My current professional service work includes:
- co-editing FEN Blog with Dr. Daniel Libertz
- working on the organizing committee of Western Carolina University’s AAUP chapter
- mentoring graduate assistants in the English Studies department
Service is an integral part of my job and ethos. I have led workshops and trainings on:
- supporting Appalachian, first-generation, and LGBTQIA+ college students
- creating equitable assessment practices within an open-enrollment college
- Safe Zone training for faculty, staff, and students
- alternative assessment practices, both specific to composition classrooms and more broadly for university instructors across disciplines
- general pedagogical knowledge for engaged, writing-centered, and thoughtful classrooms
I pull from ideas of service best represented by thinkers such as Kazu Haga and other practitioners of nonviolent communication, beloved community spaces, and whole earth interconnectedness. The work we do at universities does not happen in isolation, and I do not believe we can our individual selves, our work, and our communities.
I also engage in service that does not easily map onto a CV, such as mentoring undergraduate students, volunteering with local organizations, and doing care work for my loved ones. Despite their lack of academic cache, these acts of service sustain my workplace, community, and world, all of which matter deeply to me as an educator.
Feel free to reach out (ebrier [at] wcu [dot] edu) with opportunities to speak in your classroom or at your institution.
Em Brier 