Collaborative Research: Investigating Contextual Factors that Impact Early-Career Faculty Teaching Practice

Public and private funding agencies invest in large-scale professional development programs for biology faculty, yet little is known about how those investments pay out over the long term, particularly in early-career faculty.

This project investigates innovative teaching practices by early career faculty in biology departments nationwide. It will determine whether investments in faculty training result in sustained changes in instructional approaches and improved student learning.

This study will identify the variables at departmental and institutional levels that affect the teaching practice of early career faculty. Specifically, it will provide evidence for how organizational structures can sustain educational innovation among all faculty and inform movements that focus on departments as the unit of change in undergraduate science education.

We focus on 80 early-career faculty at four major institution types and evaluate the role of organizational factors in supporting and sustaining instructional change.