CTE In The News

After receiving a $20,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, WTJU is developing a jazz curriculum with the help of the CTE.

Q&A with Christina Boltsi who was a PhD Plus intern at the CTE during the 2020-21 academic year to support pedagogical development programs for graduate students.

Author Ken Bain believes in courses -- "super courses," he calls them -- that will transform the teaching and learning experience. He considers CTE Assistant Director Andrew Kaufman's Books Behind Bars course among them.

Programs like UVA Acts bring to life higher education troubles and tensions through original sketches. These performances strive to educate, entertain—and transform.

In his Virginia Politics and Policy course, Batten Professor Andy Pennock asks his students to choose policy problems facing the Commonwealth that they’d like to see solved. Then, the class works together to both determine relevant readings and invite guests to speak on the issues they’ve selected. Pennock designed the class through UVA’s Center for Teaching Excellence, using a model called "open inquiry."

Rachel Most, associate dean for undergraduate academic programs in Arts & Sciences, and Erin Eaker, assistant professor and association dean, credited the Center for Teaching Excellence and the A&S Learning Design & Technology group for helping to develop a structure for their course "The Past, Present, and Future of Humankind."

In 2019, UVA faculty and administrators added a dynamic new tool to their toolbox with the arrival of UVA Acts, an educational theatre program promoting equitable, vibrant spaces for working and learning.

In the face of educational inequities exacerbated by COVID-19, how can instructors harness their grading practices to support equitable outcomes and deep learning for all students?

We offer a sampling of strategies that you, your colleagues, or your program can employ to prepare and engage students before, during, and after the 2020 US presidential election.

What and why to teach are more important considerations than how to teach if we are to offer an education that truly matters at this distinct historical juncture, writes Andrew Kaufman.

The Center for Teaching Excellence and Learning Design & Technology in the College of Arts & Sciences have invested considerable time and resources this summer to ensure the highest-quality learning experiences possible under the circumstances.

Under Holmes, the Center for Teaching Excellence established Thrive grants for faculty adding experiential learning to existing syllabi.

Learn more about CTE resources that will help you prepare to teach this fall, regardless of instructional modality.

With c3Design, the learning happens at a distance, is spread out over several weeks, and is less dependent on individual schedules. The current pandemic makes c3Design a perfect alternative to our Course Design Institute.

In early March my university administration informed me that I had a week to transition my University of Virginia course Books Behind Bars online.

Ahead of the first days of virtual classes, CTE Director Michael Palmer shares some advice for instructors on communicating with students and making adjustments, big and small.

As UVA faculty shift all spring semester courses from the classroom to virtual delivery, the A&S Learning Design & Technology team, alongside other partners like the Center for Teaching Excellence, is working to ensure instructors have the tools and support they need to make the transition as smooth as possible.

Since the fund's creation in 2017, approximately 100 professorships have been endowed through the partnership of donors and UVA, including at entities like the Center for Teaching Excellence.

Astronomy graduate student Yiqing Song shares her experience in the PhD Plus Liaisons Program, where she has co-developed and co-facilitated a workshop for Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs) in the STEM fields.

Physics graduate student Sharon Philip shares her experience in the PhD Plus Liaisons Program, where she is making efforts to not only encourage active communication between graduate students and the administration, but also bridge the gap between TAs and students in STEM disciplines.

"One of the things that I've always enjoyed doing as a teacher … was figuring out how to make literature exciting to everyone—not just students and fellow academics—but how to take the beauty and the power of literature and share it with many others outside of the academy." The CTE's Assistant Director of Community-Engaged Learning Initiatives Andrew Kaufman shares how he got involved in this work and the impact he hopes to have in his new position.

Curry graduate student Christian West shares his experience in the PhD Plus Liaisons Program under the mentorship of CTE Assistant Director Adriana Streifer.

Facilitated theater is a new problem-solving technique that the University currently uses to indirectly address potential discrimination through performances. UVA's own group, UVA Acts, is expanding the type of issues that the Center for Teaching Excellence is tackling.

Curry Associate Professor Karen Inkelas, CTE Assistant Director of STEM Education Initiatives Lindsay Wheeler, and SEAS' Instructional Technologies Coordinator Michael Redwine built and are piloting a new observational tool designed to identify what makes a class session engaging and effective.

UVA Vice President and Provost Liz Magill urged graduate students to take advantage of opportunities offered by the Center for Teaching Excellence.

SEAS Educational Strategies Coordinator Michael Redwine, Education Associate Professor Karen Inkelas, and CTE Assistant Director Lindsay Wheeler are developing a “suite of digital tools designed to improve college teaching and student learning.”

UVA Nursing Professor Tomeka Dowling shares her story of recognizing a powerful teaching moment last fall, originally recounted at the CTE's Celebration of Teaching Excellence on May 15.

University of Virginia faculty members in STEM disciplines will have the opportunity to enlist more support for using active-learning methods in their large introductory classes–with the help of undergraduate students.

The CTE's Lindsay Wheeler receives a $141,173 grant from the Jefferson Trust to develop tools to improve instructors' teaching and transform student experiences.

The University of Virginia has expanded its commitment to the Bicentennial Professors Fund to further strengthen efforts to attract and retain the best and the brightest faculty members across every discipline.

CTE Associate Director Dorothe Bach has been unwavering and compassionate in bringing innovative, evidence-based teaching techniques and tools to UVA classrooms – effectively spreading her successful, meaningful methods to tens of thousands of students.