Invest in IT Resources

 Institutions across the U.S. are utilizing data and technology to improve student retention,increase degree completion, boost learning, inform administrative decision-making, and modernize to meet consumers’ expectations. NWC’s IT office this year alone has created several new programs to boost efforts related to student academic success and student well-being. However, NWC staff report that innovative and efficacy-boosting initiatives – in […]

Leveraging Existing Areas of Innovation

 For a couple of decades, the Honors Program languished as an underfunded afterthought to Northwestern’s academic mission, despite the yeoman work of several past faculty directors. In Spring 2016, this changed when the faculty unanimously passed a major overhaul to the honors curriculum.  Among the numerous changes, two aspects of this overhaul were significant:  […]

Director of Teaching and Learning Innovation

 Introducing effective innovation into the classroom often takes time and expertise that individual faculty members do not have. Most faculty members have not had training in pedagogy, nor are they able to keep up with new pedagogical technologies and techniques while simultaneously keeping abreast of their own field. Computing services personnel are not trained […]

Increased External Learning for All Programs

 NWC must continue to establish strong, enduring, and multifaceted relationships with regional businesses and organizations.  These relationships can take many forms such as responding to a local educational or research need; collaborating to reinvigorate civic culture; partnering to create mutually beneficial programs; and developing experiential learning opportunities.  Increasing these relationships will enhance students’ educational experience and offer needed assistance to […]