Teresa Foley has been selected to receive the honorary title of Teaching Professor. The working title of Teaching Professor is given to a select group of Senior Instructors to recognize a record of distinction. The title carries the expectation that the individual is not only an exemplary teacher, but has made a major impact in the disciplinary unit and its students (e.g. on pedagogy and curriculum), one that likely extends to considerable impact on the campus generally and/or a role in national discussions. The evaluation committee cited the numerous ways that Dr. Foley's record exceeds these criteria, and the profoundly positive impact she continues to have on undergraduate physiology education, particularly in IPHY.
Dr. Foley's own undergraduate, and graduate, education also took place at CU Boulder, where she initially aspired to a career in medicine or physiology research. Although she was born into a family of educators, it was not until a few years into her PhD work, while giving an outreach presentation to 5th graders, that she fully realized her passion for teaching science. She then spent 3 years as a Postdoc with the Science Education Initiative, working with IPHY faculty to bring evidence-based, student-centered instructional approaches to the Department. Since 2011, as an Instructor and then Senior Instructor in IPHY, she quickly took on a leadership role in the Department's educational initiatives.
Dr. Foley has taught both small and large enrollment courses within and outside her expertise, earning praise from students and colleagues alike for her teaching, which skillfully interweaves student interaction with content delivery, making full use of evidence-based "best practices" from education research. She also targets the whole student, seeking ways to encourage engagement and identity with the subject matter. Beyond the classroom, she maintains contacts with individual students to promote their success, and is also active in mentoring student research projects in physiology.
The impact of Dr. Foley's work extends throughout the IPHY teaching program, having helped develop learning goals for 14 courses. She worked to revitalize the Human Physiology and Cell Physiology labs to an inquiry-based design, and helped design the curriculum for Introduction to Epidemiology, one of two required courses for the Undergraduate Certificate in Public Health. She serves as a Department Education Specialist, working closely with faculty to apply best teaching practices throughout the IPHY curriculum. She has been a co-PI on three Chancellor's Awards for STEM Education, and has earned the respect of colleagues on campus and nationwide for her work pushing IPHY to the cutting edge of science education.
Currently, Dr. Foley teaches Immunology, Endocrinology, and Introduction to Epidemiology while working on several pedagogy projects aimed at improving the quality of teaching and learning in IPHY. As a member of the Teaching Quality Framework (TQF) Initiative on campus, Dr. Foley and several of her colleagues developed a new framework to evaluate teaching that uses the perspectives of faculty members, their students, and their peers as key sources of data. The framework also provides transparent and measurable standards for development to help faculty improve their teaching practices. She also continues to assess the effectiveness of student learning in IPHY using a curriculum map she developed for the department with Dr. Janet Casagrand, and Phys-MAPS, a physiology pre-post assessment tool developed by education researchers at CU-Boulder.
In all of Dr. Foley's outstanding pedagogy work, from classroom excellence to restructuring IPHY's curriculum and the way teaching is evaluated, she is driven by a tireless focus on what works in education for each individual student. Her efforts have been instrumental in improving physiology education in the IPHY Department and beyond.
The Teaching Professor title was inaugurated in the spring of 2017 to create a new level of distinction for instructional faculty. After a minimum of three years at the rank of Senior Instructor, Senior Instructors may be considered for this title. For more information on eligibility and a list of awarded professorships, see the Teaching Professors page.