Berkeley Language Center | Center for the Teaching and Study of American Cultures |
Graduate Student Instructor (GSI) Teaching and Resource Center | Service-Learning Research and Development Center

The Berkeley Language Center

Overview: The Berkeley Language Center (BLC) is a comprehensive discipline-specific program that fosters the intellectual and professional development of instructors teaching foreign languages. Established in 1994 to improve and strengthen foreign language instruction on campus, it supports all language teachers by disseminating information on language instruction and related topics, facilitating the use of technology for language instruction, and assisting lecturers and GSIs to develop their foreign language teaching skills. Its particular focus is on Unit 18 lecturers; the BLC has promoted the effectiveness and professional development of this group of instructors, and has enhanced communication across all levels of instructors teaching foreign languages.

Programs: The BLC supports quality teaching in foreign languages through a lecture series in which prominent scholars in applied linguistics and second-language acquisition speak on various topics; a fellowship program in which lecturers and graduate students develop research projects to enhance language teaching on campus; teaching portfolio development workshops; a monthly language coordinators forum to discuss pedagogical issues and recent second-language acquisition scholarship; funding for lecturers to attend conferences on teaching; a newsletter; a professional library; and other initiatives. Many of these programs were developed as a direct result of a 1997 survey (Van Deusen-Scholl et al., 1999) of language-teaching lecturers, and the BLC has continued to adapt its programs to improve its educational effectiveness as the needs of departments, instructors, and students change.

Number of Participants: The BLC is open to all ladder-rank faculty, lecturers, and GSIs involved in language instruction on campus, with lecturers as the specific target audience. About 60-70 participants attend each lecture in the series; in Spring 2003, six lectures and one daylong conference were offered. About 15 language faculty regularly participate in the monthly forums for coordinators. The portfolio workshops have attracted about four to five participants per session. In all, the BLC reaches about 95% of the approximately 60 language lecturers on campus through one or more of its services and programs. Since the BLC began, 44 lecturers and GSIs have participated in the fellowship program (resulting in 47 publications), and 53 lecturers have received funding to present at and attend approximately 45 professional meetings of language instructors.

Evidence of Effectiveness: The BLC assesses its effectiveness through a variety of strategies. Workshops are evaluated by the participants, and the lecture series’ ongoing high attendance indicates a successful program. Instructors receiving fellowships present the results of their research projects to the foreign language community at the end of each semester and write a report for the BLC newsletter; conference attendees who do not give a paper write a report on the conference for the newsletter. Periodically, all foreign language instructors are surveyed and the data are used to assess the effectiveness of BLC programs and to identify preferences for future activities. The most recent survey, administered in 1997, indicates that the BLC has increased lecturer engagement and has fostered a sense of community among peers. All BLC fellows are asked to respond to a survey which seeks feedback on their fellowship experience and the impact on the department and their professional development.

Student learning is assessed by each individual instructor and by the foreign language department as a whole. Final exams typically include both a written and oral component. Beyond individual student self-reports, several departments make use of proficiency exams. As a result of the Conference on the Oral Proficiency Interview and individual BLC Fellowships, a number of departments have implemented programs to assess student learning across the undergraduate curriculum. For example, the Russian program requires students to take standardized reading, listening, and grammar/lexicon tests of Russian each of the first four semesters, and work is being done to extend this to upper-division courses. Other departments have begun assessing student progress (Italian, Arabic, French). Sixteen foreign language departments have a common exam for multiple sections. None of the foreign language departments administers a standardized test to graduating seniors.

Relation to Core Values: The BLC is an example of how a program can evolve from the bottom up (von Hoene & Van Deusen-Scholl, 2001) to meet common needs identified across departments programs. The Center reflects and encourages Berkeley’s diversity of perspectives by bringing together scholars in the field of applied linguistics, social linguistics, and language pedagogy, fields of research that have no formal administrative presence on campus, yet which are crucial for an understanding of how language is acquired, and therefore, how language should be taught. BLC Fellowships encourage lecturers and graduate students to carry on research on language teaching and learning, which may include teaching materials development, curricular development, and theory.

Impact of the Model: The BLC has had an intellectual and pedagogical impact on foreign language instruction. For example, as a result of BLC activities, the German department has revised its curriculum, and the French, Russian, and Asian language departments have developed new strategies for assessing student proficiency. The BLC has collaborated with other UC campuses in the development of the UC Consortium on Foreign Language Teaching, thus strengthening foreign language teaching system-wide.

Future Directions: The BLC intends to work on improving communication among language coordinators by creating a listserv for sharing ideas and problems, and by inviting all lecturers to some of the monthly meetings of coordinators. In addition, to improve coordination with academic departments, the BLC Director is planning to have more informal meetings with department chairs to inform and solicit feedback on BLC activities. The BLC also intends to increase efforts at external fundraising to supplement its technology budget.

