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Undergraduate Academic Affairs

Category: Academic resources

Posts that relate to programs in the academic resources menu.

Protecting our shared home: A conversation with author, climate advocate and alum Brianna Craft

Written by Danielle Marie Holland
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Photo of Brianna Craft
Brianna Craft, ’10, author and senior researcher at International Institute for Environment and Development. Photo by Gemma Turnbull.

Brianna Craft, ’10, had a panic attack and from that moment, everything changed. An undergraduate in the Honors Program at the University of Washington, Craft found herself in an environmental studies lecture freshman year, with her heart beating rapidly and her fingers gripping her seat.  “Learning about the climate crisis changed everything for me,” Craft shared.

Far from remaining frozen in panic, Craft spent the following years diving into the issues behind the climate crisis. Craft credits some of her journey through fear and into deeper understanding to the UW Honors Program’s interdisciplinary approach. She was awarded a Bonderman Fellowship in 2008, and used the following year to travel through 14 countries. As she spoke with biologists in Costa Rica, families in Fiji and farmers in India, she learned how global warming was impacting people. She has worked hard to protect our shared home from the climate crisis ever since.

After graduating from the UW with a B.A. in architectural studies and minors in environmental studies and urban planning, Craft went on to earn her master’s degree in environmental studies from Brown University. As a graduate student, Craft began her involvement in U.N. climate negotiations, participating as a member of The Gambia’s national delegation. During the years that led to the signing of the Paris Agreement, Craft supported Mr. Pa Ousman Jarju, chair of the Least Developed Countries (LDC) Group. Post graduation, Craft joined the staff of the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED). As her role evolved, she took on research, writing briefings and directly supporting LDC delegates in negotiations on technology development and transfer.

Today Craft is a senior researcher at IIED, where she continues to bring together diverse fields of knowledge to make informed policy recommendations. Her memoir, “Everything That Rises: A Climate Change Memoir,” will be published on April 4, 2023.

 

Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What was your personal call to writing “Everything That Rises: A Climate Change Memoir”?

Image of the book cover for the book "Everything that Rises."After four years spent in United Nations’ negotiations, I celebrated the 2015 adoption of the first universal climate treaty, the Paris Agreement. Months later, the world’s largest cumulative greenhouse gas emitter (the U.S.) elected a climate change denier to their highest office. I needed every American to hear me, to see what my colleagues and I had worked so hard to accomplish. So I started what turned out to be a six-year journey from the memoir’s inception to publication.

 

In “Everything That Rises,” you write of “growing up in a house where the loudest voice always won and violence silenced those in need.” Can you speak to the intertwined natures/futures of oppression in the home with oppression in the global political sense?

I see so many parallels between the climate crisis and oppression dynamics. My father was violent and I grew up terrified. Living with the climate crisis is like living with him. The stress and the fear — the constant risk of death. The pressure and despair that impacts everything, underlies everything.

As a researcher, I work to support the LDCs in the U.N. climate change negotiations. The 46 countries are classified as the world’s poorest. They have done the least to cause the climate crisis – emitting less than 1% of global emissions – and are disproportionately impacted by the havoc it wreaks. Watching them push for adequate international decisions reminds me of what growing up was like. How every day I watched those with power undervalue things that were precious, irreplaceable. And the silence around it, the isolation. The pretending, when it is not safe. These dynamics are not talked about, in part, because doing so would mean owning up to reality and the part we play in its perpetuation.

 

How did you learn to be an advocate, and what do you hope readers will take away from your story in how they use their voice and personal power?

I started my time in the U.N. climate change negotiations as a 24-year-old graduate student. I went from looking to others for solutions, to advocating for those I love myself. The climate crisis is the single greatest threat we have ever faced. I hope readers will use their voice and power to shape our collective response: that they will vote to elect officials who will cut our greenhouse gas emissions to net zero; that they will protest climate inaction; and that they will divest their time and their money from fossil fuels. It will take all of us to protect our shared home.

 

How did Honors’ interdisciplinary studies inform your relationship to learning about the environment, and how does it inform your current research?

I would not have learned about climate change if not for the Honors’ interdisciplinary approach. Being an Honors student landed me in an environmental studies lecture. I’ll be eternally grateful! I continue to use interdisciplinary approaches in my current research — bringing together many fields of knowledge to craft policy recommendations. The climate crisis is a wicked problem. Climate change combines the interconnected problems of sustainability and pollution with many actors, long timescales, great economic burden, and uncertainty. Interdisciplinary approaches are needed to implement effective solutions.

