"Holy ****, you're actually listening to me" Student-faculty collab to improve courses:

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Presentation/Discussion Recorded in TLT Group's FridayLive! May 20, 2011 - Homebase Webpage has links to refs, text chat transcript, audio/video recording, etc. 

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Description

Some institutions are attempting to increase student engagement through faculty and students designing classes together. Surprising results have been discovered:  e.g., students want demanding assignments, teaching was harder than students thought.  We'll discuss what works/doesn't work? What are the greatest obstacles? What set of conditions are necessary for collaboration?

At Elon University, collaboration is initiated by experienced faculty who believe students who recently took a course were not learning something important - not learning it easily or well enough. 1 faculty + a few students per course, all volunteers, meet 6-8 times before course begins again.  Students encouraged to share expertise on student experience, attitudes.  Faculty encouraged to share expertise in subject, course, teaching.  

Students read work of previous students, observe current class, provide peer view of student learning;  privacy, confidentiality honored.
Students like being listened to by faculty:  "Holy ****, you're actually listening to me" 

Most faculty participating are recognized as teaching "good" courses, not "broken" courses.
Collaborations organized and facilitated by Director of Center for Advancement of Teaching and Learning. 

But not all are convinced that course design collaboration is wise. In this session, Peter Felten will join Steve Gilbert to share how his team at Elon University undertook student-faculty collaboration almost five years ago. Peter's team has written and spoken widely on the topic and we welcome their insight into some key questions about collaboration: What works/doesn't work? What are the greatest obstacles? What set of conditions are necessary for collaboration? 

For an example of a certain kind of intensive student-fac collaboration in SHAPING  a course, see http://www.tltgroup.org/icampus/eecscadres.htm

Also see Faculty-Student Teams Design Courses - Antidote for "Academically Adrift"?   <http://tlt-swg.blogspot.com/2011/04/faculty-student-teams-design-courses.html> 

Read more about McDaniel's and Elon's efforts to improve student engagement!

• "McDaniel Students Help Design the Classes They're Taking," by Childs Walker, Baltimore Sun, April 3, 2011
•  "Power and Expertise: Student-Faculty Collaboration in Course Design and the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning"; Mihans, Long, Felten, Elon University, in International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, July 2008.  
• Chapter by Felten et al. in Engaging Student Voices in the Study of Teaching and Learning, Edited by Carmen Werder , Megan M. Otis