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Phillip M. Edwards

Instructional Consultant

Phone: (804) 827-0533 Fax: (804) 827-1393 Office: Center for Teaching Excellence Virginia Commonwealth University Grace E. Harris Hall 1015 Floyd Avenue, Room 5116-H Richmond, VA 23284 Email: pmedwards@vcu.edu Blog http://onewholedaylaterthanyesterday.blogspot.com/

Background

I joined the Center for Teaching Excellence at Virginia Commonwealth University as an Instructional Consultant in 2011, although I have spent most of the past decade teaching undergraduate and graduate courses at both the University of Washington and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After being nominated by my students, I was awarded the 2010-2011 Outstanding Teacher Award from UNC's School of Information and Library Science, and I try to incorporate many of the same characteristics which "work" for me in the classroom--accessibility, flexibility, thoughtfulness, transparency--into my consulting practices. Faculty, staff, and students who work with me should be able to expect:

• Hands-on interaction with a variety of approaches to teaching (including the incorporation of appropriate technologies and tools) in a supportive, partnership-focused environment;
• Confidential one-on-one consultations about the design, implementation, and assessment of teaching and learning activities (including the selection and integration of technologies into courses), emphasizing "authentic" experiences for students; and
• Collaboration across units to support curricular and institutional initiatives, including critical and evidence-based inquiries which can be shared broadly (i.e., Scholarship of Teaching and Learning).

I am fairly intellectually eclectic when it comes to my interests in teaching and learning at colleges and universities, but most of my enthusiasm is directed toward learning activities with reflective components (e.g., development of teaching philosophies/portfolios among faculty, journal- and portfolio-based assessments among students), issues of diversity both within and outside the classroom, design and assessment of student learning outcomes, and uses of emerging technologies (e.g., social media, e-readers) in higher education. I received my B.S. in Chemistry (2001) from the University at Buffalo--SUNY and my M.S. in Information (2003), with a specialization in library and information services, from the University of Michigan.