 

What is your day-to-day like as a senior researcher at the International Institute for Environment and Development?

I love the people I get to work with. LDC negotiators and my badass team, whose motivation to make change fuels them (and me) through the marathon of effort required to reach international decisions.

When not in U.N. negotiations supporting countries to reconcile what the climate crisis has irrevocably lost and damaged, I do a lot of writing. I write briefings, toolkits and research papers about climate diplomacy. I help run training workshops for new climate negotiators from the LDCs. And lately, I’ve spent some quality time helping authors from Nepal, Rwanda, the Solomon Islands and Sierra Leone tell stories about how climate change will mean their lives will never be the same.

 

We understand that you are a lover of peanut butter. Was it that which truly brought you to the environmental movement?

I could wax lyrical about peanut butter. It’s the most delicious, low impact protein source I can think of! I don’t know if I’d say that the love of peanut butter brought me to the climate movement, but it has certainly fuelled me through it.

Celebrating the 2021–22 Undergraduate Medalists

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From the thousands of undergraduate students at the University of Washington, three are selected each year for the prestigious President’s Medalist Award. Olivia Brandon, Peyton Goodwin and Anaëlle Enders are the medalists for 2021–22, selected by a committee for their high GPAs, rigor of classes and numbers of Honors courses. All three are students in the University Honors Program, completing the Interdisciplinary Honors track.

15-seconds at a time: Academic Support Programs [video]

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
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In this video, Academic Support Programs Director Ryan Burt takes on the challenge of explaining Academic Support Programs in less than 15 seconds at a time. “15 Seconds at a Time” is a series in which different Undergraduate Academic Affairs programs explain their work in bite-sized bursts.

Academic Support Programs, located at the UW in Mary Gates Hall, provides a space for all UW undergraduate students to be included, challenged and supported in their educational journey. An academic home away from home, Academic Support Programs offers peer-to-peer programs and services include tutoring and coaching, as well as connections to other academic support programs across campus.

Academic Support Programs’ resources are available to you online and in person. Academic coaching is available through the day into the evening, CLUE tutoring on evenings and online appointments can be made at academicsupport.uw.edu. CLUE tutors cover a wide range of majors including: math, physics, political science, chemistry, public health, English, social work, statistics, economics and more. Visit Academic Support Programs to learn more about scheduling with one of their amazing student coaches and tutors.

Produced by: Ian Teodoro and Kirsten Atik
Edited by: Ian Teodoro
Thanks to: Ryan Burt

This autumn, let us begin again

Written by Ed Taylor
Posted on

It’s the beginning of another academic year. The leaves on the iconic cherry trees in the Quad are turning red, orange, gold. We often focus on these trees in the spring — and with good reason, the blossoms are spectacular and represent a kind of joyful renewal — but autumn and the start of classes brings its own beauty and renewal through this specific time and place.

The leaves change together, just as our students transform together through a common experience of learning at this point in time and at this public institution. The turning of the leaves, a new school year, new students coming to campus: It is hopeful and gives us all an opportunity to begin again.

In Undergraduate Academic Affairs, we create opportunities and programs that enable students to connect to, deepen and expand their undergraduate academic experiences. As a result, students are able to be fully present and be the lead protagonists in their own educational journeys.

As we all begin this new academic year, full of possibility and hope, I think of James Baldwin, who wrote, “The world is before you and you need not take it or leave it as it was when you came in.”

Many students in the UW’s history did not leave the UW as it was when they entered. They gathered, learned, organized and changed the way this very University operates and has made us a better institution. We are better today because of the people who have come through here.

The people make the institution, and students develop capacities for leadership, community engagement and scholarship that make it so they are not just at the UW, but are able to be the UW.

Emily Dickenson wrote, “Hope is the thing with feathers / That perches in the soul, / And sings the tune without the words, / And never stops at all …”

With all the challenges our local and global communities face, when I meet students, I am filled with hope anew. The UW provides students with both common academic experiences and vast opportunities to choose and create their own academic adventures. Hope perches in our souls and sings no matter what.

This class of more than 7,200 entering students is filled with new Huskies, parents, families, mentors and supporters who are here because they’ve been hopeful.

