Departmental Action Teams: Sustaining Improvements in Undergraduate STEM Education Through Faculty Engagement

该项目继续开展机构转型新模式的早期工作，重点是需要改变部门结构和文化，以维持改进。这一应用研究项目的主要机构重点是科罗拉多大学博尔德分校，大部分工作将在那里进行。这所大学从事STEM教育改革的历史较长。这项工作围绕着一个新型的工作组--“部门行动小组”(DAT)展开。这一团队方法是由STEM机构转型行动研究项目开发的，该项目源于该大学近十年前开始的科学教育倡议。DAT是一个自选的群体，主要由同一学术部门内的教职员工(但包括博士后和学生)组成。DATS有三个主要目标。其一是解决教育部感兴趣的教育问题。第二个相关目标是通过创造持久的结构和文化变革，保持在解决(或改进)部门问题方面取得的改进。第三个目标是为DAT成员提供协作的社区建设体验。DATS以部门为重点，由外部推动，由教员驱动，以团队为基础，专注于创造可持续的变化。目前，这所大学有六个DAT。该项目的重点是大幅扩大数字技术援助的使用，使部门驱动的体制改革成为新的常态。拟议的工作包括继续在科罗拉多大学研究和建立DAT，并将该模式扩展到科罗拉多州立大学(CSU)，看看是否可以从头开始制定法律。该项目将发展：(1)在校园教学中心(TLC)培养DAT促进者和使DAT制度化的过程，(2)关于DAT如何在不同背景下运作的理论，以及(3)文化和结构变化的衡量标准。许多关于大学组织变革的研究认为，部门文化是变革的关键。这项研究将大大有助于理解采用这一模式作为实现体制转型的有效途径的前景。

This project continues early work on a new model for institutional transformation through focusing on the need to shift departmental structures and culture to sustain improvements. The main institutional focus for this applied research project is the University of Colorado at Boulder where most of this work will take place. This University has a relatively long history of efforts to engage in STEM education reform. The work centers on a new type of working group, a "Departmental Action Team" (DAT). This team approach was developed by the STEM Institutional Transformation Action Research project, which grew out of the Science Education Initiative at this University that began nearly a decade ago. A DAT is a self-selected group comprised mostly of faculty (but including post docs and students) within a single academic department. DATs serve three main goals. One is to address an educational issue of interest to the department. A second and related goal is to sustain improvements made in solving (or improving) a departmental issue by creating lasting structural and cultural changes. The third goal is to provide a collaborative, community-building experience for DAT members. DATs are departmentally-focused, externally facilitated, faculty-driven, team-based, and focused on creating sustainable changes. Currently this University has six DATs. The focus of this project is to expand substantially the use of DATs to the point where departmentally-driven institutional transformation becomes the new norm. The proposed work involves continuing to study and form DATs at the University of Colorado and expanding the model to Colorado State University (CSU) to see if a clean slate enactment can work. This project will develop: (1) a process for enculturating DAT facilitators and institutionalizing DATs in campus Teaching and Learning Centers (TLCs), (2) a theory of how DATs operate in different contexts, and (3) cultural and structural change metrics. Much research on change in university organizations identifies departmental culture as the lynchpin of change. This study will contribute substantially to understanding the prospects for adopting this model as an effective way to achieve institutional transformation.