Measuring pandemic change: Analyzing syllabi for student-centeredness over time

Abstract

Researchers seek to measure the extent to which faculty increased their student-centered practices in response to COVID-19 by analyzing course syllabi across three semesters. Faculty were randomly selected from two campuses of a STEM-focused institution (n = 110), each of whom had taught the same course during Fall 2019, Fall 2020, and Fall 2022. Scorers used an abbreviated version of the Student-Centered Syllabus Rubric (Palmer et al., 2014) to identify shifts in student-centeredness over time. Results revealed that 85% of measured syllabi changed over time, with over one-third of measured syllabi reverting to pre-pandemic status. The researchers discuss their methods, results, limitations, and future research opportunities.

Keywords

• syllabus
• pandemic
• student-centeredness
• elastic