2025 Course Design Institute

NACE, the National Association for Colleges and Employers, has identified the eight most crucial skills for new professionals to demonstrate career readiness.

This session will introduce the NACE competencies, discuss why they are important to student career success, and highlight ways to incorporate competency development in courses. Join us for an interactive discussion on ways to enhance current curricula that support skill development opportunities for students.

Connections with the Course Design Institute theme: In addition, as AI usage becomes more prevalent on college campuses and in the job search, we will cover ethical ways that students can leverage AI as they prepare for their future careers.

Engaging Students in the Course Design Process  

Presenters:  

• Eliza M. Blau, Instructional Design and Technology Specialist, School of Arts and Sciences Office of Undergraduate Education  

• Pauline Carpenter, Instructional Design and Technology Specialist, School of Arts and Sciences Office of Undergraduate Education  

In this workshop, you will consider ways to bring student voice into your course design process. We will explore the principles of design justice and equity-minded teaching, focusing on practical strategies like Classroom Assessment Techniques (CATs) and co-design. Learn how to effectively gather student feedback on their learning processes and partner with students to shape aspects of your course. By the end of this workshop, you will get started with an implementation plan that you can consider for your course design project.  

Connections with the Course Design Institute theme: We intend to discuss teaching and GenAI throughout the session. For example, we plan to discuss how you can co-create an AI policy for your course, ensuring all student voices are heard and students are more empowered to consider how AI use may help or hurt their learning process. Our session also presents various ways to enhance metacognition among learners, which we believe is an important skill in the face of AI. Metacognition exercises provide instructors with low-stakes ways to assess learning and promote a growth mindset, which can deter instances of academic integrity violations, and we will be intentional about drawing these connections. 

Teaching Byrne First-Year Seminars

Panelists:

• John Evans, Associate Chair, Dance
• Nicole Houser, Assistant Dean for Curriculum Internationalization, Rutgers Global-Study Abroad
• Megan Lotts, Art Librarian
• Aaron Mazzeo, Associate Professor, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
• Christopher Manente, Executive Director, Rutgers Center for Adult Autism Services

Moderators:

• James Register, Sr. Program Administrator, Byrne Family First-Year Seminars

Byrne Seminars are designed to introduce first-year students to academic inquiry and faculty research. The program’s format gives faculty the opportunity to create a completely unique seminar that focuses on their area of expertise.

This session will feature a panel of faculty who have taught some of the program’s most popular seminars. The discussion will cover topics including how to develop a Byrne Seminar, strategies for engaging a first-year student audience, and how to integrate experiential learning into the one-credit course format.

Connections with the Course Design Institute theme: Panelists will be asked how they have navigated teaching and generative AI.

SoTL in an Hour: Turning your Course (Re)design into a Research Project

Presenters:

• Crystal Quillen, Assistant Director of Teaching and Learning Scholarship, Institute for Teaching, Innovation, and Inclusive Pedagogy
• Douglas Cantor, Teaching Instructor, Political Science
• Sheila Tabanli, Assistant Teaching Professor, Mathematics

This workshop will explore how you can turn your course (re)design into a Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) project. This session is designed to ignite your interest and highlight the meaningful impact SoTL can have on your students’ learning. With an emphasis on generative AI in research (e.g., brainstorming, SoTL methodologies, assessment), attendees will develop SoTL-related questions pertinent to their respective courses and initial ideas for how to implement a research study. Participants will also be invited to work with the Institute for Teaching, Innovation, & Inclusive Pedagogy for ongoing project support. Additionally, two Rutgers faculty members will share their experiences and insights on how they have conducted research in their own classrooms. We look forward to a collaborative exchange of ideas that will enhance our understanding of effective teaching practices.

Connections with the Course Design Institute theme: We will discuss generative AI use in research brainstorming and developing research questions. Rutgers faculty will discuss how they are researching GenAI use in students.

Are you looking for ways to engage students in learning in your course? Are you wondering how you might use generative AI as a tool to engage students? Then join this session to learn about and discuss specific classroom examples shared by Rutgers faculty colleagues. Building on the discussion of designing significant learning experiences (e.g., Backward Design, Universal Design for Learning, etc.), this session will model some strategies and tools that can be leveraged to structure and design student engagement in class. You will also have the opportunity to identify strategies that are applicable to your own course contexts.

Connections with the Course Design Institute theme: This session will address how generative AI might impact student learning and how it might be used as a tool to engage students in learning. Specific examples (and demos as time allows) will be shared for further discussion.