The Courage to SoTL

Abstract

Using Parker Palmer’s The Courage to Teach, and in particular the notion of the undivided life, to guide reflections through the process of collaborative autoethnography, we reflect on our lived experiences with the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL). The central question being: How does Palmer’s idea of the undivided life enable SoTL scholars to explore notions of identity and integrity that are intertwined with our academic practice? Ultimately, we found that Palmer’s insights provoked us to think deeply about our identities, and while perhaps we did not always see ourselves on the paths he illuminates, his work, and our collaborative ethnographic process, helped us to illuminate our own paths. More specifically, we share five themes arising from our collaborative autoethnography related to the importance of context and positionality, defining a SoTL scholar, the power to diminish, the importance of relationships and community, and collaborative autoethnography as method and process. Our stories highlight the need for us to see our community as complex, messy, and deeply human, and we remind readers of the need to think about the ethics of all methods and the power in our everyday practice to include or exclude.

An invitation into authentic dialogue about positionality in SoTL

“…It is about what we're doing right now." We thus join Godbold et al (2021) whose work highlighted key themes including: "the importance of context and positionality, defining a SoTL scholar… [and] the importance of relationships and community" (380). This article does not aim to tell readers exactly how to effectively integrate positionality into SoTL work-that would be an impossible task.…”

Creating a sense of “aliveness” in a SoTL CoP on a rural campus

“…Drawing on existing proven practices for this reimagined design, the seven principles for cultivating Communities of Practice (CoPs) (Cambridge, Kaplan, and Suter 2005), were applied as well as Felten's (2013) SoTL principles of good practice. Although other attributes, frameworks, and approaches to SoTL exist (e.g., Mirhosseini et al 2018;Manarin et al 2021;Godbold et al), Felten's principles were deemed as most aligned with the pragmatic paradigm of the QQ team.…”

Epilogue

“…Similarly, Nattalia Godbold, Dawne Irving‐Bell, Jill McSweeney‐Flaherty, Patrice Torcivia, Lauren Schlesselman, and Heather Smith describe the specific kind of community they found within an ISSOTL International Collaborative Writing Group, which helped them “feel less divided and … more supported” in their choices that integrate teaching and research through SoTL (2021, 389). They also note that such “communities of congruence” can also be found through research networks discovered through ISSOTL or other organizations and with campus colleagues who encourage or conduct SoTL, including centers for teaching and learning.…”