The role of Instructional Assistant at 天美视频 is somewhat different from what you may have encountered as Teaching Assistants in other academic contexts. All of our IAs hold Master鈥檚 degrees from 天美视频 or similar programs, and are practitioners at various stages within their chosen fields. Instructional Assistants work with faculty to ensure that you get the most out of your learning experience. They provide feedback on papers, are available to meet for office hours, and periodically teach and facilitate classroom interaction. Moreover, we ask IAs to bring their experience as former students and as practitioners in their current vocational contexts into all they do here at 天美视频. Instructional Assistants are dedicated to your growth and development as students and are eager to walk alongside you in this journey. Get used to seeking them out! They are here for you.

Today we’d love to spotlight two of the IAs who are working specifically in First-Year courses this fall (see below). And while we move quickly towards the start of the academic year, on behalf of all of the instructional staff here at 天美视频, we can鈥檛 wait to engage with you in the classroom soon.

Chris Curia (he/they)

Welcome, new students! I look forward to getting to know you more personally once the academic year begins. But first, I wanted to introduce myself here, extend my congratulations, and offer my best wishes for embarking on this next chapter in your professional journey. Having completed the MACP program in 2023 and the MATC-Community Development track in 2024, I am a recent 天美视频 graduate and know what it is like to begin such an undertaking. I commend you for leaping!

As an alumnus, I credit many aspects of my formation at this small, beautiful, complicated graduate school for how my life looks today. Apart from my role on the Instructional Staff team, I am a psychotherapist based in downtown Seattle and a commissioner on an advisory board with the City of Seattle. I am proud of my academic and personal work and the questions about belonging, equity, justice, identity, and liberation I wrestled with throughout my graduate years that have followed me into my career. As such, I returned to 天美视频 as an Instructional Assistant because of my belief that your graduate student years can be just as formative if you let them. So, it is my joy to come alongside you in whatever that journey will hold. I wish you all the best and plenty of rest in the weeks ahead, and I look forward to our work together this academic year!

Jessalyn Jackson (She/Her)

Welcome! My name is Jessalyn. I am looking forward to another academic year filled with the highs and lows of learning and self-discovery and supporting you along the way. I graduated with a Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology from Northwest University across the pond in Kirkland in 2019. Since then, I鈥檝e worked in a community mental health setting for about three years before transitioning to private practice. The emphasis on reflection and depth work at 天美视频 has had a profound impact on my personal and professional life. Because personal growth is a journey that never ends, I encourage you to engage in the work authentically and with curiosity and see where it takes you. Practice embodied self-compassion as you are seemingly inundated with knowledge and information. You will find that once your time here is done, you鈥檝e retained more than you think. Finally, enjoy connecting with your colleagues! You each have a wealth of knowledge, perspectives, and unique understanding to contribute that is invaluable. When I鈥檓 not a therapist, I’m a wife and mom to an 8th month old boy (Graham). I enjoy design, sports, and used to like going to the movies. I look forward to meeting you!

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While asynchronous learning was well underway before the pandemic, the necessity of transitioning to online learning helped accelerate both our timeline and innovation among our faculty members. With no other choice but to teach online, our professors rose to the challenge in remarkable ways to deliver not only engaging but truly unique classroom experiences to students.

Incoming students who choose to pursue graduate school through our low-residency programs can expect to be engaged no less than those learning in person. Core to our mission is transforming relationships and we believe, particularly for those who want to pursue their calling in their current location, the ability to learn while rooted in your community is vital.

But what does innovative online learning look like in practice? Transitioning to teaching online was not without its challenges, but the ability to increase accessibility across formats and locations proved invaluable. We had the privilege of speaking with three faculty who shared with us how they were able to adapt their teaching styles to best engage students online.

Read how a few of our courses were taught in unique and collaborative approaches over this past year.

Lauren Sawyer, MA: Philosophy

鈥淚 find that philosophy is a subject that requires at least some teaching in the form of lectures. Especially for those who have not read philosophical texts recently鈥攐r at all鈥攊t鈥檚 hard to pick up a chapter from Immanuel Kant鈥檚 Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals and understand what the hell is going on, even with some engaging secondary sources.

I decided to record my lectures as podcast episodes for a few reasons. Some were practical: so that my students could listen聽to the lecture on their own time and so that I didn鈥檛 have to stress about creating slides or looking bright-eyed on camera every week. But it also allowed me to present the content in more creative and different ways than I would have had I lectured synchronously, in-person, or on Zoom.

I rely on some of the strategies of my favorite podcasts: storytelling; intentional聽pauses and slow-downs; clips, music, and sound effects; voice acting, and conversational interviews. In one episode, I give a 鈥淧eople鈥檚 History of the Enlightenment鈥� by telling a (mostly) historically accurate account of a witch-hunt in light of the major cultural and intellectual shifts of the 17th century.

In almost all the episodes, I interview content experts or include voice work done by my friends. This way I can include a diversity of voices and ideas that are not represented in the philosophers we鈥檙e studying (especially as we are reading mostly male Continental thinkers). I decided to use the podcasting platform, Anchor.fm, to enhance my students鈥� experience鈥攖hey can subscribe and access the podcast on their phones. Anchor provides me with data on how many students are listening and at what point in the episodes they tune out. I鈥檓 a bit of a data nerd; having this extra bit of information helps me fine tune the podcast for future courses. It has shown me, too, that I have an audience beyond the 16 students in my class! The podcast is called 鈥�,鈥� a borrowed line from Tertullian鈥檚 infamous text that asks, 鈥榳hat has Athens (philosophy) to do with Jerusalem (theology)?鈥欌��

Dr. Ron Ruthruff: Engaging Global Partnerships

Dr. Ron Ruthruff faced a unique challenge in needing to adapt a course that typically takes place on the ground in Guatemala to students’ homes. How does one replicate the sights, interactions, and in the moment learnings of being in a different country?

