Who We Are
Our Purpose: to provide better access to resources for college mathematics instructor development and to create durable versions of the existing informal networks
A crucial element of improving teaching and learning in undergraduate mathematics is teachers who are equipped to provide high quality instruction in their courses.
Historically, higher education faculty in the mathematical sciences have received little formal preparation for teaching, often no more than a few hours of professional development in the week before classes begin. Similarly, despite the important roles they play in undergraduate mathematics education, little attention has been focused on the preparation of graduate teaching assistants (TAs) for the classroom.
Although some resources are available for the PD of novice college mathematics instructors, faculty who wish to start or enhance a program may find it challenging to locate instructional materials or faculty with experience to draw on. There are informal networks of people who work in this arena but the networks’ informality make the resources that do exist inaccessible and/or difficult to locate for those new to the work.
We are creating an infrastructure, housed and supported by the MAA, to enhance the mathematics community’s ability to provide high quality, teaching-related professional development (PD) to graduate students. Project components are designed to address the needs of three core groups whose efforts have significant influence on the quality of undergraduate mathematics instruction:
- Providers: Faculty who provide PD to graduate student Teaching Assistants (TAs)
- Scholars: Faculty and graduate students whose research and other scholarly activities center on the teaching of undergraduate mathematics
- TAs: Graduate students whose responsibilities include teaching mathematics courses
CoMInDS Project Goals
Experienced Providers will serve as Mentors to faculty wishing to start or improve a PD program. Activities include site visits, collaboration on materials development and adaptation, and evaluation of the success of their programs. We are also creating structures to support collaboration among those who conduct research and those who develop TA PD materials. Efforts of both groups will be enhanced via collaborations that use research findings to inform materials development and that use experiences from implementation of the materials to inform research agendas.
The resource suite includes instructional materials and products of scholarly activity along with resources for assessment and evaluation of TA PD for use by Providers. Instructional materials include sample syllabi for TA PD courses, lesson plans, activities with instructor guides, and video- and text-based case study materials. Products from scholarly activity include a searchable guide to research papers, books and other relevant scholarship accompanied by annotations from experienced Providers and Scholars. Resources for assessment and evaluation include data collection instruments, information on program and course evaluation, and findings from evaluations of PD efforts. Content for the resource suite is gathered initially via existing informal networks in which project team members are active. The team also seeks out materials from existing PD programs and experienced Providers and Scholars who contribute to and provide annotations to materials in the suite. This helps ensure that the design and content of the suite are valuable to likely users and ensure the capture of expertise in the field in a durable way.
We serve a wide network of PD Providers
267
faculty have participated in CoMInDS workshops
121
masters and PhD-granting institutions
48%
of PhD-granting math departments in the United States
The work and materials produced by the CoMInDS Project was initially sponsored by the National Science Foundation through the project Improving the Preparation of Graduate Students to Teach Undergraduate Mathematics DUE-1432381.