News from CTL

My first internship was at the Texas Capitol in the Spring of my freshman year. At the time, my major was economics, and I wanted to dive into the fields that were congruent with what I was studying: government and finance. I had always been interested in politics, and this seemed like a good place to start. Initially I was assigned administrative work—typical intern tasks—but that work allowed me to slowly prove myself to the Senator and earn the independence to engage in important research and bill-related work.

What is a Chemistry major doing at a Global Tech company? Trying to answer this question has made me wonder about the unique value proposition of my UT Chemistry degree. My lack of tech experience intimidated me at first, but it forced me to look internally: “What has my UT education and undergrad experiences provided me to prepare me for this opportunity? What am I uniquely qualified to do at this company?”

The CTL recently had a chance to record a conversation we had with writer and novelist Peter C. Brown. His latest book, Make It Stick, was co-written with two prominent cognitive psychologists, one of whom was Brown's brother-in-law.

As part of their curriculum redesign effort, the College of Pharmacy is confronting several 6-hour “monster courses.” Until now, the courses have been chunked by topic and taught by groups of expert faculty--a challenge to coordinate--and students who fail a single unit must retake the entire course. Separating these 6-credit beasts into a series of shorter courses, as short as 3 weeks and worth as little as 1 credit, will allow students to more efficiently receive credit specifically for what they've mastered. 

Faculty understand the challenge: the field of journalism is changing rapidly, and students who choose journalism degrees need a much wider range of continuously evolving skills. Creating a “Vision” document, with the help of the CTL in Fall 2016, prompted them to articulate those pain points clearly.

On March 30, 2017, UT held the Changing Education Symposium [#UTChangingEd] to explore new approaches to redesigning undergraduate education and to better meet the needs of a digital, mobile, and continually evolving society. The format included keynote presentations punctuated by short talks and plenty of time for discussions in breakout sessions. The organizing themes were intended to connect high-level concepts and developments with institutional decisions and instructional practice:

In 2003, I came to the UT Libraries with a passion for teaching students to think critically about information. Informed by the literature and best practices in information literacy instruction, I was ready to work with my classes as a guide on the side rather than a sage on the stage, facilitating peer-to-peer learning and incorporating active learning into class plans. I hadn’t thought about how the physical spaces in which I taught could help or hinder my teaching approaches.

“Clickers.” If you’re not already using them, you might have heard about them from colleagues or students. Or you might know them by product names like iClicker—which uses its own handheld device—or web-based products like Squarecap, Poll Everywhere, and Top Hat that can be used on any mobile device.