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Full-Text Articles in Education
Evidencing The Value Of Educational Development: Charting A Course On The Waves And Winds Of Change, Jovan Groen, Carolyn Hoessler, Carolyn Ives, Veronica Bamber, Corinne Laverty, Klodiana Kolomitro
Evidencing The Value Of Educational Development: Charting A Course On The Waves And Winds Of Change, Jovan Groen, Carolyn Hoessler, Carolyn Ives, Veronica Bamber, Corinne Laverty, Klodiana Kolomitro
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
Across higher education, educational developers and their supporting campus communities are being called upon to scale up evidence-informed practices, to enhance student experiences, and to document the changes. This article builds on the work of scholars who have taken up this evaluative challenge, by examining varied aspects of the evidencing process using an adaptation of Saunders’s (2000) RUFDATA framework for evidencing value. Reflections on emerging patterns and tensions in the evidencing of educational development are subsequently discussed. We argue for making evidencing value a purposeful and intentional process, and we chart a path forward for creating and implementing a vision …
Data-Driven Iterative Refinements To Educational Development Services: Directly Measuring The Impacts Of Consultations On Course And Syllabus Design, Chad Hershock, Laura Ochs Pottmeyer, Jessica Harrell, Sophie Le Blanc, Marisella Rodriguez, Jacqueline Stimson, Katherine Phelps Walsh, Emily Daniels Weiss
Data-Driven Iterative Refinements To Educational Development Services: Directly Measuring The Impacts Of Consultations On Course And Syllabus Design, Chad Hershock, Laura Ochs Pottmeyer, Jessica Harrell, Sophie Le Blanc, Marisella Rodriguez, Jacqueline Stimson, Katherine Phelps Walsh, Emily Daniels Weiss
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
Evidence-based practice in educational development includes leveraging data to iteratively refine center for teaching and learning (CTL) services. However, CTL data collection is often limited to counts and satisfaction surveys rather than direct measures of outcomes. To directly assess impacts of consultations on course and syllabus design, we analyzed 94 clients’ syllabi (32 faculty, 62 graduate students and postdocs) before and after consultations. Faculty and non-faculty clients demonstrated significant change following consultations (6% and 10% gains in syllabus rubric scores, representing 50% and 31% of possible gains and effect sizes of 0.73 and 1.04 standard deviations, respectively). We compared faculty …
Fellow Travelers: Taking Stock Of Faculty Fellows Programs In The Age Of Organizational Development, Susan A. Colby, Laura Cruz, Danielle Cordaro, Clare Cruz
Fellow Travelers: Taking Stock Of Faculty Fellows Programs In The Age Of Organizational Development, Susan A. Colby, Laura Cruz, Danielle Cordaro, Clare Cruz
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
Faculty fellows have long served as a staple of centers for teaching and learning (CTLs), but to date little to no evidence has been gathered regarding their broader impact. The current study provides a snapshot of U.S.-based faculty fellows programs today, based on a comprehensive review of CTL websites. We categorize faculty fellows programs across five modalities that reflect decades of evolution and adaptation in the field of educational development. Our findings are intended to provide the foundation for new pathways of research, practice, and inquiry regarding the implementation of CTL fellowship programs.
Supporting Faculty As Writers And Teachers: An Integrative Approach To Educational Development, Jennifer Ahern-Dodson, Monique Dufour
Supporting Faculty As Writers And Teachers: An Integrative Approach To Educational Development, Jennifer Ahern-Dodson, Monique Dufour
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
In this article, we explore how supporting faculty writers can also help them to become more effective teachers of writing in their disciplines. Based on over ten years of facilitating and studying faculty at our writing retreats, we demonstrate how understanding and improving their own writing experiences can spark insight into their students as writers. Furthermore, we suggest that helping faculty make this “turn to teaching” exemplifies the potential for an integrative model of educational development, one that leverages connections across faculty roles and responsibilities.
