Carl Wieman聮s efforts to improve undergraduate teaching are 聯making waves nationally聰 in addition to influencing instruction at the University of Colorado at Boulder, according to Mary Ann Shea, director of the campus聮s Faculty Teaching Excellence Program.
When Wieman is invited to give a talk on his scientific research at another university, he often insists that he also be allowed to meet with faculty to discuss undergraduate science teaching.
聯One has to have a profound motivation, inspiration and focus on understanding the learner to become the professor that Carl has become in the classroom,聰 Shea said.
聯Being an excellent teacher is not just a matter of learning one聮s own discipline, it聮s also a matter of understanding how people learn. And Carl has plumbed the depths of that -- for students and for our colleagues.聰
In pursuing his goal of becoming a more effective teacher for students from freshman nonscience majors to physics graduate students, Wieman read many if not most of the pertinent education studies and 聯approached this as research,聰 Shea said. 聯He has become a student of education research. And you become a better teacher by gathering that kind of information and evaluating your own experiences in teaching against the research.聰
FTEP began serving CU-Boulder faculty in 1986 and offers a 聯menu聰 of services that lets professors pick the services they need. It is built on the principles that all faculty can learn to be good teachers and that faculty often learn best about teaching from other faculty.
聯All of our services are aimed at supporting faculty in becoming the teacher they want to be and in knowing that they have created satisfying learning environments for their students,聰 Shea said.
These services include classroom videotaping, classroom observation, individual consultation, a summer institute on educational technology, early career faculty instruction, a lecture series and symposia, among many others. In addition to being a resource, FTEP also provides a safe, confidential place where faculty can go to talk about teaching issues, Shea said.
FTEP also runs the President聮s Teaching Scholars Program, which is designed to honor and reward faculty from all four CU campuses who have excelled in teaching, scholarship and research. The scholars are chosen not only for skill in their own classrooms but for their promise of improving education across the university.
Wieman was named a President聮s Teaching Scholar in February 2004.
In 2003, Wieman and Shea collaborated with the chair of the physics department, John Cumalat, and other physics faculty on a special initiative aimed at improving teaching and learning within the department. Department-level projects make sense because instructional techniques apply within any particular discipline. Teaching physics is different from teaching English, Shea said.
The physics effort started two years ago with a lecture by the dean of the School of Education, Lorrie Shepard, to discuss relevant research on teaching and how students learn. It continued with weekly brownbag lunch discussions involving both education and physics faculty about physics teaching, summer course development projects, a lecture series by several national experts in physics education including Eric Mazur of Harvard University, and the development of specific learning goals for each physics course and an assessment of whether or not they were met.
聯Many individual efforts to improve physics education already had occurred, but this program provided a forum in which many participated and the department was able to reach a consensus on areas of focus,聰 Cumalat said. 聯More than anything, these discussions caused us to reflect more on teaching: are students learning as much as they ought to?聰
With FTEP and on its own, the physics department also has created a number of Web-based instructional materials, improved labs, involved citizens and students in helping with physics classes and created a database of syllabi so professors can see what was taught in courses in the past. A number of the department聮s Web-based outreach efforts are posted at .
FTEP is part of the Office of the Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs. For more information visit .
For more information see the News Center Special Report: 2004 U.S. Professor of the Year