Still storing your bookmarks on your browser? That is soooooooooo 2007. It’s time to get with the program and start using social bookmarking. Social bookmarking is a “two-for” — it will save you time and provide a way for students to collaborate on their research.

Academic leaders can have a tremendous effect on faculty satisfaction and productivity. Part of the responsibility of being an academic leader is to provide appropriate guidelines and support to foster faculty productivity throughout their careers, says Susan Robison, a psychology professor at the College of Notre Dame of Maryland.

I had a great experience last week: I attended the Organizational Behavior Teaching Conference in Albuquerque, New Mexico. This is the annual meeting of an organization that supports college teaching for those within the management field. A number of our professional associations (most often in the large disciplines) have separate organizations or subgroups within the association that are focused on teaching and learning. Does your field have such an organization? If so, I would encourage you to consider attending events hosted by the group. There is such energy generated when folks who care about teaching convene to explore issues and share ideas.

We handed out the 2010 McGraw-Hill and Magna Publications Scholarly Work on Teaching and Learning Award at the recent Teaching Professor Conference. The review committee designated two finalist articles along with the winning piece, and all three of these articles are open with free access (for a limited period for two of the articles). I do hope you’ll take time to peruse them. Even though all three appeared in discipline-based periodicals, they are relevant to wider audiences—first, as exemplars of scholarly work on teaching and learning and second with content relevant beyond just the discipline. The winning article describes an impressive project that used a creative assessment method to look at the critical-thinking skills of a program’s majors. What discipline would not find that of interest? The article on library instruction looks at how well online instruction, face-to-face instruction, or a combination of both fostered learning. And the history article shares an assignment in which students prepared a well-researched entry for Wikipedia, a writing assignment that could work in many courses.

A parent calls you to ask how her son is doing in your class. Her son, a first-year student, began the semester well but recently started missing class and turning in assignments late. The mother says she’s worried about him and wants to know if he’s showing up for class, how his grades are, and if he will pass your class.

“One can still be committed to one’s discipline, one can still be scholarly, studious and literate ... and SMILE while you are doing it.” That was the message early in John Huss’ session on humor at The Teaching Professor Conference this past weekend.

A new college teacher identifies the previous experience that most helped him when he first started teaching: “But it was in Outward Bound that I learned the most. Probably the single most important lesson was the need for humility. The sheer talent and passion that my peers displayed at times made me wonder if I should just give up. Eventually, however, I came to grips with a guiding philosophy of Outward Bound: Not everyone can be great, but everyone can, and is obliged to, get better. Post-course debriefing sessions were not about patting each other on the back. We were expected to critically evaluate our peers and do something with the feedback we received. It didn't matter how gifted you were; if you didn't see room for improvement in your performance, you weren't qualified to teach anyone. Get better or get out.” (p. 62)

Adjunct faculty make up approximately half of all instructional faculty in degree-granting institutions (National Center for Education Statistics, 2008). Some teach online and some in a traditional classroom-based setting. Some work at private colleges, others for large public universities, and still others at community colleges. Adjuncts represent a diverse group professionals with a wide variety of backgrounds, but they do have at least one thing in common: they’re under increased scrutiny to demonstrate their effectiveness.

The Teaching Professor Conference is next week, and it’s a sold-out event. More than 800 of us will gather in Cambridge outside Boston for this event. If this year’s conference is like previous ones, it will be a high-energy event with virtually nonstop talk about teaching and learning