Salt Lake MLA Summer Institute:

In June, 2023, the Department of Writing and Rhetoric Studies and Salt Lake Community College's Department of English, Linguistics, and Writing Studies successfully co-hosted the first-ever Salt Lake MLA Summer Institute on Reading and Writing Pedagogies at Access-Oriented Institutions. We were invited by MLA to host this weeklong institute on the basis of our nationally recognized partnerships in preparing graduate students for teaching and learning at access-oriented institutions (we have collaborated on a Community College Professional Apprenticeship program for our graduate students since 2020). Salt Lake was one of four sites selected to host these institutes this year, and we were the only site west of the Mississippi. MLA awarded us a $20,000 start-up grant for the Institute with encouragement to continue offering the program in future summers with the support of the College of Humanities.

We had 34 MLA Institute fellows this year-- 20 who joined us in person here in Salt Lake, and 14 who joined remotely. We were the only institute this year to offer a remote option, and we had attendees joining us from 16 different states and from Palestine. Our version of the Institute featured extensive readings in two-year college literacy studies and daily panels of guest speakers from Salt Lake Community College, the University of Utah, and teacher-scholar-activists in the Two-Year College English Association (TYCA) from across the country. A central focus of the Institute was anti-racist and culturally sustaining literacy pedagogies. All participants spent the week developing Pedagogical Inquiry Projects that they shared with each other and panel of Salt Lake Community College transfer students on the final day of the Institute. Twelve participants opted to continue developing their projects for the classroom or publication for graduate course credit offered through the University of Utah-- another opportunity available only to participants in the Salt Lake MLA institute.

Attendees included MA and PhD students in Writing & Rhetoric Studies and English at the U of U, as well as from Weber State, Idaho State, SUNY Binghamton, Texas Christian University, the University of Cincinnati, the University of Michigan, the University of Nebraska, and the University of Bristol.

 Faculty attendees hailed from Salt Lake Community College, Mesa Community College, Kirkland Community College, Community College of Aurora, Des Moines Area Community College, Southwestern Illinois College, Norco College, Belmont Abbey College, Eastern Oregon University, Tennessee State University, San Jose State University, University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, St. John's University, and the University of San Diego. The range of institutes represented included community colleges, rural and urban universities with an access mission, HBCUs, HSIs, and instructors teaching in college access programs for first-generation college students and Native American students.