My hope for all our students is that, by finding a sense of belonging at the UW, they develop the habits of heart, grow their intellectual capacity and discover their own drive to create the world anew.

Emily Kolby named director for First Year Curriculum and Engagement

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Undergraduate Academic Affairs is pleased to welcome Emily Kolby to her new appointment as director of First Year Curriculum and Engagement. Kolby identifies First Year Programs’ guiding principles of intentionality, collaboration, equity and access as essential to the work of serving students. She believes that with continuing the work of intentionally connecting with each student, that the program can create full and holistic first year experiences.

15 Seconds at a Time: Undergraduate Research Program [video]

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In this video, Undergraduate Research Program Director Sophie Pierszalowski takes on the challenge of explaining the Undergraduate Research Program in less than 15 seconds at a time. “15 Seconds at a Time” is a series in which various Undergraduate Academic Affairs programs explain their work in bite-sized bursts.

Creating your UW academic adventure

Written by Undergraduate Academic Affairs
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Welcome to the University of Washington! This story is your own choose-your-own-adventure story, and begins right here with you. You are a first-year student in your first quarter. As you read, you will face challenges that ask you to decide which way to go. What will your pathway be? As you jump from storyline to storyline, you will learn about the resources available to you through UAA’s Academic Support Programs. Just as in life, you can’t go backward in this story, but you will get opportunities to redirect along the way. Have fun, and see you at the finish line: commencement!

Editor’s note: This story is not meant to be read straight through. Read a section, make your choice and see what part of your academic adventure unfolds next.

1

It’s your first quarter at the UW! You feel very motivated and excited by the possibilities of a big university and living on your own for the first time.

As you prepare for classes, you reflect on how you want to make a difference in people’s lives and help others. You aren’t entirely sure what this may look like, but you are leaning pretty heavily toward a major in a STEM field. You talk it out with your family and they support this idea, saying, “Not only would you be able to help others, but you will have many post-graduate opportunities in a medical field.”

You signed up for a series of introductory classes at summer Advising & Orientation, including a chemistry class. In the first week of class, you overhear a student saying, “I heard this is a weed-out class,” but you feel pretty confident in your academic ability based on your grades in high school.

Continue to #2

 

 

 

2

The quarter is underway, and after just a few weeks you find yourself overwhelmed with the workload in your chemistry class. Looking around you say, “Why does everyone else seem to be managing this better than me?” Your new friends are going to parties and get-togethers while you are stuck at your desk for hours trying to understand the textbook. You realize you never really learned how to study in high school, and have no idea if you are doing it effectively.

You decide you need to either increase your study hours and commit to study nights at Odegaard Library or talk to your TA about your challenges.

#3 Decide to do more solo studying at Odegaard

#4 Decide to check in with a TA

 

 

 

 

3

Decide to solo study at Odegaard

Having dedicated more time to studying at night in Odegaard library, you begin to get caught up on all your readings before each class. Although the evenings there come with fewer distractions, the late nights start to wear on you, leaving you feeling isolated and sleep-deprived. You make plans with new friends only to cancel, telling them, “I can’t hang out because I need to study. I’m so anxious about answering questions in class correctly.”

Your focus has improved as you move through the quarter. You review your lecture notes, the readings from the textbook, and do all the practice exercises. Since you are studying alone, though, you question if you are answering the questions correctly. The back of the textbook has some of the answers but not the ones you are most stuck on.

As midterms approach, you find yourself falling behind again. The late study nights leave you sleeping through your alarm clock and running late to classes. You are exhausted and bail on your quiz section to take a nap. At this point in the quarter you find yourself asking, “Do I need to go talk to my chemistry TA, or should I just keep doing what I’m doing and hope for the best?”

#4 Decide to go check in with a TA

#5 Head to the midterm

 

 

 

4

Decide to check in with a TA

You schedule a meeting with your TA and share how much time you are studying. The TA reassures you that it’s enough time and gives you a piece of advice, “It is important to find study strategies that work best for you to understand the material.” You know the TA cares about your success and talking with them was helpful, but when you leave you realize you aren’t exactly sure how to find the strategies that work best for you, especially when you never had this type of workload in high school. You feel a little lost and stuck, so you head to the library for a few more late nights of midterm prep.

