Pre-Symposium Workshop

Workshop #1

9:00AM - 12:00PM
Thursday, November 23, 2023

Mapping SoTL the Journeys of SoTL Scholars: Planning for the Personal Context

Melanie Hamilton, EdD

University of Saskatchewan

Cherie Woolmer, PhD

Mount Royal University

Anna Santucci, PhD

University College Cork

This pre-conference workshop aims to foster active engagement among participants in the transformative shift of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) community. Academics are entering SoTL at various career stages, experiencing transformative shifts in interdisciplinary identities (Santucci & Nasrollahian, 2022). Mid-career faculty (Hamilton, 2022) and postdocs (Woolmer & Suh, 2022) increasingly engage in SoTL, seeking research networks and expanding knowledge beyond disciplines. The participatory research model involving students as partners has provided students with a scholarly home in SoTL and career opportunities.

This evolution challenges traditional roles and transforms expertise perceptions within and beyond SoTL. A noticeable shift indicates more individuals intentionally choosing SoTL as a career, aligned with Boyer's (1990) vision, influenced by diverse national contexts and institutional factors. This raises important questions about envisioning and planning programs that accommodate diverse experiences and expectations, focusing on individual developmental pathways. Informed by research and national efforts in Canada and Ireland, the workshop invites participants to reflect on their contexts and envision potential SoTL career trajectories. Embracing this changing landscape fosters an inclusive and robust SoTL community empowering educators and students


Workshop #2

1:30PM - 4:30PM
Thursday, November 23, 2023

SoTL as collective leadership: Designing SoTL projects to engage colleagues and students as partners towards improving teaching and learning

Joshua Hill, PhD

Mount Royal University

Do you aspire to take up a shared SoTL project with colleagues and/or students? Engaging in SoTL with a team has many benefits including: enlisting diverse perspectives; learning from one another's teaching, research, and disciplinary knowledge and experience; and sharing the research workload across a team. Furthermore, collaborative SoTL projects can transform teaching and learning in a course, department, or faculty.  Key to reaching this potential is collective leadership and creating the conditions for agency, voice, and contribution by all. In this workshop we will work together to conceptualize and sketch out collaborative SoTL projects. Josh (the workshop facilitator) will draw on collective leadership literature and his experience of engaging in collaborative SoTL work to help you frame a potential project and consider how you might develop protocols and ways of working to create a space for diverse perspectives, and facilitate effective collaboration. You will leave this workshop with a project concept and pitch to kick start SoTL as collective leadership in your context.


Workshop #3

1:30PM - 4:30PM
Thursday, November 23, 2023

Knowledge Mobilization and Translation in SoTL

Erika Smith, PhD

Mount Royal University

Richard Hayman, MA, MLIS

Mount Royal University

An important yet often underutilized part of realizing impact in our scholarship comes via knowledge mobilization (KM) and knowledge translation (KT) processes, where researchers engage in intentional strategies to connect with a diversity of audiences and to apply scholarly findings in ways that facilitate real-world impacts to policy and/or practice, expanding beyond traditional academic settings. In order to foster KM and KT in SoTL practices and in research promotion generally, necessary in the context of today’s digital environments, an online presence is a critical component of successfully achieving, and promoting, impact in our scholarship. In this workshop, we will outline strategies for engaging different knowledge audiences through open and public KM and KT outputs (e.g., publications, graphics, websites, profile tools, etc.), and through both active and engaged online activities. Using the strategies presented, participants will have a hands-on opportunity to learn and apply skills and techniques that aim to increase the visibility and impact of their scholarship.  

As this is a hands-on workshop using digital technologies, participants should come prepared with a laptop. If you do not have access please contact the workshop facilitators in advance so that one can be provided.