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Teacher–Scholar Inspiration Day

by | Apr 6, 2026 | Blog, Event, Faculty Development Workshop, Scholarship of Teaching & Learning

You are invited to attend Teacher–Scholar Inspiration Day, a one‑day gathering designed to energize your teaching, deepen student learning, and support your own well‑being as an educator. The event will take place on Tuesday, July 28, 9:30 AM to 4:30 PM in Apodaca. Participants will receive a certificate of completion, a letter from the Coulter Faculty Commons, and a light breakfast and lunch. 

Through an engaging keynote delivered by Laura Cruz, faculty panel, interactive sessions, and collaborative conversations, participants will explore how small, intentional, evidence‑based shifts in teaching can make a meaningful difference for students and for ourselves. 

SoTL at WCU banya tree
Register for the 2026 Teacher-Scholar Day

The day emphasizes scholarly teaching: using curiosity, reflection, and research- informed practices to guide instructional choices. You’ll exchange ideas with colleagues, explore shared teaching challenges, and leave with practical inspiration you can carry into the year ahead. We’ll also have SoTL (the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning) concurrent sessions as one possible pathway for turning teaching questions into collaborative inquiry. If you have never heard of  SoTL, are ready to begin planning a SoTL study, or your SoTL project is complete and you need help moving forward, we have you covered.  

All faculty, instructional staff, and graduate teaching assistants are welcome to attend and take away what is most meaningful for your teaching, your students, and your professional renewal. Come grounded in your current practice. Leave inspired, connected, and supported. 

The Perfect is the Enemy of the Good: A Call for an Early Start in Undergraduate Research

by | Mar 25, 2026 | Blog, Problem Based Learning, Student Engagement, Teaching & Learning Tip

By CFC Faculty Fellow Chad Hallyburton, Environmental Health Sciences 

I absolutely hated high school. 

As an undergraduate student, I spent some semesters just “phoning it in.” 

But when I arrived at WCU as a graduate student, the creativity and independence of original research ignited my passion for learning, and I haven’t looked back since. I sometimes wonder what my academic career would have looked like if I’d discovered research earlier, and that makes me want to give my students an early start with scholarship. 

This is important, because early involvement in undergrad research is a high-impact practice that improves scientific skills, critical thinking, and problem solving, and makes students more employable by fostering their time management, teamwork, and communication skills. 

Undergrad research students are better prepared for their degree work, for graduate school, for their future careers, and for life. 

But too few students get involved. I see my own Undergraduate Research Student Partners grow and flourish, but often only the “best and brightest” show up at my door looking for opportunities, and often only later in their undergraduate careers. 

So, during the Fall 2025 semester I developed and evaluated a curriculum engaging first-year seminar students who conducted an applied Public Health project.

They collected and analyzed data on low flu vaccination rates among our first-year WCU students, described barriers to vaccination in this population, and worked with the Division of Student Affairs to share social media and print messaging encouraging student vaccination. They described the reach and impact of their messages and developed poster presentations with their suggestions for how WCU could more effectively support students’ vaccine decision-making.

Poster of a WCU student in a purple shirt and backpack chasing a cartoon flu virus, with the caption “Don’t let the flu call the shots.”

After completing this Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experience, or CURE for short, science process confidence grew in over 80% of the class, many identified as potential future scientists, and about two-thirds said they were more interested in finding future undergrad research opportunities.

Was this project perfect? Did it include all the elements of undergraduate research that students might experience working in an advanced research lab? Absolutely not. But it was a first step towards showing the newest members of our WCU community that scholarship is within their reach. 

Many of you already support undergraduate research. If you try to engage more students earlier in their careers, will your efforts be perfect? Nope. But you can surely do something good. 

If you need some inspiration, here are a few good resources to get you going: 

We Recommend – Capture your Students’ Attention with Lessons Learned from JMU’s Faculty Lounge Podcast

by | Mar 19, 2026 | Blog, We Recommend

April 2026

Recommended by April Tallant, CFC Director 

I am a big fan of podcasts. Most of the podcasts I listen to are for leisure, providing me with an escape from everyday reality. In my experience, podcasts about academia have been hit or miss – until recently when I stumbled across James Madison University’s Center for Faculty Innovation’s (CFI) Faculty Lounge podcast. You can access the podcast on their website, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube. 

In listening to episode 15, Connection is the Curriculum: A Conversation with Dr. Julie Gochenour, I found myself being inspired and contemplating ways I could apply her strategies to my own context.

