Afterword

Utah State University (USU) instructors are committed to developing the Habits of Mind that can help students achieve academic, career, and personal success. Many instructors have designed entire courses around Habits of Mind. Others have incorporated Habits of Mind into specific assessments. And some instructors have created course policies that align strongly with the Habits of Mind learning framework. The work highlighted in this edited collection demonstrates how seriously USU takes its mission to educate our students.

As Utah’s only land-grant university, USU has an important mission to serve the emerging and rapidly changing needs of Utahans by providing equitable access to higher education. The Habits of Mind framework can assist instructors in meeting our students’ needs. As our state continues to grow and to diversify, we know that many of our students will continue to come from disparate backgrounds with various levels of preparation for higher education. If we meet students where they are, all while developing their Habits of Mind, USU instructors will continue to thrive as transformative educators. We will satisfy our mission to the state we serve.

Habits of Mind: Designing Courses for Student Success offers a snapshot into the kinds of skills-based and intentional teaching happening at USU. We enthusiastically encourage other institutions of higher learning to look at USU and the practices outlined in this edited collection. We believe that the teaching approaches highlighted in this book provide models for how to structure a community of learners devoted to fostering study skills, academic competencies, and educational success.

About the authors

name: Julia M Gossard

institution: Utah State University

website: https://chass.usu.edu/history/directory/julia-gossard

Julia M. Gossard is Associate Dean for Research in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences and Associate Professor of History at Utah State University. Dr. Gossard earned her Ph.D in History at the University of Texas at Austin. An award-winning educator and a specialist with high-impact teaching practices, Dr. Gossard’s teaching portfolio is expansive, ranging from engaging online introductory surveys to historical research methods and graduate courses in history and theory. Her writing on teaching has appeared in The History Teacher, The Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy, and with W.W. Norton. She is the lead editor for Habits of Mind: Designing Courses for Student Success and the author of two other books, Young Subjects: Children, State-Building, and Social Reform in the 18th-Century French World (McGill-Queen’s University Press) and Encountering Childhoods in Vast Early America (with Holly N.S. White, Routledge).

name: Chris Babits

institution: Utah State University

website: https://chass.usu.edu/history/directory/chris-babits

Chris Babits (he/him) is a temporary assistant professor. He earned his Ph.D. in U.S. History, along with the Health Humanities graduate certificate, from the University of Texas at Austin in 2019. Chris’ forthcoming publications include peer-reviewed academic articles in Pacific Historical Review, History of Psychology, Modern Intellectual History, The History Teacher, and Teaching History: A Journal of Methods as well as his first monograph, titled To Cure a Sinful Nation: A History of Conversion Therapy in the United States (University of Chicago Press).