#5 Time to head to the midterm

 

 

 

 

5

It’s time for the midterm

The first midterm of the quarter is here, and with all the extra nights you spent studying, you feel like it went pretty well! The professor mentioned it would be graded on a curve, so you think you will get at least a B. When the test scores come back you find out you did not even pass! Looking at your score you think, “I don’t even know how this could happen! I studied so much, and missed out on all the fall events. I’m nervous about asking for help, but with this score, it’s clear I am going to need it.”

You remember seeing a post for CLUE tutoring on your Instagram feed and think they might be able to help you with your chem homework. You also remember an Academic Success Coaching flyer in the HUB and think they might be able to help with study skills and time management. You feel anxious about either option but eventually decide to reach out.

#6 Go to CLUE tutoring

#7 Go to the academic success coach

 

 

 

6

Decide to go to CLUE tutoring

You have been feeling a little intimidated connecting with others, and your nervousness has kept you from going to CLUE tutoring yet. You realize you really do need the help as you say, “What’s the worst thing that could happen?” while eying the time on your phone. It’s 7 p.m., so the CLUE tutoring drop-in sessions just started. You grab your chemistry homework and head over. You sit in the chemistry tutoring section and hear other students talk about tips they have used to better understand concepts. It’s reaffirming to hear that others struggle with the same material, and you feel like you’ve warmed up to working with other students. The CLUE tutor reviews additional problems with you, helping you identify what step you were missing. You write down the steps to solve the problems, and are so happy to have that for later reference!

You feel like you have gotten help with some of the concepts you were struggling with in class, so now you need to choose if you want to keep studying these concepts for finals, or meet with an academic success coach and dive deeper into your study skills.

#10 Apply what you learned at CLUE and head to finals week

#8 Stopover with an academic success coach before finals week

 

 

 

7

Meet with the academic success coach

“What’s the worst thing that could happen?” you ask yourself as you schedule a session to meet with an academic success coach. When you arrive and settle in, they ask how the quarter is going, and at first you say, “It’s going okay.” They continue to ask you questions and mention that they had a challenging time their first quarter at the UW. You decide to tell them how you are actually doing: “I’ve worked so hard and it’s as though I don’t see any of it reflected in my grades. I am homesick and sad to have missed out on new adventures with friends. I’m just always studying and barely making it!”

The coach listens and says, “It’s completely understandable that you are feeling homesick with all this time spent studying alone. I know when I studied alone and tried to teach myself all of the material my first quarter of college, I was totally exhausted and realized I needed to try new study strategies that would work for me.” You feel relieved that someone understands you, and even more relieved when they share these active studying techniques with you. The coach suggests you start working with others to avoid isolation and collaborate through practice problems. “You can actively study with others by working together through practice problems and having discussions on the material,” they suggest.

Before you leave, they go over what your academic needs and learning styles are so they can coordinate the right resources for you. You end up walking out with a list of CHEM student organizations for group course content discussions, CLUE tutoring to work through problems with and strategies for tackling practice problems. You think, “I am so happy that I gave this a shot! You think about whether you should also get some 1:1 tutoring at CLUE or join a study group as you head to finals week.

#9 Decide to go to CLUE tutoring

#10 Head to finals week

 

 

 

 

8

Dive into study skills with an academic success coach

After going to CLUE tutoring, you are less intimidated in connecting with others. Now that you have gotten support with some of the class concepts, you want to address potential study strategies.

You head in to meet with an academic success coach and they ask how the quarter is going. You say, “It’s going okay,” but they continue to ask you questions and mention that they had a challenging time their first quarter at the UW. You decide to tell them how you are actually doing, “I’ve worked so hard and it’s as though I don’t see any of it reflected in my grades. I am homesick and sad to have missed out on new adventures with friends. I’m just always studying and barely making it!”

The coach listens and says, “It’s completely understandable that you are feeling homesick with all this time spent studying alone. I know when I studied alone and tried to teach myself all of the material my first quarter of college, I was totally exhausted and realized I needed to try new study strategies.” You feel relieved that someone understands you, and even more relieved when they share these active studying techniques with you. The coach suggests you start working with others to avoid isolation and collaborate through practice problems. “You can actively study with others by working together through practice problems and having discussions on the material,” they suggest.

