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Ten UDL Moves to Improve Your Semester

Date: Monday, August 17
Time: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Zoom (link will be sent in advance)
Facilitator: Liz Norell

According to , Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is “a framework to improve and optimize teaching and learning based on what we know about the human brain.” In this session, you’ll get ten ideas on how to build your course in an accessible way from the start, drawing on the three components of UDL: engagement, representation, and action & expression. You’ll leave with ideas on creating a smoother experience this fall—for you AND for your students.

Using Poll Everywhere for Student Engagement and Attendance

Date: Monday, August 17 OR Thursday, August 20
Time: 2:00-3:00 pm
Location: Zoom (link will be sent in advance)
Facilitators: CETL team, in collaboration with FTDC

ÌÇÐÄTV¹ÙÍø has recently contracted for a one-year subscription to Poll Everywhere, and the tool is now integrated in Blackboard with unlimited use for faculty and students. Poll Everywhere is primarily a pedagogical classroom response system, though it can also be used to record student attendance. In this workshop, we’ll walk you through the basics of how to use Poll Everywhere to help facilitate learning in your courses, with a special focus on a research-validated strategy called Peer Instruction.

CETL will host two identical workshops on Poll Everywhere this week. We recommend choosing one to attend.

Syllabus Boot Camp: Crafting New Language with the CETL Syllabus Template

Date: Wednesday, August 19
Time: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Zoom (link will be sent in advance)
Facilitator: Emily Pitts Donahoe

Looking for some last-minute syllabus inspiration? Join us for syllabus boot camp. In the first part of this session, we’ll share CETL’s updated 2026-27 syllabus template, which contains suggested language for a range of course policies as well as information on relevant university requirements. We’ll then provide time for attendees to work on their own syllabi. At the end of the session, you’ll have a chance to exchange syllabus language with others and share any questions or concerns you have about your syllabus. Whether you’re working on last minute tune-ups or creating a new syllabus from scratch, this session is for you!

Course Design: What Do You Want Your Students to Remember in 20 Years?

Date: Thursday, August 20
Time: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Zoom (link will be sent in advance)
Facilitator: Josh Eyler

When we design courses, we are so deep in the weeds of learning outcomes and assignments that it can be difficult to look beyond our goals for the semester. In reality, though, most of our students will not major in our fields or pursue careers in our disciplines. What, then, do we want them to take away from our courses to benefit their lives after college? What do we want them to remember in 20 years? This workshop takes these questions as our framing for thinking about the structure and objectives for our courses.

Facilitating Effective Classroom Discussions: A Tried-and-True Way to Maximize Student Learning and Engagement

Date: Wednesday, September 2
Time: 12:00-12:50 pm
Location: Johnson Commons East Ballroom
Facilitator: Josh Eyler

One of the oldest, and still most effective, teaching strategies available to us in our work with students is facilitating meaningful class discussions. Here’s the catch, though: discussion-based pedagogy is powerful but difficult to get right. Sometimes a discussion really takes off, and sometimes it falls a bit short of our goals. In this workshop, we’ll explore different ways to structure a discussion, how and why to communicate our expectations for the importance of discussion, and what we are hearing from students about the obstacles that impede their participation in discussions.

Lunch will be provided for registered participants. Please register by Wednesday, August 26th.

The K-12 Landscape and College Student Preparation: A Panel Discussion

Date: Wednesday, September 16
Time: 12:00-12:50 pm
Location: Johnson Commons East Ballroom
Panelists: Joel Amidon (Teacher Education), Nicole Roberson (Teacher Education), and Candies Winfun-Cook (Teacher Education)
Moderator: Josh Eyler

As college educators, we often want to better understand our students’ K-12 educational experiences and backgrounds. In this faculty panel, we’ll be taking steps toward doing just that by exploring what is happening in the K-12 world right now and how knowing more about the current state of K-12 curricula, practices, student experiences, etc. might help us as college teachers. Joining us to discuss these issues will be three colleagues from the Department of Teacher Education in our School of Education, who will share what they have seen during their work supervising pre-service teachers, observing K-12 classrooms, and teaching both college and K-12 students.

