Study abroad and off-campus domestic study are popular pursuits at Elon and at many other colleges and universities. And with good reason: The immersion in a novel culture can provide a tipping point that can help with both learning and…

The 2011-2013 Elon University Research Seminar on Critical Transitions: Writing and the Question of Transfer supported multi-institutional research by 45 scholars and resulted in an impressive (and still growing) list of conference presentations and publications. Writing across Contexts: Transfer, Composition, and…

According to the most recent statistics, nearly 300,000 U. S. students now study abroad, while close to one million students from other nations are studying abroad in the U. S. In an upcoming Center for Engaged Learning (CEL) seminar on…

This week’s Chronicle of Higher Education includes Dan Berrett’s story, “Students Can Transfer Knowledge if Taught How” (subscription required), which features research from participants in the Center’s 2011-2013 Elon Research Seminar on Critical Transitions: Writing and the Question of Transfer. To learn…

Sharing Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) projects online is not a new concept. The University of Kansas Center for Teaching Excellence has a well established portfolio gallery and the Elon Teaching and Learning Partnership highlights SoTL projects by secondary and post-secondary school faculty – just two examples of SoTL online. Yet what would it look like if the SoTL community embraced online tools to disseminate research more quickly and more broadly, while also facilitating peer review of projects?

Imagine an online resource that cataloged Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) studies from across global contexts. Now imagine if you could search that archival site to find not only the key findings of studies but also rich contextual information about where each was conducted. If you could, through one online tool, aggregate all the SoTL studies conducted in educational contexts like yours, how might you use the data? How might the aggregated results inform your future scholarship? Your research-informed practices?

Association of American Colleges & Universities, Washington, D.C., January 25, 2014 Session facilitators: Peter Felten & Jessie L. Moore, Center for Engaged Learning, Elon University (U.S.) Research panelists: Michael Reder, Connecticut College (U.S.) Luke Millard, Birmingham City University (U.K.) Jeffrey Coker and Desiree…

From college-to-career readiness discussions to professional networks to publications on teaching, higher education stakeholders are witnessing steadily increasing calls for evidence-based teaching. Yet what do policy makers, administrators, and faculty/academic staff mean by “evidence-based”? Lee Shulman suggests that our understanding of…

As Lee Shulman notes, one exciting characteristic of the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) is that it has evolved. It has a rich history sparked by a core group of scholars and extended by an international community. Where did SoTL start? Briefly…

Questions about the value of higher education and governmental focus on its costs continue to filter into discussions about colleges and universities. From Our Underachieving Colleges (Derek Bok, 2006) to Academically Adrift (Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa, 2011) to news stories around the globe, higher education’s status quo is being called into question… Fortunately, a growing number of scholars are recognizing the potential of the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) to change campus cultures about student learning.