Storyboard

Storyboard is a community of faculty and staff from across campus who are dedicated to helping students shape and share their stories. We focus on community-building, pedagogical innovation, and fostering student leadership.  

Storyboard is built on an intellectual foundation that is inclusive and integrative. We use narrative thinking and reflective practices to empower students to connect and articulate their experiences throughout their time at Boise State.

In the Storyboard approach, we view reflection and narrative as complex intellectual activities. While people reflect and tell stories all the time in their daily lives, we focus on “storywork”:  The process of intentionally shaping stories for specific contexts and communities.

Our approach to storywork draws upon five core concepts: reflection, narrative, integrative thinking, articulation, and inclusivity. This Guide contains pages for each core concept. On each page, we have compiled definitions, essential readings, and resources. We invite faculty and staff to delve into the resources on each page but we also encourage connections across the concepts.

The visual representation of our theoretical foundation, portrayed in the shape of a lens, appears at the top of each page. We selected the lens shape because ethical and generative storywork requires that we consider all five core concepts together. Here's how we see it: 

• Narrative thinking and reflective practice are our key tools
• Integrative thinking reminds us of the importance of encouraging students to blend past and present experiences along with future goals
• Articulation to external audiences serves as our goal
• Inclusivity operates around everything we do as a reminder that there is no single, idealized student story or experience.

As you read through the sources, we encourage you to recommend additional readings and resources through our “Suggest a Source” box (below). 

How might our students’ educational experiences change if we invite them to approach college as a story?

Stories have narrators, themes, scenes, and chapters. They have moments of struggle and transformation. Stories move beyond chronological reporting by communicating deeper significance. We believe that students will experience their education with more purpose and ownership if they are actively building a story during their time at Boise State.  

• Embedding reflection. We believe that reflection should be embedded into all courses, programs, campus jobs, and experiential learning so that students are analyzing meaning and connecting experiences throughout their college experience. 
• Naming specific skills. We believe that students should receive consistent support in naming the specific skills they gain in their courses and through experiential learning. 
• Focusing on student experience. We believe that in order to support students in building their story, faculty should rethink the design and delivery of courses, programs, and degrees in ways that focus on the student experience.  

How does Storyboard fit into the larger Boise State vision? We are part of the Beyond the Major initiative at Boise State: