Articulated Learning Goals

In 2014, the University of Michigan launched an NSF-funded program to reinvent introductory teaching and learning in the core STEM disciplines.  REBUILD (Researching Evidence-Based Undergraduate Instructional and Learning Developments) aimed to promote recruitment, retention, and academic excellence in STEM disciplines by catalyzing the use of evidence-based teaching methods and learning analytics.  Toward this end, REBUILD faculty and postdocs led reform efforts in traditionally lecture-based, high-enrollment courses and labs in Astronomy, Biology, Chemistry, Math, and Physics.

The CU-SEI program has had a broad array of impacts. Across the program as a whole, over 100 faculty have been impacted by the SEI, with over 90 having modified their instruction based on the SEI efforts. 

The Colorado Learning Assistant (LA) Model: Launched at CU Boulder in 2003, its purpose is to increase STEM research faculty members’ awareness and involvement in evidence-based reforms and to support STEM teacher recruitment and preparation.

In early 2016, the REBUILD committee harnessed the momentum provided by REBUILD to launch a university-wide Foundational Course Initiative. In partnership with Michigan’s Center for Research on Teaching and Learning, we talked to hundreds of administrators, faculty, staff, and students representing numerous schools and colleges, departments, student support programs, residential learning communities, and other units at Michigan.

The Rainforest Expedition and Laboratory course introduces undergraduates to research by providing them an opportunity to discover novel microorganisms in the Amazonian rainforest and screen them for natural products with applications for human health and the environment. The students learn about biodiversity, the process of scientific inquiry, and the open-ended possibilities available for scientific investigation.

UVA's upper level Biochemistry Laboratory course has been designed to ensure that all students graduating from the Chemistry department with a Biochemistry specialization have had research experience.

To improve learning, the Swanson School of Engineering at the University of Pittsburgh is introducing a flipped, or inverted, classroom model in which direct learning (lecture) takes place outside of class, while class time is used for active learning.

The University of Pittsburgh's Discipline-Based Science Education Research Center (dB-SERC) promotes and supports evidence-based teaching practices which bridge the gap between teaching and learning.

The University of Pennsylvania is supporting faculty in making use of Structured, Active, In-class Learning (SAIL) in their teaching. SAIL classes begin with the related premises that students benefit from learning by doing and that class time should be used to help students learn to work with material.