Before you leave, they give you some great resources. A list of CHEM student organizations for group course content discussions and strategies for tackling practice problems. As you walk out you tell yourself, “I think I have a better handle on study strategies I want to try. I’m going to reach out to these groups today and commit to studying with new friends instead of by myself!” You are very happy you decided to schedule an appointment, and head out for boba to celebrate.

#10 Time for finals!

 

 

 

 

9

Decide to go to CLUE tutoring

You decide to head over to CLUE after your coaching session, grabbing your chem books and unanswered problems. The CLUE tutor reviews the problems with you and is able to identify what step you were missing. “I could tell right away, because that is the step I always forgot and most students struggle with,” they share. It’s reaffirming to hear that others struggle with the same material, and it feels good to be working with another student. After you complete a few problems, they have you write down the steps you took to solve it. You are grateful to take that with you for later reference. You feel like you have gotten help with some of the concepts you were struggling most with in class. Between the coach and CLUE, you feel ready now for finals.

#10 Head to finals week

 

 

 

10

It’s finals week!

As the week begins, you find yourself thinking “I’m definitely more prepared now than I was for midterms. I’ve reviewed the concepts from the CLUE tutor and I’ve been using the active studying techniques from the academic success coach. I’m ready for this week!”

When final scores arrive, despite your hard work, you discover you are ending the class with a grade lower than what you were expecting. As you reflect on the experience of this first quarter, you wonder if you should sign up to retake the course. The idea alone has you feeling burned out and unmotivated. You ask yourself, “Do I really belong in STEM? I thought I would be motivated by studying something I could use to help people in a career. What am I doing wrong?”

#11 Reinvigorate your path to STEM

#12 Continue as you have been

#13 Decide to switch majors

 

 

 

11

Reinvigorate your path to STEM

Thinking back to the conversation you had with the academic success coach, you remember them asking, “What’s your motivation?” When the year began, your goal was just to pass your classes. “What is my motivation?” you wonder. You pull up a goal-setting worksheet from the coaching website and spend the rest of the evening filling it out. Identifying specific short-term goals for each week, you put them all together toward one major long-term goal.

Keeping on track over the coming weeks helps you regain the motivation you felt before school started and you start to feel less burned out. With your free time you do self-care activities including more calls to your family. On a recent call you share, “I’ve really been questioning myself and if I belong in STEM.” Your family reminds you of how much of an impact and a difference you can make in your community! You feel inspired again and that is the fuel you need for the next quarter. Keeping your mind on the big picture, you eventually make it through the hardest times. You find yourself enjoying your studies and succeeding. You become a regular at CLUE and also continue meeting with an academic success coach. You feel invigorated and continue on through the school year — excited for class, happy to share time with new friends and look forward to what the future holds.

This is the end of this story, but yours is just getting started …

 

 

 

12

Continue as you have been

This quarter passes, then the next, and you keep grinding in your CHEM classes. You are so burned out you don’t even have the motivation to complete your work or reach out for more help. Thinking back to the conversation you had with the academic success coach, you remember them asking, “What’s your motivation?” When the year began, your goal was just to pass your classes. “What is my motivation?” you wonder. “I really felt like this was an optimal path for helping people and ensuring a great career post-college, but I think there might be another pathway for me to do that,” you tell yourself. You schedule a meeting with your academic adviser, and share your recent self-discovery. “I don’t feel connected to this side of the STEM world anymore. I’ve been thinking about a move toward psychology as a potential field to help people.” Your adviser helps you develop a plan to switch potential majors. You feel invigorated by your new self-discovery and continue on through the school year becoming a regular at CLUE and regularly meeting with an academic success coach. You are excited for class, happy to share time with new friends, and look forward to what the future holds for you.

This is the end of this story, but yours is just getting started …

 

 

 

13

Decide to switch majors

You’ve struggled all year with the question: “Is STEM really for me?” Thinking back to the conversation you had with the academic success coach, you remember them asking, “What’s your motivation?” When the year began, your goal was just to pass your classes. “What is my motivation?” you wonder. “I really felt like this was an optimal path for helping people and ensuring a great career post-college, but I think there might be another pathway for me to do that,” you tell yourself. You keep coming back to psychology as an option where you could redirect yourself and still be helpful to people in your community. You meet with your adviser for support and together you put plans in place to switch potential majors. You feel invigorated by your new self-discovery and continue on through the school year becoming a regular at CLUE and regularly meeting with an academic success coach. You are excited about class, happy to share time with new friends, and look forward to what the future holds for you.