The Center for the Teaching and Study of American Cultures

Overview: The Center for the Teaching and Study of American Cultures is an interdisciplinary effort that integrates teaching and research. It was established in 1989 when the Academic Senate adopted the American Cultures breadth requirement for all undergraduates, effective Fall 1991. The requirement stipulates that all Berkeley undergraduates pass a class that covers the complexities of racial, ethnic, and cultural pluralism as they have shaped the United States. The Center’s purpose is to support ladder-rank faculty, lecturers, and GSIs to develop and teach American Cultures courses, which are approved by a Faculty Senate Committee. The Center was a recipient of the 1994 Theodore M. Hesburgh Faculty Development Award (Honorable Mention) and the 1996 Educational Initiatives Award.

Programs: The primary activity of the Center is an intensive summer seminar for which instructors receive fellowships. During the summer seminars, faculty design, discuss, and present their American Cultures courses. A Teaching Librarian works closely with the fellows. As a follow-up to the summer seminar, participants teaching American Cultures classes meet twice each semester (near the beginning and near the end) to discuss their teaching experiences—pedagogy, assignments, classroom environment, sensitive topics, and the like. In addition, regular luncheon meetings are held throughout the year for American Cultures summer seminar fellows (and other interested parties) to hear guest speakers and/or to present their research and teaching results. These activities offer an opportunity for faculty to participate in interdisciplinary and pedagogical discussions. The Center also offers a Community College Summer Seminar so that community college instructors can develop American Cultures courses transferable to Berkeley. The American Cultures website lists all American Cultures courses on campus each semester as a resource to students.

Number of Participants: In 2002-03, the campus offered 113 American Cultures courses enrolling 9,668 students. Forty-one percent of the instructors for those courses have attended an American Cultures summer seminar. About 15-20 faculty a year participate in the summer seminar; since the program began in 1990, 188 faculty from 49 departments or programs have attended a summer seminar. Since Fall 1991, graduates of the summer seminar have taught 613 courses, enrolling 58,526 students (57% of the total American Cultures enrollment).

Evidence of Effectiveness: The summer seminar is regularly evaluated by the participants through an open-ended questionnaire. Data from 2002 show that participants valued their experiences and developed detailed content knowledge and new pedagogical skills. In Fall 2002, all past participants still on campus were surveyed to identify the long-term effects of the summer seminar (N=139). Response rates were low: surveys were returned by 30 faculty for a 22% response rate. Over 90% of the respondents found the Center to be helpful or very helpful in helping them prepare and teach their class; about 87% would teach an American Cultures class again; 50% felt that their participation in the summer seminar or experiences teaching an American Cultures course significantly or very significantly affected their pedagogy in other courses; and 52% felt that their department had been significantly or very significantly affected by their teaching an American Cultures course. In terms of student learning, the Center has collected evaluations (totaling about 25,000) from students taking American Cultures classes since 1991; these data are currently being analyzed.

Relation to Core Values: The Center is an example of the interrelationship of research and teaching. The Center both studies and exemplifies diversity (of perspective, discipline, culture). It becomes a nexus for developing teaching skills contextually as well as critical thinking about the boundaries of disciplines and shapes of cultural assumptions. Finally, the Center's teaching extends throughout the university and out to community colleges.

Impact of the Model: The model of the Center’s summer seminar has been used to develop the new Mellon Faculty Institute on Undergraduate Research, which was piloted in Summer 2003.

Future Directions: The Center must continue to increase the aggregate number of seats in American Cultures courses in proportion to growing undergraduate enrollment. This will require attracting and recruiting new faculty members to teach American Cultures courses, and more importantly, institutionalizing such courses within undergraduate major programs. The campus needs to both consolidate its base of American Cultures courses in the humanities and social sciences, and also to find ways to expand such offerings in the science and engineering disciplines and professional schools. It also needs better assessment mechanisms to evaluate the educational impact of the American Cultures requirement on students' understanding of race and ethnicity in American history, society, or culture and on their liberal arts education at Berkeley. In 2002-03, the Center was evaluated as part of the regular review of the units of the Division of Undergraduate Education. The report outlines recommendations for the future. In June 2003, the campus convened a Faculty Roundtable on the Future of the American Cultures Requirement. The group was charged to examine strategies for expanding the presence of American Cultures in the sciences, the possible redefinition of qualifying minority categories in light of developments in scholarship, and the possibility of building an international dimension into the requirement.

