The University of Guelph is proud to announce that this year three projects will be awarded funding through the 2024-2025 Associate Vice-President (Academic) (AVPA) Grant for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL).
Supported through the office of the AVPA, these projects are on the leading edge of teaching innovation:
2024-25 AVPA SoTL Grant Award Recipients:
Drs. Kimberly Squires and Tricia van Rhijn (Family Relations and Applied Nutrition) | $6,300
- Investigating the impact of play-based experiential learning, through the implementation of play labs in second-year undergraduate courses within the Department of Family Relations and Applied Nutrition.
Drs. Dan Grunspan (Human Health and Nutritional Sciences), Sara Fulmer (Office of Teaching and Learning), and Ben Giguère (Psychology) | $9,360
- Understanding how institutional features, like course structure, pedagogical methods, and residence status, influence the structures and contents of students’ social networks, and how these networks moderate various behavioral and affective outcomes.
Dr. Alena Barysevich (School of Languages and Literatures) | $10,000
- Exploring how social justice in language education can be a critical tool that informs world language study, promotes diversity, equity, and inclusion as well as promoting access across languages, cultures, and language users.
“The SoTL grants give our faculty and staff the opportunity to investigate meaningful questions about teaching and learning at U of G, and share those findings with our community,” says Byron Sheldrick, Associate Vice-President (Academic). “These investments have had a significant positive impact on our campus, and help foster a culture of innovation that truly values SoTL work”
Each year, the University of Guelph invests in faculty and staff engaged in original research activity in the SoTL through the APVA SoTL Grant in support of innovative approaches that advance the University’s strategic priorities around student experiences, IEDI in teaching and learning, and supporting faculty and staff success.
“I was really pleased to see so many successful proposals from new applicants” said Aron Fazekas an Educational Developer with the Office of Teaching and Learning, who manages the grant portfolio on behalf of the AVPA, “It really is a reflection of how broadly engaged our campus community is in teaching and learning scholarship”
More information about the AVPA SoTL Grant can be found on the Office of Teaching and Learning’s website.