Expanding the NEST
Expanding the NEST is an initiative designed and supported by the CETL team for all
Kennesaw State University Educators. NEST stands for Nurturing Environments through Scholarly Teaching. Environments include, but are not limited to, physical classrooms, online
spaces, office suites, and events.
More information on engagement indicators can be found on the NSSE website.
The resource document offered here was created by CETL to support faculty as they
cultivate student success at KSU. We developed this resource to connect with data
from KSU Student Responses to the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE). With this data, CETL identified practices to support in the three highlighted areas
extracted from our NSSE report: Student-Faculty Interaction, Effective Teaching Practices,
and Supportive Environments.
CETL acknowledges this is not an all-inclusive list. The suggested practices are intended
as a menu, and we do not expect faculty to implement all 25 practices. On the other
hand, many of us already use some of these practices. This document may serve to validate
beneficial practices around cultivating student success that you are already using,
while also offering new suggestions. You can further explore inclusive teaching through
conversations with colleagues, consultations with CETL, or relevant teaching and learning
scholarship (e.g., CETL's Inclusive Teaching Practices).
You are welcome to print this resource out, but it is most beneficial in the electronic
format to access the links embedded throughout.
In addition to providing one-on-one consulting services in any of this work, CETL
is offering workshops and events throughout the semester focused on different practices
found within the menu of options to cultivate student success.
January 29 - Grading for Growth
CETL Faculty Fellow Laura Howard is hosting a book chat to discuss David Clark and
Robert Talbert's book Grading for Growth: Alternative Grading Practices that Promote
Authentic Learning and Student Engagement in Higher Education.
This book chat connects with the following practices:
- #10 Review your course to align learning outcomes, assessments, and instructional
strategies.
- #23 Cultivate students' sense of agency by promoting a growth mindset and metacognition. For instance, allow for productive trial and error (e.g., through low-stakes practice
quizzes or drafts).
Register in OwlTrain
February 13 - Peter Felten
CETL is bringing Dr. Peter Felten to KSU. Dr. Felten is Assistant Provost, Executive
Director of the Center for Engaged Learning, and Professor of History at Elon University.
Dr. Felten has written 6 books on undergraduate education, including the wildly successful
Relationship-Rich Education: How Human Connections Drive Success in College. He will be giving a keynote address to campus on February 13, 9:30 - 11:00 a.m.
with a book signing to follow until 11:30 a.m. His topic dovetails perfectly with
KSU’s Student Success goals.
This event connects with multiple aspects of Expanding the NEST with particular focus
on the Student-Faculty Interactions and Supportive Environments sections.
Register in OwlTrain
February 27 - Building Rapport
As a follow up to the Peter Felten Event, CETL Faculty Fellow Laura Howard will be
hosting a workshop called Building Rapport: Faculty-Student Interations that Foster Growth and Development. This workshop is a deep dive into Student-Faculty Interactions as one aspect of
our Expanding the NEST intiative. In this workshop, faculty will learn how they can
positively influence the cognitive growth, development, and persistance of college
students through interactions. Specifically, we will explore strategies for building
rapport in the classroom.
This workshop will touch a number of practices that fall within the Student-Faculty Interaction section in Expanding the NEST.
Register in OwlTrain
March 7 - Equity Minded Teaching
CETL Faculty Fellow Rudy Aguilar is hosting a book chat with the Norton Guide to Equity Minded Teaching to explore best practices for curating inclusive learning spaces across various modalities
in institutions of higher learning. As colleges and universities embrace face-to-face,
online, and hybrid approaches to teaching, the authors of The Norton Guide to Equity-minded
Teaching equip faculty with real-life scenarios and day-to-day tools to implement
in your courses to better ensure diverse student populations feel appreciated, and
their needs met.
This book chat connects with the following practices:
- #5 Avoid generalizations that may exclude students (e.g., "when you go home for break,"
"if you have a child someday," "just walk over to my office," "it only costs $xxx").
These phrases make implicit assumptions about students' physical ability, family structure, social identities, linguistic
preferences, citizenship status, or economic means.
- #22 Give students opportunities for reflection on how their own cultural identities
relate to the content.
Register in OwlTrain
March - Making it Stick
We will be releasing a recording of the keynote presentation from the 2023 SoTL Summit
titled Making it Stick: Improving Learning with Spacing and Retrieval Practice. In this keynote address, Dr. Megan Sumeracki, co-founder of the popular website
The Learning Scientists and co-author of Understanding How We Learn: A Visual Guide, will describe two strategies--spacing and retrieval practice--that have robust evidence
to support their use during learning. After providing a brief overview of the strategies
and evidence to support their effectiveness, she will draw on The Learning Scientists'
resources to share applications of the strategies that can be used in a variety of
instructional settings, followed by a discussion of how instructors can leverage scholarship
of teaching and learning methods to investigate these strategies.
Link to recording will appear here in March
March 28 - Crafting your SoTL Conference Proposal
Hillary Steiner, Associate Director for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning,
will be hosting Crafting your SoTL Conference Proposal. This can be a great opportunity
to get a conference proposal on the research and work you are completing connected
to Expanding the NEST and more!
This workshop connects with the following practice:
- #23 Cultivate students’ sense of agency by promoting a growth mindset and metacognition.
For instance, allow for productive trial and error (e.g., through low-stakes practice
quizzes or drafts).
Register in OwlTrain
April 10 - Team-Based Learning
We invite you to join Tris Utschig's, Director for Scholarly Teaching, workshop to
experience what it might be like to work in a Team-Based Learning classroom. In Team-Based
Learning, the use of activities drives much of the instruction through extensive use
of cooperative teams to enhance learning. During the workshop, participants will experience
a number of important elements in the Team-Based Learning approach. This includes
the Readiness Assurance Process, completing team-activity worksheets, and peer review
of team members. In addition, the Tris will share anecdotal and other evidence of
how the course setup positively impacts student performance.
This workshop connects with the following practice:
- #20 Be intentional about all aspects of collaborative learning, from group formation
and composition to duration, roles, process vs. deliverables, cohesiveness, individual
vs. group accountability, providing feedback, and opportunities for reflection.
Register in OwlTrain
