While Engineering values direct communication, indirect communication produces a kind of literacy salient for engineers that direct communication may not offer in the way indirect communication does. This article emphasizes the inadequacies of overly emphasizing direct communication for Engineering majors and explains how teaching indirect…

Higher education is ripe for innovation. While emerging technological developments such as digital courseware and mobiles apps have made it easier than ever for people to engage with learning resources, significant issues of access and equity persist among students from low-income, minority, single-parent families, and other disadvantaged groups.…

Since 2005, the first-year engineering program at Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, has been significantly restructured to include more hands-on learning. A major grant (2004-2009) under the department level reform (DLR) program of the National Science Foundation (NSF) facilitated this restructuring. A number of hands-on learning modules were developed…

In 2004, a group of engineering and education faculty at Virginia Tech received a major curriculum reform and engineering education research grant under the department-level reform (DLR) program of the NSF. This DLR project laid the foundation of sponsored research in engineering education in the Department of Engineering Education. The DLR…

By integrating and infusing computer learning technologies wisely into student-centered or social constructivist art learning environments, art educators can improve student learning and at the same time provide a creative, substantive model for how schools can and should be reformed. By doing this, art educators have an opportunity to demonstrate…

The first stage of implementing the middle-school concept in York County, Virginia, involved moving sixth-grade teachers and students into middle schools and onto teams. One school integrated the curriculum by involving teachers in initial planning stages aligned with schoolwide goals. Curriculum integration succeeds when driven by teachers and…

In the first decade of the 21st century, the nation, the states, and colleges and universities began to grapple with the challenges of globalization, changing demography, the implications of the digital era, and of a less expansive public sector. Although not a transformative period for higher education, the decade saw significant innovations in…

This issue of the Center's "Systems Newsletter" will be the last one published under the aegis of Dr. JoyceVanTassel-Baska, the Center's founder and current Executive Director. As of this August Dr. VanTassel-Baska will officially retire from the College of William and Mary and the Center. She will still be an integral part of the Center…

Maintains that the National Geography Standards provide an opportunity to forge close relationships with teacher preparation programs. Reports on strategies used by the Virginia Geographic Alliance to produce regional, cross-disciplinary teams. Includes a table outlining the goals of Virginia's "Geographic for Life" Institutes. (CFR)

The authors describe how their institution revised its general education writing curriculum and how that change not only affected the university's approach to advanced composition but also transformed the roles and relationships among teachers, librarians, literacy practices, curricula, students, and the community. Part service-learning, part…

This report documents a 2-year research and development project aimed at determining the effects of interdisciplinary teamed instruction (ITI) on teaching and learning. The study also sought to validate the effectiveness of a professional development model that would facilitate development, implementation, and evaluation of ITI. Through summer…