News from CTL

Eyes on Teaching is an annual campus-wide event hosted by the Center for Teaching and Learning and the Provost’s Teaching Fellows that highlights the benefits of non-evaluative peer observation and cross-disciplinary conversations. For two days each February, the doors to many of UT Austin’s classrooms are opened for a group of faculty, staff, and graduate student visitors to observe one class session.

This April I had the opportunity to attend the Othering and Belonging 2019 Conference, hosted by the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society at the University of California-Berkeley. The three-day, biennial conference focuses on what the Haas Institute’s mission to investigate social hierarchies based on power differentials and resource access (you can find more about the Haas Institute and the Othering and Belonging Journal here).

This summer, the Center for Teaching and Learning is pleased to host the Big 12 Teaching and Learning conference on the campus of UT-Austin.  We recently had the opportunity to interview one of our keynote speakers, Adashima Oyo, on topics related to higher education issues and graduate student professional development.

On April 12, the new Chief Information Officer, Chris Sedore, visited a meeting of the Technology-Enhanced Learning community and discussed the ways in which campus IT can support and expand opportunities for instructional technology. 

When I joined the Army in 2006, entering the United States Military Academy as a Cadet, I never dreamt that I would one day be teaching at an institution of higher education. I was fortunate to be chosen by the Army to teach at the University of Texas at Austin and have been teaching since August of 2017. I quickly learned however, the Army method of instruction and collegiate instruction were more than slightly different.

How do support sophomore or second-year students and how do we identify areas that need additional support at the institutional level?  The CTL had the opportunity to interview Dr. Barbara Tobolowsky at the University of Texas at Arlington and talk about her book, "Helping Sophomores Succeed."  From 2002-2009, Dr. Tobolowsky was the Associate Director at the National Resource Center for the First-Year Experience and Students in Transition, which is focused on student success into and through higher education.

How might we characterize the benefits of interdisciplinary programs for students, faculty and the university? In the following video, Dr. Phillip Barrish (English, Humanities Institute) considers this question and discusses the ways in which initiatives in "health humanities" at UT are developing important cross-campus conversations and opportunities for students.

For me, inclusive teaching means thinking about who is included—and excluded—from curricular materials. Part of the experience of teaching for me goes back to my earliest days as a student. In high school, I didn't envision a path to college, but I had exemplary mentors. I managed to arrive at UT in fall 1990, thinking that I had what it took to be successful. A few months later, I was certain that my college experience was going to come to an abrupt end. As a first generation, African American male from a moderate-income background, I felt like an outlier on campus.

A recent New York Times opinion piece explaining the author’s decision to ban laptops in her class has generated many rebuttals centering mainly on two issues. First, and in my view by far the most important, students with learning issues may need laptops, and a ban unfairly stigmatizes these students. Second, a ban requires students to ask permission to do something that ought to be the student’s decision.