Abstract:

Rapid changes precipitated by COVID-19 pandemic (Strielkowski, 2020) affected how teachers and students approach teaching and learning (Mahmood, 2020). Students want more hybrid and distance learning options (Benito et al, 2021; Peimani & Kamalipour, 2021) while faculty still struggle to catch up with technostress (Boyer-Davis, 2020) and the changes brought by the pandemic and student demand. These challenges are layered on top of the conversations about diversity, equity, and access to education which makes faculty challenge their own assumptions about the curriculum, teaching approaches, and their own place in the classroom (Williams, McIntosh, & Russell, 2021; Zhang-Wu, 2020).

To help faculty adapt to the rapid change, Caldwell University has conceptualized a faculty development workshop series consisting of eight fully online modules with synchronous and asynchronous elements. As part of the workshops, faculty can work with a facilitator to learn about new advances in learning sciences, inclusive teaching, as well as discuss and address the pedagogical challenges that they are currently facing in their own classrooms. The workshops provide the faculty with a shared platform to discuss pedagogical and andragogical approaches that may potentially inform their teaching practices.

The University started the course by launching a survey to understand how much the faculty understand the current state of the field of learning sciences and educational neuroscience, the pedagogical practices that they are currently using in their classrooms, as well as their needs in terms of professional development. The survey results are analyzed to inform the instruction planned in the faculty development course.

The results of the survey and the subsequent development, implementation, and evaluation of the faculty development workshop series will be presented at the conference.

References:
[1] Benito, A., Yenisey, K.D., Khanna, K., Masis, M.F., Mnoge, R.M.,Tugtan, M.A. et al (2021). Changes that should remain in Higher Education post COVID-19: A Mixed method analysis of the experiences at three universities. Higher Learning Research Communications, 11(0), 51-75 DOI: 10.18870/hlrc.v11i0.1195
[2] Boyer-Davis, S. (2020). Technostress in higher education: An examination of faculty perceptions before and during the covid-19 pandemic. Journal of Business and Accounting, 13(1), 42-58.
[3] Mahmood, S. (2021). Instructional Strategies for Online Teaching in COVID-19 Pandemic. Human Behavior & Emerging Technologies, 3(199– 203). https://doi.org/10.1002/hbe2.218
[4] Peimani N, Kamalipour H. (2021). Online Education in the Post COVID-19 Era: Students’ Perception and Learning Experience. Education Sciences, 11(10):633. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci11100633
[5] Strielkowski, W. (2020). COVID-19 Pandemic and the Digital Revolution in Academia and Higher Education. https://doi.org/10.20944/PREPRINTS202004.0290.V1
[6] Williams, T. K., McIntosh, R. W., & Russell III, W. B. (2021). Equity in Distance Education during COVID-19. Research in Social Sciences and Technology, 6(1), 1-24.
[7] Zhang-Wu, Q. (2020). Teaching hybrid online college composition classes to international students during COVID-19: Equity, diversity, inclusiveness, and community building. English Leadership Quarterly, 43(2), 9-13.

Keywords:

Faculty development, teaching and learning, online learning.