Course Transformation Fund

UPDATE: This grant is suspended until further notice. Applications will not be accepted for 2025-26.

Eligibility

All faculty members, instructors, and unit chairs and directors may apply.

Funding and Support

Three types of funding and support are provided to successful Course Transformation Fund applicants:

• Direct payment of $8,000
  • This funding (made in two payments) is to cover instructor’s course development time, student hiring, training and equipment.
  • Fund recipients who are either faculty members, instructors, unit chairs and/or directors may choose to receive funds as direct financial compensation, which will be taxed as salary income; or as a grant deposited to an appropriate internal account (administered by the participant).
  • Contract instructor recipients are eligible only for direct financial compensation.
• TLS in-kind contributions
  • In addition to the direct payment, successful applicants will receive up to 180 hours of instructional design, educational technology or media production support from Teaching and Learning Services. For example, you will benefit from collaboration with our instructional design team on course content or assessment design, and students’ engagement with these elements, their classmates and you.
  • You may also collaborate with our teams, benefitting from their expertise in the creation of engaging experiences.
• Possible support from the Students as Partners Program
  • Successful applicants will also be prioritized to receive funded support from the Students as Partners Program if desired by the instructor. The Students as Partners Program provides funding for undergraduate students to partner with instructors, librarians and teaching support staff on course design projects. In addition to assisting with tasks, student partners enrich curriculum development by contributing a students’ perspective.

Project Scope and Examples

Course Transformation Fund project interventions can include, but are not limited to:

• Redesigning a course central to a program or discipline to embody Carleton’s Future of Learning four directions (Empowering, Collaborative, Flexible, Sustainable)
• Redesigning bottle-neck courses
• Changing a course’s delivery method
  • In-person to online or HyFlex, or vice-versa
  • Adopting a ‘flipped’ modality
• Building a master course to be used as a model for multiple sections
• Re-imagining a course central to a program or discipline to better support the vision of the academic unit
• Redesign of assessment items, grading strategies, in-class activities, collaboration strategies, visual media
• Redevelopment of course lectures, labs, or lab manuals

See our list of past Course Transformation Fund recipients and project titles for more ideas.

What is Out of Scope?

• Funding for research labs or projects
• Funding for purchase of new enterprise software
• Creating full-length lecture videos, filmed in studio or lecture hall

Recipient Commitments

Course Transformation Fund recipients are expected to:

• Complete work on a for-credit course offered in winter 2024, summer 2024 or fall 2024
• Work with TLS staff as thought partners during the course design process
• Participate in (at minimum) a project kickoff meeting with TLS staff, midpoint project meeting and final project debrief meeting
• Provide monthly project updates by email
• Give back to the Carleton campus community (which may require collaboration with TLS to obtain ethics clearance to ensure privacy and good ethical practice). Examples include:
  • Demonstrating results of the Course Transformation Fund intervention via showcase presentations and/or blog post or Scholarship of Teaching and Learning research
  • Sharing newly developed content or tools with others

Evaluation Criteria

Applications to the program are accepted on an ongoing basis. Applications will be reviewed by TLS using the following criteria:

• Instructors’
  • Eligibility to participate
  • Willingness to collaborate with TLS staff during the redesign process
• Projects’
  • Potential impact of the initiative (e.g. larger impact via core, foundation or large enrolment classes)
  • Focus on solving learning problems through re-design
  • Reasonable timelines, and instructor’s time to commit to the project
  • Letter of recommendation from departmental chair

Teaching and Learning Services will evaluate applications using a rubric based on the application questions; note that TLS will endeavour to spread the funds across faculties if feasible. The selected list of projects will be subject to review by each faculty’s associate dean.

NOTE: If you can’t commit to a course re-design right now, TLS still welcomes the opportunity to assist you with course design, assessments, communication plans, lecture videos, and much more. Please use the course consultation form on the TLS Support Portal.

Application Form

Applications have now closed. Stay tuned for information on future calls for applications.

Previous Recipients

Congratulations to all previous fund recipients.