49% of college instructors nationwide are classified as adjunct faculty. Adjunct faculty are seen as peripheral to higher education, but play a vital role in student education. Community colleges are leading the way in developing programs and professional development opportunities for adjuncts. At North Shore Community College in Massachusetts, the college developed a one-year adjunct…

One of the key trends impacting colleges and universities today is the need for multiple pathways to participation in an institution. At the City University of Seattle, faculty and administrators tackled this issue head on. At AAC&U’s conference on general education, Elizabeth Fountain, David Griffin, and Melissa Mecham described their university’s approach to a multiple…

A general education outcome that reads, “through a diverse set of course, students explore various disciplines as part of an integrated education that causes them to connect and apply their learning across the curriculum,” might in practice mean, “We teach what we want. Students take courses willy-nilly. If they happen to relate, well, that’s cool.”…

A Tale of Two Universities: Faculty members and administrators at Boise State University and Miami Dade College joined forces in this session to share their two stories. Their hope was that the similarities between reform processes at two dissimilar institutions could suggest a few best practices for faculty engagement. Here are four overarching strategies with…

We have to face the fact that we have designed curricula that no longer resonate with our students and do not promote the learning the need to succeed in today’s society, says Susan Gano-Phillips, Professor of Psychology at University of Michigan-Flint. Faculty should be able to engage with general education in a way that causes…

The creative inquiry project at Clemson University has the goal of “a research project for every student,” says Barbara Speziale, Associate Dean for Undergraduate Programs at Clemson. It supports a intensive, discovery-oriented approach to learning for all students. At Clemson, creative inquiry is for all students at all levels. Faculty and staff mentors work with…

E-portfolios are bodies of work that rely on collection, selection, and reflection, says Kathleen Blake Yancey, Professor at Florida State University.The e-portfolio has the ability to bring together multiple types of learning in a single place. It can showcase a deliver curriculum, an experienced curriculum, and a lived curriculum (which may or may not be…

Barbara Wright, Vice President of Western Association of Schools and Colleges suggests that our biggest threats build on the changing demographics of our students, but also our changing perceptions of technology, assessment, learning-outcomes, and alternative higher education. At colleges, the old business model relied on of knowledge, instruction, learning, degrees, social networking, cultural opportunities, and…

“It’s no surprise to anybody that the landscape of higher education is changing, ” says Steve H. Murdock, Professor of Sociology at Rice University, on the demography of classrooms. The American population is changing, growing, becoming more diverse, and indicative of an aging, and shrinking majority population. The largest population growth in the nation is…