Would you like one-on-one help to improve any aspect of teaching in your course? Would a workshop on teaching be of interest? Want to improve student learning experiences through active learning? Looking for local funding to transform your teaching by improving or fully redesigning a course? Or do you need help with an writing a teaching or outreach component of a grant proposal?

Individual Consultations

MTEI offers individual consultations to faculty for any discussion of teaching in their courses. Contact us to get started. We can consult on these topics and many more:

• I’m teaching a new course. How should I plan for it?
• Something isn’t working in my existing course. What should I do to improve?
• Oh no, a crisis! I need help right away from someone who understands.
• I’m intrigued by active learning and want to pilot it on a small scale in my course. Or, I want to go all the way with it.
• I’d like to try out classroom polling with iClicker or Poll Everywhere, but I’m not sure how to get started or how much effort it will take. (Spoiler: not much.)
• I need help with technology in my classroom.

Workshops

MTEI offers a variety of workshops each year to help you transform the teaching in your courses.

Active Learning

Active learning is an evidence-based teaching practice that can improve student learning outcomes. It can also make lectures a lot more fun! Providing training and support for active learning is part of the core mission of MTEI.

• MTEI has a page dedicated to active learning. So does CTI.
• MTEI has offered several workshops on active learning:
  • At ETD’22: Active Learning
  • At ETD’23: Active Learning — Basics, and Active Learning — Beyond Think-Pair-Share.
• Cornell’s Active Learning Initiative funds courses to implement active learning.

Course Improvement Grants

There are several funding opportunities available locally at Cornell to support your work in improving your courses.

• CRISTEL (Course Redesign Initiative to Support Teaching for Engaged Learning) is program administered by MTEI. CRISTEL provides funding of up to $45,000 over a period of two years to redesign core courses. Redesign projects must significantly increase the use of active learning or other research-based pedagogies that improve student engagement and learning. View the CRISTEL 2024 Request for Proposals.
• Cornell’s ALI (Active Learning Initiative) awards substantial funding to departments to implement active learning across multiple undergraduate courses.
• CTI Innovative Teaching & Learning Awards provide funding of up to $25,000 to explore new tools and emerging technologies, approaches, and teaching strategies.
• CTI Faculty Micro Grants provide funding of up to $1,500 for small, immediate improvements in the student learning experience.
• CTI maintains its own page of funding opportunities.

Grant Proposal Support

MTEI is available to assist you in writing teaching and outreach components of grants, such as the Broader Impacts section of NSF CAREER proposals, as well as large center proposals. We can help with assessment design, literature references, IRB requests, and more. Contact our director to get started.