Collaborative Faculty Professional Development: Bringing the Classroom to the Screen

Abstract

When the higher education practice of face-to-face instruction was disrupted by the COVID pandemic, faculty unaccustomed to and/or uncomfortable with online teaching needed to adapt quickly to serve their students. Fortunately, there are faculty and institutions with long histories of online teaching with much to share about the why and how of offering high-quality, deeply engaging digital learning experiences to support the success of higher education students. The paper explores the collaboration of two universities to create professional development delivered through a virtual workshop series to support faculty needs and encourage an emerging community of practice related to online teaching and learning, jointly envisioned and delivered with pilot funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Four key issues conclude the paper: (1) how can success be measured and supported, (2) how can emerging practices be disseminated beyond workshop participants, (3) how can we respond to the need for changes in how we recognize, incentivize, and reward good teaching, and (4) how do we move forward from here?