The University of Georgia hosted its third annual Active Learning Summit on Feb. 27 and 28. More than 370 attendees — up from 260 last year — gathered at the Georgia Center for Continuing Education & Hotel to learn from peers, exchange ideas and foster collaboration. Several participants traveled to the summit from other universities, including faculty and administrators from as far away as the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Miami.

UGA President Jere W. Morehead welcomed participants during the opening ceremony and shared some key data points about the university’s Active Learning Initiative:

• More than 1,500 instructors at UGA have now participated in introductory sessions on active learning.
• More than 1,000 active learning toolkits have been distributed to faculty.
• 151 faculty members across 65 departments have completed the Active Learning Summer Institute, resulting in 147 redesigned courses that have directly benefited over 78,000 students.

“I know that we will continue to see the benefits of this initiative as the years progress,” Morehead said. “Thank you to everyone at this summit for continuing to push the boundaries of undergraduate education and ensure that we are providing the highest level of instruction to our students as we prepare them to become leaders in our society.”

Provost S. Jack Hu spoke next, recognizing the most recent cohort of faculty who completed the summer institute as well as faculty mentors who help develop a supportive active learning community.

Vice President for Instruction and Senior Vice Provost for Academic Planning Marisa Pagnattaro followed the provost. She recognized peer learning assistants, students who are trained to help in the classroom and are a crucial part of the Active Learning Initiative, and the PLA faculty mentors who work with them.

An inspiring keynote and engaging breakout sessions

This year’s keynote speaker was Natasha Jankowski, director of the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. In her talk, “Active Learning and Assessment: Refining Practices to Empower Student Success,” she highlighted surveys since 2020 showing that students are still struggling post-pandemic with mental health issues and feeling unmotivated and behind academically. Jankowski explained the various ways that active learning can improve student outlooks by creating a more relational and involved experience in the classroom.

Highlights from the rest of the conference included a lunch and learn led by the Office of Assessment, which detailed  the collected data and evidence of active learning’s impact on students, and breakout sessions on topics such as implementing active learning techniques in gateway courses, designing classrooms for hands-on active learning, assessing active learning, redesigning online and flipped instruction, leveraging change grants, creating dynamic student engagement and using generative AI in active learning.

A brief history of active learning at UGA

UGA’s Active Learning Initiative began in 2017 when President Morehead formed a task force to inquire into what the university should be doing — or doing better — to facilitate student learning and success. One of that task force’s key recommendations was to transform courses and classrooms to more actively engage students.

Soon after, in 2018, the university launched the Active Learning Summer Institute to help faculty redesign their courses to incorporate active learning strategies. The first 32 graduates saw gains in their students’ enjoyment of the classroom experience and in their students’ performance on exams in the redesigned courses.

That same year, the university designated $1 million to transform select classrooms into spaces that would fully support active learning. In 2022, Morehead announced that UGA would dedicate $6 million over the next five years to support additional instructor development, student engagement and classroom enhancements. The university also hired its first director of active learning, Leah Carmichael.

A theme heard again and again at this year’s summit, particularly from out-of-state attendees, was how fortunate UGA is to have the full support of the administration for such a complex initiative that requires far-reaching culture change.

Carmichael echoed this sentiment when she kicked off the first day of the summit. “When I share about our culture of active learning at other national and international conferences, colleagues from other institutions often envy the groundswell of support we have cultivated here,” she said. “They recognize that transformative change of this magnitude isn’t possible without strong support from senior leadership.”