NEW THIS YEAR: In addition to our traditional application for teams, we will be launching a track at the Institute on PBL for individuals. Any faculty member or staff member with a relevant role (e.g., instructional designer, librarian) who is interested in advancing their understanding or practice of PBL is welcome to attend.
Institute Dates and Location The Institute will run from Tuesday, June 3, through Friday, June 6, 2025, and is held at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Massachusetts. The Institute program will officially start with a welcome and reception at 5 pm on Tuesday and will end at noon on Friday with team presentations. Check-in will begin at 3 pm on Tuesday. Participants should plan to attend the Institute in its entirety.
Who Should Attend The Institute is designed for faculty and administrators from a wide variety of institutions—including public, private, liberal arts, STEM, community colleges, and research universities—who are interested in learning about project education and advancing plans to integrate learnings into their own curricula.
Why Attend Project-based learning offers students real-world opportunities to research issues, think critically, gain new perspectives, solve problems, and develop written and oral communication skills all within the framework of a team environment and guided by engaged and involved faculty. Through the Institute on Project-Based Learning, faculty and administrators from colleges and universities around the world benefit from over 50 years of experience at WPI.
What Participants Should Expect Participants, whether in a team or as individuals, will come to the Institute with a proposal outlining a specific goal or project they would like to advance. Through collaborative work, and with the support of an Institute coach, participants will develop strategies to integrate project-based learning into their own undergraduate curricula, whether in general education or in the major, in one department or across the campus.
Institute faculty will use proven materials and examples to help participants
- bring project work into their own classes, seminars, and capstones, and learn how to use projects to help students make interdisciplinary connections.
- use faculty-guided project work to strengthen service-learning, study abroad, and internship programs.
- develop the fundamental skills needed to make project-based learning work for students, including student team formation and development, evidence-based thinking and writing, and strategies for attacking open-ended problems.
- create faculty development plans to support project-based learning, including community networks and partnerships with external organizations.
- use student project work as a key component for overall program evaluation and student learning assessment.
- build relationships with participants from other institutions to share ideas and experiences.
Attending the Institute as a Team Attending the Institute as an Individual
2025 KEYNOTE SPEAKER
J. Elizabeth Clark, Professor of English at LaGuardia Community College/City University of New York, teaches composition, children’s literature, and the capstone course in the Liberal Arts.
Her scholarly interests include children’s literature, teaching with technology, ePortfolios and digital rhetoric. She is a graduate of Lycoming College (B.A.) and Binghamton University (M.A. and Ph.D.). She has been part of LaGuardia’s dynamic ePortfolio team since 2002 and has served in a variety of leadership roles at the college. Her critical work on teaching writing, technology, reflection, and ePortfolios has appeared in journals such as: Computers and Composition, Peer Review, and The Journal of Basic Writing. She regularly presents on integrative learning, reflection, teaching with technology and ePortfolios.