. Though we may not be able to put a finger on any tangible outcomes, the collaborative experiences gained for the student co-leader, for the faculty mentor, and for the class as a whole are innumerable and invaluable.” (Rashaan Meneses, Collegiate Seminar)

“I have had three student co-leaders, and in different ways each one was extremely helpful to me and a very positive presence in their class. They set a tone of intellectual seriousness and enthusiasm. They showed by example how to foster open, respectful, and inclusive discussions.

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They were exemplary participants in shared inquiry, sometimes by sharing brilliant insights, but more often by having the confidence and humility to admit to not-knowing, to ask simple questions, to respond to new perspectives, and to try to move through discussion toward insights they had not had in advance. They also helped me to see what was going on in the classes, and were able to suggest new strategies to facilitate discussion. It was wonderful to watch them grow into their role and to gain self-confidence as leaders over the course of the semester. I would be more that happy to have student co-leaders in every Seminar class I lead, for their sake, for my sake, and for the sake of the class as a whole” (David Arndt, Collegiate Seminar).

“Although I have taught Seminar for 30+ years, I have not had a student co-leader before Spring 2016. When faced with the opportunity to work with a student co-leader in my Seminar 001 class, I was a little ambivalent at first, not knowing precisely what to expect. The experience turned out to be a very positive one. The co-leader was a personable, outgoing sophomore

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majoring in Accounting. We met before the course began and worked out a tentative plan for his participation. I wanted him to observe our discussions carefully, noting how they developed and how individuals were participating, insert himself occasionally to raise a question, clarify a point, or invite someone into the conversation. He did a fine job carrying out these functions and others as the semester progressed. He related well to the other students, inviting them to share concerns and offer suggestions they had about the class. He was particularly adept at keeping track of the extent and nature of students’ participation, which was very helpful to me in evaluating each student’s daily participation.

Although my co-leader was very busy with classes and other on-campus responsibilities, we met regularly a few minutes before most classes and talked as we walked across campus. We would also touch bases a few minutes after each session to do a quick evaluation of the discussion. Several weeks into the semester, he suggested that we set up a pair of student discussion leaders for each class—a practice I have used in the

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past but was not certain it would work with this class. My co-leader and I worked together getting students signed up and prepared for this task. It turned out to be quite effective, generating a variety of discussion-launching activities, inducing quieter students to take on a more active role, and inviting more active involvement of most of the students supporting their leaders.

In summary, I found my Seminar co-leader very helpful in providing an additional set of eyes tracking the functioning and general climate of the class. I believe the experience was also valuable to the co-leader, helping him develop new communication skills and new insights into the Seminar method. I would highly recommend that Seminar instructors consider mentoring a student co-leader. I believe they would find the experience as beneficial as I have” (Jerry Brunetti, Education)

“It was an absolute joy to work with my mentee this semester. She modeled for the 1st-year students not only how to approach texts critically and carefully but also how to engage respectfully with fellow students through shared inquiry. I feel honored to have been

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asked to participate in the program as an instructor/mentor in Collegiate Seminar. I hope that you will continue to invite me to work with another co-leader next year. With regard to your request for suggestions, I found that meeting weekly – in my case, over lunch every Friday afternoon – with my co-leader was extremely helpful.  It allowed my mentee and me both to ‘look back’ at the week in the course as well as anticipate the coming week vis-à-vis the readings and any techniques we wanted to use to encourage the development of critical skills. I will continue with this practice as it allowed for a formal review and a ‘taking the pulse’ of the class at the end of every week” (Brother Michael Murphy, World Languages and Cultures).

“In 28 years of teaching Seminar, I have had faculty co-leaders but never a student co-leader until this Spring. I wasn’t sure exactly how it would work out, but it turned out to be a wonderful boon. My co-leader had excellent listening skills and could allow the conversation to move on its own without having to intrude, but he also had excellent ‘Seminar’ questioning skills and would insert a question or

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call attention to a passage just when it seemed most helpful to the discussion. Students in my Seminar 103 section were his peers (juniors), yet he had no difficulty establishing himself as a leader of his group whenever we split the class into two groups for preliminary discussion of the reading. He checked in with me regularly to work out a ‘game plan’ for the upcoming classes and was present for every single class. It was terrific working with him and I think the Seminar really benefited from having him as well as me as a facilitator” (Frank Murray, Theatre).

“I really appreciated having a Seminar co-leader. My co-leader set a great example for the students very early on in the class when how to do Seminar is less clear to them, and her example also provided them a target in terms of developing their own Seminar practice. The co-leader perspective was great to have for me too. As I get older, I feel like my ability to judge class dynamics actually becomes more difficult, so it is nice to get to hear the perspective of someone who is outside the class, yet still closer to them as a peer. Some students may find it easier to seek the

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help of a peer, and the co-leader, being a peer expert, is a great resource. In fact, when considering the qualities of a co-leader, it is likely that being someone whom students can open up to when faced with difficulties is equally important as having been a Seminar star in past classes. One day, I came to class early to find my co-leader working with one of my students who was having great difficulty in working through some of the texts. They were going over the reading for that day a little ahead of time to make it easier for him to get in the conversation during class” (Jeff Sigman, Biochemistry and Chemistry).

Notes

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