Place-Based Educational Development: What Center For Teaching And Learning Spaces Look Like (And Why That Matters), Laura Cruz, Karen Huxtable-Jester, Brian Smentkowski, Martin Springborg
Place-Based Educational Development: What Center For Teaching And Learning Spaces Look Like (And Why That Matters), Laura Cruz, Karen Huxtable-Jester, Brian Smentkowski, Martin Springborg
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
This study seeks to explore the physical spaces centers for teaching and learning (CTLs) occupy; with an emphasis on gaining a better picture of what CTL spaces look like; where they are located; how they developed: and what these spaces represent. We gathered visual, empirical, and qualitative data to take the first steps towards developing a shared vision of not only of our physical spaces, but also as a jumping off point for further analysis of the CTL as a meaningful place.
What Really Matters For Instructors Implementing Equitable And Inclusive Teaching Approaches, Tracie Marcella Addy, Philip M. Reeves, Derek Dube, Khadijah A. Mitchell
What Really Matters For Instructors Implementing Equitable And Inclusive Teaching Approaches, Tracie Marcella Addy, Philip M. Reeves, Derek Dube, Khadijah A. Mitchell
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
Supporting instructor implementation of equitable and inclusive teaching approaches is a critical area of focus in educational development. However, there is limited empirical evidence on factors that either support or hinder instructors’ implementation of inclusive teaching. The results of this national survey study reveal several predictors of instructors’ utilization of inclusive teaching approaches and reported obstacles faced. For this sample, knowledge of inclusive teaching was a statistically significant predictor of implementation, as was being from a non-STEM discipline. Responses highlighted promising approaches, several of which can inform the efforts of educational developers.
How A Flexible Teaching “Camp” Answered Our Pandemic Teaching Emergency, Patricia Dineen
How A Flexible Teaching “Camp” Answered Our Pandemic Teaching Emergency, Patricia Dineen
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, faculty scrambled to move courses online and to master technology tools seemingly overnight. Keeping a focus on course design and teaching techniques became a central challenge for a center for teaching and learning (CTL) in the midst of the emergency move to online and blended learning. This article chronicles one CTL’s design and implementation of a virtual Forward Looking Explorations in Teaching Camp (FLEX Camp) that aimed to address pedagogy and technology simultaneously by immersing faculty in learning experiences. It details the planning process, learning goals, key activities, assessment methods, and lessons learned …
An Efficient And Coherent Pipeline For Graduate Student And Postdoctoral Scholar Educational Development, Daniel Mann, Matthew Mahavongtrakul, Ashley Hooper
An Efficient And Coherent Pipeline For Graduate Student And Postdoctoral Scholar Educational Development, Daniel Mann, Matthew Mahavongtrakul, Ashley Hooper
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
As higher education shifts toward a culture of evidence-based teaching practices, future faculty are seeking opportunities to develop their pedagogical knowledge and skills. Many centers for teaching and learning (CTLs) have not proportionally grown in resources to meet the demand for graduate student and postdoctoral scholar programming (e.g., teaching certificates and pedagogy seminars). This article presents a model of a wide-ranging, coherent pipeline of educational development for graduate students and postdoctoral scholars managed by a CTL with modest staffing.
“Am I Really Good Enough?”: Black And Latinx Experiences With Faculty Development, Sylk Santiago-Sotto
“Am I Really Good Enough?”: Black And Latinx Experiences With Faculty Development, Sylk Santiago-Sotto
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
This study focuses on the experiences of Black and Latinx faculty in academic medicine in relation to their educational and faculty development. Narratives by participants reflect on their career path and refer to faculty development programs as valuable but also as dominant group-centric, counter to their cultural backgrounds and the underrepresented faculty experience. Findings reveal the need for faculty development to be spaces for affirmation, validation, and accountability and suggest the need for tailored programs. Furthermore, implications on the research and practice of faculty affairs within higher education and academic medicine are outlined.
