Professional Development Workshops

• Alternative Assessments, Thinking Beyond the Test: Alternative assignments focus on the student's performance and quality of work completed aligned with the course goals. Instead of tests, assignments can be designed to provide students with opportunities to use multimedia, technology, and other resources for their projects. The supports increasing student engagement, enabling greater attention to detail, encouraging creativity, and embracing challenges.
• Active Learning Overview:  You've heard the buzz about "active learning," but what exactly is it and how can you incorporate it into your course? This session will provide learners with an overview of Active Learning, including definitions, and barriers, and discuss different strategies that can lead students towards active learning.
• Blackboard: Using Blackboard Tests to Improve Assessments and Analyze Student Performance: Item analysis provides statistics on overall test performance and individual test questions. This data helps you recognize questions that might be poor discriminators of student performance. You can use this information to improve questions for future tests or to adjust credit on current attempts.
• Course Design & Development Series: By the end of the workshop series (four sessions), you will have developed a course structure that will ensure course goals and lesson learning objectives are met whether you are teaching in a classroom or online.
  • Session 1 - Design: During this workshop we will walk through the course design process starting with backward course design, aligning content with course learning outcomes in a flexible and modular format.
  • Session 2 - Activities & Assessment: This workshop, explores formative and summative assessments, activities, course materials, evidence-based practices, and other resources to help students, successfully, demonstrate their learning.
  • Session 3 - Universal Design for Learning: Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility: This workshop discusses ways in which we can create an environment where all students can flourish.
  • Session 4 - Communication: This final workshop, communication, focuses on creating class community, instructor presence, instructor-to-student communication, and student-to-student communication.
• Designing Assignment for Deep Learning: What is deep learning and why is it important for students? Deep learning involves using higher-order cognitive skills for long-term understanding. What are the characteristics of and how can assignments be developed to encourage deep learning? Design with the end in mind.
• Discussions by Design: Creating productive discussions can be challenging. Explore strategies and tips that will help prepare for facilitating effective discussions with participation and engagement, online and in the classroom
• Humanizing Assignments: This workshop begins with a question: How can faculty create assignments that work most effectively both to help students learn and to enable them to demonstrate their achievement?
• Improve Course Accessibility with Anthology Ally: This session includes an overview of Anthology Ally and what the indicators (looks like gas gauges) mean and will walk through some tips on fixing specific content in your course. We will go over how to prioritize what to fix. The focus is on making the most important parts of your course as accessible and possible so serve all students, equitably. Though we would like to be 100% accessible, this is a work in progress and improvement is what counts.
• Simple Course Design: One of the most important tools instructors have to help establish a productive learning experience is the learning management system (LMS). Learn how to create a simple course navigational structure to improve student access and productivity.
• Student Evaluation of Teaching: Would you like to increase your SCES response rates, increase scores, and learn about alternative ways to measure effective teaching? This workshop will introduce strategies to improve teaching and/or student learning. End-of-course evaluations can be helpful by improving teaching methods and revising course design for the next term. We will share best practices for increasing the response rates and methods to integrate a variety of formative evaluations and assessments throughout the course. Research indicates by showing students their input is valuable and makes a difference in teaching and learning, they will be more responsive in their evaluations.
• Tips on How to End Your Course: The end of the semester has so many things going on for students and instructors. Instructors should use this time to check in on their students and use it as an opportunity to help students make meaningful connections with the course content. In this workshop, we will discuss tips on how to end your course to promote students’ success and improve your course with their feedback.
• Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and Accessibility: UDL is a pedagogical framework focused on responding to learner diversity by designing flexible pathways to engage, represent, and express knowledge. This workshop offers an overview of the foundational knowledge, tools, skills, and resources necessary to effectively implement the principles of UDL. Whether you teach traditional, blended/hybrid, or online courses, UDL can enhance the efficacy of your instruction.
• Teaching with GenAI - Designing Assignments with AI: This workshop will share the essential skills for faculty to use Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) in their assessment design. We will explore the potential benefits and drawbacks of using GenAI in higher education and discuss pedagogical considerations for integrating GenAI for assessment purposes. The workshop will also demonstrate ideas for designing assessments with the help of GenAI. 
• GenAI Fundamentals: Understanding and Selecting an Appropriate AI Tool: This workshop will describe Generative AI(GenAI), and some popular models like ChatGPT. The session will explore the strengths, limitations, and biases of GenAI tools. The workshop aims to equip participants with fundamental knowledge and skills to select a GenAI tool. 
• Blackboard Ultra Introduction: This session will introduce participants to the new Blackboard Ultra user interface. Blackboard Ultra courses offer a new modern, intuitive, accessible, and mobile friendly interface with improved workflows and new features. 
• Creating Assessments in Blackboard Ultra: This session will guide participants through the process of creating and managing assessments in Blackboard Ultra, focusing on tests and assignments. You will learn how to craft various types of questions, configure test settings, and create assignments. Additionally, we will cover assignment settings, including rubrics, to optimize grading and feedback.
• Engaging Students Features in Blackboard Ultra: This session will introduce participants to tools in Blackboard Ultra courses that enhance student engagement and foster collaborative learning. Focusing on features such as Class Conversations, Discussions, Journals, and Peer Review Assignments, we will guide you through creating dynamic learning experiences. 
• Exploring the AI Design Assistant in Blackboard Ultra: Blackboard Ultra now has the AI Design Assistant included to help instructors create and design content in courses.  This feature is available to help with auto-generating learning modules, rubrics, discussion prompts, question banks, and assessments. Learn more in our exploring AI workshop. 
• Collaborative and Personalized Learning in Blackboard Learn ULTRA: In this session we will discuss tools and strategies to foster collaborative and personalized learning experiences. The workshop is designed to help instructors in designing engaging and effective learning environments. 
• Effective Collaboration with Groups in Blackboard Ultra: This session will focus on creating and managing groups in Blackboard Ultra to enhance collaboration and streamline student interaction. Participants will learn how to create group sets, assign students to groups, and utilize group-specific settings for discussions and assignments. By the end of the workshop, participants will be equipped to set up collaborative learning opportunities that engage students and simplify grading.