The 5th UIT Academic Technology Summer Institute for Teaching and Learning with Technology is looking for faculty to apply for this year’s event. This seemed like a good time to look at how previous Summer Institutes impacted participating faculty’s teaching.
Susan Setnik, Lecturer in the Classics Department, attended the first Summer Institute in May 2003. Here she learned about innovative ways to use the discussion tool in Blackboard and became intrigued about using some of these strategies in her Latin classes. By the 2004 University Conference on Teaching and Learning, she was sharing her experience with her Latin 3 class. Susan reported that the use of strategic discussion assignments, especially at the beginning of the semester, resulted in participation from all students and the forming of a community of learners earlier than she had previously experienced. This seemed especially important for students who were reticent speakers.
When Ross Feldberg, Professor in the biology department, attended the 2004 Summer Institute, he had no idea that one of the presenters at the Institute would spark his interest in trying the anti-plagiarism software Turnitin. After hearing about the tool, Ross asked to pilot the tool with his biology students. UIT Academic Technology sponsored this pilot in the 2004-05 academic year and then expanded the pilot to others in the department. The tool was very helpful in the laboratory sections of Bio13L, a large introductory biology course with 13 separate lab sections taught by different lab instructors. Ross and other biology faculty members’ experience was so positive that all Arts, Sciences and Engineering faculty in the 2006-07 academic year now have access to Turnitin.
If you are interested in applying for this year’s Summer Institute, application forms are available on the UIT Academic Technology Faculty Development page or by contacting Rebecca Sholes, Faculty Development Coordinator, at rebecca.sholes@tufts.edu by February 1.