The Teaching of Psychology in Autobiography: Perspectives from Exemplary Psychology Teachers Edited by Trisha A. Benson, Caroline Burke, Ana Amstadter, Ryan Sidey, Vincent Hevern, Barney Beins, & Bill Buskist.
23 An Inverse Career Path: From Faculty Development to Developing as a Faculty Member Barbara K. Hofer Middlebury College pp. 157-164

I am currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont. I received my PhD in 1997 from the Combined Program in Education and Psychology at the University of Michigan, along with a certificate in Culture and Cognition. I also have an EdM in Human Development from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. My dissertation adviser, colleague, and collaborator was Paul Pintrich (Hofer & Pintrich, 2002) with whom I worked on issues of epistemic understanding, motivation, and self-regulation. I also worked with Harold Stevenson at the Center for Human Growth and Development on cross-cultural investigations of the psychological correlates of achievement, and with Bill McKeachie and Paul Pintrich, who coordinated a college teaching research group. With Pintrich I was awarded the 1999 Research Review Award from the American Educational Research Association (Hofer & Pintrich, 1997). In 1997, I received the Outstanding Graduate Student Award from the University of Michigan and the McKeachie Early Career Excellence Teaching Award from the Society for the Teaching of Psychology (STP; Division Two of the American Psychological Association [APA]). Other awards from APA have included dissertation and travel funding, and most recently, a grant from the Science Directorate. I am an active member of APA Division 15, Educational Psychology, currently serving as Secretary of the Division, on the Publication Committee, and on the editorial board of Educational Psychologist. I am also active in the American Educational Research Association. In 2002, I was a Faculty Fellow at Doshisha University in Kyoto, Japan.

My broad interests in epistemic understanding, motivation, college student learning, and culture and cognition were honed through an inverse career path that involved working in faculty development prior to becoming a faculty member. As a staff member at a university teaching center, I ran workshops for faculty members and teaching assistants, provided instructional consultation, and conducted research on instructional innovation and curricular change. Throughout those years, I became increasingly interested in learning more about intellectual development, how students learn, and what constitutes effective teaching. I also wanted to develop research skills that would enable me to address pressing questions in this realm, which led to my application to the doctoral program at Michigan, a naïve but life-changing decision.

My steps toward that decision were far from the linear career moves that I watch my current students planning. Prior to the years in faculty development, I had worked at three different universities as a coordinator of service-learning and experiential education programs, teacher of English as a second language, program evaluator, ethnographer, and trainer of international teaching assistants. For a 4-year interlude away from higher education, I was the director of an educational conference center and summer camp, a job shared with my husband while our children were young. As disparate as these roles may seem, all contribute to what I currently bring to teaching courses such as Educational Psychology, Adolescent Development, Research Methods, and Cultural Psychology. These experiences not only provided me with rich examples, but also with a sense of the applicability of course constructs to the variety of roles that my students may someday assume.

My Early Development as a Teacher

Growing up in a relatively remote island community, I turned to books early on, read intensely and broadly, and developed scholarly ambitions appropriate for my era, gender, and socio-economic status: I wanted to be a high school math teacher. Awarded a competitive teaching scholarship at any university in the state, I chose the University of South Florida, a fairly new institution designed as a liberal arts college within the state university system. I had small classes, engaging seminars, and models of good teaching and close student-faculty relationships that remain my models to this day, but interest in my chosen profession waned, and I began to explore other possibilities. Fascinated by a required behavioral science course in which I volunteered to help with research, I then enrolled in Introductory Psychology, the only large lecture class in my undergraduate career. Unfortunately, the rote memorization of details and transmission model of education were an unappealing contrast to the complex intellectual challenges and interdisciplinary excitement I found that same semester in the new American Studies Department, where I subsequently chose to major, along with a secondary concentration in English. I found many of the education classes even less enticing and made a decision to relinquish my scholarship and take on a second job (college was cheap in those years!). My interest in psychology and education never diminished, however, and I am grateful that admissions committees at both Harvard and Michigan were able to overlook early transgressions in the two fields I chose to combine for graduate training.

