The John M. Burns Conference is co-sponsored each year by the Teaching Academy and the Teaching, Learning, and Professional Development Center. Named in honor of Dr. John M. Burns, who helped found the Teaching Academy, this conference is held each fall and features two keynote sessions from an invited teacher-scholar and a poster session from recipients of the Lawrence Schovanec Teaching Development Scholarship Award. Past speakers include Noah Finkelstein, Bryan Dewsbury, Derek Bruff, Michelle Miller, Lauren Barbeau, Claudia Cornejo Happel, and Lindsay Masland.
This year, we are excited to hear from Dr. Ann Austin. Dr. Austin is a University Distinguished Professor at Michigan State University (MSU), where she has been a faculty member in Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education in the College of Education since 1991. She has recently served as Interim Vice Provost and Associate Vice President for Faculty and Academic Staff Affairs (2022-2023), and she previously served as Interim Dean of the College of Education (2021-2022), Associate Dean for Research (2016-2021), and Assistant Provost for Faculty and Academic Staff Affairs (2016-2021). She has been a Program Director at the National Science Foundation (NSF) (2015-2016), a U.S. Fulbright Fellow (1998, South Africa), and President of the Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE), and she is a Fellow of the American Educational Research Association (AERA).
Her international work in higher education has taken her to more than fifteen countries. Her research concerns organizational change in higher education; academic work, careers, and professional development; creating more inclusive academic workplaces; teaching and learning issues in undergraduate education; doctoral education; and STEM education. Her current and recent National Science Foundation-funded projects have focused on gender equity in academe, teaching preparation of future STEM faculty, improving teaching evaluation, and organization change networks. Dr. Austin has published extensively, and she and her colleagues have a book on teaching evaluation that will be published by Harvard Education Press in fall, 2025.
The conference will feature a keynote talk in the morning and a workshop in the afternoon. Lunch will be provided in between the sessions and recipients of the Lawrence Schovanec Teaching Development Scholarships will present posters sharing information from the conferences they attended. Please register by Wednesday, October 8th.
*Please Note: While this conference is intended to be face-to-face, we may offer a virtual option for remote faculty. If you have a remote appointment, please email tlpdc@ttu.edu to request a Zoom link.
Registration is now open! Please click on the session title to for the description and option to register.
- Oct17Fri
John M. Burns Conference Keynote: New Approaches to Teaching Evaluation: Evaluation Strategies that Enhance Teaching Quality – (October 17, 2025 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM)
Location:TLPDC Room 151
2802 18th Street
Lubbock, TX 79409Room: TLPDC 151
Available Seats: 65
Keynote speaker: Dr. Ann Austin (Distinguished Professor at Michigan State University) Teaching evaluation can be a pathway to more effective teaching and learning, better student learning outcomes, fairer recognition of faculty work, deeper conversations among colleagues about professional values and commitments, and stronger institutional cultures that foster teaching and learning excellence. However, typical approaches to teaching evaluation often fall far short of achieving these outcomes. Acknowledging critiques of usual strategies for teaching evaluation, this workshop will focus on important principles to guide more effective approaches to teaching evaluation. The workshop will also explain new and effective approaches based on these principles—and tested and implemented in more than 70 departments through a funded project called TEval. The workshop will provide opportunity for participants to discuss how to apply the ideas and strategies in their own departments to create more comprehensive, holistic, and valid teaching evaluation.
- Oct17Fri
John M. Burns Conference Afternoon Workshop: Improving Teaching as a Systemic Change Process: Strategies for Institutional Leaders – (October 17, 2025 01:30 PM – 03:30 PM)
Location:TLPDC Room 151
2802 18th Street
Lubbock, TX 79409Room: TLPDC 151
Available Seats: 65
This session is designed for designed for deans, chairs, directors, and area coordinators. Keynote speaker: Dr. Ann Austin (Distinguished Professor at Michigan State University) Advancing transformative change toward an important institutional goal—such as improving teaching and learning through new approaches to teaching evaluation—requires a strategic and systemic approach. This workshop is designed especially to guide institutional leaders—including deans, department chairs, and leaders of units focused on teaching excellence and student success—to consider their roles in encouraging and supporting significant institutional change. We will discuss important levers and processes for fostering change in higher education, and why taking a systemic perspective is essential. The workshop will focus on changing teaching evaluation as an example of a major change goal; however, the change strategies discussed can be used to nurture many kinds of institutional change goals. This interactive workshop will include opportunities for small group discussion organized to enable leaders in similar leadership roles (e.g., senior-level leaders; department chairs; and other unit leaders) to discuss practical application of the ideas shared in their specific contexts.