Fisk University has joined in the Fall of 2011 a national network focusing on Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education through development of future and current faculty.

The Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning (CIRTL) Network, http://www.cirtl.net/, is supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and headquartered at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In November 2011, CIRTL has expanded to include Fisk University in its network that will grow from 6 to 25 of the nation's top universities. Since 2003, CIRTL has pioneered an academic initiative for preparing science graduate students that are bold and creative in the classroom, as future faculty, as they are in their programs of research.

CIRTL provides a menu of experiences and resources for graduate students and faculty through three core ideas: teaching-as-research, learning communities and learning-through-diversity. A number of graduate students and postdoctoral scholars in the Fisk-Vanderbilt Masters-to-PhD Bridge Program have participated in the past in CIRTL-led activities in enhancing excellence in undergraduate education teaching and learning development, now made available for the broader Fisk community. Among the events sponsored by CIRTL are formal graduate courses as well as online weekly seminars and for those interested in issues of teaching and learning in the Science, Technology Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) disciplines. The current set of CIRTL learning outcomes and development levels are posted at http://www.cirtl.net/CIRTLoutcomes.

For more information, please contact Dr. Arnold Burger, aburger (at) fisk.edu, http://www.fisk.edu/aburger.