Mobile Summer Institutes: An Institution-based Iteration of the Summer Institutes on Scientific Teaching that Targets Both Individual and Institutional Transformation.

While research has demonstrated the benefits of active learning on student success and reduction of performance gaps for historically excluded groups, the majority of post-secondary STEM educators still rely heavily on passive lectures. This disconnect results from many factors, including lack of training and lack of institutional support and incentive structures for improving teaching. Pedagogical training addresses the first issue but, alone, cannot overcome institutional barriers to teaching reform. The Mobile Summer Institutes on Scientific Teaching (MoSI) is an institution-based iteration of the successful National Academies Summer Institutes (SI) intended to address both individual and institutional barriers to change. Since they were first piloted in 2014, the MoSIs have expanded to offer 74 MoSIs serving over 1800 current and future faculty at 38 host institutions across the US and internationally.
Adaption of the MoSI was guided by Henderson's 4 Categories of Change Strategies: 1) Disseminating Curriculum and Pedagogy, 2) Developing Reflective Teachers, 3) Developing Policy, and 4) Developing Shared Vision. The original SI focused on the first category while four new workshops were added to the MoSI to address the goals of the remaining three. Scholarly Teaching (development of course evaluation plans) and Peer Feedback and Reflection (training with two peer observation rubrics) workshops were added to promote development of reflective practices. A new Administrator workshop fosters awareness and buy-in for policy-level support of participant efforts while a new Strategic Planning workshop facilitates development of a shared vision for change. During Strategic Planning, participants identify aspects that would make a campus ideal for student learning, then determine where their campus falls short of the ideal. They develop Strategic Plans to address one or more of the shortcomings. We will share lessons learned from the Strategic Planning Sessions and a new metric to evaluate institutional change since participation in the MoSI.