Michigan State University professor James Fairweather has been nominated to serve on a new national panel focused on improving science teaching and learning at the university level.
Fairweather, who is widely known for his work on faculty roles and rewards, holds the Mildred B. Erickson Distinguished Chair in Higher, Adult and Lifelong Education at MSU. He is the only faculty member in higher education administration appointed to the 14-member National Academies of Science committee on the Status, Contributions, and Future Directions of Discipline Based Education Research.
As the committee reviews the impact of research intended to improve instruction in undergraduate courses such as chemistry, physics and biology, Fairweather hopes to bring attention to the institutional, departmental and cultural issues that can ultimately affect learning outcomes.
It is difficult to improve the quality of an engineering course, for example, if the faculty member doesn’t have incentive to do so, or colleagues in their department don’t place a high value on teaching. In his 20 years of studying reform in undergraduate science and engineering education, Fairweather has found these contextual issues often make the most difference in the success or failure of efforts to improve teaching in the sciences.
“Successful reform requires more than knowing what makes for good teaching,” he said. “It also requires that we understand how the instructional reform fits into the daily work lives of faculty members and their academic departments.”
The committee, whose work is sponsored by the National Science Foundation, is expected to issue a major report within 30 months. The first meeting is June 28 in Washington, D.C.