The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Paradox

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In addition to these big meetings, each team met monthly to work oncourse issues specifically. These sessions were documented by theconsultants; their meeting logs were distributed back to each team.Beyond a procedural requirement, the logs helped the teams keeptrack of ongoing tasks, evaluation plans, and outstandingquestions; they also acted to clarify what happened in wide-rangingmeetings. Essentially, they created an ongoing narrative of eachteam's progress and emphasized a tacit accountability among teammembers. Indeed, we believe the efforts of the consultants createdan ethic of reciprocity that encouraged the teams in theirscholarly efforts.
A Foundation for SoTL: Three Facets
The experience of the ITTS program has convinced us that it ispossible to promote a scholarly approach to teaching withoutchanging structural features of the faculty's working environment.This is particularly important at a large research institution suchas the University of Minnesota because individual departmentsdefine which activities are accepted and valued for promotion andtenure. It is highly unlikely that any administrative official orbody would attempt to enact such a change over departments by fiat.Before we can expect a large institutionwide change, we may verywell have to seek transformation by other means, like the ITTSinitiative. It is critical, then, to examine how coteries offaculty can gradually transform their professional identity underthese conditions.
Our experience working with faculty from across disciplinessuggests that there are three facets of SoTL that are important tofull engagement in scholarly activity: engaging with scholarship,putting scholarship into action, and contributing to scholarship.To some degree, these facets parallel the faculty development modelfirst put forward by Smith (2001) and more recently elaborated onby Richlin and Cox (2004), although we have not specificallyattempted to advance SoTL development from "Novice" to"Expert." The model we used closely paired SoTL"experts"-the two consultants added to each team-with"novices" in a collaborative process involving all threefacets of SoTL grounded in the course redesign efforts. In theideal case, these three dimensions of SoTL combine to produce arich, self- sustaining process with course redesign at its center(see figure 1).
Course redesign has the potential to encourage faculty to engage inthe full spectrum of SoTL activities, each of which feeds back intothe course redesign process. First, as they begin to consideroptions and make decisions regarding course improvement, theyconsult relevant literature. Second, as they design and implementchanges, they create SoTLinformed assessment and evaluationpractices designed to reveal the impact of course interventions andguide modifications. Third, as they reflect on the redesignedcourse and consider the next iteration, they "go public"and seek feedback through dissemination of their work.
1. Engaging with Scholarship.
The first aspect of SoTL consists of becoming involved withexisting educational scholarship, often from the faculty member'sown discipline. We found that many ITTS program faculty werereluctant to search out, read, and absorb information aboutteaching and learning from existing educational scholarship. Thisreluctance arose from several factors, including lack of time, lackof familiarity with the educational literature, skepticism aboutthe quality of educational scholarship, and doubts about therelevance of such scholarship to the faculty members' concerns.
The key to overcoming this reluctance lay in mediating the facultymember's initial exposure to the literature. Consultants weregenerally well versed in recent educational scholarship and couldbring many years of experience in higher education to bear on theirprojects. They performed background literature reviews, shared keyarticles with their course teams, and helped to guide thedevelopment of interventions with this scholarship in mind. Thegeneral idea was to provide faculty with actual examples of goodSoTL, rather than meta-analyses or theoretical pieces describingwhat SoTL might encompass. The examples often drew directly fromthe instructor's particular discipline or from other disciplinesworking on the same or related questions. In some cases, theconsultants highlighted significant sections of an article to makeit extremely easy to engage the germane parts of the study.Particularly at the start, it is important not only to providefaculty with scholarship but also to discuss selections from it sothey know the debates into which they are entering. The process ofunderstanding scholarship has also been one of graduallyunderstanding the relevance of scholarship to the redesign of one'scourse.
The Biology 1001 team, for example, began the ITTS program withmany doubts about the feasibility and effectiveness of activelearning techniques used in large lectures. After examining a broadspectrum of literature on these techniques (including Crouch andMazur 2001; Fink 2003), the team decided to divide their large(700+) lecture into two sections and to employ a wide variety ofinquiry-based teaching methods, including cooperative quizzes,IFATs, and small group activities.
It was also important to provide a variety of SoTL literature.Consultants encouraged faculty to see many different types of workas models of acceptable scholarship, including practitioner pieces,experimental designs, case studies, and reflective articles(McKinney 2007; Weimer 2006). This catholic approach to SoTL wasneeded because different types of scholarship were appropriate fordifferent teams, given their unique projects, disciplines,interests, and team dynamics.