This is the end of this story, but yours is just getting started …

This story came together through collaboration. Thank you to these generous and creative colleagues for your work and dedication to this endeavor: Alli Botelho, Danielle Marie Holland, Gracie Pakosz, Ian Teodoro, Jenelle Birnbaum, Kirsten Atik and Mina Zavary. Photo illustrations by Ian Teodoro.

A pathway with promise

Written by Danielle Marie Holland
Posted on

In June, 2021, Vice Provost and Dean Ed Taylor joined then-Mayor Jenny Durkan and educational leaders to announce increased funding for the successful Seattle Promise college tuition and success program. The new funding prepares and supports Seattle Promise students in several ways, including their application and then transfer to the UW.

As reported by The Seattle Times, in the news conference Taylor “likened it to a relay race, with the batons passed smoothly from high schools to community colleges and then to the UW.”

Aerial photo of Suzzallo Library
The first cohort of participants in the Path to UW partnership have wrapped up a year of advice and support.

The baton was passed to the UW as the partnership officially launched September 2021. The first cohort of participants in the Path to UW partnership have wrapped up a year of advice and support. Eighty-three Seattle Promise students applied to the UW during this process, and 60 were admitted for the upcoming 2022-23 academic school year.

Resources and more info for and about the transfer student experience

For the next cohort, a pool of around 1,100 students in Seattle Promise will have the ability to access the Path to UW adviser, Lily Peterson, and could choose to move forward in applying for a UW transfer. Path to UW programming includes events and workshops to help students explore transferring to the UW, prepare to apply and transfer to the UW, individualized admissions and advising support, and summer seminar courses to help students prepare academically for the transition to the UW.

Many Seattle Promise students would be the first in their families to earn a college degree, come from low-income backgrounds, or experience other barriers to higher education. For these students, this can make the college application and transition process ambiguous and difficult to navigate. An adviser with experience in admissions, financial aid applications and academic planning helps students transfer successfully by supporting each student in learning how and what information to access to get their needs met in a larger system.

Path to UW adviser Peterson’s own pathway to advising is rooted in her belief in access to higher education and support for all students. Peterson’s dual roles of UW undergraduate academic adviser and UW adviser to Path to UW have allowed her to witness firsthand the discrepancy between societal narratives of equity in access to higher education versus the lived reality. Peterson sums up the goal of the Path project as “supporting students who are furthest from educational justice.”

Photo of Lily Peterson outdoors
Adviser Lily Peterson helps students in the Seattle Promise program make their way to the UW. Photo: Photo by Ian Teodoro

Peterson explains, “People assume that everybody has the same access to being able to apply to and be competitive and successfully enter into a four-year institution. But realistically, a lot of students are not even given a chance because of barriers, because of funding.”

Many students who Peterson and her fellow advisers support are navigating numerous unseen barriers that impact educational access, from funding and financial responsibilities, familial obligations, limited resources of time and even wider community responsibilities.

Knowledge and understanding of these intersections of systems help advisers apply holistic approaches to their work. Advisers help students understand the university system so they are better prepared to move through it. Identifying each student’s personal educational goals and dreams, advisers can accompany them with opportunities, information and tools so that they may realize them. Peterson additionally helps students efficiently connect to UW units, and she partners closely with directors and staff in UW resources.

As the Path to UW continues into its second year, advisers will walk alongside them, checking in to learn, “What are the students’ influences or family impacts on their decisions? What timelines do they need to be on? Where have they felt seen or unseen in representation? Do they feel safe and able to participate in certain programs?” For Peterson, learning the answers to these questions enables her to better understand the student in front of her and is fundamental to her practice of advising.

Honors Director Vicky Lawson prepares for next adventure

Written by Interview by Danielle Marie Holland
Posted on

After more than three decades of service to the University of Washington, Vicky Lawson will retire at the end of the academic year. Lawson, professor of geography and poverty researcher, has spent the past eight years directing the Honors Program, contributing to the deepening of its interdisciplinary focus and approach to intentional community building, innovative thinking and global citizenship.

