Bonus! Episode 5: Extended Interview with Tony Chambers

Guest: Dr. Tony Chambers

In this episode, Dr. Tony Chambers, Director of Equity, Inclusion and Innovation at the Center for Healthy Minds, shares challenges and opportunities for instructors looking to foster a sense of belonging in their classrooms. Tony appeared in our previous episode, “Just Be Where Your Feet Are: Student Belonging and Flourishing on Campus,” and there was so much insightful information that we wanted to share the extended interview with you!

See the transcript for this episode.

The L&S Exchange Podcast is brought to you by L&S Teaching & Learning Administration and produced by the Instructional Design Collaborative. This podcast is recorded on ancestral Ho-Chunk land, a place their nation has called Teejop (day-JOPE) since time immemorial.

Join the Conversation

How did this episode make you think? What’s on your mind about inclusive teaching? Leave us a message on Spotify for Podcasters, respond to a poll using the Spotify app on your mobile device, reply with a comment at the bottom of this post, or send us an email. We may ask to feature your contribution in this or a future episode.

Conversation Starters

1. Dr. Chambers discusses the value of diverse course materials for creating a sense of student belonging. What perspectives are present in your readings and activities? How might you incorporate material from more diverse sources or validate different kinds of knowledge?
2. With changing times and technology, students are always learning in new and impressive ways. How might you learn from your students about how they learn? How might you respond to new ways of learning?

Further Reading & Resources

In this episode we mentioned, were inspired by, or wondered about the following resources and topics.

• Learn more about how research into wellbeing at UW-Madison’s Center for Healthy Minds is having an impact, from the local level to the global scale.
• Tony Chambers applies various techniques to increase student belonging as an instructor in The Art and Science of Human Flourishing, a groundbreaking course at UW-Madison.
• If you are interested in diversifying your course content, readings, or information sources that students use, make an appointment with your Subject Librarian. Our campus librarians can help you discover and select diverse resources to support student learning.
• First-Year Interest Groups (FIGs) help incoming freshmen find a sense of belonging on campus by providing a community of classmates and by integrating learning around topics of interest, such as Flourishing in Contentious Times, which Tony taught.
• One Cool Thing that’s got Tony Chambers “jazzed” is the Center for Black Excellence and Culture, a community-based initiative in Madison that is supporting health and wellness in the Black community.

Shout Outs

Learn more about Dr. Tony Chambers’s career journey on the L&S Elevate Podcast.

Production Credits