Resumen de Exploring the role of the instructional skills workshop (isw) in shaping “backstage” conversations about teaching
M. Agnew, JANET EVANOVICH
Since 2015, our institution (a Canadian university) has been engaged in a five-year internationalpartnership with a Caribbean community college. A central component of this partnership is a facultydevelopment program set to building capacity and teaching skills at the college, through the provisionof an internationally recognized professional certification program known as the InstructionalSkills Workshop (ISW). The ISW is designed to enhance the teaching effectiveness of both new and experiencededucators, by strengthening content delivery skills and cultivating student-centered teachingpractices (ISW Network, 2019).While the ISW has trained thousands of post-secondary instructors globally, research on its impacton teaching practice and on its sustainability over time has been limited (Dawson et al., 2014). In orderto address the need for more evidence on the impact of the ISW, semi-structured interviews were conductedwith twelve faculty members from the college who were enrolled in the program. In these interviewsthey shared their approaches to teaching, their experience as an ISW participant, and the potentialapplication of the ISW to their teaching practice.Informed by research on conversations that occur in the “backstage of teaching” (Roxå & Mårtensson,2009) as well as what Friberg (2016) describes as a new 4M Framework for SoTL (micro-individual;meso-department; macro-institution; mega-beyond institution), this presentation explores the capacityof the ISW to foster an institutional culture of teaching and learning. Our research found that participationin the ISW can encourage the development of supportive cohorts of instructors, that discuss andeven hold one another accountable for implementing practices from the ISW in their classrooms. Ourfindings also indicate however that these conversations often do not transcend the “meso” level, andare confined to pre-existing networks of departmental colleagues who have taken the ISW together.As a widely-used professional program for faculty development, it is important to assess the efficacyof the ISW as a potential catalyst for broad and sustainable teaching enhancement. This session willinvite participants to share their experience with similar faculty development programs, and initiate abroader discussion on how such programs can foster “backstage” conversations about teaching.