Lawson is past president of the Association of American Geographers and former chair of the Department of Geography. Having worked across South and North America on informal economies, women’s work and poverty, her classes focus on the intersections of poverty, inequality and feminist care ethics. In addition to her leadership in the Honors Program, she is co-director of the Relational Poverty Network, a global research network that aims to expand thinking about the causes of poverty in both rich and poor countries. During her tenure at the UW, she has served as adjunct professor in the Department of Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies and as a faculty affiliate of the West Coast Poverty Center.

Photo of Ed Taylor, Vicky Lawson and Tina Ragen.
Vicky Lawson, center, at her retirement party with Ed Taylor, left, and Tina Ragen, right. Photo: Photo by Shannon Sherman

As Lawson prepares to pass the role of Honors Program director to Stephanie Smallwood, she shares her thoughts on her accomplishments as director, the transformation of undergraduates through the interdisciplinary program, and the enduring impact of the Honors Program.

Honors broadened my view

How has the Honors Program most impacted and changed you?

With a 35-year career in the geography department and College of Arts and Sciences, coming over to Honors changed my perspective on undergraduate education and the University as a whole. Honors broadened my view of the University, in terms of who holds the University up and how, and in terms of the breadth of interests and capacities of students from all across the University. Honors spans the entire campus [and includes] students, instructors and classes from every college. It was a new vantage point for me of the brilliance of students regardless of what corner of campus or what background they come from.

I teach a class on houselessness and one particular student from aeronautics engineering made a profound contribution to an art exhibit my students installed with Real Change News through a comparative historical photography project of Seattle. It was a wakeup call for me to realize that it’s not just geographers who know how to read a city.

In addition to appreciating the breadth and curiosity of the students, coming over to UAA was coming into a space that is driven by professional staff. I came to appreciate just how staff hold up the University and how much they contribute. Getting to work closely with incredibly talented staff was a real gift because you see the commitment and the depth of the work they do. In Honors, all the staff are leaders. It’s a super creative space.

A deep commitment to inviting in the students

How has the Honors Program changed in the past eight years?

It was already an incredibly innovative, complex, interdisciplinary space when I got here. I don’t take a lot of credit for the brilliance of this program. I just came in and tried to amplify and support what the staff were already doing. These were things that were already happening, but we have been deeply introspective about difference and intersectional equity in our program. Honors has evolved tremendously over its 60-year history, especially over the past two decades. Juliana Villegas has been a leader on this work, but everybody’s been involved in understanding who our students are and where they come from. We have been committed to bringing in first-generation students and students of color and understanding how we’re doing compared to the University as a whole. We have a lot more work to do, but we do have a deep commitment to inviting in students who saw the label “Honors” and thought, “Well, that’s not a space for me.” Instead [we] invite them to know that, actually, participating in Honors is being part of an education that honors the University. Everybody’s backgrounds, experience and knowledge brings brilliance. It’s been a major part of what we’ve been doing. Juliana has led on it, and everybody has leaned in very seriously on that work.

Interdisciplinary education, experiential learning, and being in community

Photo of Global Challenges event with panelists Anna Lauren Hoffmann, Ece Kamar, Shankar Narayan and moderator Vicky Lawson
Global Challenges, 2019, with panelists (left to right) Anna Lauren Hoffmann, Ece Kamar, Shankar Narayan and moderator Vicky Lawson.

Another area that I’m particularly personally proud of in Honors is this incredibly creative space that has always rested on pillars of interdisciplinary education, experiential learning and being in community. I wanted to invite the whole campus into this space with our students, and one of the ways that we did that was through our Global Challenges series. We built an annual event that puts people from different walks of life in conversation with each other and asks them to talk about an issue that students themselves raised. We pull the freshmen in and say, “What do you care about? What is keeping you up at night?” We’ve done this now since 2015. Each year we’ve filled a ballroom with 500 people and we’ve hosted the event online with hundreds of people. By asking the students what they want us to talk about, we put the students in charge of their education the minute they walk through the door. Honors students learn that, at UW, we listen to them, that we build the program around their interests. At Global Challenges, they get to see what it’s like to have three people who are very accomplished in their fields, in a humble conversation about a really big topic for which there is no simple answer. That’s an example of showing the larger community what Honors is all about, what our students are all about, what our pedagogy is all about.

We are building that broader, richer sense of who we are and why we do what we do and inviting everybody. We are building something that’s for everyone.

What is the impact you’ve witnessed of interdisciplinary research?

