Transgressing Borders: Reimagining Education and the Role of Learning in Community
April 18–19, 2025
This program is a multi-day workshop and festival aimed at reimagining how institutions of higher education and local communities work together in a generative way. Together we aim to reshape how we think about “town-gown” dynamics. We are inspired to co-create a learning ecosystem that centers authentic knowledge-sharing by situating community experts as thought partners alongside academic leaders.
Program Schedule
Friday, April 18, 9:30 a.m.–7:00 p.m.
Registration
Breakfast Snacks
9:30–10:00 a.m.
Welcome
10:00–10:15 a.m.
Opening Conversation, moderated by Robyn Sheridan
10:15–11:15 a.m.
With Kimberly Williams Brown and Krissy Hill
A dialogue around knowledge rooted in land, body, relationship, art, and education.
Housing, Food, and Place-Based Justice, moderated by Aja Schmeltz
11:30 a.m.–12:45 p.m.
With Erin Huang, Jordan Schinella, and Nyhisha Gibbs, MPA
A community conversation at the intersection of housing, food security, and environmental health.
Community Building Lunch
12:45–2:00 p.m.
Transgressive Pedagogy, moderated by Elizabeth Cannon
2:00–4:10 p.m.
With Alisha Kohn, callie mackenzie, Hilary Tackie, PhD, Justice McCray, Manbo Dr. Kahdeidra Martin, Micah, Wailly Comprés, Willie Morris, Dr. Zach Brown
Challenging the dominant narratives of who holds knowledge, this session is intended to center learning through community, while creating space for participants to contribute to knowledge-sharing.
Porous Borders: Art as Collaboration
4:10–5:40 p.m.
With Asilia Franklin-Phipps and Emilie Houssart
Collective collage as an act of radical reimagining.
Winding Down
5:40–7:00 p.m.
Snacks, passive art, and reflection with a crowd-sourced playlist.
Saturday, April 19, 10:00 a.m.–3:45 p.m.
Registration
10:00–10:30 a.m.
Opening
Welcome / Breakfast
10:30–11:00 a.m.
Care as an Act of Abolition, moderated by Jasmine Syedullah
11:00 a.m.–12:30 p.m.
With Beth Poague, Ja’na Baylor, Omar Graves, Tyler Epps
Discussing practices of collective and accessible care.
Community Clinic
12:30–1:30 p.m.
With Anthony Slade (Transitional Housing/Shelter), Cathleen Zeno (Healthcare Access/Navigation), George Haddad (Legal Support), Jean Hinkley (Civic engagement), Jenny Ingram (Community Acupuncture/Ear Seeds), Will Brammer (Financial Literacy)
An opportunity to explore community resource accessibility, offered by local advisors.
Lunch
1:30–2:45 p.m.
Program Reflection and Poetry Closing by The Office of Community-Engaged Learning’s (OCEL) Poet Laureate, Marissa Desir
2:45–3:15 p.m.
Introduced by Lili Walker
A final reflective opportunity for continued relationship-making and relational learning.
Closing Remarks
3:15–3:45 p.m.
Conveners
Zoë Markwalter
Zoë (she/they) is the Research and Program Associate in the Office of Community Engaged Learning at Vassar which stands on Mohican, Munsee, and Schaghticoke ancestral lands. A neurodivergent learner deeply connected to the Mahhicannituck (Hudson River), Zoë finds her way through fractals of emergence. Among other identities, she is a restorative circle practitioner, weaver, medical industrial complex survivor, and community member. Zoë is a 3 time college drop-out with 3 degrees in higher education. In humanity she makes meaning through the ways in which place informs identity. In scholarship, Zoë’s research is rooted in the ways that identity informs knowledge. Through place we come to know each other. To find belonging.
Asilia Franklin-Phipps
Asilia is an interdisciplinary scholar working as an assistant professor in Educational Studies and Leadership at State University of New York (SUNY) at New Paltz. She teaches classes in Art, Educational Studies, Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and teaches classes on contemporary art, popular culture, literacy, and geography. Inspired by contemporary art, film, and popular culture, Asilia’s work explores affect, pedagogy, race, gender, sexuality, and visual culture.
Elizabeth Cannon
Elizabeth Cannon (she/her) is an educator, facilitator, researcher, and practitioner within the critical community-engaged learning field. Currently, she serves as the Director of Community-Engaged Learning at Vassar (which resides on the occupied Munsee Lenape land). Elizabeth’s research interests focus on critical feminism within community engagement, community accountability, the role of power dynamics between institutions and communities, and best practices for centering community voice.
Kate Powell
Kate is a sophomore at Vassar and a Cognitive Science major with correlates in French and Creative Writing. She is originally from Buffalo, NY. Kate is a Student Ambassador for The Vassar Institute for the Liberal Arts. Her role, specifically centered around supporting the development of this signature program, has given her the opportunity to work within the Office of Community-Engaged Learning. Within the office, she also is a member of the communications team. In her free time, Kate enjoys writing, drawing, discovering new music, and long walks in the woods. Kate is passionate about finding ways to engage and learn from her community and is part of EngagePk and VELLOP, two Vassar organizations focused on fostering connections within Poughkeepsie.
Lili Walker
Lili is a second-year student at Vassar, originally from Los Angeles, California. She is an English major and a prospective Sociology double major, drawn to the ways storytelling, music, and community shape our collective experiences. Lili has worked in the Office of Community-Engaged Learning for two years. This year, her work as an assistant in Community-Engaged course and partnership programming has deepened her passion for bridging academic inquiry with real-world engagement. Outside of academics, Lili loves getting lost in a good book, spending time with friends, playing the clarinet, and embracing new experiences. Lili is passionate about hands-on creativity, whether through arts and crafts or experimenting with different forms of making.
Robyn Sheridan
Robyn is an Assistant Professor of Education, co-coordinator of the Social Justice Educational Studies MPS program and affiliate in Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies at (SUNY) New Paltz. She considers the body a critical site of inquiry in scholarship and pedagogy. Her current scholarship considers the limitations of the white body (bodies of knowledge, physical bodies) within the context of literacy situations and reading orientations. She enjoys music making, growing veggies and flowers, and spending time with her family.
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The Vassar Institute for the Liberal Arts
165 College Avenue, Poughkeepsie, New York 12604