Of course, one is not likely to have a great deal of success simplyby distributing SoTL literature to faculty. One of the benefits ofthe multiyear commitment of faculty to the program is that ithelped to develop long-term relationships among consultants andfaculty members. These relationships were, we believe, an importantsource of motivation for faculty to engage in scholarly activities.ITTS course teams met with the same consultants on a monthly basisfor two years (as of this writing). Over this time, the characterof the regular meetings gradually changed, moving from a focus onthe problematic aspects of the class in question to moreconstructive explorations of pedagogical possibilities. Thisoccurred as consultants developed a detailed and sympatheticunderstanding of each team's situation, often achieved by assuringthe team that their situation may indeed be unique in some detailsbut that the same general complaints and issues had emerged inother teams. After several months had passed, a relationship oftrust and understanding was established, on the basis of whichfaculty could consider seriously their consultants' recommendationsregarding relevant literature.
During the two years of the grant, the consultants made an activeeffort to treat each project as a scholarly endeavor by providingrelevant literature, distributing detailed meeting logs, compilinglists of publication and presentation venues, suggesting possibletopics for papers or presentations, and collaborating in thewriting process. We believe that this effort invoked a social normof reciprocity, so that course teams felt obligated to match theconsultants' efforts with work of their own that was designed topush the projects forward. The end result of these efforts was thatover time, most (though not all) ITTS faculty became less skepticalof, and even positively interested in, pertinent educationalscholarship.
2. Putting Scholarship into Action.
After discovering, reading, and discussing educational research intheir course teams, many ITTS faculty progressed to a second aspectof SoTL, namely incorporating scholarship into their courseredesign projects. One way in which they did this was by adaptingteaching techniques described in the scholarly literature to theirown classrooms. Very few faculty, however, adopted others'pedagogical methods without substantial modification, even whenthere was ample evidence of the efficacy of those methods. Theypreferred instead to develop their own approaches, inspired in partby what they read in the educational literature. We believe thisdynamic was motivated to a large degree by the perceivedparticularity of teaching problems, or the view that one's ownpedagogical challenges are importantly unlike those faced by otherinstructors. Thus, while faculty shared a common teaching problem,the fact that they came from different disciplines and deployeddifferent teaching styles virtually ensured that they approachedtheir own class idiosyncratically. Using evaluation methods andtools produced by others was another way faculty engaged inscholarship and incorporated it into course redesign. We found alarge amount of interest in literature on educational evaluationbecause faculty perceived evaluation as an undertaking of somecomplexity in which they had no expertise. Many faculty wereparticularly interested in locating measurement instruments thathad undergone psychometric testing so that they could haveconfidence in the results of their evaluations. As novices in thisfield, they sought out accepted tools, expecting that this wouldhelp them situate their scholarship in a preexisting tradition. Nodoubt they knew that a tested instrument would be less subject tocriticism, and they could concentrate on the data emerging fromtheir class rather than the validity of the measure.
The Agronomy 1101 team, for instance, examined a wide variety ofmeasures of critical thinking and student engagement for use in theevaluation of their project, including the Intrinsic MotivationInventory, National Survey of Student Engagement, and the GroupAssessment of Logical Thinking. The team is currently using theApproaches to Studying Inventory (Richardson 1990) as a dependentvariable measure in a quasi-experimental study.
The consultation process was particularly important as facultyengaged in scholarship. Consultants helped their course teamsrefine their research questions and their assessment and evaluationplans; created or refined evaluation instruments (including surveysand focus group and classroom observation protocols); conductedboth qualitative and quantitative data analysis when necessary andtaught team members how to do this whenever possible; and offeredto coauthor, copresent and/or provide feedback on draftpresentations and publications. This partnership allowed faculty tosustain a line of inquiry and not come to a dead end because of aninitial lack of expertise (Lattuca 2005; see figure 2).
To ease faculty transition to a new form of scholarship, we createda stepped series of opportunities. We encouraged a naturalprogression from their early private discussions of exploratoryresearch to ever more public dissemination of their instruments,data, and conclusions.
3. Contributing to Scholarship
Finally, after integrating scholarship into their redesignprojects, many ITTS faculty went on to produce scholarship of theirown. Initial hindrances to this process included faculty members'conviction that they had nothing worth contributing to thescholarly literature, a lack of understanding of what constitutesgood scholarship of teaching and learning, and the view that theacademic reward system does not value scholarly work of this sort.
