ElON COLLEGE – Patricia Hutchings, a senior scholar with The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, was named March 10 to a four-year term on the Elon College Board of Trustees.
Hutchings currently is co-directing The Carnegie Teaching Academy: Fostering a Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, a new program working with campuses, faculty members and scholarly societies nationwide to foster long-lasting learning for all students, to enhance teaching and to bring recognition to teaching.
“Dr. Hutchings will bring a national perspective on higher education to the board of trustees,” said Elon College President Leo Lambert. “Her insights on the quality of teaching and her strong ties to the nation’s leading higher education organizations will have an immediate and direct impact on our academic programs.”
Hutchings of Half Moon, Calif., previously was director of the Teaching Initiative at the American Association for Higher Education. She worked with faculty, administrators and others to develop and foster a campus culture, in
which teaching and learning are talked about, evaluated and rewarded. Several publications resulted from the project, including the most recent volume, “The Course Portfolio: How Faculty Can Examine Their Teaching in Advance Practice and Improve Student Learning,” which she wrote and edited. She has written and edited numerous articles on college teaching. She also is a published poet and a member of the Modern Language Association Committee on Teaching as a Profession.
From 1987 to 1990, Hutchings was the founding director of AAHE Assessment Forum, which provides leadership and resources for campuses seeking to assess student learning. She was a faculty member and chair of the English Department at Alverno College, a liberal arts college for women in Milwaukee, from 1978 to 1987. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a bachelor’s degree in English from Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., and a doctorate in English from the University of Iowa in Iowa City.
Also named to a two-year term on the board as youth trustee was Mark Richter of Greenport, Long Island, N.Y. He will graduate in May with a double major in political science and public administration and plans on a career in higher education. He has been active in the Student Government Association and currently serves as president. He also was the only student serving on the Presidential Search Committee.
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