Faculty Lounge Meetings

Meeting #1
The first Art & Design Faculty Zoom meetup brought together a beautifully diverse group of 8-10 educators, repping colleges from all across the U.S., and coming from various stages of career. The institutions ranged from community colleges and liberal arts schools to private design institutions and state colleges. Some faculty worked in big departments with plenty of co-faculty, while others were the lone design educators on their entire campus.

What stood out during this first meeting was a sense of gratitude and openness. Faculty were candid about their struggles and excited to learn from one another. This collaborative spirit is central to my teaching philosophy, and it made me realize how effectively my Imago DEIsign manifesto has served as a guiding force for me. Hosting these Faculty Lounge sessions aligns perfectly with my commitment to community-building, reducing pedagogical harm, and creating a space where people can share their stories and experiences.

I opened up the room for a conversation after introductions with the prompt: “What is your pedagogical passion project right now? What problems are you trying to solve?” The collective response to each person’s project/problem was generous. A near-universal concern was around improving student engagement, specifically—getting them to speak! This is a consistent issue across modalities, including online platforms, remote settings, and asynchronous learning. Those of us in the room who have found ways to connect shared strategies that included making collective fig jam boards, Spotify playlist, sharing your daily Spotify mix graphic, asking a question of the day, and starting with a “battery” check-in (shared with me by Yoon Soo in GD2<3).

The generosity of shared resources was so great that we began collecting them in a google doc (for now).

The participant response was one of joy and gratitude for having a space to find and exchange ideas with other faculty who are interested in being more deeply engaged with their teaching practices—this was expressed especially by folks who are extremely silo-ed in their institutions.
As we shared institutional knowledge tenured professors acknowledged that being “secure” in their positions didn’t automatically protect them from the challenges of navigating the realities of teaching in today's academic landscape. The job is constantly evolving, and the terrain can quickly shift under your feet—which means staying authentically connected to a teaching community is crucial. That particular moment illustrated how much wisdom Sr. faculty have to impart on those who are brand new.

As new faculty described the chaos of onboarding experiences, and flailing through the first weeks in the classroom those of us who have been there were all nodding with empathy. Privately I call this the “Swim Mother Fucker!” school of job training. :P This affirmation—that many design educators were figuring things out as they went along—was both reassuring and eye-opening. It confirmed my belief that a space like this Faculty Lounge was necessary and there is a wide gap of opportunity in the place between practicing design and teaching design. As a generalization, most art and design faculty have received far less training than their English or Math counterparts, or their k-12 equivalents. We who sit at the table of creating visual culture are woefully underprepared for the realities of the classroom—especially when dealing with students from diverse backgrounds with varying abilities and knowledge—and some folks out here are willing to own that, and want do something about it. 

There was a point in the meeting where an attendee who is a grad student (not at VCFA) expressed an interest in booking more time with people in the room and interviewing them for their thesis research. I made sure to follow up on this invitation by sharing that my hope was for any receiving of funds of knowledge from the group or its individual members is met with gratitude, collaboration, and recognition. I acknowledged the labor that goes into building personal funds of knowledge, and that sometimes those funds are a byproduct of lived experiences that include marginalization or oppression. It was a moment where I realized I had the words I needed to offer safety/ protection for the space and the people in it. It was a moment that you get sometimes when you are parenting and you handle something better than your parents did—and it feels like a big win.

Meeting #2
After meeting 1 I realized what I had created was a zoom-in faculty lounge and decided to go ahead and brand these meetups with that name. The October meeting had 10-12 visitors through the 90-minute session roughly 50/50 new folks and folks from the Sept meeting. This time I started us up with a quick intro and a “show and tell” where each visitor shared a resource that is helping shape their teaching practice. Again the moment was met with generosity and gratitude. 

A few of us the challenges of teaching in communities where 1st gen students are a large demographic, and often come from cultures where art and design careers are not considered viable options. We discussed strategies for building cohorts, and maintaining enrollment through outreach, gaining buy-in from parents, and partnering with campus affinity groups. One group member started a conversation about how underprepared they felt to begin teaching, especially when compared to their co-faculty from the humanities, and that they were excited to find resources here to close that gap for themselves,

From there, a significant part of the discussion focused on how isolating academia can be for art and design faculty who teach outside of private arts institutions—and how refreshing it is to find a space where people are friendly, open, and focused on community-building, rather than maintaining the cliquish, ego-driven vibes that often characterize academic circles. This led to a conversation about finding or building local communities. One attendee highlighted the AIGA Design Educator Community as a valuable resource, noting how the energy there felt different from traditional AIGA chapters—which, many participants agreed, tend to focus more on self-congratulation than true community-building. It’s a sentiment I share, and I’ve been especially critical of AIGA LA (I could go off on this one). It was interesting to hear from folks in cities like Portland and New York express how underserved they also feel. Many of us see that a growing number of designers, feeling unconsidered and isolated by AIGA, are now choosing to build communities around more specific interests rather than fitting under the broad, nondescript “design” umbrella of AIGA. We acknowledged efforts like the Adding Voices Conference, Schessa Garbutt’s community-organized events around a love for Octavia Butler, virtual critique sessions for Black designers, BIPOC Design History, and the rebirth of LA Design Fest (now led by Erica Abrams). All of these efforts reflect a collective desire to create something new—spaces where the focus is on challenging the status quo in favor of something more enriching and authentic.

One of the best moments came when someone joked about adding “publicly shaming institutions” and “starting a revolution” to the November agenda. It got a good laugh, and lots of finger snaps, but there was real energy behind it. It was clear that the group shared a vision for change, a desire to hold institutions accountable, both in academia and in professional organizations. It’s the idea that, if these structures won’t change from the inside, we can build something better outside of them. 

It feels natural to reflect on the parallels between industry landscapes and the institutional learning environment, as each shapes and informs the other. I often think about those toxic critique sessions led by the drill-sergeant art and design professor, who claims they’re just “preparing you for the real world.” And then, in the industry, you find creative directors who act like total a-holes because that was the behavior modeled for them by their own professors. It’s a cycle where harshness and ego get passed down, one generation to the next, blowing right through the boundaries of professionalism and into outright harm and systemic oppression.

Leading these sessions has revealed that the Faculty Lounge is defining itself as a meeting space where people come to feel less alone in their academic battles. It’s especially important for educators—particularly those of us who are women, POC, or both—who have had to fight to be heard in spaces that often don’t make room for our voices. As someone who has found myself isolated in those struggles, being surrounded by others who truly understand—who have faced similar challenges—is invaluable. This space provides validation, support, and a chance to regroup, and return to the work with a renewed sense of strength and purpose.

Another key realization has been the significant gap between learning design, practicing design, and teaching design. That gap is wide enough to present a real opportunity—one where we can step in to address the need directly through tailored curriculum or mentorship programs. One of our participants in this session was hired recently by CalARTS to teach the art of teaching. :)

Looking ahead, I’m thinking about how to keep that intimacy intact if lounge attendance continues to grow. The first meeting had 12 respondents and eightish attendees; the second had 16 respondents and tenish attendees. I’m unsure of how 30 people in the room would change the dynamic, but I’m considering options like breakout rooms or having co-facilitators. It’s important to keep these conversations small and personal—currently in our 90 minutes we are able to give each person a good 10 minutes to speak, and be heard.