We support faculty test item writing through sharing of best practices for item construction.

We help faculty with backwards course design processes – to emphasize the integration between learning outcomes, assessments, activities, and instructional content. An educational technologist staffed in the CFC often joins the consultation team to work through questions related to the LMS and software we support.

We can help you redesign an assignment to minimize student cheating. Many of the tactics we recommend can be implemented by faculty within a few days of the assignment start date. Others are more strategic and forward-looking.

Many faculty find students to be reluctant readers yet are dependent on the strong cognitive foundation that close reading produces. We share strategies faculty can share with students, such as the evidence-based practice “Think-Aloud Procedure” when students are tasked with researching and reading on the Internet. 

We can read and review an assignment for clarity of purpose, tasks, criteria/assessment, and learning-focused qualities. We also offer support for helping transition towards a learner-centered classroom through tools to support student self-assessment, peer assessment, student practice, and portfolio development.

Faculty often come to us and are unclear where to start. We are happy to sit down and simply talk about the challenges you are facing, prior to determining a way forward.

The Coulter Faculty Commons supports faculty new to the scholarship of teaching and learning. We can advise good resources and campus connections for getting started. We also provide consultations for faculty related to data analysis and study design.

First-Year Faculty eager for a snapshot of their course (student perceptions of learning, student behaviors, course challenges) have found value in our mid-semester analysis service. Now called the Teaching Analysis Poll, a 20 minute visit to the class provides opportunity to conduct a focus group and confidential report to the faculty member, within a week of the class visit. Aside from this service, we have tools/handouts that can be implemented by the faculty member with same-day opportunity to ascertain student perceptions of the course.

Given the importance of dialogue and inquiry in all classrooms, we emphasize the use of planning tools for faculty to pinpoint anticipated talking points, including questions for anticipated points of diversion. Tools will be shared with faculty during the consultation.

The Coulter Faculty Commons maintains the standardized syllabus for the university; it includes procedural and policy-driven verbiage, such as the Inclusive Excellence Statement adopted by Faculty Senate in 2019. In addition, we can read your syllabus for learning-centered qualities using a validated, reliable syllabus tool.

Alternative forms of assessment afforded by strong educational practice or creative uses for the Internet can be brought into the on-ground or online classroom. Testing need not utilize a faculty-created (or publisher-developed) test bank. Includes rubric development, A to Z.