Photo of Sarah Elwood and Vicky Lawson
Sarah Elwood, left, and Vicky. Photo: Photo by Shannon Sherman

One of the things that Honors did was create a space where I could literally teach my driving passion. In my research, I had a long-standing relationship with Real Change News along with Sarah Elwood, my collaborator. Each year in Honors I’ve taught a class on poverty and houselessness. A couple of years ago, we did a deep dive with Real Change News as collaborators to bring the portrait project to campus. I gave the students the responsibility to curate the exhibit to run for three weeks and build a launch event in the Allen Library. Twenty-five students collaborated together on every aspect of bringing that exhibit to campus, they collaborated with our Real Change News colleagues who were at the core of the project. Many of the students who were involved have come back to me to talk about where that experience took them.

Students will rise to any challenge

This morning, I sat with a student applying to medical school, who was in another iteration of that same class. She talked about how doing medicine was one thing, but thinking about it through the lens of social justice, access, historical racism and how that shapes who has access to care, was transformative for her. She understood that in a deep way because she’d been part of that class. I create a class space where the students teach each other and they pick up and carry that work and take it to places that are important to them.

This last quarter I had a group of students create a zine, called Hopeful Futures, in collaboration with homeless youth in the U District. It is full of incredible art, essays, cartoons and drawings. The students did the work of assembling this art aimed at elevating the voice of homeless youth, about their ideas of what the future could look like. This was a chance for our students to collaborate with the youth and to elevate their vision, their brilliance and their ideas. I’ve come to realize working with our students that, literally, they will rise to any challenge. They will mount an art exhibit, they’ll create a zine, they will do collaborations that are deep, they will face up to the impossibly difficult questions of climate change and poverty, and houselessness.

It’s been transformative for me working with these students.

How do you see the impact of the Honors Program on the students as they graduate?

What we’re trying to do and what we’ve really committed ourselves to with Honors, is to support the students to complicate their ideas and work, and to be brave about it. So if they think they’re going to do medicine, can we work with them to think about what it means to be a doctor? What does it mean to be a doctor that cares about social justice? How do we invite students into spaces in a way that is actually enabling? That’s what Honors classes do. And the students take the work places we never thought of. I have students that worked for the Pike Place senior center, a student who’s up in Skagit County as an organic farmer, students at Harvard, students in medical school, a student working on climate change activism. They learn that they can be brilliant in any number of different ways.

We have brought together a community

What’s something that comes to the forefront that you are very proud about?

I am proud of how we’ve connected to broader communities — and Carey Christie gets credit here. We have worked hand in glove to bring together a community of alumni. We’ve built an advisory board that leans in and shows up. We have built financial and moral support for this program at a level that did not exist when we came in. We have an endowed scholarship for equity. We built an endowed leadership fund that’s still growing. It’s about people believing in us and people in the community really reaching in and supporting what we do. And we’ve got an incredible group of volunteers now. We just had the most successful Husky Giving Day which is less about the money and more about the fact that over 70 people thought Honors was special enough to make a gift. I feel really proud of how we’ve expanded our community with people who deeply care and want to support our students because of how they think and what they mean to the future.

What are you most excited about with the next adventure?

Photo of Vicky Lawson riding a brown horse
Vicky, doing one of her favorite things.

I’m excited about not being busy! I’ve always been on a mission to be an academic and teach. I’m very curious what life has to offer if I’m not doing those things. I’m curious about what my next chapter is going to be and I don’t think I’m going to really truly know that until I stop. I am quite sure it’s going to continue to have to do with activism around impoverishment and houselessness. There are a lot of things I think about and wonder what my skills might do to make an impact. I do know that I’m going to grow a garden. I’m going to travel and I’m going to raise a horse and train it.

Any last thoughts?

Photo of a black pony with white lower legs and feet in a field.
Vicky Lawson’s first post-retirement project: Training Domino, a one-year-old Missouri Fox Trotter.

I came into Honors and I realized that this is where the work is. Undergraduate education, especially at a public university, is the place that I believe you can have the most impact. Undergraduate students have infinite paths open to them. Honors has redoubled my commitment to undergraduate education as a place of praxis and place of personal and professional transformation that’s really important. The staff in Honors are just quite remarkable and they taught me every day what is possible in undergraduate education for life.

Undergraduate education is the place I believe you can have the most impact.