The Graduate Student Instructor (GSI) Teaching and Resource Center

Overview: The Graduate Student Instructor (GSI) Teaching and Resource Center prepares GSIs for the teaching they will do at Berkeley and in their future careers. The Center was established in 1989 at a time when research universities in the United States were beginning to focus on the training of teaching assistants and the preparation of future faculty. Through a variety of programs, the Center works with graduate students, faculty who teach with GSIs, and departments in their development of discipline-specific pedagogical seminars for GSIs.

Programs: The Center offers a full spectrum of professional development programs that include fall and spring orientation conferences; a series of pedagogical workshops throughout the semester; a four-part workshop series specifically devoted to the development of teaching portfolios; semester-long working groups on specific pedagogical topics such as the scholarship of teaching, the impact of discussion sections on student engagement, and the integration of research into undergraduate teaching; a three-afternoon seminar for faculty on providing mentorship to GSIs; classroom videotaping and observation; grants and consultation for departments to develop discipline-specific pedagogy seminars for GSIs; and award programs for GSIs and faculty mentors of GSIs. The Center is also taking the lead in the Summer Institute for Academic and Professional Development, which will prepare future faculty and create a network of communication among Bay Area institutions of higher education across the Carnegie classifications.

Number of Participants: About 1,600 graduate students serve as GSIs each semester. Training is offered centrally through the Center and through departmental 300-level seminars. About half of the 1,000 new GSIs each year participate in the fall or spring orientation before their first semester teaching, 250 take part in the workshop series, 15 receive course improvement grants, and 15 participate each semester in the Center's working groups. The Center has assisted half of the departments on campus in setting up 300-level seminars (sample syllabus) and provides grants and consultation to faculty who teach those seminars. Each year approximately 200 GSIs receive the Center’s Outstanding GSI Award upon nomination by their department. Since 1992, 177 GSIs have been recognized for their teaching effectiveness through the Center’s Teaching Effectiveness Award program, which generates essays that are shared with the campus community describing best practices by GSIs. The Center offers a three-afternoon seminar for 10-15 faculty each year on how to work effectively with GSIs. Since 1994, 165 faculty have participated in the seminar, including those who teach some of the largest gateway courses on campus (e.g., History 7, Biology 1B, Mathematics 1A/1B, Chemistry 1 and 3, Physics 7, Nutritional Sciences 10).

Evidence of Effectiveness: All of the Center's programs are evaluated by the participants, and the data are used to make programmatic adjustments. For the orientations, GSIs report feeling more prepared to teach as a result of discussing specific teaching techniques and exchanging ideas with other GSIs. The portfolio workshops are especially valued for providing GSIs with the opportunity to reflect critically on their teaching—what they do well and what they need to improve—as well as to prepare for the academic job market. Student evaluations of 300-level pedagogy seminars attest to their effectiveness: in Integrative Biology 303, for example, the students rated most highly the value of this course “in developing a peer network to support you in future teaching endeavors,” “in introducing new ideas and/or teaching methods,” and “in providing information about resources available to you as a teacher (both practical and pedagogical).”

The Faculty Seminar on Teaching with GSIs program has been particularly effective. An in-depth survey (von Hoene & Mintz, 2000) of a sample of faculty (N=31) who had attended the seminars since their inception in 1994 indicated that, as a result of their participation, 66% had made “significant changes in the content of their weekly meetings with GSIs”; 39% stated that “the frequency of meetings [with GSIs] had increased”; about 50% stated that they had “become more involved in issues of GSI assessment”; 42% stated that they “now welcome greater collaboration in course design.”

In terms of student learning, GSIs who participate in the Center's programs routinely undertake formative mid-term assessments and administer an end-of-course questionnaire to their students. Results from the Center’s 2001-02 working group on the impact of discussion sections on student engagement and motivation indicated that the learning environment in GSI-taught sections had been enhanced through ongoing classroom research and the creation of reflective feedback loops using classroom assessment techniques.

Relation to Core Values: The Center addresses specific needs of GSIs at different stages of development. To foster this development, the Center’s programs provide the opportunity for graduate students and faculty from across the campus to learn from one another by examining the assumptions and practices that characterize teaching and learning in their respective disciplines. The programs of the Center view both research and teaching as sites of critical inquiry, assessment, and revision.

Impact of the Model: Some of the Center’s techniques have been adapted for use with undergraduate facilitators for student-initiated courses. In response to recommendations by the Special Studies Working Group on the oversight and teaching of undergraduate student-initiated courses, workshops on effective teaching are offered by the Student Learning Center, and a credit-bearing course began in January 2003. The Center’s teaching portfolio workshop series has also been adapted for use by the Berkeley Language Center.