Leveraging The Power Of Course Redesign For Student Success, Rebecca Campbell, Benjamin B. Blankenship
Leveraging The Power Of Course Redesign For Student Success, Rebecca Campbell, Benjamin B. Blankenship
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
Colleges and universities have a commitment to improve the student experience, increase persistence, and provide paths to degree completion. Course redesign, focused on student success, is a promising strategy for realizing that commitment. This article examines some of the particulars when course redesign is explicitly linked to student success. These particulars include the types of redesign outcomes, why courses should be the locus of student success initiatives, identifying which courses to redesign, and the characteristics and scope of impact of redesigned courses. The article concludes with suggestions for next steps for student success course redesign.
What's The Problem Now?, Randall Bass
What's The Problem Now?, Randall Bass
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
Revisiting an essay from 1999, this article explores the current conditions in higher education, and society more broadly, that help shape the roles for the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) and educational development. By seeing the current “crises” of higher education not only as “problems” to be investigated but as a “wicked problem,” we might be able to elevate and complicate the role that inquiry into teaching and learning might play in institutional change and the expansion of higher education. The article argues for the necessity, even urgency, of seeing educational development as a lever for change, fully engaged …
Motivations And Obstacles Influencing Faculty Engagement In Adopting Teaching Innovations, Wayne Jacobson, Renee Cole
Motivations And Obstacles Influencing Faculty Engagement In Adopting Teaching Innovations, Wayne Jacobson, Renee Cole
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
Significant progress has been made in understanding science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education and ways it can be improved, but propagation of change remains a challenge. This study presents an analysis of STEM faculty responses to open-text survey questions that asked them to identify motivations and obstacles to making changes in their teaching. Responses reveal wide variability among faculty perceptions, conceptualizations of change, and understandings of evidence. These findings suggest reasons faculty are not uniformly receptive to calls for change and challenge educational developers and advocates of STEM education reform to be explicit about their own understandings of meaningful …
Cultivating And Sustaining A Faculty Culture Of Data-Driven Teaching And Learning: A Systems Approach, Marsha Lovett, Chad Hershock
Cultivating And Sustaining A Faculty Culture Of Data-Driven Teaching And Learning: A Systems Approach, Marsha Lovett, Chad Hershock
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
A prominent goal of colleges and universities today is to enact data-driven teaching and learning. Faculty clearly play a key role, and yet they tend to have limited time, a lack of training in assessment or education research, and few incentives for engaging in this work. We describe a framework designed to address the practical and cultural aspects of these challenges via a cycle of educational development and support: motivate, educate, facilitate, disseminate. We illustrate this systems approach with concrete examples and conclude with lessons learned from our experiences that should translate to a variety of institutional contexts.
The Diffusion Of Faculty Development: A Faculty Fellows Program, Tracy W. Smith, Sara J. Greenwald, Lillian Y. Nave, Victor N. Mansure, Michael L. Howell
The Diffusion Of Faculty Development: A Faculty Fellows Program, Tracy W. Smith, Sara J. Greenwald, Lillian Y. Nave, Victor N. Mansure, Michael L. Howell
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
This critical retrospective review describes the ideation, creation, and implementation of a faculty development fellows program at a regional comprehensive university. The authors share their perspectives as fellows regarding primary considerations for designing the program, including attention to the fellows selection process, required multilevel support, cultivation of communication and relationships, professional development of the fellows, development of unit programming, and lessons learned. Each section of the article concludes with critical questions institutions might consider when conceiving a faculty development fellows program.
The Sotl Scaffold: Supporting Evidence-Based Teaching Practice In Educational Development, Laura Cruz, Kathryn Cunningham, Brian Smentkowski, Hillary Steiner
The Sotl Scaffold: Supporting Evidence-Based Teaching Practice In Educational Development, Laura Cruz, Kathryn Cunningham, Brian Smentkowski, Hillary Steiner
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
This article presents a scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) scaffold, a conceptual model designed for educational developers (and others) who support the values, practices, and production of the SoTL, both on their campuses and beyond. The SoTL scaffold explicates distinct support levels, ranging from spark to lead, each of which call for differentiated strategies and programs to be used by Centers for Teaching and Learning (CTLs) and similar units.
