With support from the Teagle Foundation, Cornell’s CTE, in collaboration with the Graduate School and other units on campus, seeks to develop a Graduate Teaching Certificate Initiative (GTCI). The purpose of the GTCI is two-fold:
- Design and implement two enhanced graduate teaching certificate programs: (1) a cohort-based university-wide program, and (2) discipline-specific programs - one in the sciences and one in the social sciences, and
- Conduct a systematic assessment to compare how well and in what ways each type of certificate program improves graduate student teaching, fosters collaboration and enhances undergraduate student learning.
The design of two distinct graduate teaching certificate programs will draw upon existing efforts to improve graduate student teaching. In addition, comparative case study research within and across programs will likely provide substantial insight on support structures, program design components, and intra- and inter-disciplinary collaboration among faculty, students and administrators. The GTCI will also provide an opportunity for participants to generate empirical evidence on how graduate teaching certificate programs advance undergraduate student learning.
Project Goals & Objectives
Criteria for evaluating the quality and effectiveness of the GTCI will be based on the achievement of the following project goals and objectives:
Goal 1: Enhance graduate teaching assistants’ teaching skills and knowledge of pedagogy and learning theory.
Objectives:
- Design and implement two distinct future faculty/graduate teaching certificate programs (a university-wide graduate teaching certificate program and discipline-specific graduate teaching certificate programs in Biomedical Sciences and City & Regional Planning).[i]
- Recruit ten graduate teaching assistants to participate in the university-wide CTE-FFP, and five graduate students to participate in each of the discipline-specific graduate teaching certificate programs (n=20).
- Develop twenty GTCI student electronic portfolios.
Goal 2: Increase collaboration among faculty, graduate students and administrators to develop teaching programs and generate knowledge on effective teaching and learning.
Objectives:
- Create two “faculty-student-staff teams” to design and oversee the development of discipline specific graduate teaching certificate programs in the fields of Biomedical Sciences and City and Regional Planning.
- Create a “faculty-student-staff team” to design and oversee the development of a university-wide graduate teaching program.
- Recruit 1 CU faculty member per graduate student participant to serve as mentors.
Goal 3: Develop a resource base on discipline-based best practices in teaching, knowledge of student learning and assessment strategies for documenting learning outcomes.
Objectives:
- Design program assessment criteria and conduct systematic assessment of how well and in what ways GTCI programs improve graduate student teaching and enhance undergraduate student learning outcomes.
- Design and implement graduate student research projects on teaching and learning
- Create a GTCI Web-site to disseminate materials generated by project teams and graduate student research and teaching (i.e., videos, blogs, portfolios, research publications, etc.).
- Develop project “wiki” for project team collaboration on program development and resource sharing.
- Host GTCI teaching excellence series and symposium for GTCI participants (and faculty mentors) to present research projects on teaching and electronic portfolios.
[i] The department Chair and senior faculty in Biomedical Sciences and City and Regional Planning support the project to develop discipline-specific graduate teaching certificate programs for 2010-2011.