Lunch will be provided for registered participants. Please register by Wednesday, September 9th.

What Better Teaching Can Do, with guest speaker Dr. David Gooblar

Date: Wednesday, September 23
Time: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Johnson Commons East Ballroom
Facilitator: Dr. David Gooblar, Associate Professor of English and Director of General Education Literature at the University of Iowa

What can institutions do to help marginalized students succeed? Our most vulnerable students often struggle in college if their professors do not take into account their lives outside the classroom door. On the other hand, their difficulties can be exacerbated if institutional decision-makers don't take into account what happens inside the classroom. In this interactive session, participants will consider the factors that influence whether students succeed—or whether they don’t. We’ll look at educational research on inequitable academic outcomes and think about what lessons we might learn. And we’ll reflect upon the “psychological situation” that governs the lives of our most vulnerable students and think about how instructors can better respond to those students’ needs. Participants can expect to leave the session brimming with ideas for their classes, recommitted to the idea that caring for our students’ whole selves is an imperative if we want them to reach their full potential.

Lunch will be provided for registered participants. Please register by September 16.

The Ethics of Using AI as Instructors: A Community Conversation

Date: Wednesday, September 30
Time: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Johnson Commons East Ballroom
Facilitators: Emily Pitts Donahoe, with Marc Watkins (Academic Innovations Group) and Danielle Clevenger (Center for Practical Ethics)

Students aren’t the only ones who are using AI to complete their work these days: many instructors are considering whether, and how, to use AI assistance in designing courses and assessments, planning lessons, and even grading and giving feedback on student work. These practices can be controversial, and they raise many ethical concerns. This session, sponsored by CETL as well as the Academic Innovations Group and the Center for Practical Ethics, will take the form of a community conversation in which we’ll consider the ethical implications of various AI use cases in teaching. Our aim is to help attendees develop a better sense of their own boundaries around AI use and to create a starting point for larger conversations about AI and ethics within departments, schools, and the university as a whole. 

Lunch will be provided for registered participants. Please register by Wednesday, September 23.

Answering Your Most Pressing Disability/Accessibility Questions

Date: Wednesday, October 14th
Time: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Johnson Commons East Ballroom
Presenter: Liz Norell

In a recent survey, instructors around the world articulated what would most help them provide required student accommodations. In this session, we’ll review the findings from that study and answer instructors’ most pressing requests for assistance. Among the topics we’ll discuss are:

• Better understanding the process by which students apply for and receive disability accommodations
• Hypothetical case studies illustrating how the most common accommodations might support students
• Course design strategies that can create less access friction for all students

Attendees will also be invited to share what kinds of resources would help them provide accommodations.

Lunch will be provided for registered participants. Please register here by October 7.

Effective and Compassionate Strategies for Low- (and No-) Tech Assessments

Date: Wednesday, October 21
Time: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Johnson Commons East Ballroom
Facilitator: Emily Pitts Donahoe

Since the arrival of generative AI, more and more faculty are exploring analog approaches in their classrooms. Many are interested in assessing students through low- or no-tech options like oral exams or in-class writing. But students often find these kinds of assessments never-wracking, and they can be tricky to implement effectively. In this session, we’ll share research on oral exams and in-class writing and introduce novel strategies for implementation—including some recently employed by actual UM faculty.

Lunch will be provided for registered participants. Please register here by Wednesday, October 14.

Faculty Reading Group—10 to 25: The Science of Motivating Young People

Dates: Fridays, September 25, October 16, November 6
Times: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Zoom (link will be sent in advance)
Facilitators: Liz, Emily, and Josh

Each fall, CETL hosts a faculty book club to bring instructors across campus together to read and learn. This fall, we’ll tackle the book , by David Yeager. Sessions will be held via Zoom on three Fridays during the fall semester. 

Register for the reading group by Friday, September 4. Books can be picked up from CETL in Hill Hall 105 after you submit your registration.

Learn more about the Faculty Reading Group here. 

