Education student workshop brainstorms teacher wellbeing

By Alexandra Noad - Lethbridge Herald Local Journalism Initiative Reporter on July 18, 2024.

Herald photo by Alexandra Noad David Slomp, organizer of the faculty of education design day challenge, addresses Master of Education students on Tuesday prior to them creating presentations examining teacher wellbeing.

Master of Education students spent time this week brainstorming and putting together presentations on how to promote teacher wellbeing, which were then judged by a panel of education experts.

Lisa Starr, Dean for the Faculty of Education, says this is the first time they have done something like this on this scale. There were 80 students from three different degrees split up into eight teams.

“This was an opportunity to bring together the different cohorts that we have in our program to talk about the same types of complex issues that everybody’s encountering to talk about together and working across disciplines,” said Starr.

Starr hopes this activity will help the students embrace the power they hold to make a difference in their field.

“I think what we’re really trying to position these people as, is changemakers. So empowering them with tools they need to go into their roles in those educational settings to be the catalyst for change and so we’re hoping this gives them the opportunity to sell their ideas and get some feedback,” said Starr.

Starr mentioned during the COVID pandemic there was a lot of attention on mental heath, especially for educators, which is a good thing, but now people in the education field have the challenge of implementing changes for the betterment of teachers she believes because of their skill set this activity will help them instill change.

“The group we have here, they are accomplished educators, so they know the system and they see what the challenges are and so they are aware of the need for change, they may just need help figuring out how to implement it,” said Starr.

While this is the first Design Day Challenge, Starr hopes this will be a yearly event to help the university stand out.

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