Apply to become an Engaged Teacher-Scholar (ETS) with the Center for Faculty Innovation.
The Engaged Teacher-Scholar (ETS) program supports faculty scholarship examining issues of teaching and learning. Scholarly work that consists of evidence-based explorations of teaching and learning activities is known as discipline-based research, teaching inquiry, and the scholarship of teaching and learning.
In the ETS Program, faculty develop and implement an inquiry project addressing their teaching and/or their students' learning. As a learning community, faculty meet during the academic year to expand their knowledge base, support progress on their projects, and connect with colleagues. Faculty projects are expected to result in a scholarly product.
The 2026-27 ETS program will focus on the theme of dialogue in the classroom. Issues of dialogue can take many forms, including developing students' interpersonal skills, supporting difficult and/or meaningful discussions, and creating connections beyond the classroom.
The ETS program is a year-long commitment. Faculty accepted into the program will receive a $500 stipend for their engagement in the ETS program, disbursed in payments of $250 at the completion of the fall and spring semesters.
Participants who complete the first year of the ETS program are eligible to continue into the second year to conduct and share their SoTL projects. They may also receive up to $1,000 in professional development funding, awarded at the end of the year. These funds are intended to support completion of the SoTL project, including expenses such as conference travel to present the work.
APPLICATION PROCESS: The program runs from September (fall 2026) through May (spring 2027). Refer to the ETS application page to learn about the application process.
Benefits to being an Engaged Teacher-Scholar include:
- Being recognized for evidence-based teaching and learning scholarship
- Serving as a liaison between CFI and department/college on ETS initiatives
- Being a part of JMU's Community of Engaged Teacher-Scholars
- Receiving professional development funds to support personal ETS efforts (i.e. disseminate ETS work, attend ETS Professional Development opportunities, travel to ETS conferences, workshops, etc.)
During the academic year, Engaged Teacher-Scholars will:
- Make progress on their evidence-based teaching and learning scholarship project(s)
- Participate in a community of Engaged Teacher-Scholars
- Attend CFI-organized or other professional development opportunities
Program Outcomes
Faculty participants will make progress toward:
- Advancing a scholarly project
- Examining issues of teaching and learning
- Developing pedagogical understandings and skills
- Creating a community with colleagues
Scholarship Programs & Resources
ETS Scholars' Accomplishments
Publications
- Connolly, A. J. & Mutchler, L. A. (2021). A course plan for principles of IS programming to withstand COVID-19. Communications of the Association for Information Systems, 48.
- DeRise, D. (2023). Everything's biased: A guide to determining when bias matters. Writing spaces: Readings on writing, 5, 140–151.
- Koubek, E., & Rodriguez, R. (2023). Another look at high-impact practices in teacher education: Linking practices with engagement. International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 17(2), 1-18.
- Lang-Rigal, J., & Galarreta-Aima, D. (2020). Improving students' confidence in speaking a second language. In D. L. Breneman & J. C. Liu (Eds.) Creative teaching cases: A collection that inspires.
- Larsson, C. F., Marshall, B., & Ritchie, B. (2021). The Alumni Project: Fostering student-alumni engagement in the curriculum. Journal of Education for Business, 97(4), 253-260.
- Meyers, J., Sawyer, A. G., Dredger, K., Barnes, S., & Wilson, R. (2018). Making time and creating space for undergraduate research. Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 18(1), 136–149.
- Rodríguez, R., & Koubek, E. (2019). Unpacking high-impact instructional practices and student engagement in a teacher preparation program. International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 13(3), 1-9.
- Rush, D. E. & Connolly, A. J. (2020). An agile framework for teaching with scrum in the IT project management classroom. Journal of Information Systems Education, 31(3), 196-207.
- Scialdone, M. J. & Connolly, A. J. (2020). Teaching tip: How to teach information systems students to design better user interfaces through paper prototyping. Journal of Information Systems Education, 31(3), 179-186.
- Sawyer, A. G., Dredger, K., Myers, J., Barnes, S., Wilson, R., Sullivan, J., & Sawyer, D. (2020). Developing teachers as critical curators: Investigating elementary preservice teachers’ inspirations for lesson planning. Journal of Teacher Education, 71(5), 518-536.
Grants
Castaneda, D. (2019). Exploring critical consciousness in engineering curriculum through ill-structured problems. 2019 Frontiers in Education, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineering (IEEE) Conference. Covington, KY.
Conferences & Proceedings
- Connolly, A., J, Rush, D., & Mutchler. (2020). Using role play to teach complexity in IT project management. Americas Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS) 2020 Proceedings, 3.
