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Suddenly Distant and Still in Flux: The Implications of COVID-19 for K12 Teachers’ Work

Date: January 13, 2021
Time: 5:30 pm

The UC Santa Cruz University Forum presents The Implications of COVID-19 for Teachers’ Work and K-12 Schooling with Professor Lora Bartlett and the Suddenly Distant Research Project Team. The COVID 19 pandemic forced the entire teacher workforce into distance teaching essentially overnight. ough a short-term crisis, the longevity of this pandemic is changing the context of teachers’ work in ways that are affecting the very nature of teachers’ work and the structure of K-12 schooling. In this Forum the Suddenly Distant Research Project Team draws on in-depth interviews with 75 teachers in nine states to explore the ways that state and local responses to the pandemic have reshaped schooling and teachers’ working lives, affected teachers’ work/family lives, and exacerbated as well as abated long standing educational equity issues. Professor Lora Bartlett and research team members discuss the patterns that have emerged, the implications for the teaching profession and K-12 schooling, and insights into teachers’ feelings about how schools can best navigate this crisis.

Featuring Lora Bartlett, associate professor of education at UCSC, with research team members: Alisun Thompson (UCSC PhD alum) and Lina Darwich (assistant professors at Lewis & Clark College), Riley Collins , UCSC PhD student; Dr. Julia Koppich, teacher labor expert and team advisor; and Judith Warren Little, UC Berkeley Professor of the Graduate School, Carol Liu Professor of Education Policy, emerita, Dean of the Graduate School of Education, emerita.

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University Forum: Immigration policies in the United States: Understanding violence nation-wide and in Santa Cruz

Date: December 7, 2020
Time: 5:30 pm

Deportation is far more than a policy term; it is a threat and an act with explosive impact on families and communities. Four in five face persecution – including torture, rape, and murder – in their home countries. Nearly 6 million children are in the care of individuals vulnerable to deportation. Family separation has immediate and long-lasting psychosocial and economic consequences for those deportand and for those left behind. Many under threat have been in this country for decades. Yet, in the face of fear and increasingly harsh policies, communities have organized to respond and build resilience. UC Santa Cruz Professor of Psychology, Regina Day Langhout, lead author on a policy brief, “Statement on the Effects of Deportation and Forced Separation on Immigrants, their Families, and Communities,” will discuss the far-reaching impacts of deportation and collective resistance.

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University Forum: Teaching and Learning in the time of COVID 19

Date: November 16, 2020
Time: 5:30 pm

Everything changed in March. UC Santa Cruz transitioned to remote teaching and learning seven months ago. Today we reflect on the lessons we have learned as teachers and learners. What has the shift to remote or fully online instruction revealed about the current state and possible future of higher education? How can we use this crisis as an opportunity to reimagine the practice of teaching and learning at a research university? Join us for this timely discussion between Jody Greene, Associate Vice Provost for Teaching and Learning; Founding Director, Center for Innovations in Teaching and Learning; and Professor of Literature, and Michael Tassio, Chief of Staff for the Division of Academic Affairs and the Director for Online Education. Cynthia Lewis, Chair and Professor in the Education Department will guide the conversation.


University Forum: Community partnerships in the time of COVID

Date: September 23, 2020
Time: 5:30 pm

Partnerships formed quickly during this evolving health crisis. Salud Para La Gente, the Santa Cruz Community Foundation, Santa Cruz Community Health, and the UC Santa Cruz Molecular Diagnostic Lab are working jointly to test and treat the most vulnerable in Santa Cruz County. Join us for a conversation with community health leaders as they take us inside the collaborative response to address the pandemic.

Moderated by Isabel Bork Executive Director of the Genomics Institute and introductions by Ryan Coonerty, Third District Supervisor for Santa Cruz County.


Past Events

Small businesses hit hardest by the pandemic

Restrictions meant to slow the spread of the coronavirus have an outsized impact on small businesses and entrepreneurs. Stores, factories and many other businesses and services have closed by policy mandate, reduced demand, and health concerns, among other factors. What are the disproportionate effects on female, minority and immigrant business owners? Governmental responses have been disparate. Economics Professor Rob Fairlie, whose work on this topic has been widely cited in the media, and referenced in pending legislation, will help us better understand where we are, and assess the early-stage impacts of COVID-19 on small business owners.

More reading: PBS NewsHour, National Bureau of Economic Research, Reuters, American Conservative.

Speakers

Robert Fairlie is a professor and chair of economics at UC Santa Cruz. His research interests include entrepreneurship, education, information technology, inequality, labor economics, and immigration. He has published over 70 journal articles and book chapters, two academic books, and numerous government and foundation reports. He received his Ph.D. and M.A. from Northwestern University and B.A. with honors from Stanford University. He has held visiting positions at Yale University, UC Berkeley, Australian National University, and the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). He has testified to the U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives, U.S. Department of Treasury, and the California State Assembly regarding the findings from his research, and received a joint resolution from the California Legislature.


Past Events

The lessons of COVID for global and community health

Date: July 20, 2020
Time: 5:30 pm

The UC Santa Cruz University Forum presents The lessons of COVID for global and community health with Professor Matt Sparke. Globally and nationally COVID is teaching us a great deal about the huge inequalities in vulnerability, resilience, and blame as well as instructive divergences in health system capacity, governmental response, and socio-economic disruption. While we are all in this together as human beings it has become clear that our unequal conditions of being human have made for vast variations in how the pandemic has been experienced. Professor Sparke discusses these inequalities and how teaching and research related to global and community health can contribute to developing antidotes to these devastating problems and how UCSC is especially well-positioned to contribute in this way.

Featuring Matt Sparke, professor of politics and member of the team at UCSC developing the new global and community health program at UC Santa Cruz, and Nancy Chen, professor of anthropology and former director of the UCSC Blum Center on poverty, social enterprise, and participatory governance.

Speakers

Matt Sparke
Professor of Politics @UC Santa Cruz

Nancy Chen
Moderator, Q & A
Professor of Anthropology @UC Santa Cruz


Solidarity Economics for the Coronavirus Crisis & Beyond

Date: June 22, 2020
Time: 5:30 pm

Event Date:

Wednesday, January 13, 2021
5:30 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.

Locations:

Virtual Event