This case study examines an initiative at a STEM-focused university where a Digital Studio was developed in response to a perceived lack of digital literacies among students. Digital Studio tutors partnered with faculty, students, and the Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence to improve instruction and enhance students’ communication and digital literacy skills. Digital Studio tutors acted as partners in several ways, including developing training materials, conducting on-campus outreach, and contributing to curriculum development and content delivery in a Speech course. Ultimately, we observed that positioning Digital Studio tutors as partners enhanced the learning experience for all involved. The tutors’ skills, knowledge, and approaches complemented those of the faculty member to help students achieve the learning outcomes of the course, while also allowing the tutors and the faculty director to enhance their own digital literacy skills through their involvement in the Digital Studio.
In efforts to improve students' digital literacies on a STEM-focused campus, one university created a digital literacies initiative to support both faculty and students. Faculty development programming supported the development of assignment parameters, detailed assessment rubrics, and scaffolding activities. A campus tutoring center was piloted to support students' acquisition of digital literacies. This chapter offers examples from three faculty members who participated in the digital literacies initiative and implemented digital literacy assignments in their courses. The researchers offer best practices for campuses interested in developing digital literacy initiatives.
This paper explores the benefits and consequences of employing crowd-sourced development and usability processes during the early stages of a software-development project. Our context is My Reviewers, a suite of web-based tools designed to facilitate document markup, team projects, peer review, e-portfolio review, and writing-program assessment. Since 2009, WPAs (Writing Program Administrators) at USF (University of South Florida) have been collaborating with instructors at USF as well as with WPAs and instructors at other colleges and universities to develop My Reviewers.To illustrate our development and usability processes and to highlight the benefits of working with diverse institutions, we provide a case study of a USF and University of Pennsylvania collaboration to develop e-portfolio tools. We conclude by noting ways our usability processes have matured along with the tool, including adoption of more traditional SCRUM methods and Microsoft Team Foundation Server.
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