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2024 SoTL Funding Support Program

2023 Participants 

Mohamed Abouelkhair, Department of Biomedical and Diagnostic Sciences 

Maria Gallmeier, Department of World Languages and Cultures 

Adam Love, Department of Kinesiology, Recreation, and Sport Studies 

Jennifer Morrow, Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies

Hollie Pellosmaa, Department of Psychology 

Haseeb Qureshi, Department of Management and Entrepreneurship 

Louis Rocconi, Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies

2022 Participants 

Daiane S. Alves, College of Arts and Sciences, Biochemistry 

Robin Barrow Nichols, College of Arts and Sciences, English 

Moonhee Cho, College of Communication and Information, School of Advertising & Public Relations 

Meghan Conley, College of Arts and Sciences, Sociology 

Renee D’Elia Zunino, College of Arts and Sciences, Modern Foreign Languages & Literature 

Maria Hurt, College of Nursing, Traditional & Accelerated programs 

Kirsten Secora & Cheryl Shahan, College of Education, Health, & Human Sciences, Theory & Practice in Teacher Education 

Suzy Prentiss, College of Communication and Information, Communication Studies 

2021 Participants 

Jennifer D’Agostino, College of Arts and Sciences, Music 

Maria Gallmeier, College of Arts and Sciences, Modern Foreign Languages & Literature 

Elizabeth Gentry, College of Arts and Sciences, English 

Tawnysha Greene, College of Arts and Sciences, English 

Sally C. Harris, College of Arts and Sciences, English 

Maria Hurt, College of Nursing, Traditional & Accelerated Programs 

Kelli MacCartey, College of Arts and Sciences, English (View final digital reflection here!) 

Robin Nicks, College of Arts and Sciences, English 

Kaitlin Palla, College of Arts and Sciences, Biology 

Suzy Prentiss, College of Communication and Information, Communication Studies 

Robert Roark, Haslam College of Business, Finance 

Michelle Violanti, College of Communication and Information, Communication Studies 

Daniel Wallace, College of Arts and Sciences, English 

Courtney Wright, College of Communication and Information, Communication Studies 


Call for Proposals

Teaching and Learning Innovation (TLI) is pleased to offer additional support for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL).  This program is intended to support both those new to this practice, who are interested in beginning to reflect on their teaching practices, and those who are ready to begin work toward research on their teaching.   

Writing is central to SoTL work, and initiating and completing a SoTL project will require a significant amount of text right from the very beginning. To help faculty members begin this work and advance it toward research and publication, we are offering supplemental support for key written components of the preparatory process. 

  • Purpose: Supporting and advancing scholarship on teaching 
  • Eligibility: All full-time UT faculty who are eligible to receive additional pay
  • Amount: $2,000 per project (applications are invited from individuals or teams, but teams would need to decide how to divide up the award)
  • Application Deadline: Sunday, March 24, by 11:59 PM 
  • Decision Announcement: by Friday, April 5
  • Kickoff Meeting: Friday, May 3, at noon
  • Project Completion Deadline:  Sunday, June 2, by 11:59pm 

The Project

This year our funding opportunity includes four options. Please choose one of the following four options upon deciding to apply. 

Reflection is the cornerstone of SoTL work and represents not merely a starting point or step in a process but rather an ongoing practice. Many SoTL projects actively produce and analyze self-reflective documents. In autoethnographic research and action research, for example, articles on scholarly teaching also have to present accounts of teaching practices and processes. 

Narrative, as a mode of reflection, turns attention to temporality, the dynamics of people and events in time, allowing us to reflect on when things happened (tense), and how long they took to unfold and how they coincided (aspect). Narrative also turns attention to subjectivity, the unique experience of people within a sociocultural environment. Together, these elements of temporality and subjectivity afford access to ideas about the connections between people and events, causality and agency. 

This option invites participants to compose a narrative reflection, an account of salient experiences over the course of the past year, and possibly discuss potential implications in an imagined future. This reflection should involve a critical reconsideration of how participants’ experiences fit together to establish a foundation for further scholarly work, which might include collaborative analysis of the narrative works, further theoretical study, or preparation for further research activity. 

Research in UT classrooms will require an IRB application, and preparing an effective application will mean attending closely to existing studies on the topic under consideration. Every SoTL project will need to consider the literature on several dimensions of the project, which may include: 

Discipline-specific practices:  How does your discipline tend to handle the learning outcomes desired for your course? Are there evidence-based best practices, documented in peer-reviewed studies? What theories drive educational praxis in your discipline? 

