I was recently interviewed by Dr. Betsy Lavolette, associate professor in the Department of English at Kyoto Sangyo University, in her endeavor to collect some information on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) efforts in Language Centers in the United States. Dr. Lavolette has done an outstanding job highlighting some of the things language center folks …
Continue reading "How are US Language Centers Approaching DEI?"
I'm happy to announce that the Michigan State University Office of Faculty and Academic Staff Development has chosen to sponsor the Learning Community that my colleague Adam Gacs and I proposed for 2022-23. This year, we'll be exploring accessibility and disability-inclusion when it comes to language teaching and learning in various learning environments (in person, …
I just completed a pilot program that I'm particularly proud of: the first iteration of a DEI Graduate Certificate conceived of by graduate students in Human Development and Family Studies (Melissa Yzaguirre and Gianna Gasaburo!) and underwritten by the MSU Office of Institutional Diversity and Inclusion Creating Inclusive Excellence Grant. This certificate program challenged graduate …
I just learned that I was selected to be an Inclusive Pedagogy Fellow (IPF) for the academic year 2022-2023! (The Inclusive Pedagogy Fellows Program is a subcommittee of the College Inclusive Practices Committee). For a couple of years now, I have been developing disparate pedagogical elements related to the teaching of accessibility for additional language …
It's official! I have completed the College of Arts and Letters (CAL) Graduate Certification in College Teaching. This personal achievement is all the sweeter because of how it positions me to help other MSU students. I'm really excited to be able to pay this experience and schema forward in order to help mentor other CAL …
Continue reading "College of Arts and Letters Graduate Certification in College Teaching"
My colleague Robert Randez and I are excited to be working on a commentary piece that was accepted for the 2023 special issue of Language Testing which has been dedicated to accommodations in language testing and assessment for disabled students. In this piece, we will first emphasize the importance of adopting appropriate terminology when referring …
Continue reading "Stay tuned! Proposal accepted for Special Issue of Language Testing Journal"
I, along with my colleague and friend from Philosophy, Dr. Megan Dean, recently compiled our experiences incorporating open format assessment into our undergraduate courses. In this article we wrote for the FLTMAG, we each showcase, in detail, how we have used open format assignments in our courses. We even included rubrics we have used! I …
Continue reading "New Article – Assessing Outside the Box: the Open Format Assignment"
I was invited by the MSU Graduate School (one of my favorite campus collaborators!) to lead a session on inclusive teaching during the Fall 2021 Graduate Teaching Assistant orientation program. Here's the link to the slides from my session: Inclusive Teaching: Understanding, Navigating, and Addressing Barriers to Student Learning.
Professional development alert! I completed a two-week workshop focused on Applying the Quality Matters Rubric (offered by Quality Matters and facilitated by a QM-Certified colleague at Michigan State University). I'm excited to be able to draw upon this resource in the coming year for my colleagues in language teaching as they design their online, hybrid, and blended courses. General Standard …
I was recently invited to speak to instructors of Arabic and Russian about foreign language assessment accessibility for learners with disabilities as part of the STARTALK Critical Language Assessment Program at Michigan State University. I had the pleasure of answering some fantastic questions about accommodations and assessment fairness for learners with disabilities, and the differences …
Continue reading "Accessibility for Learners with Disabilities in Foreign Language Assessment"
Caitlin Cornell 