Thus, my formal development as a teacher and psychologist was delayed, but both were nurtured during the years that led to doctoral work, as I continued to read and contemplate psychological questions related to education. Early on, as director of a service-learning program at the University of Kentucky, I received a grant from the Lilly Endowment to initiate a program that coupled internships and an interdisciplinary seminar to foster ethical development and investigate the outcomes. These experiences led to coursework at Harvard with Lawrence Kohlberg, the design of several other studies examining development during the college years, and a leave of absence to pursue the master's degree. In the following years, through various jobs, each professional role played a part in furthering my interest in teaching and learning.

By the time I returned to graduate school at the doctoral level, my ambitions were not to become a college professor, but to become a better researcher who could bring more of a knowledge base to faculty development. That plan began to fade quickly; walking across the Michigan campus with Bill McKeachie on a brilliant fall day, just a few weeks into graduate school, I was stunned and flattered when he asked if I would be interested in being a teaching assistant (TA) for his "Learning to Learn" course. Thus began an exhilarating upheaval in my career plans, as I discovered from the first day in the classroom that teaching really was what I had wanted to be doing all along.

The privilege of apprenticing to the master of college teaching was an extraordinary one. Bill does everything he espouses in Teaching Tips (McKeachie, 2002); he also makes the process transparent to his TAs and provides opportunities for practice. He expected us to guest lecture in his class, included us in test construction, and encouraged us to conduct research on student outcome measures of the course (Hofer & Yu, 2003; Hofer, Yu, & Pintrich, 1998). Throughout it all he was patient, responsive, supportive, and remarkably available.

By my third year at Michigan, I had fellowship and research funding and was still involved in faculty development, but was eager to continue teaching, and split an appointment in Developmental Psychology, teaching one section. I had just completed a graduate seminar on motivation and now watched Scott Paris put these ideas into practice. He used criterion-referenced rather than normative grading, constructed grading requirements with both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation in mind, fostered a mastery approach to motivation by offering students the opportunity to take an exam again (a new version, of course) if they were unhappy with their first scores (posted immediately), and designed novel and creative assignments for research papers that mitigated against potential plagiarism. He ran a weekly meeting with TAs during which he encouraged sharing of ideas and resources, initiating a culture of collaboration that has continued among several of us who taught together at that time.

The following year, as a grader for Cultural Psychology with Harold Stevenson, I learned about the intellectual pleasures of creating a course that was not textbook-bound, as the previous two had been, in a novel area with growing interest for me. As one of the initial students in Michigan's new Culture and Cognition program, I was eager to read as much as possible in this area, and assisting with Harold's course pressed me to know the material well enough to evaluate student essays on the topic. We had lively discussions of the course constructs, laying a foundation for future discussions in his lab and our writing together (Stevenson, Hofer, & Randall, 2000), an invaluable model of how research and teaching can be intertwined.

What also stands out in these years was the modeling available in my doctoral courses. Paul Pintrich was particularly skilled in facilitating graduate seminars. He promoted a pattern of talk that was student-to-student and yet he knew just when to jump in, leaping to the board and diagramming everything he had heard, and then elevating us to higher levels of conceptual complexity for the next round of discussion. Observing Paul, I also learned how to help students prepare for such discussions and how to design paper assignments that fostered autonomy, choice, and creativity. I still find myself trying to channel him when leading my own seminars, especially when I want to leap in prematurely, and when I know I need to listen more deeply in order to validate, challenge, and synthesize students' ideas. Most importantly, I learned what I know about one-on-one teaching from having Paul as a mentor. He fostered high self-efficacy, knew just where to set the bar for each student, and when and how far to raise it; he also helped set both proximal and distal goals, provided constructive and timely feedback, was generous with his time and attention, and made time-to-degree ambitions realistic and attainable.

Although several other courses stand out, the Advanced Social Psychology Seminar, team-taught by Hazel Markus and Pat Gurin, offered a rare opportunity to witness two women, outstanding scholars and longtime friends, share responsibility for a course, and provided exemplary modeling of both interactive lecturing and mentoring of discussion groups. Students took turns leading weekly discussions, and the leaders of the small groups met first to discuss the readings. We each wrote weekly response papers that these two unusually busy individuals critiqued in such a way that each week's writing became better than the last. I continue to pattern many of my classes after aspects of that particular course.

