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Models of Collaboration

Illustrating Different Working Group Structures & Activities

While not an exhaustive list, these models illustrate possibilities for collaborating within the Corridor, but each model can be adapted to suit any Working Groups’ specific aims.

Regional Peer Collaboration

The most common type of Corridor Working Group: a group of scholars working on a particular project/field meet to discuss their research (online or in person).

Benefits of This Model

  • Groups most often form around shared research interests, bridging disciplines, genres, and time periods, or they can be highly specialized within a disciplinary sub-field. Shared interests may be tied to pressing cultural issues and not necessarily to a field or discipline.
  • This model helps build both intellectual community and regional connections.
  • Corridor funding could pay for group meals and travel (if meeting in person) or event support such as IT fees, ASL and live-captioning services, facilitators, books, etc. (if online or in-person).

Writing Retreat (in-person or online)

Writing retreats take many forms, and Inside Higher Ed provides guidance on organizing effective writing retreats.

Suggested Format

  • Scholars, usually in similar fields, come together for a focused writing retreat outside their usual home/office setting.
  • For site-specific, overnight retreats, Working Groups need to find a host location in the region. Nearby facilities include:
  • Online retreats may be better suited to a half-day duration.
  • Set a schedule including designated time for focused writing, check-ins with each other, and social time over communal meals.
  • Topical discussion could include successful writing strategies, approaches to revision, individual research and scholarly projects, pedagogical and curricular challenges, or shared works-in-progress for feedback.
  • Corridor funding could pay for lodging (as an "off-site retreat"), meals, or an external facilitator, if appropriate.

Benefits of This Model

  • Helps build a strong sense of research community beyond one's own campus and opens up new (and different kinds of) mentoring relationships and networks.
  • Focused time working with others helps cultivate writing strategies, spark new ideas, and face challenges or obstacles to research/writing in a supportive and reciprocal environment.

Writing Group (online, weekly/regular)

Scholars interested in building research community and maintaining writing momentum in a collegial setting choose a designated weekly 1-2 hour time slot to check in and write together online. Each session could focus on accountability check-ins and goal-setting and/or be used as active co-writing time where people briefly touch base, but then spend the bulk of the period delving into their own writing while being connected to others.

Benefits of This Model

  • Dedicated time slot each week to focus on writing.
  • Incorporates others into a weekly practice providing a layer of accountability to yourself and to others.
  • A short-but-regular weekly time commitment offers flexibility while sustaining writing habits and building community beyond one’s home institution.
  • Corridor funding would not usually be needed for this model unless, for example, an honoraria would be needed for an external facilitator invited to provide coaching on writing strategies.

Existing Resources

Manuscript Workshop

This type of workshop is intended to provide feedback on shorter-form manuscripts, such as a book chapter or journal article. It is based on a give-and-take collaborative ethos and focuses on mentoring relationships. However, it could be adapted to include an external specialist who would participate and provide feedback in exchange for a modest honorarium for their contributions.

Consider rank when designing this type of workshop. This model could be used to support any faculty (contingent/junior faculty, graduate students, or associate professors moving toward promotion to full), but be aware of any potential sensitivities regarding hierarchy.

Suggested Format

  • Select a limited number of participants to share drafts of their work.
  • Read pre-distributed drafts (~20 pages max) a day or two before, and come up with one brief, key question for each.
  • In a half-day session, give each presenter 30 minutes: 5 minutes to set the paper up, then 5 minutes for the group to run through all their questions.
  • With the remaining 20 minutes (instead of the usual Q&A in which every question, no matter how good or bad, has to be entertained), the presenter can discuss what they feel are the crucial questions for developing the paper (usually 2-3 questions). Everything is organized around improving the essay for a possible publication or the chapter for articulating its core point.
  • Corridor funding could pay for any external participants and, if in person, group meals.

