Climate HQ's Climate Justice FLCs

Spring 2024 SFSU Climate HQ Climate Justice Faculty Learning Communities 

Through the Climate Justice Leaders Initiative, SF State’s Climate HQ aims to strengthen climate justice teaching, research, and outreach at SF State. A key way we are supporting climate justice teaching at SF State is through Climate Justice Faculty Learning Communities (CJ FLCs). Modeled on CEETL’s Teaching Squares, these FLCs will meet regularly throughout the semester to support each other and share best practices for teaching and learning focused on climate justice pedagogies.
 

Deadline for submission: November 17, 2023 

Purpose: The SF State CJ FLCs have 3 main purposes: 

1. To support faculty members to incorporate climate change and / or climate justice into their course/ project/pedagogy for the first time; 

2. To support faculty members who already teach climate change and /or climate justice into their course/ project/pedagogy to deepen their teaching of social justice aspects of climate change into that course; 

3. To facilitate connections among faculty teaching climate change and / or climate justice in different ways across campus.
    

Faculty Learning Communities: There are two faculty learning communities being hosted in Spring 2024. SFSU’s Climate HQ is hosting a self-directed FLC program, where participants self-organize around their a) own educational resource(s), b) own meeting times, and c) proposed pedagogical outcome(s). CSU Chico is hosting a CSU-wide FLC where there is a) existing content on climate change (climate solutions, anxiety, justice and curriculum, b) existing meeting times, and c) determined outcomes. If you are interested in applying to the CSU-wide FLC instead of the SFSU Climate HQ FLC, please see the call for applications here.   

Size & Membership: Each FLC should consist of 3-6 SF State faculty, staff, or student members. Both tenured/tenure-track and lecturer faculty are eligible to participate. Students are eligible so long as they are enrolled in at least one course at SF State during the semester they participate, have an interest in climate change and/or justice or experience working on climate change and/or justice, and are upper division (junior, senior) students or graduate students. We encourage groups to include staff and student members because of the meaningful insights they can provide to teaching at SF State. Note, because the purpose of the FLCs is to strengthen teaching, faculty members should comprise at least half the members of the FLC. Moreover, the FLC should provide a rationale if you are including students. 

Expectations:  

1. Each FLC should plan to meet to work on their project for ten hours over the course of the semester. Ideally, facilitation of these meetings should rotate among FLC members.  

2. At the end of the spring semester, each FLC should submit a final report including: 
   • Your proposed pedagogy outcome organized around a creative work outcome including but not limited to: syllabus change, readings list, assignment/exercise, lecture(s), project-based collaboration between departments, community collaboration, and/or organization of a climate HQ event for campus. 
   • Group’s collaboration methodology: describe how you worked together (frequency of meetings, format of meetings, meeting modality) and address how the 10 hours were utilized. 
   • Your pedagogy shifts: How has your pedagogy changed as a result of participating in this FLC? 
3. At the end of the spring semester, each member of the FLC will fill out a survey describing what they gained from the FLC and submit it for honorarium processing. 

Compensation: Each member of the FLC will receive a $500 stipend for their full participation in the FLC. 

Application submission: One person from the proposed FLC group should apply at this link and upload your 1–2-page narrative. 

The narrative should describe the following: 

1. The topic your group is working on (2–3 sentences). 

2. What your group hopes to accomplish during the semester together, including an intended outcome (i.e., syllabus change, readings list, assignment/exercise, lecture(s), etc.) (1 paragraph). 

3. The rationale for the makeup of the FLC group: why does this group of people want to work on this together? (1 paragraph) 

4. How your group plans to get started with the work, including 2-3 curated resources that may help this process. (1 paragraph) 

Some examples of a resource to use for the FLC are:  

• Environmental Communication in the Public Sphere 
• This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate 

Criteria for Selection: FLCs will be chosen for funding using the following criteria: 

1. The extent to which the FLC will support faculty to incorporate climate change and / or climate justice into their course/ project/pedagogy for the first time; OR The extent to which the FLC will support faculty who already teach climate change and / or climate justice deepen their teaching of social justice aspects of climate change. 

2. The extent to which the FLC will facilitate connections among faculty teaching climate change and / or climate justice in different ways across campus. 

3. The feasibility of the proposed outcome and collaboration within the 10-hour commitment. 

4. The composition of FLC in relation to the stated purpose of the group. 

5. The quality of the group’s curated resources for the FLC.