This past May, the Centre for Teaching and Learning’s annual Festival of Teaching and Learning (FoTL) saw several “firsts.” Perhaps the most groundbreaking was our decision to forgo the traditional external Keynote Speaker. Instead, we chose to spotlight our University of Alberta students, allowing them to take center stage.

Inspired by bell hooks’ call “to imagine ways that teaching and the learning experience could be different” amidst the stress and indifference often caused by systemic oppression in higher education, we envisioned a different approach for this year’s FoTL Keynote. Focusing on the themes of Accommodation and Proactive Design in teaching and learning, we hosted two Keynote Conversations—both at the opening and closing of this year’s festival—led by U of A students. These students chose to study with us, live, grow, and stay with us as emerging professionals and future leaders.

It was a powerful experience to witness these dynamic, candid, and deeply authentic conversations happening in real-time, right before the eyes of the U of A teaching and learning community. I am humbled and grateful that our students generously shared their time, stories, lived experiences, and their own (re)imagining of post-pandemic pedagogies here at the U of A, in keeping with the theme of FoTL 2022.

We decided not to record these conversations on Zoom to promote active and empathetic listening and truly engage with our students’ perspectives. This decision encouraged genuine, uninhibited dialogue about their contexts, learning experiences, and ideas, centering their voices as active agents within the U of A teaching and learning community. However, we promised to provide a “reflective debrief report” that would capture these conversations’ spirit, energy, and wisdom. You can now find my CTL Executive Director’s Reflective Debrief Report – Student Keynote Conversations: “Accommodation and Proactive Design” on our CTL website as part of the FoTL 2022 archives. This report is my effort to capture, honor, and share what our students so powerfully offered us.

I took extensive notes, capturing every word, every insight, and the vibrant energy from our students as they spoke. In my 25-page report, I have structured the content around twelve guiding questions that framed our discussions with the students. To make the report more accessible and valuable for the U of A community, each question is accompanied by two “blurbs.” The first, “Tommy’s 10-second Takeaways from Our Students,” provides a quick, high-level overview of the robust discussions. The second, “More Insights from Our Students,” offers a deeper exploration with more nuanced examples and reflections. In the “More Insights” sections, I have tried to faithfully convey the students’ authentic voices and recreate the incredible energy and spirit of the conversations they shared.

One of the key objectives of the inaugural Student Keynote Conversations at this year’s FoTL was to inspire our community to rethink our post-pandemic pedagogies with a focus on proactive design, keeping the voices of our actual students at the forefront. I invite you, dear readers, to revisit and re-engage with these conversations as active participants, embracing our U of A students’ invaluable contributions by sharing their time and experiences. I encourage you to approach this with curiosity, an open mind, and a willingness to engage in ongoing learning, unlearning, and relearning as part of the U of A community.

About Tommy

Tommy Mayberry (he/she/they) is a raced-white, queer and trans-settler-scholar, academic drag queen, and the executive director of the Centre for Teaching and Learning. Tommy grew up on the Haldimand Tract, in what is now called southwestern Ontario, and is the partner of experimental digital media artist Tommy Bourque (together, they are known as “The Tommies”). Their family includes their soon-to-be 17-year-old Pekingese Chihuahua, Sam.