Academic X’cellence: Sharing stories from our inspiring StFX community
It should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with StFX that our campus is filled with highly engaged students, educators, researchers, and leaders. Academic X’cellence shines a spotlight on members of our educational community to find out more about their unique experiences—both inside and outside of the classroom. (To see the full series, please click HERE.)
Here we meet Dr. Erin Austen, a longtime StFX psychology professor and current department chair. Known for her innovative and effective teaching, Dr. Austen is both a StFX Outstanding Faculty Teaching Award recipient and a recipient of a prestigious 3M National Teaching Fellowship. Dr. Austen’s teaching and research focuses on health promotion, in helping students actively engage with what they are learning, and in ensuring all students are heard and can contribute.
Dr. Erin Austen: “I hope students remember they have power to tackle pressing issues and be part of the solution.”
Tell us about yourself. How long have you been on faculty and what do you teach?
I am a 1996 graduate of the StFX psychology honours program. After spending another year at StFX working as a lab instructor, I attended the University of British Columbia where I completed a M.A. in Perceptual Psychology, a PhD in Cognitive Systems, and completed one year of a postdoctoral fellowship in the Departments of Human Kinetics and Computer Science. I then moved to Whitehorse where I taught part-time at Yukon College (now Yukon University) and worked at the Seniors’ Information Centre. I had just started a position with the Yukon Government in Health Promotion when I found out I was a successful applicant for a StFX faculty position. I had a really challenging decision. While not easy to choose, coming back to StFX has been a great decision. I started in 2005. This year will mark my 20th year.
As a faculty member, you have some autonomy in what you research and in how you teach. My research focus has changed over time. I would say my work broadly focuses on health promotion, at the undergraduate level, and at a community level. This work ties into my teaching as well. I am now teaching Health Psychology, a course in Applied Health (with a focus on disability and accessibility), and Advanced Health (I have been focusing on the connection between nature and well-being). This year, I am also running a non-credit seminar course for our honours students. In the past, I taught our Sensation and Perception course. Currently, I am serving as Department Chair.
Could you talk about your teaching philosophy?
When I think back to myself as a university student, I was very shy. I would rarely share or participate in class discussions. In classes where the course instructor would cold call students and ask them a question, I couldn’t focus on what was being said in the class. Instead, I focused on trying to make myself invisible so the instructor wouldn’t single me out. Now that I am teaching, I want to do what I can to reach all learners. I want students to know I care about their success in the course, that I will support their learning, and that I will provide varied ways for them to contribute and demonstrate their learning.
Over the years, I have used course projects to bring the material alive and highlight the relevance in today’s context. Often, the projects involve tasking students with coming up with ideas, supported by course content, to address an issue. They are asked to put those ideas into action and assess the outcome of their solutions. We have done a variety of things including creating a well-being website for the university; designing and hosting substance-free events for students; and conducting checklist accessibility audits and first-voice audits of the built environment and making recommendations for improvements. In all cases, students know I am equally invested in the outcome and am working alongside them.
What impact do you hope your teaching or courses will have?
I hope that by asking students to actively engage with what they are learning, and apply what they know to address current issues, they will remember and embody what they learned. We are lucky in that we get to see the impact each year of our course projects. I hope students remember they have power to tackle pressing issues and be part of the solution. I hope that they also learned that we can’t do this work alone, that it is easier when you can collaborate with a diverse team of people who can think about the problem from various angles and come up with novel solutions.
Tell us about innovations in your classroom or in research?
The course projects are innovative. I’ve been doing them almost every year since I started at StFX. And, I think they have had a positive impact. The projects have also grown in scope thanks to external funding obtained through Co-operative Education Work Integrated Learning (CEWIL). With CEWIL funding, the work that students are doing is recognized as work-integrated learning and students are compensated for that work. In the past, we have worked with internal community partners and this year we are working with an external partner, Positive Action for the Keppoch, to produce deliverables that will help address a need. The work that students are doing is meaningful and important and is work they put a lot of time and energy into.
