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October 2025 Tuesday Tips
7th October 2025
Tuesday Teaching Tip: Find the Connections Outside of Class
One of my favorite exercises we have faculty engage in is connecting assignments to Student Learning Outcomes (SLO) and visa versa. We do this in the AI retrofit, even though it does not have anything to do with AI and faculty sometimes discover they have assignments that are not connected to a SLO or a SLO with very little in terms of corresponding course content. When this happens I often say “we have found the first challenges–and they have nothing to do with AI.” Truthfully, we almost all have artifacts in our courses from different iterations and maybe different instructors. Once in a while, this can be a blessing.
My challenge to you is to find some of your least favorite parts about a course and track down why they are there. Ask a colleague who teaches the next course in a sequence, “do students need to know this for your class?” Find the language from the accrediting body or even state regulation that you thought required something and make sure it says what you think it says. It is unlikely you will discover that you can just abandon something you do not like, but the odds are good you will better understand why something is the way it is and be in a position to address it in a way that better matches your teaching style.
Zach Justus
Director of Faculty Development
Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences
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If you’d like to comment on this or any other Tuesday Tip, visit the FDEV Blog(opens in new window).
All past Tuesday Tips are curated on the FDEV website.
14th October 2025
Tuesday Teaching Tip: Sustainability at Chico State
This teaching tip is a collaboration with Faculty Sustainability Officer Mark Stemen.
Chico State has launched a newly reorganized Office of Sustainability, under the Division of Academic Affairs, affirming that environmental stewardship and climate resilience are central to our teaching, scholarship, and support for our region and the North State. Read more at Chico State Today(opens in new window).
Courses marked with a green leaf symbol in the course catalog are a part of Chico State’s commitment to sustainability practices and education. These green courses emphasize environmentally responsible awareness and learning.
Too often we focus our environmental teaching solely on the problem; students want us to focus on the solutions too. So, I want to share a resource with you: Solutions Journalism Network(opens in new window) (SJN), a curated collection of stories about solutions for a range of topics, including the environment. This site has allowed me to start every class with a solution to the problems that I will be discussing later in the lecture. This week, for example, prior to talking about the declining water availability in the Southwest, I used SJN’s Story Tracker(opens in new window) to find an article in El Paso Matters(opens in new window) about farmers using different techniques to reduce the water needed to grow pecans.
Support sustainability at Chico State by sharing information with your students and encouraging an open dialogue. As part of a class assignment, consider asking students to write, discuss, or present information they have learned at a campus sustainability event or researched on their own.
- Thursday, 10/23: Campus Sustainability Day - Show your support for students by learning how campus organizations and groups support sustainability. (RSVP: CatsConnect)
- Save the date! 3/26 & 3/27: This Way to Resilience
- Spring 2026 Faculty Learning Community - An opportunity to collaborate on sustainability and climate resilience. A call for applications will be shared in 2026.
- 2025-2026 Book in Common - In California Against the Sea: Visions for Our Vanishing Coastlines, Los Angeles Times coastal reporter Rosanna Xia discusses saving the golden shore.
Zach Justus
Director of Faculty Development
Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences
Google Voice/Text:
If you’d like to comment on this or any other Tuesday Tip, visit the FDEV Blog(opens in new window).
All past Tuesday Tips are curated on the FDEV website.
21st October 2025
Tuesday Teaching Tip: Course Relevance–More Show, Less Tell
The Chronicle (subscription alert) has launched a new series called “Learning Lessons(opens in new window)” and the most recent article(opens in new window) contains some great advice on helping students understand the relevance of General Education. It took me back to my time in First-Year Experience and General Education when we were building some of the Public Sphere Pedagogy programs. At a conference, I heard George Mahaffey use the term “broccoli curriculum” in reference to how typical campuses pitch general education to undergraduates—you do it because it is good for you. This was not a flattering term, and he contrasted that approach with what we were doing at Chico, wherein students understood the relevance of the work because they were engaged in a project where they saw the value outside the classroom.
Students in Political Science saw the power of political engagement because they interacted with policy makers at the Town Hall Meeting. Students in oral communication saw the power of advocacy because they went to city council chambers and saw their peers delivering persuasive messages in public places. Regardless of whether your course is in GE or the major curriculum, it is a great first step to explain why what they are doing matters. It is an even more impactful next step if you can find a way for them to actually do it. Bringing a problem from industry to a Chemistry lab, inviting an author to a writing class, or taking your class to a place where the work of a class happens outside the University are all excellent ways to move from “tell” to “show.”
The University is currently seeking a new Director of Civic Engagement, a person who often serves as a go-between for this important work. If you or someone you know is interested, please consider this critical role for helping bridge gaps between civic life and university education.
Zach Justus
Director of Faculty Development
Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences
Google Voice/Text:
If you’d like to comment on this or any other Tuesday Tip, visit the FDEV Blog(opens in new window).
All past Tuesday Tips are curated on the FDEV website.
28th October 2025
Tuesday Teaching Tip: Notes-to-Self
Sometimes, when you are teaching, you realize you had a plan, but it did not go well. You used a cultural reference and stared at blank faces as you realized most of them were toddlers when the movie you referenced was released. There was a course calendar you thought was perfect, but then you learned you scheduled an exam for fall break. Maybe you run into the grading deadline every year and think to yourself, “why do I have to grade so many exams in such a short window?”
Even for excellent, experienced teachers, things go wrong. It has been my practice for years to keep a printed or digital copy of a syllabus (or program calendar, in my current role), so I can mark it up. I make notes on the document about examples I need to update, language I need to change, or persistent problems with the rhythm of the schedule. Rarely do I have the time to make these adjustments during the term for the next year, but when I go back to the syllabus or program calendar, I discover I have a map of things that went wrong–things I would have surely forgotten had I not written them down. It is a less formal version of the “Teaching Log(opens in new window)” process recommended by the Center for Teaching and Learning at Boise State.
In FDEV, we are preparing programming for the winter break and for the spring. You will get the most out of what we do or your own exploration if you go into it with a clear list of things that need to be addressed. Rarely do we have the time to make the changes during the semester, but I bet you can find the time to make notes to yourself. Got a great app or strategy for this? Send it our way, we would love to share it in a future Teaching Tip.
Zach Justus
Director of Faculty Development
Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences
Google Voice/Text:530-487-4150
Director of Faculty Development
Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences
Google Voice/Text:
If you’d like to comment on this or any other Tuesday Tip, visit the FDEV Blog(opens in new window).
All past Tuesday Tips are curated on the FDEV website.