Interdisciplinary teaching strategies:  For projects studying how a given teaching technique works, where and how has this technique been documented in the literature? In what other disciplines have similar methods been used, and with what was the degree of success? Do other disciplines mobilize different theory bases to drive this kind of work?

Assessment and research methods:  For projects studying similar student learning outcomes, how are the goals operationalized? That is, how do other studies determine whether a given outcome or experience has taken place? What do they measure, or what kind of data do they gather? What kind of analyses do they conduct? Ideally, a literature review should establish that the project has antecedents in existing studies, but that it promises to create new knowledge that will add to the knowledge base. The IRB application will require a brief 1-2 paragraph literature review, but the SoTL Funding project will aim to create a larger document, adaptable both for the IRB application and future publication(s). 

For those who have already reviewed the available literature and are ready to begin planning for research in the classroom, the next step will be to create a plan for research activities, which can be used both in the IRB application and in the methods section of an eventual publication. This activity plan should usually address the following components: 

Purpose / Objectives: The plan should indicate what course context is being studied, and what the study aims to learn. This may take the form of a research question and hypothesis, or just a less-well-understood area of the existing literature, which the study will explore. 

Study Population: The plan should explain who potential participants in the study will be. 

Activities:  The plan should indicate what data will be collected, and how the collection process will take place. If you intend to use existing instruments, this is the place to identify them and provide a rationale for their use here.

Analysis:  The plan should indicate how you will analyze the data and how this analysis will serve to address the research question or purpose outlined at the beginning of the plan. If you intend to use specialized analytical methods, this is the place to identify them and provide a rationale for their use.

For those who have already collected their data and are ready to begin writing, the next step will be to begin reporting results, and assembling a manuscript for dissemination.  For this track, the process is more open-ended, and will depend on where the participant is in their project.  It might include one or more of the following:

  • A draft of results or findings, in preparation for further refinement as a conference presentation or journal article.
  • A summary of results, assembled as the formal component of a journal article or a conference presentation.
  • A discussion of the results, in dialogue with the relevant literature, assembled as the formal component of a journal article or a conference presentation, such as the common “discussion” section.
  • A summary of take-aways or conclusions, assembled as the formal component of a journal article or conference presentation.
  • For those who have not completed a previous SoTL Funding Support program, the final manuscript may include introduction, lit review, or methods components as well.  For those who already completed the lit review or activity planning track, however, we ask that you write material for a different manuscript section for this track.


The Process

The writing process itself will be at the discretion of the participants—upon acceptance, participants commit to attend one kickoff meeting via Zoom, on Friday, May 3 at Noon.  After that, no additional meetings are required prior to turning in the completed manuscript—but for those who prefer more dialogue, members of TLI and UT Libraries will be available to facilitate check-ins and meet with participants individually or in groups. Similarly, members of TLI and the UT Libraries will be available to help participants find ways to take the next steps forward with these projects upon completion. The final manuscript should be: 

  • Length: At least 2,000 words (no upper limit) 
  • Focus:   
    • Option 1 – Narrative Reflection: A critical consideration of specific experiences related to teaching and learning (other elements merit consideration, but the central focus should relate to teaching and learning—see additional prompts in the application). 
    • Option 2 – Literature Review: A critical consideration of the existing literature on the topic, with a clear argument about what remains to be learned (gaps in the literature; again, the central focus should relate to teaching and learning). 
    • Option 3 – Activity Plan: A thorough and detailed plan for research activities, including all the listed components (again, the central focus should relate to teaching and learning). 
    • Option 4 – Results: An informal summary of detailed results from a SoTL project, as preparation for dissemination, or a formally written component of a journal article or conference presentation, including some element of results or conclusions.
  • Deadline: All final products produced should be completed and emailed to Dr. Chris Kilgore, TLI Associate Director for SoTL, at ckilgor4@utk.edu, by 11:59pm on Sunday, June 2
  • Next Steps: TLI will retain an archive of the manuscripts for use as examples in future programming, and members of TLI and the UT Libraries will work with participants to help disseminate their work, and/or use it as a foundation for further research. 

If you have any questions about the project’s intent or the process, please contact Chris Kilgore (ckilgor4@utk.edu). 

The Application Process

Please complete the application form:

Apply for SoTL Funding Now