TUESDAY TEACHING TIP: Making Meaning through Reflection and an Invitation to Action

Social Justice is one of SCU’s eight undergraduate institutional learning outcomes (ILOs). Teaching a course that invites students to explore, define, and actively engage with notions of social justice can be challenging, but is vitally important to the SCU mission, the pressing needs of our society, and students’ ability to connect and synthesize these ideas.  

Preparing students to engage humbly, respectfully, and thoughtfully with community partners at their service placements, involves meaningful discussion, reflection, and action. Without critical preparation, community-engaged projects can cause harm to local partner organizations and the people they serve rather than enhance learning and personal transformation for students and the community partners. 

This week, we challenge you to invite students to reflect on concepts of social justice that are embedded in your course curriculum and central to the mission of your discipline. Ask them:

• What reading assignments have contributed to your thinking about social justice?
• What classroom discussions have contributed to your thinking about social justice?
• If your students participate in Community Engaged Learning: How does the discipline of your class (OMIS, Engineering, Religious Studies, English, Theatre and Dance, etc.) intersect with issues of social justice?  Find concrete connections between the discipline of the class and the issues of social justice you have studied so far.

Here’s how to do it 

1. Divide students into groups and then have them to create Google docs in which they answer the questions and then they report back to the class once they have done so.
2. Incorporate the above questions into group presentations that student groups would present towards the end of the quarter.
3. Create anonymous journal assignments in which the students can reflect on the above questions and consider the emotions their discoveries might raise and reflect on whether their worldview has changed in relation to their placements and reflecting on the above questions.

 

WANT TO READ A LITTLE MORE?

• Dan Butin's 2006 work on limitations of service learning argues that it's hard to balance contradictory goals (student learning, community benefit, institutional priorities). A recent article on the NYLC website (2025) echoes the same issues, more than 20 years later.

 

DID YOU DO IT?

Let us know how it went. We would love to hear your feedback about how you implemented today’s Tuesday Teaching Tip in your classroom. Click here to fill out our 3-question survey. The survey is anonymous, but if you choose to enter your name, you’ll be entered in a drawing at the end of the quarter to win a new book from Faculty Development!

 

UPCOMING EVENTS 

CAFEs and Workshops

Faculty Workshop on Student Advising on Tuesday, October 28

CAFE Lifting SCU Voices on Wednesday, November 5

CAFE Classroom to Career on Wednesday, November 12

 

On Campus Writing Retreats & Other Events

On Campus Writing Retreat on Thursday October 23

Accessibility Faculty Learning Community Meet & Greet on Tuesday October 28

On Campus Writing Retreat on Friday October 31

 

This week’s Tuesday Teaching Tip was prepared by Jen Merritt Faria, Phyllis Brown, Sarita Tamayo-Moraga, and Thiadora Pina on behalf of the Faculty Development and the Center for Teaching Excellence.

Missed a teaching tip? Read them all here. 

And check out our full calendar of CAFEs and other Faculty Development events.