Have you ever felt that your instructional skills and knowledge were strong, but you still wanted to make them better? Or maybe you’ve reflected on a course that is going well but has begun to feel a bit stale? If you’re lucky, perhaps something is going great with your teaching, but you’re not sure how to best describe your successes and share them with others.

I’ve experienced all these teaching challenges, knowing that there’s good evidence out there to guide my next steps, but still needing more support from my colleagues to move forward. That’s where working with the Coulter Faculty Commons often gets me unstuck and started moving in the right direction again.

In late July, almost 30 Western faculty gathered on campus to reflect on their teaching practices, learn strategies to promote student learning and engagement using strong research evidence, and most importantly, build connections with like-minded peers as they headed into the new academic semester. Participants were already skilled scholars in their areas of expertise, but they sought ways to more strongly connect their scholarly skills with their work as instructors. This was the first WCU Teacher-Scholar Inspiration Day, hosted by the Coulter Faculty Commons.

A Teacher-Scholar approaches their work by integrating their ongoing scholarly inquiry to inform their teaching practice. Examples of Teacher-Scholar activities include basing teaching decisions on a variety of sources of input, reading teaching literature, conducting peer observations of teaching, and engaging in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL).

Teacher-Scholar Inspiration Day featured Dr. Laura Cruz, Research Professor with the Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence at Penn State, who helped participants locate their own place on the Teacher–Scholar Continuum and to envision next steps to advance their skills and knowledge as Teacher-Scholars. Faculty explored specific pedagogical challenges and opportunities, how research evidence could help them advance in these areas, and planned specific actions they could take to grow as Teacher-Scholars. Most participants identified with the lower levels of the continuum: scholarly teaching and emerging scholarship activities. Following the keynote, aspirations shifted toward higher levels of engagement: Post-event survey results indicate that nearly half of respondents identify scholarly leadership as a future goal.

Dr. Matt Rave, Dr. Melissa Snyder, and Dr. Mary Whatley served as panelists for Being and Becoming: A Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Panel of Practitioners, and were well-received by participants, with 88% reporting that the panel increased their interest in using scholarship to improve their teaching. Most participants (93%) who reported that tenure and promotion applied to their position said that the professional development event will support them in their tenure and/or promotion process.

This group of Teacher-Scholars came together because they shared a common belief: scholarship and teaching are not separate realms of work, and intentionally integrating these areas can better drive student engagement and learning.

So, what’s next? The goal of Teacher-Scholar Inspiration Day was not only for colleagues to come together for the day but also to inspire future action. As a result, participants have started to build momentum in the following ways:

• A participant launched a pedagogy journal reading group to continue exploring teaching and learning literature with colleagues.
• Several participants have joined Teacher-Scholar Gatherings, where faculty share successes, discuss teaching innovations, and collaboratively address teaching challenges.

Want to know more or get involved in the journey? You’re invited to join us as we gather to hone our skills and increase our knowledge, and to support one another as we go. Get involved by sharing your own teaching topic for discussion or applying to participate in the upcoming Teacher-Scholar Leadership Academy. You can also reach out directly to me (clhallyburton@wcu.edu) with your questions or needs or contact April Tallant (atallant@wcu.edu) at the Coulter Faculty Commons.