About SoTL

The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) research is the systematic study of teaching and learning. It involves identifying a problem, asking a question, gathering evidence, drawing conclusions based on that evidence, and making those findings public for the benefit of others. It employs the rigor and diligence that is applied to disciplinary research. SoTL research can be conducted by faculty with any level of experience, is an excellent opportunity to improve your pedagogy, and represents a scholarly contribution.

What is SoTL?

SoTL research is often initiated based on a problem, challenge, or inquiry that an educator has experienced or anticipates experiencing in their own classroom. This is then molded into a research question that can be addressed using data as evidence. Pat Hutchings and colleagues (2000) describes four types of inquiries that can be addressed in SoTL
research:

  1. “What Works” This inquiry focuses on collecting evidence about whether or not an education intervention or approach is meeting a specific goal. Therefore, this usually involves comparing, contrasting, or evaluating how well the approach works in the classroom.
  2. “What Is” This inquiry is descriptive in nature, which means it focuses on what some phenomenon might look like in an educational context. As a few examples, this might include better understanding what students have learned (or haven’t learned) about a topic or diving deeper into students’ feelings or experiences.
  3. “Vision of the Possible” This inquiry focuses on better understanding what something could look like if an instructor were to teach it in a specific manner or do something different within the course structure.
  4. “Formulating a New Conceptual Framework” This inquiry generates new models or ways of making meaning about what is happening in the classroom. Such inquiry can help generate new research questions that extend the boundaries of SoTL work.

These four categories are not mutually exclusive. Many SoTL projects can overlap among several of these categories.

Why SoTL?

The value of SoTL (video) can be addressed from the following perspectives:

  • Provide systematic data-informed evidence about
    how students learn within and across the disciplines. 
  • Provide opportunities for faculty development and publications
  • Provide scholarly reflections on the teaching practices, program assessment, and development.
  • Create a new collaborative network.
  • Promote faculty’s growth mindset.
  • Change the academic landscape of the
    institution.
  • Help with faculty promotion.

Events

SoTL Reading Faculty Learning Communities
SoTL Hackathon
SoTL Project Development Institute
Opportunities
  • Breeden Endowment Grant
  • Student Opportunity (Graduate and undergraduate)
    • We are recruiting graduate students or undergraduates to collaborate with our SoTL faculty/staffs to implement data collection and analysis. If you are interested in joining, please reach out to the Biggio Center for further information.
Resources