This video was part of the July 2020 REMOTE: The Connected Faculty Summit
Teaching online magnifies the choices we have made in our onsite courses. The dull lecturer at the podium easily becomes the sleep-inducing talking head on Zoom. In this presentation, learning and technology innovator Cathy N. Davidson offers practical advice on how to turn asynchronous and synchronous online courses into opportunities for inspiring active learning and democratic participation. She invites us to trust students, especially first generation students and those from underserved backgrounds, as contributors to their education and that of their peers. Students master content while building the “soft” or “essential” life skills that support their agency and success. Davidson will be joined by Christina Katopodis, coauthor of their book, tentatively titled “Transforming Every Classroom: A Practical Guide to Revolutionary Teaching and Learning” (under contract to Harvard UP, anticipated Fall 2022). A prize-winning adjunct professor, Katopodis offers special insights to those in new or precarious academic careers.
Cathy Davidson
Distinguished Professor and Founding Director, The Futures Initiative, Graduate Center (CUNY) and Senior Fellow, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Graduate Center, City University of New York
Cathy N. Davidson, Distinguished and Founding Director of the Futures Initiative at the Graduate Center, CUNY, and Senior Fellow, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. cdavidson@gc.cuny.edu
Cathy N. Davidson has published over twenty books, most recently The New Education: How To Revolutionize the University to Prepare Students for a World in Flux, recipient of the 2019 Ness prize from AAC&U. She is the cofounder and codirector of HASTAC.org, the world’s first and oldest academic social network. With Christina Katopodis, she is writing “Transforming Every Classroom: A Practical Guide to Revolutionary Teaching and Learning” (Harvard UP, anticipated 2022).
Christina Katopodis
Ph.D. Candidate in English, The Graduate Center, CUNY
Christina Katopodis is a Futures Initiative Fellow, and PhD Candidate in English at the CUNY Graduate Center. She was awarded the 2019 Diana Colbert Innovative Teaching Prize and the 2018 Dewey Digital Teaching Award. Katopodis has authored articles published or forthcoming in ESQ, ISLE, and Profession, as well as op-eds for Inside Higher Ed. Together with Cathy N. Davidson, Katopodis is co-author of “Transforming Every Classroom: A Practical Guide to Revolutionary Teaching and Learning” (Harvard UP, anticipated 2022).