Refocusing Student Perspectives: Open Pedagogy at East Texas A&M

About 60 miles northeast of Dallas, the rural community of Commerce, Texas, is a “close-knit town full of caring citizens, involved students, and a thriving entrepreneurial spirit,” as described on its website. The town is also home to East Texas A&M University (ETAMU), an R2 public institution designated as a “Higher Access” school due to its strong regional impact, community engagement, and service to underrepresented students.

That dedication to serving and empowering students is evident in the ongoing work of Flavia Belpoliti, Associate Professor of Literature and Director of Graduate Studies, and Sarah Northam, Director of Research and Instruction. 

For several years, the ETAMU colleagues have championed open educational resources and practices across campus. They have also successfully established an open education task force that includes a representative from the Student Council.

 

Although their open education efforts are still in early phases, the two ramped up momentum in 2025 when they enrolled as an instructor/librarian team in the Open Education Network’s Certificate in Open Pedagogy.

 “I thought I had a good handle on open pedagogy,” says Sarah, “but seeing the different projects that our class colleagues did, and then doing the readings and different tasks, really made me understand that I had only a surface understanding.”

 

Looking back, Flavia and Sarah agree that the experience deepened their insight into open pedagogy and equipped them with the solid foundation to take their next step.

 

Today, they are eager to implement the action plan they developed in the Certificate. Specifically, the plan will lead them step-by-step toward their goal of replacing final exams with creative end-of-semester projects in two Intermediate Spanish courses. The idea, says Flavia, is to provide students with the opportunity to demonstrate competence in Spanish, while simultaneously prompting them to take a fresh look at smaller, rural communities like Commerce, the places where they live.

 

“Students tend to compare Commerce with big cities like Dallas or Austin,” she says. “But there are a lot of things happening right here as well. I want students to start to change their perspectives on the way that they see these spaces, these people.”

This fall, Flavia will task students in Intermediate Spanish I with creating a visual representation of their communities - the places, people, and events they would like to showcase. The project, “I Love the Place Where I Live,” will capture students’ impressions through their own written descriptions, photos, drawings, and videos, and will be publicly shared on a blog.

 

“I would have loved a project like this when I was in college,” says Sarah, who will advise the class on open licensing and publishing aspects of their work. “It’s cool because it relates to something you know, something you’re familiar with. You live in your community, so to me, that makes it engaging.”

 

In spring 2027, Flavia will assign students in Intermediate Spanish II a more advanced project: creating a bilingual biography of a fellow community member.

Basically, students will interview someone they consider relevant in their community. They will be free to choose - possibly a family member, a neighbor or teacher – anyone they recognize and would like to feature. Based on the interview, they will write a short biography in English, and then translate the English content into Spanish. The bilingual biography will be published as part of an e-book, enabling the broader community to see and share in the acknowledgment.

 

In both courses, subsequent cohorts of students will be invited to revise and/or expand upon the existing work with additional information or new entries. Through open licensing, their projects will be easily distributed and accessible, providing recognition for people who, Flavia believes, may not enjoy the same visibility as those in more populated locations.

 

Flavia is quite intentional about the ethnographical component she’s built into these assignments, hoping the underlying research and analysis may prompt students to think differently. “When you teach language,” she says, “you are also teaching ways of looking at cultures, cultural products, and cultural perspectives. The most important part of language is that it can change how you see the world.”

Kudos to the ETAMU team for tapping into the power of open pedagogy. We look forward to positive outcomes that will provide students with greater ownership of their educational experiences, and the freedom to bring their cultural perspectives to the learning process. 

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The East Texas A&M instructor/librarian team is one of several who presented projects at OEN’s Open Pedagogy Project Symposium on April 14, 2026. If you’re interested in participating in an upcoming cohort of the Certificate in Open Pedagogy, please contact the Open Education Network.