Dr. Julie Gochenour is a lecturer in the School of Communication Studies (SCOM), and winner of both the Madison Vision in Teaching award and the School of Communication Studies Lecturer of the Year award. In the podcast, she spoke about using engaging lectures and provided strategies for communicating with students. 

The following are Dr. Gochenour’s three rules for post-modern communication that she applies to connect with her students and help them learn. 

  1. We learn what we discover. Dr. Gochenour says that the learning starts when students discover for themselves. She takes a “guide on the side” rather than “the sage on the stage” approach, helping students explore and discover course content for themselves.
  2. The universe is found in the specific. She captures attention by bringing relevance to the classroom, using real life examples, either that she provides or that she asks her students to come up with. 
  3. Only the personal is contagious. Dr. Gochenour contends that if we as instructors don’t buy it, then students won’t either. She recommends being your authentic self and sharing the love for your discipline in your teaching. Showing your passion about your discipline with your students is an effective way to facilitate their learning. 

Dr. Gochenour’s rules reflect evidence-based teaching practices. By structuring learning environments where students explore to construct meaning, using relevant examples, making the connection itself instructional, she creates a fertile ground for student learning. Tune in to hear Dr. Gochenour’s 27-minute conversation with Dr. Eric Magrum, Assistant Professor in the Department of Kinesiology and Faculty Associate at JMU’s Center for Faculty Innovation. I hope you find the conversation just as refreshing and insightful as I did, and that it supports you as you engage with your students during the final stretch of the spring semester. 

To access the full collection of teaching-related recommendations,
visit CFC’s We Recommend.

Click.Craft.Connect

by | Mar 12, 2026 | Blog, Faculty Development Workshop, Learning Community, Online Learning, Teaching with Technology

Online Teaching Cohort Starts April 6

What if sharpening your online teaching skills also meant connecting with some of the most thoughtful instructors on campus? This April, the Coulter Faculty Commons is facilitating another cohort in its Excellence in Online Teaching Basics — a 4-week Canvas course that’s as much about community as it is about content.

Cat in a virtual meeting with other cats

Through 5 self-paced modules on Canvas, you’ll explore everything from the fundamentals of online learning to course design, student engagement, and beyond.

Each module takes just 1–2 hours to complete and the course includes 4 facilitated discussions where you can share your ideas with fellow instructors. 

Whether you’re brand new to teaching online or have a few semesters under your belt, this is your space to learn, reflect, and share what works.

Not sure if the EOT cohort is for you? Contact Scott Seagle at seaglej@wcu.edu to help you get started.

Register for the April 2026 EoT Cohort

We Recommend: Make Accessibility Part of Your Course Design Toolkit

by | Mar 3, 2026 | Accessibility, Blog, UDL, We Recommend

March 2026

Recommended by Anabel Livengood, Senior Educational Developer  

UDL and accessibility go together like peanut butter and jelly – they complement each other perfectly. With the upcoming deadline for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines on April 24, we want to highlight a few Universal Design for Learning (UDL) resources that can support you in your efforts to make your teaching materials more accessible for all learners.  

The Irish government and AHEAD Ireland published the free e-book “UDL for FET Practitioners: Guidance for Implementing Universal Design for Learning in Irish Further Education and Training”. While this e-book and its accompanying resources were created for the Irish educational context, they serve as excellent guides for in-depth exploration of UDL filled with examples of practitioners (refer to the full 211 page e-book) as well as a succinct 20 page summary and three reflection toolkits (two designed for instructors new to UDL, and one for already experienced UDL practitioners with the goal for deeper reflection). All of these resources provide advice for implementing UDL and provide examples from different teaching contexts. 

Book cover of "The Missing Course: Everything They Never Taught You about College Teaching" by David Gooblar.
Thomas Tobin, smiling into the camera.

The upcoming free webinar “Title II Accessibility: Be Ready for the April Deadline” on Tuesday, March 10 (3:00 – 4:00 pm) will help you prepare for upcoming Title II accessibility expectations while keeping the focus on practical, student-centered design. Facilitated by UDL expert Dr. Thomas J. Tobin, you will explore how Universal Design for Learning (UDL) proactively reduces access barriers for everyone, not just those with formal accommodations, by building flexibility and inclusivity into courses from the start. 

We hope these resources will help you expand your course design toolkit by incorporating UDL in small ways this term to round off your accessible Canvas courses.

To access the full collection of teaching-related recommendations,
visit CFC’s We Recommend.