The Fearless Teaching Framework: A Model To Synthesize Foundational Education Research For University Instructors, Alice E. Donlan, Sandra M. Loughlin, Virginia L. Byrne
The Fearless Teaching Framework: A Model To Synthesize Foundational Education Research For University Instructors, Alice E. Donlan, Sandra M. Loughlin, Virginia L. Byrne
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
There is often a disconnect between the unit of analysis in rigorous education research, and the types of recommendations that instructors find the most useful to improve their teaching. Research often focuses on narrow slices of the student experience, and university instructors often require broad recommendations. We present the Fearless Teaching Framework to address this gap between research and practice. In this framework, we define four pieces of effective teaching: classroom climate, course content, teaching practices, and assessment strategies. We argue that these are appropriate areas of focus for instructor growth, based on their relations to student engagement.
Balancing Direction And Response: Four Dimensions Of Transformative Facilitation In Educational Development, Roben Torosyan, Alison Cook-Sather
Balancing Direction And Response: Four Dimensions Of Transformative Facilitation In Educational Development, Roben Torosyan, Alison Cook-Sather
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
In this article we present 4 dimensions of transformative facilitation, each conceptualized using the “wisdom of practice” (Weimer, 2006, p. 54) gathered through our experience facilitating educational development and through the experiences posted by participants in a POD Network conference session. Composed of theoretical underpinnings we drew from several bodies of literature and practical applications generated by us and participants during the session, these dimensions include: (a) liminality (context); (b) organization (structures); (c) attitudinal stance (tone); and (d) process. Through their multidirectional interactions with one another, these dimensions aim to transform facilitation as enacted across educational development contexts.
Exploring The Potential Of Educational Developer Portfolios, Natasha Kenny, Isabeau Iqbal, Jeannette Mcdonald, Paola Borin, Debra Dawson, Judy Chan, Erika Kustra
Exploring The Potential Of Educational Developer Portfolios, Natasha Kenny, Isabeau Iqbal, Jeannette Mcdonald, Paola Borin, Debra Dawson, Judy Chan, Erika Kustra
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
There is growing interest in portfolios within the context of higher education, especially related to the use and integration of student learning portfolios, teaching portfolios, and eportfolios. Although little scholarly discourse has focused on educational developer portfolios, these have the potential to promote reflection on practice, showcase accomplishments, make explicit our approaches to practice, demonstrate impact, and support workplace personnel decisions. Despite these benefits, our community has not uniformly adopted the educational developer portfolio. Drawing from scholarly literature and based on findings from research gathered through World Cafés, this study explores the possibilities and potential for the educational developer portfolio. …
Designing An Evaluation Of Instructional Consultation In A Higher Education Context, Karen Elizabeth Brinkley Etzkorn, David Schumann, Beth White, Tiffany Smith
Designing An Evaluation Of Instructional Consultation In A Higher Education Context, Karen Elizabeth Brinkley Etzkorn, David Schumann, Beth White, Tiffany Smith
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
Individual instructor consultation is a common service provided by centers focused on educational development in higher education. The importance of this service has been reflected in its history, increasing demand, and strong anecdotal evidence to its effectiveness. However, the extant literature reveals that comprehensive assessment of consultation effectiveness has proved challenging. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to (a) provide an overview of consultation and summarize the relevant work evaluating this service, and (b) propose a comprehensive process for evaluating consultation services that was piloted at one large research intense university. The goal is to provide a systematic method …
Flipping The Mindset: Reframing Fear And Failure To Catalyze Development, Diane E. Boyd, Josie Baudier, Traci Stromie
Flipping The Mindset: Reframing Fear And Failure To Catalyze Development, Diane E. Boyd, Josie Baudier, Traci Stromie
To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development
Despite the attempts to target success and predisposition to taking risks to promote innovation, sometimes educational developers encounter moments where they fail to meet expectations set forth—by their institutions, colleagues, or themselves. Attempts to avoid potential failures can stymie the creative process, preventing them from meeting difficult challenges. What can be done to catalyze useful responses to failure when events and interactions do not go according to plan? Most researchers suggest reflecting on the failure in order to grow. To assist, a field tested reflective process (the IDeAS process) that helps flip the approach to failure and move toward the …