Center for Education, Innovation, and Learning in the Sciences

2nd Annual Teaching Celebration
2026-05-27 15:00 - 16:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | CA
Location: Hershey Hall Inner Courtyard

We’re excited to invite all educators to our annual celebration of teaching to honor your dedication, passion, and engagement with CEILS this year! This year we have invited Creamy Boys Ice Cream to create an ice cream experience where you can mix in real-fruit and other delicious flavors! They will help us create fun memories and connect with each other as we celebrate and close the quarter. RSVP today to join the celebration on May 27th 3:00 – 4:30 pm.

RSVP Link: CEILS Teaching Day Celebration RSVP 2026

Journal Club
2026-06-03 14:00 - 15:00 | CA
Paper we will discuss on June 3rd:
June 3, 2026 (In-Person & Zoom) Nørgård, R. T., Toft-Nielsen, C., & Whitton, N. (2017). Playful learning in higher education: Developing a signature pedagogy. International Journal of Play, 6(3), 272-282.

About Journal Club:

The CEILS Journal Club is a collaborative space for faculty, graduate students, and postdoctoral students to learn and discuss breakthrough STEM education research and its implications in your classroom.
Every session features a carefully selected article chosen for its relevance to teaching in STEM. This is paired with a one page summary on the article to facilitate discussion. We are making it easy to keep up with recent findings while exploring how this research can translate into your course. We encourage you to join and share your own perspective as an instructor in this space. Each meeting stands alone and welcomes new participants

Signup:

Registration Link

Pedagogical Essentials: Encouraging Student Engagement Through Playful Approaches to Teaching workshops
2026-06-09 14:00 - 15:30 | CA
Are you curious about using play or playfulness in your teaching? Incorporating playfulness can encourage your students to actively engage using the intrinsic motivation baked into the fun of playing.
But how to start? In this workshop we will go through the process of creating a playful activity that starts with your student learning outcomes or a specific topic. We will briefly discuss a framework for approaching activity design and then we will dive right into a collaborative space of brainstorming and creation while exploring what implementing playfulness in the classroom could look like. Every classroom and instructor is different though so you will also have time to playfully create an activity or approach to use that is specific to your teaching.
Roll the dice and come join us to learn about playfulness in the classroom!
RSVP Now!

UCLA Summer Institute On Evidence-Based Teaching
2026-06-13 - 2026-06-16 | CA
Co-facilitated by the TLC and the Center for Education Innovation and Learning in the Sciences (CEILS), the Summer Institute offers training on effective evidence-based teaching strategies and active learning. This four-day learning opportunity includes facilitated workshop sessions where instructors will practice innovative instructional approaches to increase student engagement and learning in your classroom. Instructors will work together in small groups to design a “teachable tidbit,” a brief course module with engaging activities and assessments to meet a course’s learning objectives.
Eligible instructors selected to participate will receive $500, payable to a research or professional development fund, and all participants will earn a certificate of completion. A record of participation can be included in instructors’ dossiers as evidence of efforts to improve teaching, as well as an activity that promotes inclusive excellence in education. Efforts in this area are recognized as a component of the promotion and tenure process at UCLA (see APM 210-1).
The Summer Institute is UCLA’s iteration of the National Academies Summer Institute, started at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 2004. Since coming to campus in 2016, the program has expanded beyond STEM disciplines to include social sciences and humanities instructors, creating an interdisciplinary setting for advancing teaching excellence.
Go to the TLC Page to learn more: UCLA Summer Institute for Impactful Teaching – Center for Education, Innovation, and Learning in the Sciences

CEILS Annual Faculty Workshop
2026-08-25 08:00 - 17:00 | Hershey Hall 158
Hershey Hall 158
This year, our annual workshop will focus on supporting you in creatively responding to the changing institutional environment while maintaining your well-being. Our goal is to provide you with resources, concrete strategies, and practices to maximize or maintain student learning.
We invite you to join us and engage in any or all of the experiences described below:

Hear from experts on AI about maintaining academic integrity in the age of AI
Learn about strategies for designing an inclusive syllabus and creating community on the first day of class, helping your students learn how-to learn, and reimagining your course with reduced TA support.
Get to know folks from the UCLA Disabilities and Computing Program and learn about making your course materials more accessible.
Engage with invited faculty, who will present lightning talks followed by roundtable discussions, each led by one of the invited faculty.

All are welcome to join this community of caring instructors who are excited to talk about teaching! We especially encourage instructors who either are relatively new to college teaching or who have instructional responsibilities in large enrollment gateway courses for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) majors.
RSVP: Coming Soon!
