New Educators Roundtable

New Educators Roundtable - SIGCSE 2011

By learning you will teach, by teaching you will learn.
-- Latin Proverb

New to teaching? Seeking advice and mentorship? Join us at the New Educators Roundtable (NER), a half-day workshop designed to mentor college and university faculty who are new to teaching. We welcome participants from across the entire teaching spectrum: tenure-track faculty at institutions where teaching is central, teaching-track faculty and lecturers, and graduate students who currently teach or are looking forward to an academic career. Come with your questions and concerns, learn from the experiences and best practices of sage elders, and build an international support group for your career. The roundtable will be held 1:00-5:30 on Wednesday, March 9, 2011 (with lunch from 12:00-1:00), immediately before the SIGCSE Symposium.

Background

Despite the important role teaching plays in many academic careers, the reality is that many new teachers receive only minimal (if any) teacher training. To become an effective teacher, you have a wide array of tasks to master: organizing a coherent course, delivering engaging lectures, designing worthwhile assignments, managing course logistics, working well with students, juggling priorities, and more. What are the strategies and tactics of successful teachers that you can adopt? How can you avoid having to learn what does and doesn't work the hard way? The roundtable will bring new educators together with experienced colleagues in a small-group setting to "dig deep" on these issues in a nurturing and informal setting.

Format

The roundtable will be broken into several sessions. Each session will focus on a range of topics, and will be facilitated by senior faculty who will share their experiences, tips, successes, and missteps. Attendees will be encouraged to steer the discussion to those questions they find most pressing and important to their situations. It is hoped that participants will form an informal "support group" social network that will extend beyond the conference.