Teachers as Scholars is a national program for K-12 educators that began five years ago at Harvard University. The Puget Sound Program is sponsored jointly by the UW s Simpson Center for the Humanities and Seattle Arts and Lectures . Small content-based seminars led by UW faculty are the centerpiece of the program. Although professional development is a well-established enterprise in schools, it often focuses almost exclusively on teaching strategies or curriculum reform, explains Margit Dementi, associate director of the Simpson Center. Teachers as Scholars allows teachers and administrators to become students again and to immerse themselves in scholarly issues, regardless of the grade level they teach or their area of expertise.
Most seminars consist of two four-hour sessions, scheduled one or two weeks apart.
The program provides a gift of time, comments one participant. TIme to reflect, discuss, and struggle with issues that are exciting and challenging. Statistics to Offer New Case-based Course Sequence For many undergraduates, statistics courses are one more hurdle they d prefer to avoid. In many introductory statistics courses across the country, the excitement, usefulness, and pervasiveness of probabilistic and statistical reasoning is never brought to the fore, says Mark Handcock, professor of statistics and sociology. CSSS s redesigned sequence emphasizes how statistics are used in practice, using actual cases.