IN-PERSON MADRID FOCUS ON PEDAGOGY. SECTION A

Abstract

This article situates the redesign of GEOG 100: Introduction to Human Geography at Simon Fraser University as both a disciplinary and cross-disciplinary inquiry into the future of teaching and learning. Rooted in feminist and critical traditions of care ethics (Noddings 1984; Tronto 1994; Ore 2017), universal design for instruction (Scott et al. 2003), and digital pedagogies of care (Rabin 2021; Burke & Larmar 2021), the project reimagined large-enrolment online geography teaching while preserving the field’s enduring strengths: critical spatial thinking, reflexive engagement with inequality, and commitment to place-based understanding. The course embedded care structurally through labour-based grading, a rhythmic preparation-engagement-reflection cadence, and affirming communication in order to cultivate inclusion and community in online learning. Drawing on mixed-methods data (surveys n = 134, focus groups, reflective assignments), the study shows that care-centred design enhanced motivation, belonging, and intellectual risk-taking. Instructor reflections reveal both the potential and the strain of sustaining relational pedagogy within digital infrastructures, underscoring the need for institutional recognition of care labour. Framed within SoTL debates on equity, decoloniality, and digital transformation, the article argues that geography – and higher education more broadly – must imagine pedagogical futures that combine critical renewal with continuity, preserving what grounds our disciplines while redesigning for justice, accessibility, and meaningful human connection.