Faculty Professional Development

New Faculty Orientation

In August of each year, the Center for Teaching and Learning collaborates with the Office of the Provost to organize and facilitate an Orientation program for all new, permanent and temporary faculty members. The New Faculty Orientation (NFO) was designed to welcome new faculty members to the ROCK and to provide the essential information needed for a successful transition to SRU and for success in the classroom, in all its forms. During NFO, faculty will hear presentations and participate in workshops regarding a wide variety of topics such as promotion, tenure, campus safety, professional development, campus technology, student success, and how to get involved at SRU. NFO provides faculty with key introductions to University contacts and resources that aim to support teaching and research.

Faculty Learning Communities

At Slippery Rock, a Faculty Learning Communities are small, cross-disciplinary groups comprised of both faculty and staff, working collaboratively to develop 21st century approaches to teaching and learning in higher education and engage in the scholarship of teaching.

Fall 2022 Faculty Learning Communities are being formed now and will be seeking members over the summer and early into the Fall 2022 semester. If you have an idea for a new FLC, please contact the CTL at 724.738.2473.

For an overview of Faculty Learning Communities, click here to download (PDF)

For an overview of the FLC/HIP Designation process, click here to download (PDF)

For a more in-depth, FAQ version of the FLC/HIP Designation process, click here to download (PDF)

The Center for Teaching and Learning assists with the formation, the coordination, and the funding of University FLC's. For more information on FLCs, or how to join or create one of your own, please contact the CTL at 724.738.2473.

Teaching on Tap

The Center for Teaching and Learning organizes and hosts a monthly, cross-disciplinary event which provides an informal venue for the discussion of evidence-based practices for teaching and learning. The format of these events involves a short presentation on pedagogy followed by an open discussion among colleagues. What makes these Teaching and Learning Conversations unique is the potential rich faculty-faculty and faculty-student interaction on the theory and practice of teaching and learning; students learn about new instructional strategies and why they are effective, and faculty members have the opportunity to learn the student perspective on those strategies.

Distance Education Certification

The DE Certification Program (DECP) provides faculty members with the skills and strategies you need to be a successful online instructor. The DECP is fully online and is comprised of three (3) weeks of self-paced activities. Each week's activities require approximately 5-8 hours to complete. The DECP is offered once in the Fall and Spring semesters. It is also offered once during the summer term. The main topics include:

What is Distance Education?
Instructional design for online instructors
Content development using Desire2Learn (D2L)

Through the DECP, you will have the opportunity to experience online learning as a student, you will learn the importance of creating strong learning communities within your online courses, you will learn and apply strategies for designing quality online courses, and you will learn and demonstrate competency with basic Desire2Learn tools.

Prerequisite

The DECP is not D2L training! Before the DECP begins, it is required that all participants attend the face-to-face Introduction to D2L Workshop offered by the Center for Teaching and Learning. If you have not attended this training, please click here to register for the next session.

Audience

The DECP is right for you if:

you have never taught online before and plan to do so in the near future.
you are planning to offer a new course online.
you are seeking professional development for promotion or tenure
you are interested in online teaching and learning and what to know more.

DECP Objectives:

In the Certification Program for Online Instructors, you will:

Interact with the components that make up a well-designed and well-developed online course
Experience many of the challenges that distance learners face
Discover and implement strategies used by successful online instructors
Identify the characteristics and needs of a successful online learner
Understand the importance of and strategies for building an online learning community
Explore and apply instructional design principles for designing effective online courses

Weekly Topics:

Course Orientation:

Have a solid understanding of the structure of the program
Know what activities are required for certification
Know how to use D2L tools to submit assignments and interact with your classmates
Know how to use basic D2L tools to design your own course

Week 1: What is Distance Education?

Develop a working definition of "distance education"
Have a solid understanding of DE in the U.S. and how it has evolved in the past century
Identify the characteristics of the online learner
Identify competencies that successful online educators share

Week 2: Instructional Design for Online Instructors

Define "instructional Design"
Become familiar with the development and application of a storyboard
Developing a storyboard for your own online course
Become familiar with the Quality Matters Rubric

Week 3: Content Development

Develop the first two weeks of your own online course
Evaluate your own design using the QM Rubric
Create a welcome video for your course

Applying the Quality Matters Rubric

The Applying the Quality Matters Rubric workshop at SRU is a face-to-face workshop that introduces faculty members to the Quality Matters (QM) Rubric, the QM peer review process, and provides the opportunity to collaborate with others on applying the QM Rubric to sample online courses. Ultimately, faculty will leave this workshop being able to make decisions on whether or not online and blended courses meet national standards for quality. After completing this workshop, faculty will also:

Receive a certification of completion from QM
Be eligible to join the internal SRU Peer Review Team
Be eligible to register for the QM Peer Review Certificate Program

Effective Teaching Practices Program

The Effective Teaching Practices Workshop at SRU prepares faculty to apply innovative and evidence-based instructional practices to their teaching with the goal of maximizing student achievement. This design and development of this Program was informed by adult learning theory, instructional design best-practices, and input from expert teachers at SRU. The Program will move participants through a five-phase model for systematic instructional course design (Dick & Carey, 1996). As participants explore each phase of this design model, they will have the opportunity learn, apply and reflect on each of those 5 phases in relation to their own teaching.

Instructional Continuity

This information has been moved to the Instructional Continuity page (also in the left hand navigation for desktop).

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