SOTL 101: Introduction to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Cynthia V. Fukami Daniels College of Business University of Denver AACSB International 2001 Continuous Improvement Symposium

Session Outline What is SOTL? Why SOTL? Examples of SOTL Fostering SOTL

The “Problem” of SOTL Faculty colleague finds “problem” in the literature in her field. Faculty colleague finds “problem” in her teaching. Which causes celebration? Which causes concern? (Bass, 1999)

What is SOTL? Teaching has a scholarly component (Boyer, 1990) Set of problems worth pursuing as an ongoing intellectual quest Why do some students do better than others? How do students come to understand concepts? Folklore/traditions versus scholarship

What is SOTL? SOTL means we invest in our teaching the intellectual powers we practice in our disciplinary research (Bender and Gray, 1999). “Scholarship” means that we apply the same standards in our work on teaching as we apply in our disciplinary research.

Three Levels of SOTL Excellent Teaching Scholarly Teaching Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (Hutchings and Shulman, 1999)

Excellent Teaching All faculty have an obligation to teach well To engage students To foster important forms of student learning

Scholarly Teaching Faculty may also want to be teachers who are informed by Assessment and evidence Latest ideas in discipline Latest ideas in teaching the discipline Peer review and collaboration

Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Faculty may also want to apply standards of scholarship to teaching The work is public Open to critique and evaluation from others Others can build on previous work Concerned about student learning

Why SOTL? With all of our obligations, why devote time and energy to SOTL? Shulman’s Three P’s (2000) Professionalism Pragmatism Policy

Professionalism It’s our job to teach well. As educators in a professional field, we must pass on what we have learned.

Pragmatism Students expect, and need, to learn from us. There is much room for improvement in student understanding.

Policy Universities, Business Schools, and Faculty are increasingly held accountable for our performance as teachers. New competitors are emerging for higher education, particularly in Business. Why are we better alternatives?

Examples of SOTL As with other scholarly activity, there is a wide range of SOTL (Hutchings, 2000) What works? What is? What if? So what?

Macro Examples of SOTL Peer collaboration and review of teaching Student outcomes assessment Campus teaching academies, Master faculty programs Preparing Future Faculty CASTL

Micro Examples of SOTL CASTL projects (1998-2001) Teaching Effectiveness in the Management Sciences (Frost and Fukami, 1997) Teaching Practice Technology in the Classroom Evaluation: students and faculty Classroom-as-organization

Fostering SOTL Remove, or at least try to minimize, the risk Start adding rewards Create and sustain a culture and infrastructure that will allow SOTL to flourish.

Case Study: Daniels College of Business To truly embrace and develop teaching as a scholarly activity, there must be alignment with your unit’s strategy, performance measurement system and reward system. What gets measured, gets done. What gets rewarded, gets repeated.

University Of Denver Founded In 1864 Independent (Oldest in Rocky Mtn. Region) John Evans (Northwestern) Degrees Undergraduate Graduate: Masters & Ph.D.

Daniels College Of Business Founded In 1908 (8th Oldest) AACSB accredited (1923 - today) No Ph.D. MBA and MS degrees Approx. 750 students Undergraduate degrees Approx. 1,000 students

Daniels College (Cont.) Approximately 80 full-time faculty Tenure-track positions (62) Non-tenure track positions Clinical Professor (4) Lecturers (14)

Daniels College’s Mission Foster enlightened practice Foster professional achievement Foster community commitment

Curricular Design Integrated format; cross-disciplinary team teaching Interpersonal & communication skills Team projects Technology Ethics

Traditional Performance Model The “3 tab” model: Teaching Research Service

Boyer Scholarship Model The “4 tab model” Discovery Integration Application Teaching

Our Version Scholarship Document Faculty performance weights Faculty position & Life cycle Performance reviews Annual merit Pre-(2 years) and post-(3 years) tenure Promotion and tenure Intellectual Contributions Database

Measures: Scholarship Of Teaching Instruction Academic service Advising Assisting student organizations Journal articles Pedagogical cases Instructional software

Measures: Scholarship Of Application Academic service Professional service Consulting Professional organizations Community service Journal articles Cases Textbooks

Measures: Scholarship Of Integration Academic service Developing courses & programs Committees Journal articles Textbooks Interdisciplinary cases

Measures: Scholarship Of Discovery Academic service Mentoring colleagues Journal articles Books & monographs

Scholarship Support at Daniels Scholarship Steering Committee Teaching Committee Application Committee Integration Committee Discovery Committee Scholarship Grants Faculty Development Annual Awards

Reward System Faculty performance report Academic unit merit raise (75% of pool) %-of-pool approach Peer or chair evaluations Dean’s office merit raise (25% of pool) College-wide bonuses

Results First (only) school reaccredited by AACSB using Boyer model. Scholarship Grants: 58 during 1999-2001. Scholarly output by faculty: 1988 versus 1999 SOT more than doubled; SOI (cases) increased twelve fold; overall output increased 37%.

Lessons Learned at Daniels Expect the change to take time Faculty resistance Align with overall strategy or mission Align with performance review Align with support Persistence, persistence, persistence

SOTL Resources Carnegie Foundation AAHE CASTL Knowledge Media Lab Campus Programs (with AAHE) www.carnegiefoundation.org AAHE Faculty Roles and Rewards Conference Publications www.aahe.org

Business SOTL Resources AACSB Disciplinary professional organizations, such as Academy of Management Organizational Behavior Teaching Society

SOTL Outlets Interdisciplinary Journals Business Journals Meetings JoSoTL (Indiana University) Inventio (George Mason University) Business Journals Journal of Management Education Journal of Marketing Education Issues in Accounting Education Simulation and Gaming AOM Learning and Education Journal Meetings

Getting SOTL Started What are your teaching/learning problems? What are your teaching/learning successes? What are your school’s unique attributes? What are you already doing?

Contact Information Cindi Fukami Daniels College of Business University of Denver Denver, CO 80208 303-871-2193 cfukami@du.edu