Benefits of This Model

  • Drawing readers/feedback from throughout the region provides a step outside the usual department colleagues, comments, pressures, expectations, etc.
  • For grad students or junior faculty, this provides experience in writing toward publication.
  • This model provides everyone with a deadline for completed drafts, can jumpstart research in the midst of the teaching, and offers immediate feedback on an active writing project.

Expert Model Collaboration

A group of scholars working on a particular project/field invite an external scholar to visit with their Working Group (online or in person) to help work through a problem or to challenge them to think in different ways.

Benefits of This Model

  • An outside expert/collaborator can help a group reframe, re-envision, or organize their work.
  • This model can help develop or broaden scholarly networks, nationally and internationally, and provide important mentoring connections for junior faculty.
  • Offers a chance to bring people in from outside the region, expanding scholarly networks.
  • Corridor funding could pay for group meals, the guest’s honorarium and, if in person, the guest’s travel and lodging expenses.

Reading Circle

A group of scholars meet to discuss emerging scholarly trends in their field (online or in person). What the group "reads" can include written materials/texts, objects, artworks, audio/visual materials, films, musical scores, recent publications, works-in-progress, or archival materials in the region.

Benefits of This Model

  • Reading circles help build intellectual community and networks across the Corridor.
  • If the group invites an author/artist/musician from outside the Corridor to meet with them, to discuss their own work being read/discussed by the group, this can help facilitate scholarly networks and also help develop mentoring relationships beyond the region.
  • Corridor funding could pay an honorarium to an external facilitator/author/artist/musician whose work is being discussed. The Corridor could also cover group meals and a bulk book or e-book purchase for all participants.

Promoting Undergraduate Research & Presentation Skills

This workshop is designed to host a small-scale undergraduate research workshop over the course of an afternoon.

Suggested Format

  • Students are chosen from those enrolled in related coursework across two (or more) campuses. Quality of papers, interest, and availability are key for student selection.
  • At the end of the semester, select three students from each class to present their final paper (20 minutes each). Recruit a grad student (or advanced undergrad) respondent for each paper (5 minutes). Allow 15 minutes discussion for each. A total of 40 minutes per paper.
  • One campus hosts and invites all the students in class to attend, ask questions, etc.
  • Audience = 6 undergraduate presenters, 6 graduate student respondents, other members of the undergraduate class at the host campus (25-30 people total).
  • Corridor funding could pay for intra-Corridor travel and group meals.

Benefits of This Model

  • Respondents learn to respond on the spot gently, positively and productively to early-stage undergraduate research. Encourage respondents not to demolish a paper nor demonstrate their own knowledge, but rather to begin to learn how to mentor students.
  • Undergraduates have few opportunities to present their own work, but it can be important toward their development as scholars and knowers. The Q&A is a real learning experience at this stage.

Other Examples from Current Working Groups

  • Poetry Reading, Roundtable, Class Visits: Internationally-renowned poets visit two campuses as part of a group’s project on classical influences in contemporary poetry. Includes a public roundtable with local scholars and visiting poets, class visits, and a poetry recital.
  • Lecture, Seminar, Class Visits on Multiple Campuses: An international scholar gives a public lecture on one campus, followed by a class visit and seminar on a second campus.
  • Lecture with Invited Scholar: A senior scholar gives a talk on the intersection of cultural politics and digital humanities, tracing the publication history of a canonical women of color feminist anthology via informal social networks.
  • Teaching Exchange (external guest): A group organizes a teaching exchange of guest lectures across 3 campuses by scholars from Corridor institutions and by invited guests from outside the Corridor. Corridor funding could pay for the guest's travel and an honorarium, plus group meals.
  • Teaching Exchange (intra-Corridor): A group teaching in similar fields arranges class visits as guest lectures on each others’ campuses. Corridor funding could pay for group meals and intra-Corridor travel for the speaker.
  • Regional Community Engagement: A group forms to improve communication and programming among museums, cultural centers, and area academic institutions.