Mission and Overview
Mission and Overview
Vision: What is
it we aim toward? We seek to frame a campus “teaching commons,” what the
Carnegie Foundation describes as a “conceptual space in which communities of
educators committed to innovation and inquiry come together to exchange ideas
about teaching and learning, and use them to meet the challenges of educating
students for personal, professional, and civic life.”
Mission: How do
we approach that?
- Offer opportunities for faculty professional
development in evidence-informed teaching that engages all students and impacts
student learning
- Collaborate with campus partners to strengthen
an inclusive, learning-centered campus culture that fosters student success
- Foster interdisciplinary dialogue within and
among faculty and campus partners about effective teaching and significant learning
- Build networks for support for faculty growth in
teaching and scholarship
- Support & encourage faculty’s intellectual
activities that enhance the art of teaching and advance knowledge in higher
education
FPDP Outcomes: What
guides our decision-making?
The Faculty Professional Development Program contributes to
faculty growth in teaching through integration of key themes into its programs
and offerings. The FPDP works toward student success through assisting faculty
in
- Strengthening deliberate planning
- Building learner-influenced teaching practices
- Building learning-informed teaching practices
- Expanding the repertoire of teaching practices
- Contributing to interdisciplinary conversations
on learning, teaching & scholarship
- Valuing scholarship of teaching and learning,
and scholarly teaching
- Facilitating faculty growth in teaching
- Facilitating faculty growth in scholarship
Principles/Teaching Competencies:What does our target look like?
The FPDP programs and offerings are guided by principles in
the literature on teaching/learning. Five overarching characteristics of
effective learning-centered teaching inform the FPDP work. Teaching that has an
impact on student success
- Draws students into active learning
- Creates an inclusive learning environment
- Sets up and communicates high expectations
- Provides multiple avenues into learning
- Is informed by formative & summative
assessment
- Is informed by scholarship of teaching and
learning
Assessment:How
do we know how well we do? We are currently engaged as a pilot institution
in a faculty development program assessment effort. This two-year project will
result in a comprehensive and systematic plan for gathering and using data in
six areas of impact.