“18 is not a magic number”: Faculty Reflections on Student Development Theories in Creating Inclusive Classrooms

Inclusive classroom training typically focuses on course design, teaching strategies, and evaluation practices girded in best teaching practices. Our university has hosted inclusive classroom training for six years, but just recently began providing mandatory training in each of the university’s academic departments for teaching faculty (including term, tenure-track, tenured, and adjunct professors). The newness and relevancy of student development theories to faculty proved worthy of increased attention by our Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching. Using qualitative assessment data from our institution's mandatory Inclusive Classroom Annual Training for faculty, we present findings that illustrate how instructors would benefit from cursory information on student development theories. Faculty reflections focused around three themes. First, it is essential for faculty to humanize teaching and learning by remembering to teach students and not just course content. Second, faculty could connect their new knowledge of student development theories to their pedagogies and specifically how it can promote inclusive classroom environments. Finally, participants shared vulnerabilities by interpreting their past, present, and future teaching through a lens of student development theories. Also provided are recommendations to enhance teaching development for faculty, teaching and learning centers, and student affairs educators centered on the importance of student development theories.