The following descriptions provide an overview of the each committee’s plans and mission for the academic year:
Curriculum Innovation Committee (CIC)
Chairs: Rachel Dean-Ruzicka rachel.dean-ruzicka@lmc.gatech.edu and Micheal Rumore mrumore@gatech.edu
The mission of the newly re-established Curriculum Innovation Committee (CIC) is to create a platform for Brittain Fellows and other interested LMC faculty to engage in ongoing conversations surrounding pedagogical questions that arise from teaching in the writing classroom or in the humanities more broadly conceived. The committee will host one to two workshops per semester that will interweave theoretical conversations on various pedagogical topics with practical tools that participants can explore in their classrooms.
The committee will also organize informal cohort meetings for Fellows for providing teaching information, discussion, and support throughout the year. In addition to organizing and implementing workshops, committee members will enjoy surveying colleagues for pedagogical needs and interests, also giving and receiving feedback on how to develop and promote one’s teaching for job market talks. Curriculum Innovation is also a resource for peer observation of classroom performance, which can be added to a job dossier or teaching portfolio. We invite pedagogically focused Brittain Fellows and Lecturers to join us for a place to exchange and promote innovative ideas about teaching.
DevLab Committee
Chair: Andrew Nance – anance9@gatech.edu, Matthew Halm – halm@gatech.edu
The mission of the DevLab Committee is to maintain and promote the Writing and Communication Program’s Research and Development Lab, located in Hall 012. DevLab is where Brittain Fellows go to access technology and develop skills that can enhance their teaching and research activities. The DevLab Committee acquires and maintains hardware and software resources for the lab. The facility includes a 3D printer, a large-format printer, book scanners, handheld audio recorder, USB microphones, and camera equipment, as well as computer workstations featuring software associated with video editing, audio recording, scanning, and printing. The committee also hosts workshops and tutorials, manages the DevLab website, and publishes the DevDigest: a monthly email update about what’s happening in DevLab. More broadly, the DevLab Committee works to keep DevLab’s technology and its mission up-to-date and to ensure that it continues to meet the needs of the Brittain Fellows.
Grant Writing Committee
Chairs: Sean Dolan – sdolan33@gatech.edu
The mission of the GWC is to offer grant resources and information for Brittain Fellows and other WCP faculty and students seeking funding for digital humanities and public humanities-oriented projects that increase the visibility of scholarship, pedagogy, and engagement of Georgia Tech’s Writing and Communication Program and the Brittain Fellowship. The GWC maintains digital grant resources on their website and has organized yearly grant writing seminars in the past. Our plans this year include an updated, more digitally responsive website and a potential grant writing seminar on research and writing grants for scholars in the humanities. Serving on the GWC committee is perfect for those Brittain Fellows interested in learning more about research and writing grants, as well as those interested in faculty development and integrative approaches to interdisciplinary research.
Hiring Committee
Chair: Andy Frazee – andy.frazee@lmc.gatech.edu
The Hiring Committee’s mission is to identify and hire a diverse cohort of excellent teacher-scholars to serve as Brittain Fellows and teach WCP courses. Every year, the committee conducts two searches: a small one in the fall for January 1 hires and a larger one in the spring for August 1 hires. In past years, the committee has also worked on updating the job ad to make it more inclusive and considering ways to appeal to a wider pool of applicants. For 2023-24, the committee will focus on its primary work of conducting the fall and spring searches. Committee members can expect to review applications, participate in Zoom interviews, and provide feedback and recommendations for hires to the WCP Director. Participating on the Hiring Committee is a great way to help ensure the continuing excellence of the Brittain Fellowship and WCP while learning about academic hiring processes and sharpening your awareness of job search best practices.
Multilingual Pedagogy Committee or MPC (formerly the World Englishes Committee)
Chairs: Chairs: Ankita Rathour (arathour6@gatech.edu) and Cameron Winter (cameron.winter@gatech.edu)
MPC’s mission is to promote multilingual pedagogical approaches in writing and composition studies and serve students and faculty with interests in multilingualism in the WCP and across Georgia Tech. MPC values non-western/postcolonial interventions in pedagogy and knowledge-making. The committee maintains a website that contains pedagogical resources about global and multilingual writing in communications, learning, media, and literature. Upcoming plans include publishing student and faculty work in RAMBLE (the online magazine), an event on anticolonial communication through Bollywood dance forms, a multilingual pedagogy symposium, and workshops related to multicultural pedagogical approaches. Serving on the MPC committee provides opportunities for Brittain Fellows with interests in multilingual teaching and learning experiences, pedagogy, global media, or ELL and global Englishes to promote their work across the committee’s digital platforms and events.