Many of the aforementioned aspects of the consultation processcontributed to the emergence of scholarly work from the courseteams' projects, such as assistance with the research process,acquainting faculty with the variety of efforts that qualify asSoTL, and so on. Consultants also provided faculty with specificcalls for presentations, journal author guidelines, and paperabstracts from SoTL conferences.
In several ways, the structure of the ITTS program itself was alsoimportant in providing momentum for the production of scholarship.To begin with, the expectation that each team would disseminate itsproject's progress and its evaluation findings both locally (at thedepartment and college levels) and more widely (at regional andnational conferences) was built into the language of the program.Consultants kept track of which course teams were presenting orpublishing their work and made announcements to this effect atmonthly meetings that included all of the ITTS teams, therebyproviding a public reward for dissemination and creating a healthypeer-peer competition to pull more teams into the production ofSoTL.
Further, modest funds were built into the program to supportprofessional development opportunities for the faculty member andgraduate student on each team. These funds were used to underwritebook and software purchases, conference attendance, and conferencepresentations. Faculty have attended and presented locally,regionally, nationally, and internationally, at both discipline-specific and other conferences, and have published in peerreviewedteaching/learning journals. The funding, while hardly a primarymotivator, nonetheless smoothed the path toward the disseminationof scholarship by our course teams and served as tacitacknowledgement of the university's estimation of their efforts.
Another important scaffolding technique involved regularpresentations in the monthly meetings. Faculty members were askedto give brief presentations of progress they had made on theirprojects, including evaluation methods and results, at monthlymeetings. We provided a presentation template that contained keycomponents of scholarly work on teaching. In addition to adescription of their courses, the teams were asked to articulatethe pedagogical challenges they faced; the outcomes they soughtwith their respective interventions; their assessment andevaluation plans; and, to the greatest extent possible, theirevaluation data and further research questions. In regular meetingswith consultants, it became apparent that the course teams felt acertain amount of peer pressure to acquit themselves well in theirpresentations, even though no tangible consequences hinged on thisperformance. It was not uncommon for teams to joke that they hadoutshone others, and this competitive spark helped motivate facultyto view their presentation as a public discussion to a new group ofpeers outside of their own discipline. This constructivecompetition fed into the evolving social norm of reciprocity, sothat course teams gradually gained confidence in their role topresent and publish their findings.
Finally, to give faculty members' work greater exposure on ourcampus, we partnered with the University of Minnesota's Academy ofDistinguished Teachers, a body of faculty who have been recognizedwith teaching awards, to sponsor a local oneday meeting on researchand practice. This biennial symposium welcomes a national keynotespeaker and showcases the work of Minnesota faculty; in 2007, aspecial track will be reserved for faculty who have participated inthe ITTS program. In some ways, a local conference lowers thestakes for instructors who may be presenting on SoTL for the firsttime, although some faculty would prefer the anonymity that adistant conference affords.
As of this writing, ITTS faculty have contributed to thescholarship of teaching in their disciplines in a number of ways.They have presented their work at conferences in the U.S. andabroad, including the International Scholarship of Teaching andLearning Conference, the Collaboration Conference, the GeologicalSociety of America, and the Human Anatomy and Physiology Society.They have begun to submit their work for publication in peer-reviewed journals. For instance, the agronomy team's problembasedlearning approach to teaching large classes is the subject of anarticle in the Creative College Teaching Journal (Brakke et al.2006) and the Biology team has an essay in the Journal of CollegeScience Teaching and articles forthcoming in Life Science Educationand the Journal of Science Education and Technology.
Conclusion
Our experience suggests a number of recommendations for developinga SoTL program that may be of interest to staff and administratorsseeking to promote scholarship on their campuses:
* Create a cohort of scholars around a shared problem to facilitatediscussion and share resources.
* Design a multiple-year program to build commitment and to allowfor instructors to create interventions that can be assessed andrevised over several semesters.
* Issue a formal faculty agreement that strengthens the socialcontract among participants and clarifies expectations.
* Form diverse course teams to draw on a range of expertise andpoints of view and to divide the labor.
* Foster cohesion and trust within course teams by ensuring thatthe teams remain together for the duration of the program.
* Hold regular monthly meetings for all scholars in the cohort toshare challenges and findings, draw on the work of experts, buildcamaraderie, and exchange work-in-progress.