I was interested in trying team-teaching after this experience, as was one of the members of my cohort, Kim Edelin, and the following fall we team-taught Educational Psychology. Observing a colleague at a similar stage in the process and being observed by her; getting to plan and debrief from teaching with a colleague; and collaborating with someone with ideas, energy, and enthusiasm made this an invaluable learning experience--one that should be available to more new teachers.

Finally, Dick Nisbett taught me just how much fun teachers can have in designing courses around topics they want to discuss, the intellectual pleasures of learning with colleagues, and how learning continues for faculty members. My last semester in graduate school I simply could not resist attending his new seminar on "Evolution and Epistemology"-nor could 15 other individuals, all either faculty members (from half a dozen disciplines) or doctoral candidates, none of whom actually "needed" course credit.

Defining Myself as a Teacher

The University of Michigan is renowned as a place that fosters interdisciplinary thinking. At Michigan I was able to combine education and psychology for the doctorate, participate fully in the Culture and Cognition program and pursue anthropology coursework through a fellowship from the program, while investigating a dissertation topic (personal epistemology) with origins in philosophy. The Combined Program in Education and Psychology, my intellectual home, was a place to tie these ideas together, discuss them with colleagues, develop related research projects, and talk about teaching among a supportive community of colleagues who knew and applied the empirical evidence for best-teaching practices. Entering the job market aware that there are no other places quite like Michigan, I was not clear about the type of institution where I might be a good fit or where I might continue to pursue multiple interdisciplinary interests, so I was glad to have interviews at diverse institutions, both research universities and liberal arts colleges.

Passionate about both teaching and research and hoping not to sacrifice one for the other, and eager to continue combining education and psychology within a cultural context, I was pleased to be offered a position at Middlebury College, where a new position had been created in the Psychology Department to bridge psychology and education. Middlebury is a liberal arts college in Vermont with a commitment to internationalism, connections to the Salzburg Seminars, a famed summer language program, and students from 70 countries. Middlebury was also attractive because the Psychology Department was young and growing, and the college had a range of opportunities for creating new courses, for example, an intensive winter-term where faculty invent courses that might not fit in the regular curriculum, first-year interdisciplinary seminars, and senior seminars in our research areas. A new science building was under development, and we were each promised lab space; further, there were students eager to do research with faculty members.

As a highly selective liberal arts college with excellent students and a faculty committed to both teaching and research, Middlebury is a demanding and rewarding place to be a faculty member. To outsiders, the teaching load and student ratio seem generous; only those at similar schools understand the intensity of the nature of teaching at such an institution where students expect outstanding teaching, detailed individual feedback, and accessibility to faculty members at a level unheard of in research institutions. Classroom visits by senior faculty and an elected committee are part of an ongoing review process. Teaching is openly valued, faculty members talk about teaching, and continual improvement and self-reflection are normative.

The primary obstacle in this environment is simply time. My image of academic life was one that offered more reflective, contemplative time than I have managed to find so far, and I always seem to have half a dozen studies I would like to get up and running, data sets begging for analyses, and writing I hunger to complete. Sometimes knowing as much about teaching as educational psychologists do is an obstacle in this profession (e.g., frequent assessments are better for the students, but more grading is bad for the instructor) and I am often my own worst enemy, compromising in ways that err on the side of good pedagogy. What I am trying to learn is to make wise investments in teaching with worthwhile payoff, and to achieve a balance between teaching and research that works best for me. Meanwhile, through an elected position on the Faculty Council, I continue to work toward systemic change (e.g., lower teaching loads) that make the desired balance more attainable for all, without sacrificing the excellence in teaching for which the college is renowned.

The Examined Life of a Teacher

Teaching is a process of constant renewal, with no two days-and no two classes-ever the same. I thrive on that novelty, and also try to learn from experience, as well as from my students. At midterm, I distribute simple forms seeking open-ended feedback, and address students' suggestions in class; this formative feedback often seems more helpful both to students and to me than the summative feedback from end-of-term course evaluations. I try to make notes following each lecture, reminders for next year about what seemed to work and what did not, and where I needed to allow more or less time. I think often of Lee Shulman's ideas about pedagogical content knowledge and recognize that my ability to understand how to teach particular complex constructs is evolving, with a growing repertoire of relevant techniques and the capability to anticipate student difficulty. I design courses in areas in which I want to advance my own understanding, and I take full advantage of Middlebury's support for teaching improvement projects, which has financed a trip to China and a seminar at Harvard on "Mind, Brain, and Education." On a less formal level, I learn about teaching by continuing to put myself in the role of learner. Whether in elementary Japanese or ice skating class, I have learned humility and appreciation for the affective aspects of learning and gained a window on teaching from another perspective.

