Opening the Classroom Door: Creating a Culture for Dialogue and Reflection
2025 Annual Faculty Retreat
Illini Union Rooms A,B,C
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
March 6, 2025

 

Suggested Resources

Campus Support

  • Center for Innovation in Teaching & Learning (CITL). Our mission is to explore and promote innovative teaching to support transformative learning experiences in all modalities. It is a hub of innovation and hands-on support for those who want to discuss and work with higher education trends, models, projects, and resources. CITL uses leading pedagogical approaches, research-based methodologies, innovative instructional technologies, and comprehensive assessment practices to strengthen teaching efforts and improve student learning outcomes.
  • Holistic Teaching Evaluation and Feedback. Teaching traditionally happens “behind closed doors.” A holistic approach to teaching feedback and evaluation begins by making these invisible interactions and systems of teaching visible. A summary of this website can be found in the Teaching Feedback and Evaluation Brief.

Office of the Provost Teaching Advancement Board (TAB) Grants (Deadline March 31, 2025)

  • Instructional Innovation Mini Grants. Instructional Innovation Mini Grants are available to support efforts to pursue innovation in teaching and learning. Projects may be inspired by participation in the Annual Faculty Retreat or other engagements in teaching and learning related activities. These grants are most often used to support a graduate assistant or offset expenses associated with the proposed project
  • Provost’s Initiative on Teaching Advancement (PITA) Grants. PITA grants are designed to support faculty with the implementation of instructional and pedagogical innovation that has a high probability of enhancing education at Illinois. The projects most likely to be funded are those that clearly align with campus educational goals, and where PITA award resources might be leveraged to increase external support

Additional Resources from the Faculty Retreat

“What’s Good Here?” Getting Specific about What Good Teaching Looks Like, Sounds Like, Feels Like”

Facilitators:

Geoffrey Herman (Computer Science and Provost Fellow)

Dawn Bohn (Food Science & Human Nutrition, Siebel Center for Design, and Provost Fellow)

Saadeddine Shehab (Siebel Center for Design)

  • Activity Sheet: “What Good Teaching ……”
  From Faculty Perspective From Student Perspective
Looks like    
Sounds like    
Feels like    

Video Vignette: Getting Together: Becoming Lifelong Collaborators

  • Caitlin Clarke (Health & Kinesiology)
  • Wade Fagen-Ulmschneider (Computing & Data Science)
  • Karle Flanagan (Computing & Data Science and Statistics)

‘Let’s Open the Classroom Door’: Hearing from Our Peers”

“Being Observed”

Facilitator: Geoffrey Herman (Computer Science and Provost Fellow)

Video Vignette: Let’s Open the Classroom Door: Hearing from Our Peers - Being Observed

  • Maria Cattai de Godoy (Animal Sciences)
  • Kevin Wandke (Mechanical Science and Engineering)
  • Carrie Wilson-Brown (Media & Cinema Studies and Advertising)

“Being an Observer”

Facilitators:

Eric Benson (Art + Design)

Amy Woods (College of Applied Health Sciences and Health & Kinesiology)

Video Vignette: Let’s Open the Classroom Door: Hearing from Our Peers - Being an Observer

  • Betsy Brandt (Dance)
  • Jacob Henschen (Civil and Environmental Engineering)
  • Debra Korte (College of Agricultural, Consumer & Environmental Sciences)

“Let’s Visit a Class”

Facilitators:

Cheelan Bo-Linn (CITL)

Jay Mann (Academy for Excellence in Engineering Education- AE3)

Handouts: 

“Why We Do What We Do”: Hearing from Our Students

Facilitator: Lucas Anderson (CITL)

Video Vignette: Why We Do What We Do

Student Panel:

  • Ariana Mizan (Business Administration)
  • Marco Antonio Soto (Aerospace Engineering)
  • Caroline Thies (Psychology & Advertising)
  • Lathanial Wells (iSchool)
  • Joshua Zhao (Psychology – Cognitive & Brain Science)