The CIRTL Network: 25 Research Universities Preparing a National Faculty to Advance STEM Undergraduate Learning

研究、教学和学习一体化中心(CIRTL)于2002年在国家科学基金会的资助下成立。它的任务是扩大和丰富研究生教育和博士后准备，以便培养一支有能力和承诺实施和改进有效教学实践的国家STEM教师队伍，使所有学生都能学习。CIRTL运作的第一个十年证明，研究型大学可以有效地培养未来的教师，使他们既成为富有成效的研究人员，又成为优秀的、知识渊博的教师。CIRTL基于三个核心理念制定、实施和评估了成功的战略：作为研究的教学、学习社区和通过多样性学习。2011年，STEM的1500名未来教员参加了六所研究型大学的学习社区，这些大学组成了CIRTL网络的原型。CIRTL评估和相关研究表明，在这样的学习社区中，未来的STEM教师可以有效地使用和推进高影响力的教学实践，并在他们被聘用为新教师后继续这样做。2011年秋天，CIRTL网络扩大到包括25所不同的研究型大学；这些大学总共培养了美国26%的STEM博士学位。这些合作伙伴正在合作，在所有25所大学建立跨学科学习社区，显然可以为未来在本科教育中使用和改进最佳实践的教员做好准备。拟议的学习社区的共同特征包括教学作为研究的经验，导师培训，博士后教学和学习准备，使用CIRTL核心思想作为新的和现有计划的统一框架，加强教学助理计划的概念，以及促进代表不足的群体的参与。作为这一规模扩大的一部分，正在开发一个跨网络学习社区，以吸引所有25所大学的多样性和专业知识，进行教学、指导、共享学习、学术探索和未来教师的跨学科合作。CIRTL还致力于成为一个可持续发展的社区。它致力于试验和研究组织、行政和财务结构，审查在信息技术和评估方法方面的有希望的发展，以支持未来可扩展到更多大学的制度化的CIRTL网络。预计25所成员大学的CIRTL学习社区每年将培养7000名研究生和博士后研究员，其中2200人预计每年完成博士工作。这一收益率相当于目前全国STEM教师毕业6年的生产率的25%。通过国家计算机技术教育与培训网络论坛、网站、出版物、跨STEM学科的演讲以及与STEM学科学会和国家高等教育组织的合作，该网络将对该网络以外的大学的研究生教育产生影响。CIRTL网络的数量可能会增加。还有相当数量的研究型大学表示有兴趣加入该网络。

The Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching, and Learning (CIRTL) began in 2002 with a grant from the National Science Foundation. Its mission is to broaden and enrich graduate education and post-doctoral preparation in order to develop a national STEM faculty with the capability and commitment to implement and improve effective teaching practices for the learning of all students. The first decade of operation of CIRTL has demonstrated that research universities can effectively prepare future faculty to be both productive researchers and excellent, knowledgeable teachers. CIRTL has developed, implemented, and evaluated successful strategies based on three core ideas: Teaching as Research, learning communities, and learning-through-diversity. In 2011, 1500 future faculty across STEM participated in the learning communities of the six research universities that comprise the prototype CIRTL Network. CIRTL evaluations and associated research on efforts to prepare future faculty indicate that future STEM faculty in such learning communities can effectively use and advance high impact teaching and learning practices and continue to do so once they are hired as new members of the faculty. In Fall 2011 the CIRTL Network expanded to include 25 diverse research universities; together these universities produce 26% of the STEM Ph.D.s in the United States. These partners are collaborating to establish interdisciplinary learning communities at all 25 universities that can demonstrably prepare future faculty who use and improve best practices in undergraduate education. Common features of the proposed learning communities include teaching-as-research experiences, mentor training, post-doctoral preparation in teaching and learning, use of CIRTL core ideas as a unifying framework for new and existing programs, conceptual strengthening of teaching assistant programs, and facilitation of participation from underrepresented groups. As part of this scale-up a cross-Network learning community is being developed to engage the diversity and expertise of all 25 universities for teaching, mentoring, shared learning, scholarly exploration, and cross-disciplinary collaboration of future faculty. CIRTL is also engaged in efforts to become a sustainable community. It is engaged in piloting and studying organizational, administrative, and financial structures, examining promising developments in information technology and evaluation methods that support an institutionalized CIRTL Network that is scalable to larger numbers of universities in the future. The CIRTL learning communities in the 25 member universities are expected to educate 7,000 graduate students and post-doctoral fellows each year, of whom 2,200 are estimated to complete their doctoral work annually. This yield is comparable to 25% of the current national production rate of STEM faculty 6 years out of graduate school. Through national CIRTL Forums, web sites, publications, presentations across STEM disciplines, and collaborations with STEM disciplinary societies and national higher education organizations, the CIRTL Network will impact graduate education in universities beyond the Network. The CIRTL Network Is likely to grow in number. A significant number of additional research universities have expressed interest in joining the network.