February 24 – February 28, 2025
The Teaching & Learning Center, in collaboration with the Committee on Teaching, hosted UCSC Teaching Week from February 24 – February 28, 2025. Teaching Week was an opportunity to celebrate and elevate the innovative teaching happening at UCSC in support of our shared goals of equity-minded and transformative learning for all students.
Teaching Week events included:
UCSC Teaching Symposium — Feb 25, 2025; 3:15–6 PM; Cultural Center at Merrill College
The Teaching Symposium, which showcased the work of instructors (including graduate students, lecturers, and senate faculty) presenting on teaching innovations, activities, programs, and scholarly work. Presentation modalities included posters and short spoken presentations.
Experiments with AI in Teaching and Learning — Feb 26, 2025, 5–6:45 PM; Zoom
Humans Do The Heavy Data Lifting / CC-BY 4.0
A topical event, Experiments with AI in Teaching and Learning, which featured short presentations from UC Santa Cruz faculty demonstrating use cases for teaching with AI and sharing their experiences—both positive and negative—with using AI in the classroom. The event concluded with a panel discussion about generative AI in teaching and learning and a broader conversation about how the campus community is shaping engagement with artificial intelligence.
Presentations:
Benjamin Breen, Associate Professor of History: Historical simulations, counter-narratives, and experiential learning with AI
Pedro Morales Almazan, Associate Teaching Professor and Associate Dean of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (PBSci): LLMs in Mathematics: A tool for process, not just answers
Adam M. Smith, Associate Professor of Computational Media: Teaching with Brace
Aisha Jackson, Vice Chancellor of Information Technology: Introducing the UCSC AI Council
Facilitator: Michael Tassio, Assistant Vice Provost for Educational Innovation
Distinguished Teaching Award Lecture: Teaching is Like a Third Birthday — May 15, 2025; 4–6 PM; University Center Alumni Room
The Distinguished Teaching Award Lecture, Teaching is Like a Third Birthday, delivered by Nathan Altice, the 2023–24 Distinguished Teaching Awardee, who spoke about the transformative effect of liberatory teaching practices.
Nathan Altice is a writer, artist, game designer, and Associate Teaching Professor of Computational Media. His research focuses on computing culture, computational platforms, and Japanese game history.