- Lang-Rigal, J., & Galarreta-Aima, D. (2019). Improving students' confidence in speaking a second language: Using TalkBoard [video conference with native speakers] in a Spanish course. Proceedings of the 12th Annual International Conference of Education, Research and Innovation (ICERI), (pp. 1744-1753). Seville, Spain.
- Larsson, C. F. (2020, October). Invited talk on The Alumni Project: Fostering student-alumni engagement in the curriculum. Financial Management Association (FMA) Innovation Award (runner-up). FMA Conference. [online]
- Larsson, C. F., Ritchie, B., & Marshall, B. (2020). The Alumni Project: Fostering student-alumni engagement in the curriculum. Southeast Decision Sciences Institute (SEDSI) Conference. Charleston, SC.
- Liu, Y. (2026, March). The digital twin classroom: Trusting AI as an autonomous co-instructor in hospitality education. North Eastern North American Federation/Council on Hotel, Restaurant, and Institutional Education Conference. Pocono Manor, PA. [roundtable]
- Lyons, C.W., Baker, S.C., & Reis-Bergan, M.J. (2020). How to use observational behavioral measures in the scholarship of teaching and learning. Society for Teaching of Psychology Annual Conference on Teaching Conference [online].
Engaged Teacher-Scholar Program Liaisons
Current Liasons
- Robyn Kondrad, Psychology, College of Health and Behavioral Studies
- Melanie Shoffner, Middle, Secondary & Mathematics Education, College of Education
Former Liaisons
- Tim Ball, Communication Studies, College of Arts and Letters
- Dayna Henry, Health Sciences, College of Health and Behavioral Studies (2018-2021)
- Ray Rodriguez, Education Programs, College of Education
- Anthony Tongen, Math & Statistics, College of Science and Mathematics
- Ashley Taylor Jaffee, Middle, Secondary & Mathematics Education, College of Education
Previous Engaged Teacher-Scholars
College of Arts and Letters
- Budimka Uskokovic Tenney, Foreign Languages
- Danielle DeRise, Writing, Rhetoric, & Technical Communication
- Diana Galarreta, Foreign Languages
- Mollie Godfrey, English
- Shana Meganck, Communication Studies
- Sombo Muzata, Political Science
College of Business
- Amy Connolly, Computer Information Systems & Business Analytics
- Carl Larsson, Finance and Business Law
- David Shonk, Hart School of Hospitality, Sport & Recreation Management
- Gilpatrick Hornsby, Hart School of Hospitality, Sport & Recreation Management
- John Guo, Computer Information Systems & Business Analytics
- Yiran (Kevin) Liu, Hart School of Hospitality, Sport & Recreation Management
College of Education
- Amanda Sawyer, Middle, Secondary & Mathematics Education
- Angela Webb, Middle, Secondary & Mathematics Education
- Ben Riden, Educational Foundations and Exceptionalities
- Katie Dredger, Middle, Secondary & Mathematics Education
- Katya Koubek, Education Programs
- Mark Lewis, Literacy Education
- Tiara Saufley Brown, Education Programs
- Zareen Rahman, Middle, Secondary & Mathematics Education
College of Health and Behavioral Studies
- Ana Abad-Jorge, Health Professions
- Christa Berthiaume, Nursing
- Cindy Hunter, Social Work
- Claire Lyons, Psychology
- Erika Metzler Sawin, Nursing
- Hui Zhao, Nursing
- Joe LeBlanc, Graduate Psychology
- Krisztina Jakobsen, Psychology
- Natasha Miller, Social Work
- Robyn Kondrad, Psychology
- Tiffany Hornsby, Graduate Psychology
College of Integrated Science and Engineering
- Ahmad Salman, Integrated Science and Technology
- Christine Toh, Engineering
- Cindy Klevickis, Integrated Science and Technology
- Daniel Castaneda, Engineering
- Elise Barrella, Engineering
- Emily York, Integrated Science and Technology
- Rachel Palkovitz, Integrated Sciences
- Samy El-Tawab, Integrated Science and Technology
- Shannon Conley, Integrated Science and Technology
- Shraddha Joshi, Engineering
College of Science and Mathematics
- Alexis Stevens, Mathematics & Statistics
- Bisi Velayudhan, Biology
- Cassie Williams, Mathematics & Statistics
- Eva Strawbridge, Mathematics & Statistics
- Heather Griscom, Biology
- Joseph Harsh, Biology
- Kim Slekar, Biology
