SoTL in the States

What is happening — and for whom?

“What is happening — and for whom?” posts are observational reports, testimonials, or reflections grounded in what the author has directly observed, experienced, documented, or heard related to teaching and learning or the practice of SoTL — in their classroom, department, institution, or community. Authors are functioning as witnesses and chroniclers, sharing here is what I am seeing, and here is whose experience it is. These posts don’t necessarily argue for a solution to what’s observed. Instead, the value in these posts is in bearing witness and naming patterns that others may recognize but haven’t seen put into words.

What works — and for whom?

“What works — and for whom?” posts share considered perspectives on what’s effective (or not) in the current practice of SoTL, including ways of conducting meaningful SoTL projects, supporting effective SoTL programs, building inquiry communities, sustaining the work across career stages, navigating institutional barriers, reaching audiences beyond the academy, making SoTL matter in the current US moment, and more. The emphasis is on how the idea works, how the author knows it’s effective, and for whom and in what context(s) it works. These posts make an evaluative claim about doing and sustaining SoTL as a practice. Authors should be honest about scope, context, and limits, including who benefits and under what conditions.

What could be possible — and for whom?

“What could be possible — and for whom?” posts are oriented toward the future of SoTL as a field — proposing, imagining, or prototyping changes to how SoTL is practiced, valued, organized, or supported in the US, or in specific contexts within the US. Authors may be responding to an emerging challenge, a structural gap, or an opportunity the current moment presents. The central move for these posts is here’s something I think the field could do differently, here is the logic for why, and here’s its specific beneficiaries. These posts are generative and forward-looking, inviting readers into a design conversation rather than reporting what has already happened. The “for whom” question is essential: who is currently underserved by existing structures, and who would be centered or marginalized by the change being imagined?

What matters — and to whom?

“What matters — and for whom?” posts examine the values, assumptions, and stakes embedded in SoTL in the US. Authors analyze and interrogate questions like What does the way we do SoTL reveal about what we actually value? Whose definitions of rigor, relevance, or belonging are shaping what counts as SoTL? Who is centered, and who is erased, by the field’s current norms and structures? These posts engage with ideas and consequences, not just practices or experiences. They may draw on theory, institutional critique, current events, or close reading of the field’s conventions. The move is not here’s what I see but instead here’s what what I see reveals. These posts make a substantive argument, one that may make readers a little uncomfortable.

Reference
Hutchings, Pat. 2000. “Introduction: Approaching the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning.” In Opening Lines: Approaches to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, edited by Pat Hutchings. Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.