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Scholars at Work: Brant Winn: Home

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About Scholars @ Work

Scholars @ Work is an initiative from the Faculty Center for Innovation designed to showcase the incredible and innovative research and scholarship from Park faculty members around the world. In addition to faculty profiles, Scholars @ Work hosts an annual fall reception and a roundtable panel discussion every semester giving faculty across disciplines an opportunity to collaboratively discuss a topic of timely importance to the University. For more information on Scholars @ Work, visit our web page!

Brant Winn

Director of Field Experiences/Associate Professor/New Faculty Support Associate

Parkville Campus, Copley 227
brant.winn@park.edu
816-584-6350

Scholarship Highlights

Brant's impressive career has included published scholarship on a wide variety of topics. Browse selected highlights from his research, and view his CV below.

Winn, B. (2023). “Soundtracks: The Surprising Cure to Overthinking”, Missouri Association Council of Teacher Education Conference, March 2023.

Learn the proven plan from Jon Acuff's book, Soundtracks, to change overthinking from a super problem into a super power.

View Brant's full slide deck here.

Winn, B., Moore, R., & Maroney, D. (2022). The imagine project: using expressive writing to help the stress and trauma of college students. Interdisciplinary Insights: The Journal of Saint Leo University's College of Education and Social Services,

The world is filled with uncertainty causing stress and trauma for children, teens, and adults at an alarming rate. Educators are seeing the negative effects of life’s challenges on students of all ages in their classrooms every day. Universities are looking for ways to help educators deal with their own stress during their education so they can then help their students when they reach their classrooms. The Imagine Project is an expressive writing tool that is standardized and easily used in all university and school settings. Expressive writing, specifically The Imagine Project, helps students of all ages identify, understand, and process life’s unfortunate stress and trauma, and emerge into a hopeful future, building vulnerability, empathy, and community in a classroom.

Read the full article for free.

About Brant

Dr. Brant Winn is Director of Field Experiences, Associate Professor of Education, and New Faculty Support Associate at Park University. He is located at the Parkville, Missouri campus.

Brant received his bachelor's degree in Mathematics Education at Missouri State University, before earning his M.A. in Secondary Administration at University of Central Missouri. His doctoral degree is in Educational Leadership from Columbia International University.

Brant is beginning his 30th year in education as a teacher and administrator, both in public and private K-12 schools and higher education. He has taught at Park University for 6 years and is based in the College of Education & Health Professions. 

In his roles as Director of Field Experiences/Associate Professor/New Faculty Support Associate, Brant pours himself into his work with education students while teaching face-to-face and blended courses focusing on the topics of trauma-informed, mindfulness, resilience, and student engagement. 

His research interests include such topics as trauma, resilience, post-traumatic growth, mindfulness, gratitude, and The Imagine Project. He is a member of the Missouri Association of Colleges for Teaching Education (MACTE), Missouri ACT Organization (ACT), Community Youth for Alliance (CAFY), and E6 Men’s Ministry (E6).

When not teaching or working with faculty and students at Park, Brant enjoys spending time with family, traveling, watching and playing sports, and leading and participating in E6 Men’s Ministries. 

Wise words from Brant

"I believe that every student is a unique individual who needs a positive, caring, and student-centered environment in which to grow and mature emotionally, intellectually, and socially. My goal is that everyone who interacts with me, whether it is faculty or students, feel seen and heard and that their talents and gifts are celebrated and encouraged."

Winn, B. (2022). Mindfulness and gratitude: does it really make a difference for college students. Insight: A Journal of Scholarly Teaching, 17.

Mindfulness is the intentional and nonjudgmental awareness of all thoughts, feelings, and sensations that occur in the present moment. Mindfulness has also been associated with higher levels of quality of life, sleep quality and duration, and life satisfaction and happiness (Chavan et al., 2017). Similarly, gratitude is a tendency toward appreciating the positive in life. It also has been associated with well-being, such as reducing anxiety, stress and depression, and increased life satisfaction (Lindor, 2019). This article takes these findings and explores them to determine whether consistent mindfulness activities and gratitude practices make a difference in the lives of college students, leading to a reduction in anxiety, stress, and uncertainty, as well as an increased ability to be present and to feel appreciation for their current lives. 

Read the full article for free.

Scholar Spotlight

Winn, B. & Olson-Morrison, D. (2020). #IAmResilient [MOOC]. Park University.

Park University's first ever Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) tackled the topic of resiliency. Every one of us, no matter how privileged, how confident, how healthy, feels the effects of isolation, despair, grief, chaos and loss. Though we could not have anticipated all the issues 2020 brought we do believe that building the capacity to manage hard times, and feel stronger because of them is a skill we could all benefit from. By building resiliency we build courage, strength, and confidence that sustains us through the inevitable ups and downs in this life. There has never been a better to time to learn about how to become more resilient.

Find more information about the MOOC here.

Winn, B. (2022). “Teaching to Build Resilience”, 2022 Missouri ACT Conference, Fall 2022.

Using The Missouri Model: Principles of Trauma Informed Care of safety, trustworthiness, choice, collaboration, and empowerment, we discuss practical strategies individuals can use to teach to build resilience.

View the full presentation here.

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