What is the Digital Gardener Faculty Fellows Program?

The Digital Gardener Faculty Fellows Program provides a semester-long opportunity for faculty to learn to integrate digital literacy into their courses, teaching, and work with students. Through collaboration with other Fellows, participants will be a key factor in developing a university-wide culture committed to digital literacy, creativity, and learning.

The Faculty Fellows program is one component of the Digital Gardener Initiative, a faculty-driven commitment to connect members of the IU community working in digital literacy. The initiative aims to share best practices and grow successful programs across the university to prepare students for an increasingly digital world.

The Digital Gardener Faculty Fellows Program has four Goals:

CREATE EXPERTS

Prepare faculty members to understand digital literacy, improve digital communication skills, gain experience with digital technology, and become savvy digital consumers.

SUPPORT STUDENTS

Give faculty members the tools to empower students entering today’s workforce with greater digital agility, which leads to greater access to job opportunities.

PROMOTE DIGITAL LITERACY

Encourage faculty members to study the impact of pedagogical strategies and digital technology as they’re being used by peers across the university.

BUILD A COMMUNITY

Connect faculty members so that they can foster their own community networks to help develop digital confidence and promote digital literacy and creativity.

"Digital Literacy is self-empowerment. It's about learning how to communicate in and through the digital spaces that shape our lives and our world" -- Miranda Rodak

Digital Gardener Faculty Fellows receive:

• A $500 stipend paid into a university account for conference travel and teaching/research support
• Personalized support from senior Digital Gardener Fellows and UITS Learning Technologies staff supporting the Digital Gardener Initiative
• A designated cohort for community engagement, peer feedback, and idea development
• Access to colleagues exploring how to integrate digital literacy skills in their work

Important Dates:

• May 12: deadline to submit an application for the Fall 2023 cohort
• May 19: applicants notified of application status

Requirements

The program is open to all faculty and professional staff working in roles that directly support teaching and learning from all IU campuses. Because part-time faculty and staff generally do not have research accounts, we may need to find other mechanisms to provide support in lieu of the stipend available to fellows. Those unsure of eligibility are encouraged to contact dgi@iu.edu to discuss opportunities to be involved in Digital Gardener Initiative programs.

Digital Gardener Faculty Fellows must fulfill the following requirements:

• Participate in a virtual kick-off meeting, scheduled for 9 a.m. - noon ET on Friday, September 1, 2023.
• Participate in at least five of the six required regular virtual meetings. These will tentatively be held on September 15 & 29, October 13, November 10, and December 1 & 15. There will be two attendance options for each required session.
• Commit to integrate digital literacy practices into curriculum.

There will be multiple optional virtual events over the course of the semester to complement the required components of the program, as well as some in-person events, including our annual Digital Gardener Summit (tentatively scheduled for October 27). Though these additional programming elements are optional, attendance is encouraged. More information will be shared about the optional dates and scheduled events once the spring cohort has been determined.

Experience with digital literacies or competency with digital tools or technology is not required. Applicants merely need an interest in increasing opportunities for students to develop greater digital literacy and digital creativity skills--improving students’ capacities for digital expression and integrating new avenues for engagement with course content and disciplinary ways of knowing, doing, and making.

"Unlike traditional literacy, which is largely static and monolithic, digital literacy is dynamic, everchanging, broadly applicable, and includes active ways of engaging with the world" -- Susan Popham

Expectations for Faculty Fellows

Participants must attend and participate in five of the six required virtual meetings (dates listed above) during the semester. Additionally, Fellows must produce the following deliverables:

• Teaching assets: a written explanation of the strategy, a short video narrative, core related assets, and a course syllabus showing implementation
• Working group outputs: something created in a small group activity led by a Digital Gardener faculty mentor intended to grow the Digital Gardener community
• Promotion/retention statement: written statement reflecting on involvement in the program as it relates to professional development

More Information

For more information about the Digital Gardener Initiative or the Faculty Fellows program, contact dgi@iu.edu or one of the program co-founders:

• Justin Hodgson—hodgson@indiana.edu
• Adam Maksl—amaksl@iu.edu