Travis Margoni presents at annual TYCA conference

This March, YVC English Instructor Travis Margoni presented, along with a handful of other faculty from Washington State Community and Technical Colleges, at the Two-Year College English Association (TYCA) National Conference. The conference theme was “Recovery and Reinvention in Our Profession: Emerging from a Recent Time of Crisis.”

During the conference, attendees considered how they have adjusted their teaching at the two-year college amid a time of exceptional change and tumult. Presenters discussed new faculty experiences, ideas for engaging diverse student voices through culturally responsive pedagogies, and innovative ways to foster equity in writing classrooms.

English department selected for grant project

YVC’s English Department was recently selected by the State Board for Community and Technical Colleges for the Antiracist Writing and Assessment Ecologies (AWAE) Grant Project. With funding from College Spark Washington, AWAE is engaging 28 faculty members from seven colleges in building the artifacts of an antiracist writing assessment ecology to assess the ENGL&101 outcomes developed and approved as part of (de)Composing ENGL&101.

Instructors Travis Margoni, Olivia Hernandez, Kristy Webster, Carolyn Calhoon Dillahunt and Dodie Forrest are representing YVC. Over the course of the grant, the faculty participants will work in Communities of Inquiry composed of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color and white-identified faculty from different institutions. The will work collaboratively to build artifacts  to support English departments and practitioners across the Washington State CTC system to “increase the percentage of students who earn their first college-level credits in English within one year of college enrollment” by closing equity gaps for historically underserved students of color.

YVC efforts are supported by the UDEAL grant.

Faculty contribute article on narrowing placement divide

English Instructors Carolyn Calhoon Dillahunt and Travis Margoni will have their article, “Narrowing the Divide in Placement at an HSI: The Case of Yakima Valley College,” published in the WAC Clearinghouse.

Pedro Navarrete appointed assistant dean of the Grandview Campus

Congratulations to Pedro Navarrete who was recently appointed assistant dean of the Grandview Campus. Navarrete who joined YVC in 2018 has most recently served as the interim director of baccalaureate education.