In general, my philosophy of teaching is one that is informed by cognitive science, developmental psychology, and educational psychology, with a focus on the constructivist nature of the learning process. I apply my own research as well, helping students understanding how they know what they know and why, helping them become critical thinkers and self-regulated learners, and fostering a mastery-oriented approach to motivation in my classes. My goal as a teacher is to set high standards for student learning and to craft conditions for students to meet them. I continue to experiment with pedagogical processes, and more than 20 years after running service-learning programs at a university-wide level, I am now putting these ideas into practice in my own courses.

Advice for New Teachers

In an ideal graduate program, students would have opportunities to apprentice with master teachers who provide regular mentoring, time to focus on teaching, concurrent workshops from a teaching-learning center, knowledge about teaching and learning, and a progression of pedagogical responsibilities that culminate in a stand-alone course prior to graduation. Exigencies of graduate funding sometimes mitigate against this process, but typically at the cost of good teaching, which not only negatively affects the undergraduates being taught, but can erode the confidence and self-efficacy of the teaching assistant, an expensive proposition with long-term consequences. Fortunately, many universities have begun to recognize the mutual benefits of fostering teaching development, and various programs to prepare the future professoriate have been beneficial in this regard.

On an individual level, I encourage graduate students to participate in such programs wherever they are available and to become involved in the work of university teaching centers. Enroll in workshops, invite consultants to observe your classes, and assist in preparing those a few years behind you in the pipeline. Equally importantly, create a culture of support within your own graduate program. Talk about teaching, share syllabi and lecture plans, trade ideas for lab activities, and foster a climate where teaching can be made more public. This network will also sustain you during early years as a new faculty member, especially when asked to teach a course for the first time; former graduate student colleagues can be an invaluable resource. As graduate students, take courses from the best teachers possible and observe their teaching carefully. As a faculty member, learn to balance your time effectively between teaching and scholarship, and decide what balance meets both your own needs and fits within your institution's expectations. Find allies who care about teaching, utilize campus resources for teaching improvement, and observe other faculty members' classes. Enjoy!

Final Thoughts

The invitation to participate in this volume arrived on the last day of the fall semester, a year to the day when I had been awarded tenure, thus at the conclusion of my first year of post-tenure teaching. At lunch that day, a colleague about to be reviewed for tenure in the coming spring asked what was different now, and if teaching took less time, or if I felt more comfortable cutting back on my preparation. I laughed, knowing how internalized the motivation to teach and to engage in scholarly development seemed to be, and how little either had been affected by tenure. I doubt that I ever worked hard at teaching or research to please someone else or for extrinsic reward, and I suspect that is probably true for many contributors to this collection of autobiographical narratives-chosen, ironically, on the basis of having been extrinsically rewarded for their teaching. Teaching is a calling, a passion, a way of life, and we are privileged to get to teach and be paid for it, and to intertwine it with our scholarly lives.

References

Hofer, B. K., & Pintrich, P. R. (1997). The development of epistemological theories: Beliefs about knowledge and knowing and their relation to learning. Review of Educational Research, 67, 88-140.

Hofer, B. K., & Pintrich, P. R. (Eds.). (2002). Personal epistemology: The psychology of beliefs about knowledge and knowing. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Hofer, B. K., & Yu, S. L. (2003). Teaching self-regulated learning through a "Learning to Learn" course. Teaching of Psychology, 30, 30-33.

Hofer, B. K., Yu, S. L., & Pintrich, P. R. (1998). Teaching college students to be self-regulated learners. In D. Schunk & B. Zimmerman (Eds.), Self-regulated learners: From teaching to self-reflective practice (pp. 57-85). New York: Guilford.

McKeachie, W. J. (2002). Teaching tips: Strategies, research, and theory for college and university teachers (11th Ed.). Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

Stevenson, H., Hofer, B., & Randel, B. (2000). Mathematics achievement and attitudes about math in China and the West. Journal of Psychology in Chinese Societies, 1, 1-16

This page was first posted online on November 8, 2005 and was last updated on November 8, 2005

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