By Cynthia Rutz, Director of Faculty Development, CITAL Some of your faculty colleagues have been meeting regularly this year to explore a teaching topic that interests them and then making positive changes in their classrooms. That is what our Faculty Learning Communities (FLCs) do. In the following article, Abbie Thompson (Psychology) talks about what she […]
Category: 2023
Healthy Minds, Healthy Bodies
By Cynthia Rutz, Director of Faculty Development, CITAL Half-way through the semester, both you and your students can start to feel run-down and overworked. Yet some faculty are unaware of the many resources at Valpo for mental, physical, and spiritual health. Here is an annotated list of the resources available both for you and your […]
Saving Your Students Money By Using OERs
By Cynthia Rutz, Director of Faculty Development, CITAL Jon Bull decided to make using open educational resources (OERs) a priority for his work at VU in order to help with student retention. That is why Jon instituted the OER Development Awards. This program, now in its sixth year, awards faculty from $500-$2,000 to move their […]
Why Quality Matters Matters
By Cynthia Rutz, Director of Faculty Development We all know that enrollment in traditional in-person university classes has declined across the country. But did you know that there has been a corresponding increase in enrollment in online and hybrid courses? Despite this growing demand, many faculty have little or no experience designing online and hybrid […]
Valpo Faculty Perspectives on Simple Syllabus
By Cynthia Rutz, Director of Faculty Development, CITAL This fall Simple Syllabus debuted university-wide. For our students this means consistent syllabus navigation across all their courses and the ability to easily access their syllabi via Blackboard or SS directly using their device of choice. A print option is also available for students who prefer a […]
Collaborative Spaces: One Size Does Not Fit All
By Ed Finn, Executive Director, CITAL Collaboration can happen almost anywhere; we see it all the time. Whether it is students sitting underneath a tree on a fall afternoon, or faculty members engaged in discussion at Grinders, the need to congregate and discuss big ideas is ever-present on a college campus. In this short article, […]
Valpo Faculty Respond to Generative AI
By Cynthia Rutz, Director of Faculty Development, CITAL At the faculty workshop this August, our keynote speaker Derek Bruff spoke about four possible faculty responses to AI: Red Light: I’ll prohibit the use of AI. Yellow Light: I’ll permit the use of AI, but with limitations. Green Light: Let’s see what AI can do! No […]
Two Perspectives on ChatGPT
By Cynthia Rutz, Director of Faculty Development, CITAL This past winter there was a veritable explosion of news stories about ChatGPT, a technology that lets users put in prompts to generate text that reads like it was written by a human. Some decried it as the end of the college essay, others saw it as […]
Getting Your Students Excited about Learning
By Cynthia Rutz, Director of Faculty Development, CITAL Two proven ways to get students excited about learning are research and philanthropy. In the article below, you will learn about how the students of Kristi Bugajski (Biology) are raising money to combat malaria. You will also hear about two alumni whose introduction to research at Valpo […]
Marketing Your Class
By Cynthia Rutz, Director of Faculty Development, CITAL Have you ever worked hard to create a terrific course only to have it canceled because not enough students signed up? Two of your Valpo colleagues, Richard Sévère and Selina Bartels, share some great ideas for how to get the word out about your outstanding courses. Richard […]