Center for Teaching 2020-21 Year-in-Review
by Derek Bruff, CFT Executive Director
I am excited to share the Center for Teaching’s 2020-21 Year-in-Review, now available as a PDF on our website.
When higher education pivoted to remote and online instruction in the face of COVID-19, the Vanderbilt teaching community faced the herculean task of fostering student learning during a pandemic. They confronted this challenge with resolve, creativity, and compassion. I’m proud to be a part of such a dedicated community of teachers.
The Center for Teaching, in turn, faced the challenge of helping that teaching community learn and practice the kinds of adaptive teaching they needed to navigate changing conditions. By some measures, the Center provided about ten years of programming in just four months. And all this during a year that was as tumultuous politically and socially as any I can remember.
I am honored at the trust the university teaching community placed in the Center for Teaching during this trying time, and I am proud of the work that my CFT colleagues accomplished. I am also grateful that our campus sees the value of the Center for Teaching both during crises and in more ordinary years and that the university administration has invested in a world-class teaching center.
The CFT offers a wide array of learning opportunities for the entire Vanderbilt community grounded in the scholarship on teaching and learning. These opportunities are intended to foster professional and instructional development across the disciplines. From effective uses of educational technology to methods for inclusive teaching, the CFT continued to enhance the effectiveness of Vanderbilt’s educators in this difficult year and, through them, enrich the learning experiences of our students.
In our 2020-21 Year-in-Review, readers will get a sense of the many ways the Center for Teaching supported the teaching mission of Vanderbilt University between March 2020 and June 2021. Thanks to the entire Center for Teaching team for contributing to the Year-in-Review, but thanks in particular to assistant directors Joe Bandy and Rhett McDaniel and administrative assistant Juliet Traub for their hard work creating this document.
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