Celebrate teaching and learning: A SoTL symposium at the University of the Pacific

This paper presents a faculty-driven teaching and learning celebration that fostered institutional cultural change. The symposium showcased exemplar instructional methods at an institution, whose mission is to to provide a superior, student-centered learning experience integrating liberal arts and professional education. The symposium was a grass-roots effort that attracted seventy-two faculty members from various disciplines to attend the four day symposium sessions to share, discuss, and learn about the best practices used by their colleagues. The overall evaluation and response to the symposium exceeded the expectations of the organizers. The paper contributes to both the scholarship of teaching and learning and institutional cultural change literature by providing an overview of the program, reflections on the endeavor, and four successful presentations that helped to foster an interdisciplinary community of practice committed to sustainable pedagogies

Community Breeds Inspiration

Community Breeds Inspiration -- At last year’s Summit, Susie Mannon challenged faculty to banish dreary essay topics and craft assignments that might better engage student writers and result in papers that faculty enjoy reading. BSE professor Delores McNair took up that challenge. By building on Susie’s idea of combining writing with visual images, Delores’s revamped graduate student field placement reflection papers had new depth and power

Community Breeds Inspiration

Community Breeds Inspiration -- At last year’s Summit, Susie Mannon challenged faculty to banish dreary essay topics and craft assignments that might better engage student writers and result in papers that faculty enjoy reading. BSE professor Delores McNair took up that challenge. By building on Susie’s idea of combining writing with visual images, Delores’s revamped graduate student field placement reflection papers had new depth and power

Virtual School Startups: Founder Processes in American K-12 Public Virtual Schools

Traditional school districts do not have a lot of experience with virtual schools and have lost students to state and charter virtual schools. To retain students and offer alternative learning opportunities, more public districts are starting their own virtual schools. This study was an examination of foundational processes at three California virtual schools in traditional school districts.  An analysis of the findings revealed that sites perceived the establishing founder, preliminary research, district support, teacher and staff selection, financial evaluation, and curriculum decisions as keys to the founding process.  The analysis also led to surprising conclusions, including the need for virtual schools to constantly change and adapt and the focus in this study of organizations over technology.  The findings have implications for traditional districts starting virtual schools. The study also indicates that changes in policy could reduce the need for organizational adaptation among virtual schools in traditional school districts

Enhancing Student Success in Introductory Biology through Cross-Disciplinary Research

Introductory Biology courses are “gateway” courses for many majors, and, as in many colleges and universities, attrition and achievement problems are a barrier to student success and program effectiveness. Class sizes have been steadily rising in elementary, high school, and college classrooms. We aim to study how this impacts student achievement

From Gatekeeper to Gateway: Improving Student Success in an Introductory Biology Course

Introductory science, math, and engineering courses often have problems related to student engagement, achievement, and course completion. To begin examining these issues in greater depth, this pilot study compared student engagement, achievement, and course completion in a small and large section of an introductory biology class. Results based on t-tests indicate that students in the small section of the course were more engaged and had higher achievement scores than students in the large section. Additionally, students in the small section were more likely to complete the course than students in the large section. Although further research is needed, reduced class size has the potential to be an effective strategy for improving student engagement, achievement, and course completion in an introductory biology course that has too often been a gatekeeper instead of a gateway for students who intend to be science, technology, engineering, and math majors

Enhancing Student Success in Introductory Biology through Cross-Disciplinary Research

Introductory Biology courses are “gateway” courses for many majors, and, as in many colleges and universities, attrition and achievement problems are a barrier to student success and program effectiveness. Class sizes have been steadily rising in elementary, high school, and college classrooms. We aim to study how this impacts student achievement

Celebrate teaching and learning: A SoTL symposium at the University of the Pacific

This paper presents a faculty-driven teaching and learning celebration that fostered institutional cultural change. The symposium showcased exemplar instructional methods at an institution, whose mission is to to provide a superior, student-centered learning experience integrating liberal arts and professional education. The symposium was a grass-roots effort that attracted seventy-two faculty members from various disciplines to attend the four day symposium sessions to share, discuss, and learn about the best practices used by their colleagues. The overall evaluation and response to the symposium exceeded the expectations of the organizers. The paper contributes to both the scholarship of teaching and learning and institutional cultural change literature by providing an overview of the program, reflections on the endeavor, and four successful presentations that helped to foster an interdisciplinary community of practice committed to sustainable pedagogies