Public SoTL Scholarship ICWGs: Call for Group Facilitators (2025)

Call for Group Facilitators: Public SoTL Scholarship International Collaborative Writing Groups (ICWGs) 2025

Background

In her closing remarks at the 2019 ISSOTL conference, Nancy Chick encouraged us to find ways to make SoTL more public. This outreach model is grounded in a recognition that SoTL as public scholarship has “common roots in Ernest Boyer’s expansion of recognized scholarships: his notion of ‘the scholarship of teaching’ (1990) grew into SoTL, and his later description of ‘the scholarship of engagement’ (1996) encompasses what we now call public scholarship, to develop spaces where ‘the academic and civic cultures communicate more continuously and more creatively with each other” to “[connect] the rich resources of the university to our most pressing social, civic, and ethical problems’” (Chick, “SoTL as Public Scholarship”).

With this in mind, we would like to take up the challenge to make SoTL more public, go beyond traditional forms of sharing SoTL, and extend current SoTL audiences by exploring new and non-traditional outlets and media. The key objective of these particular Public SoTL ICWGs will be to promote, exemplify, and build capacity around the sharing of SoTL-based knowledge through alternative modes and venues targeted at a broader public. 

ISSOTL currently hosts International Collaborative Writing Groups (ICWGs) every three years that result in publication submission to Teaching & Learning Inquiry. These groups bring together academics (faculty, staff, students) to co-create articles on teaching and learning topics from an international perspective. 

The Public ICWG will convene on 2 November during the pre-conference day before the ISSOTL conference in Christchurch, New Zealand (3-6 November, 2025). After the conference, the groups will work together online to ultimately produce a public SoTL artefact no later than October 2026. All Public SoTL ICWG co-leaders, group facilitators, and participants are expected to attend the pre-conference working session on 2 November and register for and attend the conference.

We invite group facilitator applicants to identify both a topic for a Public SoTL ICWG group project and a medium for dissemination to a broader audience. The only other Public SoTL ICWG in 2020-2021 produced a podcast series. Examples of the products of more public modes of communication are conference posters, public statements on pressing issues, videos, web sites, public art installations or performances, or series of blog posts/podcasts/audio-visual content aimed at a wider audience. However, we rely on your creative ideas to extend these potential examples.

Aims and Outcomes

The aims of the ISSOTL Public SoTL Scholarship ICWGs are to

• build capacity of participants to innovate and work collegially in international collaborative groups;
• promote, share and extend SoTL-based practices and findings through alternative media outputs to engage new audiences;
• develop sustainable examples of SoTL as public scholarship, extending its purpose toward advocacy, its audiences toward a broader public, its products toward more public forms of communication, and its influence beyond courses and academic programs.

We are looking to recruit 4 group facilitators for this initiative.

Facilitator Role Expectations

In this role, your focus will be on leading and facilitating your group, and engaging with the whole ICWG cohort (i.e., the co-leaders, the other facilitators, and participants). We, as the four ICWG co-leaders, will lead the overall ICWG coordination and logistics of the face-to-face meeting in Perth. 

If you are selected as an ICWG group facilitator, you would

• Facilitate an international group of 4-6 members (including you as the group leader) in developing and completing the project, starting in November 2025 and through to public dissemination no later than October 2026
• Work with your group in person at the 2 November session immediately prior to ISSOTL25 plus virtually following the conference. The objective being to co-create an artifact before October 2026.
• Ensure that your group meets the various deadlines (see below).
• Collaborate with the ISSOTL ICWG Working Group and other group leaders in the broader initiative.

Costs

All Public SoTL ICWG leaders, group facilitators, and participants are expected to attend the 2 November pre-conference working session, as well as register for and attend the ISSOTL25 conference in Christchurch, New Zealand. ICWG facilitators have their registration waived for the ICWG pre-conference working session.

Benefits

The benefits are manifold and range from capacity-building in mentorship, leadership, and communities of practice; improved communication and dissemination skills; improved knowledge of scholarly literature and alternative avenues for the dissemination of SoTL-related knowledge; expanded networks of international colleagues; excellent evidence for academic portfolio (invited to lead an ICWG in association with the ISSOTL); and the list goes on. 

Timeline

After we have selected the 5 group facilitators, we will release a call for applications for the other group members of Public SoTL ICWGs. We expect to have group facilitators selected by 1 June.

The current timeline has groups actively working from the conference through to November 2026 with tentative milestones being:

• Summer 2025: Formation of the ICWGs. 
• September-October 2025: ICWGs Co-Leaders and Facilitators plan for their projects to discuss with participants at a pre-conference workshop. 
• November 2025: ICWGs work together in New Zealand at ISSOTL Conference.
• November 2025 – October 2026: ICWG cohort and individual groups continue working until completion of final products.
• October 2026: Final products due, recommend presenting at ISSOTL26

Applying

If you would like to apply for this exciting new initiative, please submit the application materials below to Susannah McGowan (sm256@georgetown.edu) and Amy de Jaeger (Amy.DeJaeger@umanitoba.ca) by 20 May 2025. 

• In 300 words or less, please outline your topic of interest, your ideas for envisioned output: medium/mode/genre, and your intended audience and how this aligns with the Public SoTL goals.
• Key reasons (100 words max) why you believe you would be an effective facilitator for an international collaborative effort on this specific project.