Author: Brenna

A collage of destroyed posters on the wall of a building.
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The People Have the Power to Redeem the Work of Fools: A Toolkit for Resistance

ByBrenna Reading Time: 9 minutes

I promised a toolkit in this final post, and a sense of what resistance can look like. Sometimes I think the most helpful way to think about this work is to recognize that every choice we make every day is part of the larger constellation of resistance, which I get sort of sounds exhausting. I promise, I get that. And I don’t think we can possibly fight every fight or be ready for a fight every second of the day. But taking the “every day, every choice” approach also means that every day has myriad opportunities to challenge the status quo, to start a difficult conversation, to ask a question no one else is asking. I find that hopeful, because it means that when you do step back, or opt out, or take time to breathe, the next opportunity to make the small connection that sparks the change is just around the corner.

Here are the moves that I think should be in every post-secondary reformer’s toolkit.

A multi-coloured brink wall sports a sign reading "Accessible Entry," but no door is visible.
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Is Anyone as Cruel as a Normal Person?: Disability, Access, and Why I Refuse to Go “Back to Normal”

ByBrenna Reading Time: 9 minutes

And of course, Western chauvinism drips from the preceding paragraph: to be even at this stage of this unending trial is due to the accident of birth of vaccine privilege, which the richest countries in the world seem determined to horde like Gollum’s ring (and you know what happens to hobbitses who horde rings). But with the wealth of opportunity we have had to protect and care for ourselves and each other, it’s all the more disheartening to see how quickly the collective solidarity of the early pandemic days has fallen away. We’re heading “back to normal,” which I guess means “everyone for themselves” — because the normal we had before didn’t work for an awful lot of people. If there’s one thing this moment has made achingly clear, it’s that the ableism baked into how we do business in the post-secondary sector will take a lot more than a global pandemic to unseat. And that if we don’t use this moment to imagine something a damn sight better than normal, it’s hard to imagine that we ever will.

How depressing. Let’s dig in.

A stencilled camera on a cement wall.
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Every Breath You Take, Every Move You Make: Surveillance and the True “New Normal” of the Moment

ByBrenna Reading Time: 8 minutes

When everyone first left the campus and went home to teach and learn remotely, there was a lot of talk about how we would reduce assessment loads and reframe our evaluations to meet the moment. Many institutions offered a Pass/Fail option in the immediate term and instructors were encouraged to find compassion for students in crisis.

And then, you know, universities gotta university. By January 2021, students were reporting a perception of increased workloads and by June 2021, the sector had decided everyone was cheating and somehow the idea that our processes should change in a, you know, global pandemic became a lot less attractive. Instead, what became a lot more attractive was surveillance.

A graffiti'd wall with the chemical symbols from the periodic table used to spell out "PUSH."
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The Worst Is Yet to Come, and Babe, It Won’t Be Fine

ByBrenna Reading Time: 8 minutes

So last week, we talked about fatigue and burnout, and I promised you I would give you some reasons to keep engaging with the things that matter. I didn’t promise a cheery chat — and the title today reinforces that! — but I am going to provide some reasons to hope even as I try to spook you into action.

Naomi Klein’s concept of disaster capitalism, as she outlines in the Shock Doctrine, is one that resonates. We’ve talked about it in these pages before: it’s the idea that bad, exploitative policy — of the neoliberal variety — typically follows on from crisis. Klein herself has acknowledged the parallels to this moment. And I’ve argued that we’re seeing this same thing happen in educational technologies, as universities floundered to sign agreements and then get stuck with tools they are ill-prepared to effectively manage and use.

Graffitti collage of a woman with a tiger emerging from her skull; both are weeping neon tears.
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We Get Knocked Down, But We Get Up Again: Discourses of Resilience, Realities of Burnout

ByBrenna Reading Time: 6 minutes

I don’t know what it’s like in your circles, but in mine — which, thanks to Twitter, span a broad range of English-language academics, and sometimes a little beyond — everyone is done. Everyone is burnt out and tired and feeling pulled beyond what they can do. And in many ways, things feel bleaker than they did at the beginning of the pandemic, because we’re now all too aware that everything we hoped was temporary, from critical staffing shortages to the demands of working in multiple modalities, is probably not, in fact, temporary. Anytime an institution finds it can run with less, it rarely goes back to more. Even if the cost is human; maybe especially when the cost is human. Humans are infinitely replaceable. Capital projects are forever.

Thank you for your resilience.

Welcome (?) to the 2022 TRU Digital Detox
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Welcome (?) to the 2022 TRU Digital Detox

ByBrenna Reading Time: 4 minutes

My friends, what a time to be working in education. When I sat down in November to plan this year’s Digital Detox, I really struggled. Reading back through the essays of the last few years, it is easy to believe that nothing has really changed or improved since the start of the pandemic, and that…

Blue neon off-set at the top right of a blue wall. Text reads, "Work harder."

Digital Detox #4: Habits, Data, and Things That Go Bump in the Night: Microsoft for Education

ByBrenna Reading Time: 9 minutes

Today, I want to spend some time looking at a tool that has become just about ubiquitous in education: the Microsoft Office365, and particularly Microsoft Teams.  For most of us working in post-secondary, the Office suite has traditionally been wallpaper: it’s just there, used in our offices and offered to our students, but not part…

Red and blue neon on a birkc wass reads "Leave dishevelled or leave now."

Digital Detox #3: E-proctoring Sucks, So Why Won’t It Go Away?

ByBrenna Reading Time: 9 minutes

If there’s one trend that Covid-19 brought on like a freight train — other than the crushing existential dread — it’s e-proctoring. Reader, I hate it. There are loads of good pieces online about why e-proctoring is troubling, but I want to focus on what I think e-proctoring says about the state of education now,…