Supplement the learning environment with resources

Originally posted in our April 2022 Top of Mind Newsletter. In school, did you dread group work? Whether it was a research paper or group work on a set of problems in science class, many people report feeling frustrated, confused, and annoyed. However, many studies over the years have shown that this type of work yields much better learning outcomes.  While we all have experienced a boring lecture, when you’re lucky enough to attend a talk…

Originally posted in our April 2022 Top of Mind Newsletter. Over the last two years, we’ve seen significant shifts in policy around COVID-19. Changes to school, work, and public life were all topped off with extreme ambiguity about when things would get back to normal. For many college students, this constant state of the unknown seems to have had more significant impacts than we first realized. Across the country, higher education faculty are reporting devastating rates…

Originally posted in our March 2022 Top of Mind Newsletter. We end this month’s Top of Mind by reflecting on “choosing joy” from the blog formerly known as Brain Pickings (now The Marginalian). Maria Popova writes beautifully about how we should choose joy “at first consciously, effortfully, pressing against the weight of a world heavy with reasons for sorrow, restless with need for action.” She urges us to choose joy despite all that the world throws…

Originally posted in our March 2022 Top of Mind Newsletter. As we have examined this month, there are significant ways we should explore our personal and organizational frames of mind. To become resilient to an ever-changing future, we need to adjust our assumptions. This piece from McKinsey shows a direct call to action to make our organizations more resilient.  The article outlines the imperative for organizational resilience while also describing the various dimensions of resilience we…

Originally posted in our March 2022 Top of Mind Newsletter. If someone were to ask you to think about your future self, who would you imagine? In this piece from the BBC, the author discusses two general ways people answer this question. One is a relatively vivid picture of the self who is well connected to the person’s current identity. The other is, in many ways, a stranger to the present person. Interestingly, the difference between…