Some resources for improving teaching quality and faculty advising

Improving teaching quality and faculty advising is not in the charge
of our committee, but we are all interested in it. It is a major
emphasis of the Caltech Council on Undergraduate Education (CUE):
http://cue.caltech.edu/ , and Melany Hunt has been bringing in
visitors and speakers.

Last spring she brought in Dr. Rohan Abeyaratne, Head, Department of
Mechanical Engineering, MIT, who gave a nice talk (you can find it
here: http://www.mechse.uiuc.edu/media/pdfs/about/seminars/schaller_fa2007.pdf
).

In his talk, Prof Abeyaratne highlighted the work of Carl Weiman and Eric Mazur.

Eric Mazur's Science Education website is here:
http://mazur-www.harvard.edu/education/educationmenu.php

Here's Carl Weiman's very influential article, "Why Not Try a
Scientific Approach to Education?"
http://www.cwsei.ubc.ca/resources/files/Wieman-Change_Sept-Oct_2007.pdf

Here's Carl Weiman's very interesting blog:
http://www.scientificblogging.com/cwieman

And his Physics Education technology web site
http://phet.colorado.edu/index.php

Mike Brown has met with folks from the Stanford Center for Teaching
and Learning:
ctl.stanford.edu .

Finally, if you really want to know what a university education is
worth, down the line, Prof Abeyaratne suggests you learn from Father
Sarducci: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kO8x8eoU3L4