Columbia, SC: Columbia College has been selected to receive the 2007 TIAA-CREF Theodore M. Hesburgh Certificate of Excellence, given in honor of The Reverend Theodore M. Hesburgh, president emeritus of the University of Notre Dame and a nationally renowned educator. The Hesburgh awards are given for “Faculty Development to Enhance Undergraduate Learning.” The awards are sponsored by the Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association and the College Retirement Equities Fund (TIAA-CREF), the nationwide pension system for colleges, universities and related non-profit educational organizations.
 
Columbia College was chosen for the Certificate of Excellence based on its innovative and highly successful Faculty Development through Interdisciplinary Teaching and Learning program.  Since 1999, the College has placed a rededicated emphasis on workshops, training sessions for teaching and weekly faculty meetings to help faculty concentrate on deepening students’ learning and encouraging them to become self-motivated, critical thinkers and active learners.  Columbia College also received this national honor in 1996 for its Collaborative Learning Center program.
 
The University of Wyoming was chosen as the recipient of the 2007 TIAA-CREF Theodore M. Hesburgh Award. The University of Wyoming and Columbia College will be honored February 12, 2007, during a special presentation at the American Council on Education's annual meeting in Washington, D.C.
 
About Faculty Development through Interdisciplinary Teaching and Learning

In 1999, Columbia College launched a redesigned core curriculum based on several years’ analysis of its goals for liberal learning.  At the center are two required interdisciplinary courses, Liberal Arts 101 and 102, designed to help students make connections across disciplines and to improve skills in critical thinking, writing, and speaking. This reform has engaged almost half of the faculty in comprehensive, rigorous faculty development events. Stressing the constant goals of collaboration, interdisciplinarity, and the fundamental value of the liberal arts, faculty development efforts have helped reorient faculty to concentrating on deepening students’ learning and figuring out ways of encouraging students to become self-motivated, critical thinkers and active learners.