Introduction

With this issue of the Journal on Empowering Teaching Excellence (JETE), we are pleased to present several articles that demonstrate methods for engaging undergraduate and graduate students and broader communities through higher education. As someone who believes personally and professionally in the sublime beauty of community-engaged learning, I (editor-in-chief Nichelle Frank, Ph.D.) am so pleased to see this collection of articles that show the many benefits of knitting together student learners and their larger communities.

To begin this issue’s focus on community engagement, Sarah Tulane, Ph.D. (Utah State University) and Shirlene Call Law (Utah State University) demonstrate the significance of community-engaged learning (sometimes called service learning) in graduate coursework. “Coaching Graduate Students Through Early Childhood Focused Community-Engaged Learning: Graduate Student Perspectives and Course Design” outlines how master’s and Ph.D. students in a graduate-level child-development course created presentations and conducted interviews for an online summit with 275 community participants and created presentations for a face-to-face “playshop” through an educational organization with 30 community participants. Readers will see how these assignments contributed to the graduate students’ sense of personal growth, community connection, and peer and mentor support.

Continuing the vein of student engagement, Dr. Anna Carissa Rozzo’s “Coaching Undergraduates: A Conceptual and Practical Guide” shows how a coaching mindset supports student-centered learning. With coaching in a teaching setting, the student identifies learning goals, and the instructor helps the student find the steps to take to reach those goals, such as asking questions and providing mirroring statements. Rozzo argues that coaching connects to educational practices like metacognition, critical reflection, self-directed learning, student-centered learning, and authentic assessment. The article outlines several methods for integrating coaching practices into teaching.

In “Virtual Teaching During COVID-19: Attitudes, Abilities, and Educational Needs of Cooperative Extension Staff,” Kathryn Yerxa (University of Maine Cooperative Extension), Kayla L. Parsons, Ph.D. (University of Maine), and Jennifer Lobley (University of Maine Cooperative Extension) draw readers’ attention to a significant arm of higher education institutions: extension offices. Extension offices serve the broader communities in which they exist. In this article, the authors describe the experiences of University of Maine Cooperative Extension staff members in using virtual instructional methods. In recent years, eXtension.org has provided a virtual space in which extension offices can reach audiences in new ways. With this transition, the study’s extension staff have been learning how to best leverage virtual environments. We hope that this study raises awareness about the need to provide professional development opportunities for extension staff.

This issue concludes with “Enhancing Student Engagement in Numerical Methods: The Impact of Alternative Grading Practices” by Vivek Singhal, Ph.D., Kenan Baltaci, Ph.D., and Oai Hai, Ph.D. The authors used a bonus point self-assessment rubric and peer evaluations in a challenging math-based course to increase undergraduate student engagement. These two strategies not only fostered stronger participation but also reduced student anxiety. The article draws our attention to the experiences of undergraduates, particularly the prevalence of assessment-related anxiety. By showing the positive effects of other assessment strategies, this article paves the path for instructors to use such approaches in their own courses.

We hope that you find these articles as instructive as they are thought-provoking. As always, we look forward to future issues, including articles or book reviews. Thank you for your support of JETE!