Partner with us for targeted support in the areas you need to be successful in your teaching, arranged to fit into your schedule. Below are some of the individualized support options that we can provide. Contact Chris Odato, Coordinator of Instructional Development, or Jenny Darrow, Director, Digital Learning, with questions about arranging any of these services or to discuss how we can best address your individual needs.
Instructional consultations are one of the most high impact opportunities for faculty professional learning. Based on your specific goals or challenges, we can research and recommend effective practices, provide instructional design support for you in developing new courses or re-imagining existing courses, develop creative assignments or learning activities for your classroom, and plan approaches to measure how you and your students are meeting your goals for the course. We can also collaborate with you in the scholarship of teaching and learning. All consultations are confidential.
To make it easier to access some of the most frequently requested individual supports, we have developed forms to simplify the process of requesting the services below. You can also contact us at any time for help with these or any other needs or questions.
If you are preparing your course to be delivered partially or fully online, incorporating more online activities and resources, or using Canvas or another tool in a new way to organize and deliver course materials, a review is an opportunity for you to have a fresh set of eyes on your course design and materials, and to receive feedback with suggestions for potential improvements that could help make your course a more successful learning experience for you and your students.
Use this form to submit a request for Chris Odato, Coordinator of Instructional Development, to review your course. I will contact you by email to share my feedback when it is completed; we can also schedule follow-up meetings to to work with you to implement changes based on the feedback.
A syllabus review is an opportunity for you to have a fresh set of eyes on your syllabus and course design, and to receive feedback with suggestions for potential improvements that could help make your course a more successful learning experience for you and your students. I will use criteria from the University of Virginia’s learning-focused syllabus rubric and from the inclusive syllabus design resources on this page to guide and organize my feedback and will also address any specific questions or concerns that you identify. I will gladly work with you to implement any changes you wish to make based on my feedback, but the decision to make any changes will be up to you.
To request a syllabus review by Chris Odato, Coordinator of Instructional Development, please use this form to submit a request.
Transparent assignment design is a simple teaching intervention that significantly benefits student learning and contributes to equity and retention. Specifically, transparent assignments clarify the purpose of an assignment along with the tasks and criteria to complete it so that students understand them before they start an assignment. This simple strategy can be implemented in any course and does not require you to change your teaching style or the overall design of your course. For more information on transparent assignment design, see the resources on this page.
Chris Odato, Coordinator of Instructional Development, is available to review one or more assignments and make suggestions to improve clarity and transparency. I will use criteria from the University of Virginia’s transparency rubric to guide and organize my feedback and will also address any specific questions or concerns that you identify.Please use this form to request an assignment review.
We are piloting a new approach to help provide faculty with easy access to scholarship on teaching and learning that is tailored to your individual goals. Use this form to submit a question about teaching and/or learning. For example, you might ask about strategies to help students more effectively prepare for class, how to develop an effective rubric, or the effectiveness of active learning techniques. Chris Odato, Coordinator of Instructional Development, will review and synthesize recent research related to your question, and will contact you to schedule a meeting once the review is completed. At the meeting we will share and discuss the research and brainstorm ways to apply it. We can also schedule follow-up one-on-one consultations to continue to implement new ideas in your teaching. Use this form to request a personalized research review.
If you would like feedback or recommendations on your teaching that is separate from, or supplements, regular evaluation processes, Chris Odato, Coordinator of Instructional Development, is available to conduct informal class observations. We will meet before the observation to discuss your goals and focus for the observation and meet again afterward to discuss feedback and recommendations based on your needs and interests. Student feedback sessions are an effective way to collect anonymous mid-semester feedback from students that you can put to use immediately rather than waiting for end-of-semester evaluations. Chris will arrange to visit your class for 20-30 minutes while you step out, and facilitates a conversation with the students about what aspects of the class are more and less effective. You then meet with to discuss the anonymized feedback and brainstorm ways to apply it. These services are confidential and work well in combination with individual consultations.
Departments or other groups with shared interests or challenges are encouraged to collaborate with Collaborative staff to organize workshops or other presentations related to teaching and learning. Topics, time, and location can be tailored to your specific needs.
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