Friday, August 21, 2026, 8:30am-4:00pm
It’s our 8th annual Pedagogy Matters conference, this year held in person on the Colby College campus! CBB has invited keynote speaker Dr. April Andry Rah’Man to share her work on authenticity in teaching and learning. Following lunch, we’ll have breakout sessions and a reception to continue the conversation! Come join us at Colby!
An Invitation to Authenticity
This year’s keynote is an invitation to (re)imagine our classrooms as spaces where we are held. What would it look like, feel like, be like to walk over the virtual or physical threshold of your classroom and, without fear of reprisal, be your full self? To know that your histories, identities, lived experiences, needs, and interests will be valued and centered? To have a place where your families and communities are welcome?
I imagine the possibilities as a kind of meditation.
Breathe deeply. Center yourself as your breath flows: into the brightest spark of you, the darkest depths. Your fullness. Breathe out. Imagine your breath moving over your edges, through the sharp thinness of their atmosphere. With these breaths, know that you—all of you, in your wholeness and brokenness and all the spaces between—are welcome and wanted.
We will dream together in the keynote, but dreams of having space for our authentic selves in our classrooms are not enough. In a complementary workshop, we will work together to translate imagination into action. What would it take for us to arrive at the dream? What classroom and institutional structures might we need to build to make authenticity possible for each of us? How will our plans then need to shift to make authenticity possible for all of us?
With storytelling, reflection, and design practices as our tools, we’ll work our way from a vision of our individual authenticity to shared visions, practices, and structures for collective authenticity as transformative pedagogy.