Last Day To Register: April 7th, 2023
The ACT in ACTLA: Disruption is a positive act for transformation, supporting Student-Centered pedagogies like ungrading, embodied learning, social emotional and cultural wealth, and communities of learning.
At ACTLA, we have long imagined:
- transforming the legacy of remediation and deficit-minded pedagogies in Tutoring and Learning Assistance to pedagogies grounded in the community and cultural wealth of the growing diversity of our students
- creating empowering spaces that are trauma informed, and embodying practices of social justice and empowerment
- learning collaboratively and with each other as we inspire and sustain students, mentor tutors, and create learning communities, engaging social emotional learning and embodied learning.
We are not alone in embodying these practices as we transform our centers, the physical and virtual spaces where students come to learn with all of themselves and transform tutor training in response to the neuroscience of learning, social emotional learning, and cultural responsiveness.
ACTLA is the space to grow and learn together, a space of transformation and collaboration that heals and empowers us to reimagine and recreate the role that tutoring and learning centers can play in transforming the lives of students.
Meet Our Exciting Keynote and Strand Spotlights!
Meena Srinivasan is a highly respected educational leader who brings deep expertise and credibility in the field of Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) and is also one of Mindful Magazine’s 2022 Ten Powerful Women of the Mindfulness Movement...
Conference Strands
- Educator/Peer Educator Identities & Intersectionalities: engaging student identities; race, class, gender, disciplinary cultures, learning other ways, engaging cultural wealth, funds of knowledge, inclusion, belongingness neurodiversity, social emotional learning
- Disrupting and Transforming Policies, Practices, and Spaces for Equity and Social Justice: culturally-informed spaces, culturally-relevant practices, inclusion, diversity, basic needs, cultural capital, transparent practices, tutoring for ungrading and labor based grading practices, innovative learning spaces
- Training and Community Redesigned with Serving Students in Mind: peer leaders, tutors, staff, coaches, AANAPISIs, HSIs, MSIs, social emotional learning, student experiences, trauma-informed practice, Chicanx rhetorics, conocimiento (knowledge),undocumented students, safety, community-building
- Innovative Practices to Disrupt and Transform Online Tutoring and Learning Assistance: reimagining the uses of technology, humanizing online support, inclusion, equity and technology, communications, learning practices online, building social emotional learning
- Embodied Practices in Tutoring and Learning: spatial design, embodied learning practices, affective learning, cultural/emotional wealth, inclusivity, belongingness, race, class, gender, disciplinary cultures, learning other ways, engaging cultural wealth, trauma informed practices, social emotional learning, brain-culture connection, engaging productively with amygdala hijack, the neuroscience of culture
Our Full Statement
History of ACTLA
The Association of Colleges for Tutoring and Learning Assistance (ACTLA) was organized in 1973 with the purpose of improving tutorial programs and services in California Community Colleges. The first conference was held at Allan Hancock College in Santa Maria on May 2, 1974. Through 1983 the organization was called the California Community College Tutorial Association (CCCTA). Beginning in 1984, with the intention of including all institutions of higher education in California, the name changed to the Association of California Colleges for Tutoring and Learning Assistance (ACCTLA). In the summer of 2002 a strategic planning committee of the executive board approved a final name change to the Association of Colleges for Tutoring and Learning Assistance (ACTLA). More than 30 years after its inception ACTLA is now a national organization but retains its original purpose: improving tutorial programs and related services.
ACTLA loves its roots (all segments of higher education in California) but its canopy (a national organization with a CLADEA affiliation) is the direction and purpose we've had for 15 years!
Mission
The mission of the Association of Colleges for Tutoring and Learning Assistance is to advance excellence within our discipline and practice. Through professional development, certification, and dialogue, we foster and promote racial and socioeconomic equity in student achievement. We recognize the critical role of tutoring and learning assistance programs in disrupting and transforming inequitable practices and educational systems.
The historic and systemic nature of educational inequity has created economic and psycho-social barriers for our students. We are committed to ensuring equitable access and inclusive practices regardless of race, gender, socioeconomic class, age, ability, religion, sexual orientation, national origin, and individual expression and experience.
Our work facilitates student empowerment, restorative justice, and the transfer of cultural knowledge within our global communities.
Specific Objectives and Purposes
The specific objectives and purposes of ACTLA shall be to improve the tutorial and learning assistance programs and services of colleges and universities. Special emphasis will be directed to meeting the individual learning needs of those students who have traditionally been underrepresented in post-secondary education such as ethnic minorities and students with physical and educational disabilities. This will include but not be limited to the following objectives/goals:
a. To share ideas and information;
b. To develop and share tutorial materials, methods, techniques, and procedures;
c. To evaluate materials, methods, procedures, techniques and services;
d. To inform the public, college administration, and legislative bodies of Association goals, objectives, programs and services;
e. To coordinate ACTLA goals with other related organizations;
f. To support efforts of individual colleges as they relate to Association goals;
g. To support research and practice in the field of tutorial and learning assistance;
h. To advance the profession and discipline of tutorial and learning assistance;
i. To make recommendations to state administrative and legislative bodies.
ACTLA on Social Media!
Learning Support Center in Higher Education
ACTLA is a member of the Council of Learning Assistance and Developmental Education Associations.
Learning Assistance Programs