* Allow consultants with SoTL expertise to mediate faculty's earlyexposure to SoTL to help find and filter appropriate literature andhighlight its relevance to the classroom issues in a particularcourse.
* Provide a variety of SoTL models from different kinds of sourcesand different types of scholarly explorations.
* Develop or provide a toolkit of evaluation methods to helpinstructors view the range of acceptable tools at their disposal.
* Generate lists of conferences and publications so thatinstructors begin to understand their audience and the viability oftheir own work.
* Offer help with writing, literature research, and poster design.
* Award stipends for SoTL conferences and professional development.
* Partner with established units on campus to hold a local teachingconference where findings can be shared and possibly mainstreamed.
With the luxury of appropriately balanced reward structures andSoTL-encouraging promotion and tenure processes, institutions cando much to promote SoTL across the faculty ranks (Miller, et al.2004; O'Meara 2006). However, these conditions do not often exist,and we are left with the paradox of creating the conditions forSoTL without the incentives. Without a major institutionaltransformation, which may indeed happen over time, we need tocreate support structures such as the teaching commons or learningacademy. They provide a measure of respectability for the teachingprocess and help to build confidence and trust within and acrossinstructional teams. The ITTS program took a systematic approach toscaffolding and supporting SoTL at the University of Minnesota. Theresulting activity suggests that-given the right kinds of supportand encouragement-faculty will engage in the full range of SoTLactivity even when the promotion and tenure reward structureremains fixed. AFTER DISCOVERING, READING, AND DISCUSSINGEDUCATIONAL RESEARCH IN THEIR COURSE TEAMS, MANY ITTS FACULTYPROGRESSED TO A SECOND ASPECT OF SOTL, NAMELY INCORPORATINGSCHOLARSHIP INTO THEIR COURSE REDESIGN PROJECTS. ONE WAY IN WHICHTHEY DID THIS WAS BY ADAPTING TEACHING TECHNIQUES DESCRIBED IN THESCHOLARLY LITERATURE TO THEIR OWN CLASSROOMS.
REFERENCES
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Carrier, C., L. Jorn, and J. Weinsheimer. 2004. Enhancing studentlearning through innovative teaching and technology strategies: AUniversity of Minnesota proposal to the Bush Foundation to renewthe current grant. http://www1.umn.edu/innovate/bush-ITTS2004-7.pdf(accessed July 10, 2008).
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Cuseo, J. 2007. The empirical case against large class size:Adverse effects on the teaching, learning, and retention of first-year students. Journal of Faculty Development 21:5-22.
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Fink, L. D. 2003. Creating significant learning experiences. SanFrancisco: Jossey-Bass.
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Huber, M., and S. P. Morreale. 2002. Situating the scholarship ofteaching and learning: A cross-disciplinary conversation. InDisciplinary styles in the scholarship of teaching and learning:Exploring common ground, ed. Mary Huber and Sherwyn P. Morreale, 1-24. Washington D.C.: AAHE.
Lattuca, L. R. 2005. Faculty work as learning: Insights fromtheories of cognition. New Directions for Teaching and Learning102:13-21.
McKinney, K. 2007. Enhancing learning through the scholarship ofteaching and learning: The challenges and joys of juggling. Boston:Anker.
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Miller, S. K., S. Rodrigo, V. Pantoja, and D. Roen. 2004.Institutional models for engaging faculty in the scholarship ofteaching and learning. Teaching English in the Two Year College32:30-38.
O'Meara, K. A. 2006. Encouraging multiple forms of scholarship infaculty reward systems: Influence on faculty work life. Planningfor Higher Education 34:43-53.
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Robinson, J. M., and C. E. Nelson. 2003. Institutionalizing anddiversifying a vision of the scholarship of teaching and learning.Journal on Excellence in College Teaching 14:95-118.
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Shulman, L. 2004. Visions of the possible: models for campussupport of the scholarship of teaching and learning. In Thescholarship of teaching and learning in higher education:Contributions of research universities, ed. William E. Becker andMoya L. Andrews, 9-23. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.
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J. D. Walker is manager for the Research and Evaluation Team,University of Minnesota. Paul Baepler is an instructionalconsultant for the Center for Teaching and Learning, University ofMinnesota. Brad Cohen is assistant to the director of the DigitalMedia Center, University of Minnesota.
Copyright (c) 2008 Heldref Publications
Copyright Heldref Publications Summer 2008
(c) 2008 College Teaching. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rightsReserved.

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