Through a Davis Educational Foundation grant, established by Stanton and Elizabeth Davis after Mr. Davis’s retirement as chairman of Shaw’s Supermarkets, Inc, the multi-year UConn Advancing Structural Consistency through Educational Networks and Design (UASCEND) project aims to expand support for faculty and academic programs to develop student-centric learning objectives; align assessment measures to objectives; design of common rubrics; and/or design authentic assessment measures.
UASCEND will provide a semester-long multi-module professional development curriculum for faculty to strengthen their skills in designing, implementing, and evaluating effective assessment strategies to enhance student learning and success. The professional development curriculum will be delivered online with asynchronous and synchronous components throughout. Modules include:
- Assessment for Student Success
- Defining Learning Objectives
- Aligning and Designing Assessments
- Developing Authentic Assessments
- Developing Rubrics
- Scholarly Teaching
- Evaluation of Teaching Data
Module lengths will vary, ranging from 1-3 weeks, with the entire program offered sequentially across the semester. Through modules designed and delivered by UConn faculty and the grant leadership, participants will engage with their peers in module activities, create deliverables, and consult with peer assessment leaders, Common Curriculum faculty leaders, and the Office of Academic Program Assessment.
Fall 2025 Pilot
During the Fall 2025 semester, we are offering a pilot for faculty teaching undergraduate courses. The UASCEND curriculum will guide faculty through developing course learning objectives and assessment measures aligned to their academic program’s objectives or the Common Curriculum’s objectives. Faculty participants will be provided with a mini-grant award upon completion of the professional development curriculum.
We are currently accepting applications for the Fall 2025 pilot.
Who should apply?
Any in-residence, tenure-track, or tenured faculty member who is interested in gaining skills in the above topics should apply! Faculty are required to have a course to work on that part of their undergraduate degree-conferring academic program. The course can also be part of the Common Curriculum. For the pilot curriculum, we will focus on both single section courses and multi-section courses. We are seeking applications from:
- Faculty of single section courses who want to develop strong and measurable learning objectives aligned to program objectives. Through the UASCEND curriculum, faculty will generate assignments and rubrics aligned to those objectives and that scaffold student success.
- Faculty who teach multi-section courses and want to increase course consistency in terms of course learning objectives and assignments. If you are a faculty member of a multi-section course, we would love to see you participate in UASCEND together with other faculty who teach the course. Preference will be given to faculty from multi-section courses who collaborate across multiple campuses.
To ensure the good work you do throughout the UASCEND curriculum is adopted throughout your program, if you are selected for the UASCEND course, we will reach out to your department head for approval. They will need to confirm that the learning objectives developed from the UASCEND curriculum will be the official objectives entered into the university catalog and that the assignments and/or rubrics will be used across all sections of the course.
To apply, please complete the following application form by April 28, 2025.