鈥淭he thought of going online with a class usually held in Guatemala seemed ridiculous, until I began to plot and plan with my Guatemalan Colleague. Dr, Joel Aguilar. Making this pivot to an online format intentionally grew us in at least three areas of the course: The uses of film study and required readings, student engagement and application, and faculty collaboration.

We folded the readings and film study that were part of pre-trip preparation into the course to serve as an asynchronous way to establish a solid understanding of the socio-political and religious history of Guatemala. Conversation via Zoom and online discussion boards were tethered more directly to the film study and required readings instead of being frontloaded on the trip, which helped us dissect and digest the material more effectively.

Students who wanted to engage with the material but had barriers to international travel have welcomed the opportunity to take an international course without needing to leave home. Moving the course online also afforded us the opportunity to bring the course 鈥榟ome鈥� as we were able to invite a panel of Pacific Northwest activists to talk about how they are serving local Latinx communities, allowing students to connect global wounds of colonialism to [events?] in their own backyards.

Perhaps most importantly, this format allowed me the opportunity to work more closely and collaboratively with my dear friend and colleague, Joel Aguilar, rather than me front-loading theoretical information to students and Joel planning a 7-day vision trip. We met every Friday via Zoom to plan for the following week. Needless to say the pandemic, quarantine, and the demand to pivot to online modalities was not easy, but we are learning and growing, and while I long to be back with my friends around the world, we are allowing what has been an incredible challenge to also be our teacher.鈥�

You can learn more about low-residency learning opportunities in our Master of Divinity, Master of Arts in Theology & Culture, and Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology programs.

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For the past nine years, I have the privilege of teaching Being the Word on the Street: Developing Intercultural Competency. The class is delivered in three movements: our past lineage, our present relations, and our future imagination.

Our Past Lineage: We begin our study by reading the works of three historians: Ron Takaki’s A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America, Nell Painter鈥檚 The History of White People, and Ibram Kendi鈥檚 Stamped from the Beginning: A Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. Each of these authors exposes our shared history in the United States as it relates to race, illuminating how public policy, policing, education, and healthcare have been shaped by racist and racialized ideas. This is our lineage and it impacts how we live together, and how we see each other.

Our Present Relations: Jeff Chang鈥檚 We Goin鈥� Be Alright: Notes of Race and Desegregation and Ibram Kendi鈥檚 work are profoundly helpful in teaching us about the current state of race in the U.S. and our ability or inability to relate to each other. The second movement builds awareness of four different levels of at play in all human interactions. Our relating is far more complex than simply person to person. Human difference is informed by Systemic forces that influence our ways of knowing, Organizational culture (s) that develops unspoken meaning-making mechanism, Interpersonal communication dynamics and intrapsychic, deeply internal views of the self and the other. Students begin to connect how history we share and the varying levels of relating inform every human interaction.

Our Future Imagination: Finally, with the help of some wise guides from the community, we explore a theological and sociological imagination for relating across differences as equals. Eric Law鈥檚 The Wolf Shall Dwell with the Lamb: Spiritual Leadership in a Multicultural Community explores the power dynamics across differing cultures and offers simple strategies to facilitate communication and understanding across those differences. With this is our text we begin to engage in conversation with leaders who have built bridges and are creating truly miraculous symbiotic multicultural discourse

At the end of each term, students are asked to create a presentation that explores the history of the United States as it relates to diversity, how this history has shaped our identity and impacted community, and how we as a community could imagine a new future with each other. I find myself often struck by the creativity of these projects and humbled by the deep listening each student has done to build the presentation. The following two projects are examples of the work of our students are doing as we explore what it means to work towards cultural credibility and strive to be a therapeutic presence in a world of difference.

The Impact of COVID-19 on the BIPOC and Unhoused Communities of Seattle

by Milli Haase, an MATC student

鈥淭his project was an opportunity for students to create a visual experience – to capture the ways racism was / is constructed and continues to impact communities, all while drawing on course resources. Ron’s invitation provided for a more visceral experience. Given the recent outbreak of COVID, I’m grateful that Ron allowed me the space to connect the outbreak to Seattle’s own racist systems, to show that this outbreak is really unveiling our own violent structures for what they really are. Yes, it is true that nobody is born hating another person because of the color of their skin. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love (Mandela), and also: racism is the very system we have been born into and benefit from. We are not born into a world in which we are not racist until taught to be. Rather, we are born into a world in which by systemic default we must actively engage to be anti-racist.鈥�
-Milli

A Journey Towards Cultural Credibility: Informing Anti-Racist Living

by Christina Bergevin, an MATC student

鈥淭his presentation was the culminating project for RLM520 – Being the Word On the Street: Developing Intercultural Competency; the second class on multicultural narratives and American racism that I have taken at 天美视频. Thanks to Dr. Ron Ruthruff for introducing our class to challenging authors, dynamic community leaders, and sobering conversations that begin to shape and grow the theological, historic, and cultural understanding needed in the work of racial justice and anti-racist policy.鈥�
-Christina

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