I am increasingly interested in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) and in assessing the impact of the course projects on student learning. Working with student researchers, for example, we collected data from students to find out whether their understanding of accessibility changed as a result of conducting accessibility audits of the built environment; all students who participated in the research indicated ‘yes.’ A summary will soon be published in the Canadian Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. This initial project also highlighted a glaring gap for us. We were assessing the accessibility of the built environment using a checklist audit based on standard building codes, but we were missing the first-person disability perspective on accessibility. The following year, with the support of a CEWIL grant, we partnered with individuals from the local community who live with disabilities; they worked with us to conduct first-person perspective audits. Students quickly learned that checklist audits are insufficient on their own to determine whether a space is accessible. We all learned so much from the first-person perspective audit and are working on a summary document to share with StFX Administration.
What about awards or accomplishments?
I was the recipient of the StFX Outstanding Faculty Teaching Award in 2017. This year, I was selected to join the 3M National Teaching Fellowship (3M NTF), which is a huge honour, and very exciting. The 3M NTF recognizes teaching excellence, teaching innovation, and educational leadership that is sustained over time. This summer, I met the nine other new fellows. I am really looking forward to working with them and learning from one another. We are gathering in Banff this November for a facilitated retreat where we co-design a project to carry out this year. We will share what we did at the Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education conference in Saskatchewan.
What drew you to teaching, and at the post-secondary level?
To be honest, when I envisioned a career for myself way back when, teaching wasn’t initially part of that vision. Both of my parents were teachers, and I grew up seeing how much time and energy they put into the profession. Now that I am teaching (and doing research and service, which are all parts of the job), I have a much better understanding of how, and why, people give so much of themselves to teaching – it is meaningful and rewarding work.
When I was in grad school, I ended up mostly taking on teaching assistantships that involved teaching. In one course, the instructor had students design and carry out mini in-class research projects. It was amazing. The excitement in the room was palpable, and students were clearly gaining so much. I also saw this as a great alternative to pure lecture-style classes. When I started teaching, I incorporated similar activities into my classes. I continue to make a point of having some form of experiential learning part of every course I teach.
Teaching is something I am passionate about and it is something I pour a lot of time into. I aim to be student-centered, and I am always learning alongside students (higher education is interesting, as the more you learn, the more you realize how little you know and how much more there is to learn). I think that helps me build trust with students; it is clear to them from the outset that I am invested in them, in the course, and in the outcomes.
What excites you about teaching at StFX?
I love that StFX is situated within a small rural community. When university is in session, the population of the university nearly doubles the population of the town of Antigonish. That’s incredible. I start most of my courses by telling students this and telling them that they have the power to contribute in meaningful ways to campus and to the broader community, and to effect positive change where needed. Our course projects are one way to make those contributions and to realize change. Students can see evidence of the impact of their work and can be proud of what they have done to create positive change.
The internal collaborations we have on campus have strengthened over time. As one example, Psychology has strong ties with StFX Health and Counselling, and Student Services. We work together to promote health on campus. Students are directly involved in this work.
As part of a small community, we also have opportunity to be well connected outside of the university. We have created partnerships and get students into the community through Service Learning and Work Integrated Learning (WIL) opportunities. Our most recent WIL partnership is with the Keppoch, a local four-season outdoor recreational facility. Students in Health Psychology will participate in Field Leader Hiking training (a two-day certification program through the Outdoor Council of Canada). It is exciting that as we are talking about health and health behavior change in this course, we are also experiencing the benefits of being outdoors and engaging other people in health-promoting behavior.
What’s something surprising about yourself?
I always wanted to be more active and involved in organized sports, but besides a short stint as a competitive swimmer when I was younger, never really participated in sport. As an adult, when I finally had the courage to try new sports, and joined teams as a true beginner, it was frustrating for everyone (lol). That is maybe not the surprising part. Now that my own kids are in sports, I spend a lot of time at their practices and games. A few moms I know encouraged me to try hockey. After the first few sessions, and after experiencing true acceptance and support as a beginner, I bought the gear. I have been playing (or at least trying my best) for the last three years. I appreciate the way the more experienced players have encouraged all new players and allowed us to be learners of the game. It is incredible.
