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One of the best parts of my job at the Center for Teaching is that I regularly engage instructors from all academic disciplines in conversations on teaching and learning. Whether it’s a discussion about using digital timelines in a history course or the kinds of questions that get students talking to each other in a law classroom or ways to incorporate more inquiry in an astronomy lab, I enjoy figuring out what learning looks like in different university contexts and then sharing and adapting teaching strategies across those contexts. I’m proud that the Center for Teaching is one of the places at Vanderbilt that brings faculty, staff, and students together for cross-campus conversations. And the upcoming academic year is no exception. We’re putting together a number of opportunities for the Vanderbilt teaching community to meet and learn from each other, including CFT-led learning communities on teaching and social class, podcasting, lab pedagogies, and language pedagogies. We’re also launching a new Senior Faculty Fellows program, designed to support faculty leaders as they help build a strong teaching culture here on campus. And next week, we’re hosting a Just-in-Time Teaching Conference for instructors getting ready for fall courses. Our conversations go beyond campus, too. See, for instance, Leading Lines, our new podcast on educational technology co-produced by the Vanderbilt Institute for Digital Learning, the Office of Scholarly Communications, and the Associate Provost for Digital Learning. Each episode features an interview with an educator, researcher, or technologist drawing interesting and useful connections between pedagogy and technology. Through the podcast, we hope to amplify ideas and voices that can help shape how we think about digital pedagogy.
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| Speaking of technologists, I’m happy to welcome the newest member of the CFT team, Ashley Burton. Ashley started here this month as an Instructional Technologist, coming to us from the University of Southern Mississippi. Ashley is working on her Master’s of Instructional Design and Development, and she will be a key part of the CFT’s Blackboard support and outreach efforts. Please join me in welcoming Ashley to Vanderbilt. As the fall semester gets started, I hope you’ll look for opportunities to talk with colleagues about teaching and learning, whether at the CFT or elsewhere. Why suffer “pedagogical solitude” (to quote Lee Shulman), when teaching can be a community endeavor? Derek Bruff, PhD
Director, Center for Teaching
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| It’s never too late to make a good decision, right? Although planning fall courses starts long before the start of classes, we recognize that many instructors are still making course design and implementation decisions right up to the wire. That’s why we’re offering a variety of teaching workshops for Vanderbilt instructors on August 22nd and 23rd, right before the first day of the fall semester. Visit the Just-in-Time Teaching Conference webpage for session descriptions and to register.
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| The CFT is accepting proposals for its new Senior Faculty Fellows program. Fellows will identify teaching and learning challenges in their departments or programs, then work to address those challenges in collaboration with colleagues. Senior Faculty Fellows will be partnered with CFT professional staff, who will assist in facilitating the learning communities, and each Fellow will receive $3,000 in research funds to support the work of their learning community. If you have received tenure or have been at Vanderbilt at least seven years, you are eligable to apply!
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Announcing the New Teaching Affiliates for 2016
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|  | This year's Teaching Affiliates are, left to right,
Beth Estes (Political Science), Andrea Gardiner (Civil & Environmental Engineering), Danielle Kopke (Biological Sciences), Kylie Korsnack (English), Allison McGrath (Sociology), Dani Picard (History), Matt Thompson (Chemical Engineering), Amie Thurber (Human & Organizational Development), Emily Turner (Psychology), and KatieYewell (Economics). |
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The Center for Teaching is excited to announce the Teaching Affiliates for 2016. Teaching Affiliates create and facilitate sessions for TA Orientation, an event that helps prepare new TAs to launch their careers as junior instructors at Vanderbilt. At TA Orientation, Teaching Affiliates work with groups of new TAs in their own or related disciplines to help prepare the TAs for common challenges related to grading, office hours, or discipline-specific pedagogies. Their thoughtful work helps make the CFT’s biggest annual event a success.
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CFT Proudly Welcomes the
2016 Cohort of
Junior Faculty Teaching Fellows!
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|  | Left to Right: Melanie Adley (Women’s and GenderStudies), Amanda Clayton (Political Science), Lisa Fazio (Psychology and HumanDevelopment), Anjali Forber-Pratt (Human and Organizational Development), Jessica Greenfield (French and Italian), Jessie Hock (English), Jessica Oster (Earthand Environmental Sciences), Guojun Wang (Asian Studies), and Alexis Wells (ReligiousStudies) |
| The Junior Faculty Teaching Fellowship provides its recipients with a structured faculty development experience complete with consultations, course design seminar, peer education, and senior faculty mentorship. This program not only helps its fellows develop an understanding of best teaching practices across the disciplines, but also assists them in their professional growth by helping them hone their abilities to balance teaching and research, improve their materials for review, and build a collaborative culture of teaching at Vanderbilt.
Over the coming months, the CFT newsletter will highlight the work of this year's Junior Faculty Teaching Fellows. Each month two fellows will be featured discussing their teaching philosophies and interests.
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New Podcast on Ed Tech in Higher Education Leading Lines is a podcast on educational technology produced here at Vanderbilt University. Each episode explores creative, intentional, and effective uses of technology to enhance student learning, uses that point the way to the future of educational technology in college and university settings. Through interviews with educators, researchers, technologists, and others, we hope to amplify ideas and voices that are (or should be!) shaping how we think about digital learning and digital pedagogy.
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Blackboard Drop-in Sessions for August
Blackboard Support at the CFT will be offering drop-in training and support for the fall semester for faculty, graduate students, and staff using Blackboard. Come get technical and pedagogical support from a team of Blackboard specialists during our drop-in support hours. Feel free to bring any questions or issues you want to resolve.
August Drop-in Support Hours
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Wednesday 8/24 9-11am & 3-4pm
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| Learning Community Opportunities at the CFTThe CFT hosts a number of learning communities, intended for members of Vanderbilt’s teaching community interested in meeting over time to develop deeper understandings and richer practices around particular teaching and learning topics. This year’s learning communities are:- Teaching and Social Class
- Lab Pedagogies
- Language Coordinators
- Podcasting
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