Category: Electrifying Lives (Blog)

To Teach is to Learn

Posted on by Racheida Lewis
Teaching in the traditional sense has been viewed as a one way street of knowledge transfer from teacher to student. In some cases, students have been so conditioned to be absorbers of knowledge and not active contributors of it. On the other hand, we encourage students to help their peers because if they know how to explain the concept to someone else then 1) they fully understand the concept and 2) they're learning the concepts better as well. So why don't we think the same for the teacher-student relationship? In the three semesters I've taught freshmen I've learned just as...Read More

Into the Future

Posted on by Racheida Lewis
On Friday, November 18th I had the pleasure to visit the White House to be apart of a conversation on "Advancing Postsecondary Diversity and Inclusion". This was an all day event that included university reps from students to presidents, and staff of the department of education. I found out about the opportunity through my involvement with the National Society of Black Engineers and it was a great opportunity for the NSBE members in attendance as well as the other students who I met and quickly bonded with during the convening. The day started out with three panel sessions: Leadership Reflections:...Read More

The Minority Report

Posted on by Racheida Lewis
Throughout my entire higher education career I have prided myself on being an African American, a female, and an engineer. As my classes became less and less diverse with people who could meet me at any intersection of my identity, I began to feel even more empowered. The fact that I was the only one, or one of few made me realize that the work that I was doing was not in vain, and that I should continue to push forward toward my goal of being a full time engineering faculty member. There were only two faculty members who looked...Read More

Welcome to the Village

Posted on by Racheida Lewis
"It takes a village to raise a child" -African proverb I'm sure we've heard this saying one time or another. And if you're experiences were anything like mine growing up you might be thinking "what village and who the hell would be in it?". However, as we grow older and wiser the village becomes more apparent in our lives whether we take the time to acknowledge it or not. For those who are unsure by what the village is, it's simply a community of people that surrounds you, with the hopes of helping you succeed in one or more aspects...Read More

GRADES

Posted on by Racheida Lewis
Interestingly enough this week's post is about assessment and not the wonderful English producer I've recently fallen in love with (hence the image above). As I've spent my weekend revamping a portion of my course inspired by the "gaming segment" earlier in the semester, I've had to figure out my own method of assessment as what I'm implementing is different than what any other instructor teaching my course is doing. Historically in ENGE 1215, we've not provided rubrics to prevent the following conversations: Trying to break students out of the mindset of learning for the test or for the grade...Read More