Podcast Committee
Chair: OPEN
The mission of the Podcast Committee is to produce digital audio shows that showcase the work being done by Brittain Fellows and other early career scholars in a readily accessible platform. The committee welcomes ideas for episodes of ongoing podcasts – The Office Hour and Technically Pop – as well as pitches for new shows, one-off programming, and creative new methods for presenting academic labor that would otherwise go invisible or unnoticed. The committee is eager to promote and develop ideas that transmit the conversations that emerge from Brittain Fellows’ conference presentations, class lectures, job talks, student work, and new pedagogical concepts to a broader public audience, and welcomes innovative, collaborative attitudes towards new media production methods and concepts.
Technical Communication Committee
Chair: Katie Musick – kmusick7@gatech.edu
TECHStyle Committee
Chair: Rachel M. Hartnett – rhartnett@gatech.edu
As the Brittain Fellow-run open-access publication for the Writing and Communication Program (WCP), TECHStyle’s (TS) mission is to provide a public humanities platform for Brittain Fellows to share their academic research and writing pedagogy methods. In addition to representing the WCP, TS is a venue for ideas that don’t necessarily fit in journal articles or two-page teaching statements. Last academic year, TS published three articles. Dr. Courtney Mullin’s article, “The Naugle Communication Center: Promoting Equity and Process Pedagogy Within and Beyond the Writing Classroom,” argues that the Naugle Communication Center facilitates a more equitable learning environment for students by empowering students to seek support outside of the classroom. Dr. David Measel’s article, “Musical Listening Resounding: Sonic Rhetorics in the Technical and Professional Writing Classroom,” applies the theory of musical expectation to Technical and Professional Communication. Finally, in “Integrating AI into College Writing and Communication Courses,” Dr. Lainie Pomerleau shows how teachers can use AI tools to help students with the revision process. This fall, the editorial board of TS will be publishing two articles by Brittain Fellows and composing a CFP for the upcoming spring 2025 semester.
Brittain Fellows who wish to edit and/or publish for TS not only gain a few lines on their CV but also sustain the WCP’s positive public face by sharing fresh ideas about the intersections between their research and pedagogy. Additionally, the emerging field of public humanities provides a space for engaging diverse publics with the relevance of humanities research beyond the ivory tower of academia.
Examples of the kind of work committee members can expect to do:
· Brainstorming and composing a CFP for an open-source publication
· Reviewing and editing short-form, public-facing scholarship for publication
· Cultivating an online forum for open discussions of research and pedagogy in an accessible format
Textbook Committee
Chair: Justin Chandler – jchandler64@gatech.edu
The Textbook Committee’s mission is to continuously revise and update WOVENText and accompanying textbooks used in ENGL1101 and ENGL1102 for accuracy, relevancy, and user-friendliness. Every year Brittain Fellows maintain and update the contents of WOVENText. In Summer 2023, WOVENText evolved to an Open Educational Resource (OER). Last year, the committee improved the textbook’s contents and usability, and created an appendix of resources for using the text.
For 2024-2025, the Textbook Committee has several related goals:
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- Finalize appendix and make available to instructors through the OER.
- Review and update the OER’s content to reflect the distinct ways the OER can be used to support both 1102 and the revised 1101 curriculum.
- Research/review various approaches to providing instructors with guidance when using WOVENText. This may include more online resources or a Spring workshop series on integrating the textbook into assignments and activities.
- Research and review more avenues to develop new material to be integrated into the OER.
More generally, committee members can expect to attain and discuss feedback on textbook usability, review and revise content, and design materials to assist educators in effectively implementing the texts. Participating on the Textbook Committee is a great way to sharpen technical communication skills, explore ways in which to design learning materials for practical use, continue to enrich and expand the resources available to WCP instructors, and ensure that that our public facing materials represent our pedagogical values and abilities.