About CIRTL

Who We Are
The Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching, and Learning (CIRTL) is an NSF Center for Learning and Teaching in higher education. CIRTL uses graduate education as the leverage point to develop a national STEM faculty committed to implementing and advancing effective teaching practices for diverse student audiences as part of successful professional careers. The goal of CIRTL is to improve the STEM learning of all students at every college and university, and thereby to increase the diversity in STEM fields and the STEM literacy of the nation.

The Pillars of CIRTL
Teaching-as-Research, Learning Communities, and Learning-through-Diversity underlie all CIRTL activities. STEM faculty use research methods to systematically and reflectively improve learning outcomes. This work is done within a community of shared learning and discovery, and explicitly recognizes that effective teaching capitalizes on the rich array of experiences, backgrounds, and skills among the students and teachers to enhance the learning of all.

The CIRTL Network
To prepare the future STEM faculty of the nation, CIRTL must influence graduate-through-faculty preparation in teaching and learning at a significant number of research universities. Building again on the CIRTL pillars, we propose to achieve this goal through a learning community of diverse research universities mutually engaged in teaching-as-research activities to prepare future faculty in teaching and learning for all students.

To test this strategy, we have created a prototype experiment: the CIRTL Network. Established in fall 2006, the CIRTL Network comprises the University of Colorado at Boulder (CU), Howard University, Michigan State University, Texas A&M University, Vanderbilt University, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The diversity of these institutions—private/public; large/moderate size; majority-/minority-serving; geographic location—is by design.

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About CIRTL