The CEP is excited to welcome submissions for articles, guides, op eds, and personal essays to Barnard students and alums. In selecting pieces for publication, we look for pitches and publications expressed in a lively, fluid style that focus on critical pedagogy, antiracism, experiential and experimental learning, accessibility, and/or community engaged teaching and learning. We are open to related topics, too, so please feel free to reach out to us with your ideas, as we would be happy to workshop them with you. If you would like to submit a visual, video, audio, or hybrid project, please do — we welcome work in multiple forms.

To give a sense of the type of work we are looking for, recent Barnard student publications on our website include a best practices guide to Zoom recordings in the online classroom; a freshman’s perspective on learning during Covid-19; interviews with students in the US and abroad about their experiences transitioning to online learning in spring 2020; and a thesis process guide. Recent alum work on our website includes a faculty-oriented guide to Gender Inclusivity in the Classroom. We do not see these examples and their forms as strict containers for the work you may choose to produce with us, but rather as springboards for further thinking around the forms, styles, and themes your piece might explore. 

Taking some time to familiarize yourself with our work and principles will be very helpful in getting a sense of our Center’s focus and approach. Much of our work at the Center for Engaged Pedagogy is grounded in that of thinkers, writers, and educators such as Paolo Friere, bell hooks, adrienne maree brown, June Jordan, and Iris Marion Young. To put it simply, anti-oppressive teaching and learning is at the center of what we do. We are interested in intersectional work that explores what teaching and learning can look like from a variety of perspectives, and in the context of the hegemonic systems in which we live.

You are welcome to contact us with either a pitch or a submission, and we would be happy to work with you in any stage of your thinking, development, and/or writing processes. If selected, your work will be published on our website, which serves as an important and evolving pedagogical touchpoint for the entire Barnard community, including prospective and current students, faculty, staff, and alums.

A pitch is a short letter offering a story, idea, or project proposal to an editor of a publication. If you are pitching an idea for an article, essay, guide, or project, please be sure that your pitch answers the following questions: Why is this topic important to write about? Why is it important to write about at this moment in time? Why am I the person to write it? 

Pitches should be approximately 300-500 words in length.

We accept rolling submissions and completed pieces should run between 800 and 4,000 words. When submitting, please include a short letter to introduce the article, essay, guide, or project.  

Features typically run between 2,000 and 4,000 words and essays, op-eds, guides and articles generally run anywhere between 800 and 1,200 words.  

• The CEP considers a feature to be a reported or comprehensively researched work between 2,000 - 4,000 words that offers insight into any aspect of pedagogy, community engaged teaching and learning or how anti-oppressive pedagogical theory and praxis intersect.  
• An article is a reported or researched piece on any of the above topics but shorter in length, between 800-1200 words.  
• An essay is a first-person reflection of between 800-1,200 words centered around any of the topics above (or related topics), usually but not necessarily drawing upon the author’s lived experience.  
• An op-ed is between 800-1200 words and is a well-researched and argued work of persuasive writing or commentary on pedagogical practice, anti-oppressive and anti-racist pedagogy or experiential and experimental teaching and learning.
• Guides are also between 800-1200 words and offer original and well-researched suggestions for students, faculty, staff and administration as they reimagine pedagogical practice.  
• We are also open to related topics for all submissions, so please do not hesitate to send us a pitch or completed piece that may be slightly outside of those listed above.

The CEP invites you to look at the following examples of these forms from our website:

• An essay: “A College Freshman’s Perspective on Covid-19” by Aaisha Sajjad (Barnard ‘23)
• A guide:  “A Student’s Perspective:  A Guide to Best Practices for Zoom Recordings” by Sonja Eiseman (Barnard ‘21) 
• “Thesis Process Guide” by Kate Barrett (Barnard ‘20)
• A feature-length article:  “Barnard First-Year Experience: Preserving Community During Times of Transition” by Joscelyn Jurich (CEP Graduate Assistant)

We do not accept previously published work. Previously published includes work that has appeared on social media accounts and personal blogs, as well as other websites and publication outlets. We do welcome submissions originally written for Barnard and Columbia courses as well as articles, essays, zines, standalone sections of theses, and other projects created outside of these and other academic spaces. 

Our editorial process centers close and collaborative work with authors to ensure clear and open communication about their articles from conception through to publication. We are excited to hear from you and work with you!

If you are interested, please send your submissions and/or pitches to pedagogy@barnard.edu as a Microsoft Word document or PDF attachment.