Graduate Reading Group—One Classroom at a Time

Dates: Fridays, September 18, October 9, November 13
Times: 12:00-1:00 pm
Location: Zoom (link will be sent in advance)
Facilitators: Emily Pitts Donahoe, with Alejandro Garcia, Samuel Junior Osei-Nketiah, and Anna Platt

This semester, the Graduate Reading Group will tackle the book , by David Gooblar. Registered graduate students will receive a paperback copy of the book, and pizza will be provided for lunch. 

This semester, members of the reading group are also invited to attend a breakfast and conversation with the book’s author, David Gooblar, on Wednesday, September 23 at 10:00 am in Hill Hall 117. 

Join us to learn more about college teaching and connect with fellow graduate TAs, instructors, and aspiring educators. Register by Friday, August 28. 

Learn more about the Graduate Reading Group here. 

Fundamentals of Teaching: A Learning Community for Graduate TAs and Instructors

Dates: Thursdays, August 27, September 24, October 22, November 12
Time: 9:30-10:45 am
Location: JD Williams Library Room 103
Facilitators: Emily Pitts Donahoe, with Alejandro Garcia, Samuel Junior Osei-Nketiah, and Anna Platt

Want some extra support while teaching, TAing, or preparing to teach as a graduate student? Register for the Fundamentals of Teaching Learning Community to hone your teaching practice, build community with other graduate teachers, and get access to CETL resources and expertise for the entire term. We’ll meet regularly to talk about setting the tone for your course or section, planning effective lessons, grading and assessment, and student feedback. We’ll also connect with one another during regular coffee hours to reflect, troubleshoot, share resources, and provide real-time teaching support.

Register by Tuesday, August 25.

Learn more about Fundamentals of Teaching here. 

Student Reading Learning Community

Dates: TBD
Facilitator: Liz Norell

Faculty report today’s students are not engaging in course readings beyond a few pages in length. Recognizing that this is a complex challenge in the current environment, CETL aims to bring together a group interested in examining the scope of undergraduate attitudes about course readings. This group will set its specific agenda, but we broadly expect that it will: 

• Explore existing literature and research that discusses student reading compliance.
• Gather feedback from UM undergraduate students about their reading habits, preferences, and barriers.
• Inform CETL programming to help instructors introduce and structure course readings to improve student engagement with those materials.

Participation in this learning community is open to anyone in the University of Mississippi community (students/faculty/staff at any rank) interested in addressing this challenge. Learning community members should be available for approximately 2-3 hours per month (including one monthly meeting and 1-2 hours of asynchronous or small-group work) from September-November and February-April. If there is sufficient interest, members of this group may opt to generate publishable research out of their work.

Learn more about Faculty Learning Communities here. 

Course Digital Accessibility Training Sessions in August

Join the Digital Accessibility team in August for training sessions focused on enhancing the accessibility of Fall semester course content in Blackboard. 

The Digital Accessibility team will host three training sessions per week via Zoom from August 3^rd through August 21^st to share practical strategies and helpful tools to help you make your course materials more accessible and usable for all students. View descriptions, the full schedule, and register for sessions in MyOleMiss – Employee Tab – Tools & Resources - Training Workshops. 

• Accessibility Basics will be held on Mondays (8/3, 8/10, 8/17) from 1pm to 2pm
• Increase the Accessibility of Course Materials on Wednesdays (8/5, 8/12, 8/19) from 1pm to 2:15pm
• Increase the Accessibility of Materials in STEM Courses on Fridays (8/7, 8/14, 8/21) from 1pm to 2:15pm

Browse Digital Accessibility trainings here or consult the Course Accessibility Toolkit here. For more information or to schedule a session, please reach out to Jennifer Bland at jbland@olemiss.edu

Academic Outreach: Teach Online Workshops and Webinars

Our colleagues in Academic Outreach are offering a variety of sessions on teaching online this fall, including workshops on creating accessible content, diversifying online assignments, active learning in the age of AI and more.  

Faculty Technology Development Center Training Opportunities

Our colleagues in the Faculty Technology Development Center are offering a variety of sessions on course accessibility and using Blackboard this fall.