USC Center for Excellence in Teaching

CET Event Calendar

Every Year CET offers a new set of programming and forums addressing teaching and learning issues that occur both in and out of the classroom. The content of our programs vary from the technically practical to the highly theoretical but always seeks to foster a dynamic discussion with active participation allowing all viewpoints to be considered.

Nearly all CET events are video captured and available in their entirety through the CET Video Archive, an excellent way to participate even if you cannot be physically present.

Recent CET Events

CET event programming is one important way that USC advances the discussion about teaching and learning while including voices representative of all members of the USC learning community.

Teaching and Learning

The CET website offers an ever-growing resource of teaching and learning materials and information.

Teaching Consultation and Mentoring

Excellent teaching is multifaceted and highly individualized. Colleagues come to us with many concerns, plans and questions. At CET we help by listening, by asking questions, and by offering research-based solutions. All Faculty Fellows welcome the opportunity to offer off-the-record and constructive advice to assist USC faculty, teaching assistants, departments and schools. Simply email a Fellow or the CET Director to begin the process!

Associates Award for Excellence in Teaching

The Associates Award for Excellence in Teaching is the highest honor the University Faculty bestows on its members for outstanding teaching. Up to two awards of $7,500 are presented each year at the Academic Honors Convocation (in April) to emphasize the University's recognition of the significant role that teaching plays in its mission.

The award recognizes the career achievements of outstanding full-time tenure track and full-time non-tenure track faculty with a proven track record as exceptional teachers with a positive, inspiring, and long-lasting effect on students and their learning, along with extraordinary, unique, or pioneering contributions to excellence in teaching. It is not intended as a "Teacher of the Year" award. Nominees should thus have spent a significant period of time at the University of Southern California.

Fund for Innovative Undergraduate Teaching (FIUT)

The USC Fund for Innovative Undergraduate Teaching (FIUT) supports the innovative educational initiatives of faculty who teach undergraduate courses in all disciplines at USC. All full-time faculty (tenure-track and non-tenure-track) are eligible to apply. Awards may range up to $15,000. The next call for proposals will be distributed during the Fall of 2011. Proposals are due February 3, 2012 for funds becoming available in mid-May 2012.

Helpful Links

Spring 2013 Faculty Fellows

(Rollover to view info. Click to view bio.)

Teaching Excellence in Action

Distinguished Fellows

Call for New CET Faculty Fellows

Faculty Fellow Nomination Form

Becoming a Faculty Fellow

Responsibilities and benefits of CET fellowship

CET provides a forum for student and faculty discussions about learning and teaching inside the classrooms of a research university and beyond. CET offers university-wide programs calculated to enhance learner-centered teaching.

University-Wide Programs and Faculty Forums

CET offers workshops and other programs aiming to enhance understanding of learning. Recognizing that research and teaching are inextricably intertwined and that at USC liberal and professional learning are often integrated, CET forums focus on articulating learning objectives, modes of learner-centered teaching, and appropriate measures of success. The implementation of CET's objectives relies on its fellowship programs.

Faculty Fellows

CET seeks the colleagueship of faculty members in all fields to help foster and enable a commitment to engaged learning among USC's students in all venues associated with teaching and learning. Faculty fellows mentor undergraduate fellows and teaching assistant fellows and support and assist faculty colleagues across the University.

Teaching Assistant Fellows

CET seeks the colleagueship of outstanding teaching assistants to assist all TAs from across the University in a commitment to enhanced learning in laboratories, discussion sections, and other venues related to academic success.

Undergraduate Fellows

CET seeks colleagueship with undergraduates who show leadership potential and a drive to enhance the Center's efforts in understanding how students learn best.

Be sensitive to student struggles. Students may need guidance and empathy in coping with multiple points of view, making wrong decisions, and dealing with uncertainties. Dogmatic students may need help in seeing others' point of view; indecisive students may need help in forming judgments; complacent students may been help in thinking skeptically. (P. 261)

Tools for Teaching, Barbara Gross Davis, 2nd Ed. Jossey-Bass, 2009