This award supports a one-and-a-half day early-career symposium focused on helping participants develop personal technology research agendas, to be held at the Annual Meeting of the Association for Education Communications and Technology (AECT). The organizing committee has selected three members of the learning sciences community to mentor advanced graduate students and pre-tenure faculty from this community, to help them focus on taking a theory-based approach to designing potentially-high-impact learning technologies.
The goals of this early-career workshop are (i) mentoring of advanced doctoral students into the social/professional network as partners in idea-making, (ii) supporting advanced doctoral students and early career faculty in developing viable technology-oriented research agendas, (iii) providing specific feedback and guidance to advanced doctoral students and early career faculty about their research agendas, and (iv) further developing a community of researchers interested in ways technology can transform teaching and learning.
This proposal was funded to support an Symposium for Early Career Faculty. The symposium was held November 2011 and included 9 graduate students and 9 early career faculty in the field of Instructional Technology. The symposium was held in collaboration with the Association for Educational Communications Technology's International Conference in Jacksonville, Florida. The intended outcomes of the Early Career Symposium include:- mentoring of early career faculty and advanced doctoral students into the social/professional network as partners in idea-making,- supporting early career faculty and advanced doctoral students in developingviabletechnology-oriented research agendas,- providing specific feedback and guidance to early career faculty and advanced doctoral students about their research agendas,- providing information about building a research agenda, pursuing funding, and building collaborations,- developing a community of researchers interested in ways technology can transform teaching and learning. On the first day, the mentors worked with their primary team of participants (4- 5participants per mentor) for much of the day. Then, on the half-day, the mentors were switeched participant groups so that each participant received personal feedback from at least two mentors. Symposium participants gained experience in constructing a technology- oriented research agenda, beginning teaching, applying for funds and grants. Participants each worked on a research project with their mentors and progress reports Spring 2012. AECT places extreme value on the benefits of the Early Career Faculty Symposium and are looking forward to the session cointinuing in 2012. A generation of IT scholars has been created and is influencing the field as a result of their participation. Participants reported high-satisfaction with the symposium and have been invited to participate in the current year's symposium at an alumni discussion.
