Amidst the pressures of our profession – a heavy teaching load, the challenge of teaching students of widely different abilities and preparation – it is sometimes easy to forget why we chose this vocation in the first place. In addition to finding deep satisfaction in working with students whose lives are transformed by the opportunity to earn a college degree, some of what we revel in has to do with being a part of a community of educators and scholars. Perhaps we have fond memories of being students ourselves. We are attracted by a life of the mind, which includes, at least in part, the opportunity to engage in discourse about our work. Many of us entered our graduate programs in a cohort; if we are lucky we maintain those connections for a lifetime. We recognize that on campus there is strength in numbers. We take comfort in our ability to share our successes as well as grievances with our colleagues. All of this should point to reasons to engage in collaboration in the classroom as well. Indeed, some of the most exciting and nourishing experiences I have had of late have been the result of collaborations with colleagues across the university. When we appear in the classroom together, we demonstrate the power of interdisciplinary learning; we model for students the value of collaborative work and civil discourse; we demonstrate that even as professors we have much to learn from our peers. How exhilarating it has been to share the classroom with an anthropologist, a political scientist, and a scholar of theater. Collaborations with our Instructional Designer, Aura Lippincott, have also been tremendously fruitful. I encourage you to try it! And I encourage our administration to explore strategies for facilitating (and rewarding) collaboration.