Future Directions: In July 2002, a Task Force on Graduate Student Instructor Training and Mentoring was charged to review relevant policies and practices and make recommendations for changes needed to develop more consistent campus-wide standards for oversight, mentoring, and training of GSIs. This work resulted in a revised Policy on Appointments and Mentorship of Graduate Student Instructors that will require each department to offer a 300-level pedagogy seminar for new GSIs. The Center will play a key role in implementing this policy, offering workshops on developing these courses and bringing faculty from across disciplines together to share best practices. The Center is also developing a short online course on professional standards and ethics that is required for all new GSIs under the new policy.

The Service-Learning Research and Development Center

Overview: The Service-Learning Research and Development Center was established in 1994 to promote community service opportunities within discipline-specific academic coursework. Service-learning allows students to apply theories to practical situations, thereby increasing their understanding of the academic material, as well as enabling students to provide service to the local community. The Center houses both a development unit, which advances service-learning courses on the Berkeley campus, and a research unit that has completed more than 30 national, state, and local investigations on a variety of issues related to service-learning activities in higher education, teacher education, and K-12 education.

Programs: The Center’s development unit offers a variety of services and information to encourage and assist faculty in integrating service-learning into their courses. Programs include (1) the Junior Faculty Mentorship Program, (2) the service-learning faculty development workshop series, (3) instructional mini-grants to help faculty develop service-learning courses, (4) the Chancellor’s Faculty Award for Service-Learning, (5) the Community Speakers Fund for community agency representatives who work directly with an academic service-learning course, and (6) service-learning curriculum development and student assessment assistance. The Center’s website lists for students all courses incorporating service-learning on campus, and provides resources, evaluation tools, and names of publications to assist faculty.

Number of Participants: Since its establishment in 1994, the Center has documented the growth and development of service-learning on campus. From 1994 through 1999, the number of service-learning courses rose substantially from 14 courses during the 1994-95 academic year to 141 courses offered during the 1998-99 academic year. Since 1999, the number of service-learning courses has remained steady at approximately 140 courses per year. These courses encompass the three distinct forms of service-learning (service-based internship, co-curricular service-learning, and academic service-learning) defined by the Faculty Policy Committee on Service-Learning in 2002. On average, the 140 service-learning courses offered each year involve approximately 100 ladder-rank faculty members from 40 departments who develop a variety of community-based service-learning experiences for about 2,200 students. The most current data reveal that in Spring 2003, 79 undergraduate service-learning courses were offered in 17 departments enrolling about 1,300 students.

Evidence of Effectiveness: Each year, the research staff at the Center works with faculty to develop assessment tools that meet the needs of individual courses and collect and analyze data about the outcomes of service-learning on students, faculty, and the community. Data are collected from attitudinal survey questionnaires, portfolio assessments, and focus group interviews. Data from a battery of surveys (1995-2001) of service-learning students’ (N=2,805) attitudes towards academic content, self, the community, and community service reveal that students who participate in service-learning activities have statistically significant (p=.05) more positive attitudes towards their course content, themselves, and the community than students (N=1,682) who elected not to participate in the service-learning component of the courses. Student attitudes towards performing community service have shown differences between service-learning and non-service-learning students. Most of the data currently available are based primarily on student self-reports, although faculty, through anecdotes and in formal interviews, generally report higher content learning among service-learning students. Overall, more comprehensive data are needed from service-learning and non-service-learning participants to draw firmer conclusions about the effectiveness of the campus’s service-learning activities. Efforts are under way to develop a systematic approach to studying the effectiveness of service-learning on the campus.

Relation to Core Principles: The Center works to integrate academic coursework at Berkeley with the larger community, benefiting undergraduate learning by helping students draw connections between their classes and the society around them. The Center also works to advance the civic purposes of the campus by integrating community service and public outreach, typically separate functions of the academy, into the teaching function of the university. It promotes research on the benefits of instructors using service-learning in their classes, provides a stable support structure that crosses departmental lines, and assists instructors throughout their development as teachers.

Impact of the Model: The Center is unusual among campus-based service-learning centers, which typically are housed in student affairs units rather than academic units. The Center is the nation’s first university-based research center to focus its research exclusively on service-learning, and today it remains the nation’s only university-based center to focus its research on service-learning across all sectors of education (K-12 education, teacher education, and higher education). In 2001, the Center inaugurated and served as host to the First Annual International Conference on Service-Learning Research.

Future Directions: The major challenge facing the Center is to further its institutionalization within the Berkeley campus. The Center is currently funded through a combination of extramural grant funding and in-kind support from the Graduate School of Education. The development unit of the Service-Learning Center is guided by the Faculty Policy Committee on Service-Learning, an ad hoc committee that reports to the Chancellor; however, the unit currently does not receive central campus support for its development efforts. The Committee is currently exploring alternative organizational structures that could permit the Center to continue and to expand its efforts.

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