Instructional Development

Instructional Development

 

Digital badges are awarded upon successful completion of requirements. The badges can be shared electronically for your teaching portfolio and other professional networks. For more information or to enroll, contact the Faculty Resource Center at frc@uccs.edu.

View all Badges available at UCCS.

Program Benefits

Anyone who plans to teach or is already teaching a course at UCCS is eligible to participate in our programs, including full-time, part-time, and honoraria faculty, and faculty with special appointments.

  • Explore "best-practice" pedagogies of teaching and learning in higher education that enhance student engagement and retention
  • Foster faculty collaboration across the campus in discussions about the scholarship of teaching
  • Encourage innovative and high impact teaching practices
  • Work with a Faculty Resource Center Instructional Designer to create a personalized learning plan that capitalizes on your own learning preferences and professional goals for teaching in the classroom or online
Open Educational Resources (OER) SUCCESS Program

The OER SUCCESS Program runs annually beginning in the summer and is composed of three phases: Awareness/Review, Educator Adoption and Redesign, and Creation/adaptation. For each phase, there is a corresponding course that may be taken asynchronously or synchronously to guide participants in the retainment, reuse, revision, remix, and redistribution of OER.

Limited stipends funded by the UCCS Campus Store are available for qualified applicants. The application period runs April – May each year. Otherwise, enrollment in the program is open throughout the year and may be requested by emailing frc@uccs.edu.

Explore more about OER at UCCS.

Put Your Professional Development Hours to Work For You!

The Teaching Enhancement Badge Program provides opportunities to research and apply innovative teaching strategies or practices to one's teaching. Badge earners will apply up to five teaching strategies or practices to a course objective, activity, or assessment, evaluate the success of the teaching practice in the course, and share experiences with colleagues. Annually, earners can create a Teaching Enhancement Plan that focuses on teaching goals and unique interest tracks toward completing a digital badge. Earners can expect to spend a total of 24-36 hours earning one badge.

Self-enroll in the program to begin completing your Teaching Enhancement Plan. Questions can be directed to frc@uccs.edu.

Teaching Online Program

The Teaching Online Program is divided into a series of four focus areas: Online Course Design, Design with Accessibility in Mind, Online Facilitation, and Quality Assurance offered in an asynchronous or hyflex, in-person format. Each course is grounded in the quality assurance components known as the UCCS OSCQR rubric containing standards for compliant online courses. Paired with an instructional designer, participants can expect to spend 24-36 hours over a recommended six-week period per course, plus course design and building time. Faculty may choose to participate in only one or up to all four levels. Only one course may be pursued at a time.

This summer the Faculty Resource Center is offering limited participation in the program so emphasis on digital accessibility can be the center’s main area of faculty support of online teaching. Faculty who are currently enrolled in the TOP and wish to continue their journey and those interested in the Design with Accessibility in Mind course are invited to participate and work asynchronously online or through pre-arranged one-on-one consultations with an FRC instructional designer. Otherwise, the program will open for full participation in Fall 2024 as follows:

Online Course Design

Online Course Design focuses on alignment of course and module objectives with course learning material, activities, and assessments, an accessible course syllabus, and setting up a pre-course, a getting started, and three content modules.

  • Fall 2024 online, asynchronous option: September 3 – October 1
  • Fall 2024 synchronous workshop series option: Fridays, 2:00-4:00 pm, September 6 – October 4, Columbine 203
Design with Accessibility in Mind Workshop Series

Design with Accessibility in Mind focuses on digital accessibility and universal design for learning principles. Emphasis is on incorporating multiple forms of representation, engagement, and student action and expression, as well as meeting digital accessibility requirements.

  • Fall 2024 online, asynchronous option: October 7-28
  • Fall 2024 synchronous workshop series option: Fridays: 2:00-4:00 pm: October 11 - November 1, Columbine 203
Online Facilitation

Online Facilitation targets establishing instructor, social, and cognitive presence in an online course through identifying five issues encountered in online teaching related to those areas, proposing solutions to those issues, and then planning for the implementation of those solutions. Participants work with a partner guided with an FRC instructional designer.

  • Fall 2024 online, asynchronous option: November 4-22
  • Fall 2024 synchronous workshop series option: Fridays: 2:00-4:00 pm, November 8-22, Columbine 203
Design for Quality Assurance

Design for Quality Assurance is designed for self- and formal evaluations of an online course using the UCCS OSCQR rubric. The rubric is composed of six sections of quality assurance standards used to closely examine and revise course content and include: Course Alignment, Getting Started and Module Overviews, Organization and Representation, Accessible Course Design, Engagement and Interaction, and Assessment and Feedback. Faculty may participate in this course as the final phase of the TOP (reduces time commitment by approximately half) or to certify an existing online course for quality assurance.

Register for the in-person workshops or asynchronous online courses by emailing frc@uccs.edu with your participation preference.

Universal Design for Inclusive Teaching (UDIT)

The full program begins in the summer when participants work through the learning components of the UDIT course and plan for implementation of selected inclusive teaching strategies into a fall course. There are also two opportunities to participate synchronously throughout the summer as follows:

Throughout the implementation phase, participants are asked to track and measure student impact of these strategies and then share out the results in an FRC-sponsored event. Participants may then continue their UDIT journey by selecting another area of focus.

Please complete the 2024-2025 UDIT Program Application if interested in participating.