Fall 2003

Rethinking Courses

The University Teaching Fellows Program aims to help our most intellectually sound and successful junior faculty members develop into exceptionally fine teachers. The selection committee-comprised of award-winning faculty-seeks to choose junior faculty members who show promise of becoming both eminent researchers and inspiring teachers. In existence since 1992 and funded by the Provost, the UTF Program remains true to its original Lilly Endowment goals to support impressive junior faculty as they refine their teaching expertise while pursuing strong research agendas. The Program centers around ongoing conversations about how faculty communicate their academic disciplines to undergraduates, how various teaching approaches might enhance one's courses, and how research enlivens and inspires teaching. The 2003-04 winners of University Teaching Fellowships will be rethinking these courses:

Lawrie Balfour, Politics
My plan is to revise the large lecture course "Introduction to Political Theory." For some students, this is the only political theory class they will take; for others, it is an enticement to further study. With both groups in mind, and with the aspiration to nudge some students from the first to the second category, my objectives are twofold. First, I am interested in devising a structure that is more strongly thematically driven and that allows texts from different periods to speak directly to each other. My second aim is to explore mechanisms for fostering student involvement during lecture.

Ira Bashkow, Antrhopology
My project redesigns Anthropology 267, "How Others See Us," for a large lecture format. This course examines how America, the West, and the white racial mainstream are viewed by "others" in different parts of the world and introduces anthropological perspectives on culture, colonialism, race, and discourses of otherness. I aim to forge stronger connections with (and among) students and help them learn more effectively by giving more structure to sections, by rethinking the methods of evaluation, by more tightly integrating multimedia sources, and by adding an interview-based, field research project to be conducted in local communities by student teams.

Hilary Bart-Smith, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
I plan to develop "Strength of Materials" by structuring the course around a problem-based-learning approach. During the fellowship year I will develop small group projects designed around the subject material. These will be centered on real-world engineering problems. Each project will require students to work in small teams and will include basic calculations and research of current literature. The goal of these projects is to enhance students' capacities for higher-level thinking such as analysis, synthesis, and evaluation.

Louis P. Nelson, Architectural History
The Architectural History survey course introduces students to the subject and methodologies of the discipline in an expanding global context where non-Western material is an increasingly important component of class material. Through its writing component, the class also requires students to learn the basics of academic research and writing. During my tenure as a University Teaching Fellow I will further diversify coverage of topics recently incorporated into the field, develop creative classroom techniques to communicate cultural content, and enhance methods for teaching scholarly research and writing skills.

Roseanna M. Neupaurer, Civil Engineering
Designs of civil engineering systems must account for many uncertain quantities. I will introduce the concepts of uncertainty into "Groundwater Hydrology." Students will measure hydrogeologic properties through laboratory and field experiments, thereby observing the variability of properties and the sources of measurement uncertainty. I will introduce tools for quantifying the variability and uncertainty. Students will apply these tools to the design of a groundwater well field for aquifer remediation. This design project will help students develop skills important to engineering design in the presence of uncertainty.

Paolo D'Odorico, Environmental Sciences
I will develop new strategies to motivate students in "Applied Hydrology" to become more engaged in analyzing and understanding the physics of environmental processes. I intend to assess background knowledge in order to make students aware of what they need to know to be successful in the course and to provide me with information about the students' pre-existing knowledge. I will also utilize examples to connect theory to the "real world" and to develop problem-solving skills. Together with other methods, these techniques will demonstrate to students how to recognize the methods that are best suited to solve various types of problems.

Kevin Skadron, Computer Science
I will redesign "Operating Systems," a required course for computer science and computer engineering majors. My goal is to enhance students' problem-solving skills. This involves covering fewer topics than I have before, thereby allowing more time to focus on a deeper understanding of basic principles and on putting these principles to practical use. I will also extend and deepen the course's programming projects and add a wider range of case studies. Ultimately, these revisions are intended to help students recognize common principles and solution techniques, and thus learn how to extrapolate their knowledge and skills to new problems, questions, and material.