Course Design Institute (CDI) - Center for the Enhancement of Learning and Teaching

The summer 2026 course design institute will take place Monday, August 10th - Thursday, August 13th, 9am-4pm. Register online here.

August 10-13, 2026, 9:30am-3:30 pm

Modality/Location: In-person (on Medford campus) with Zoom option

What might your course look like if you had the time to (re)design it for students today?

Join us for CELT’s Course Design Institute!

In this four-day program, you will have the opportunity to develop and refine key components of your course in a structured, supportive environment. Through dedicated independent work time, workshops, and conversations with colleagues, you will gain a foundation in key elements of course design and develop strategies for engaging today’s learners through navigating the impact of AI, harnessing experiential learning, and fostering an inclusive and equitable classroom.

Each day, you will:

Attend a workshop focusing on a core component of evidence-based course design (9:30-10:30)
Have several hours of protected work time to:
- apply what you learned in the workshop to a related task – for example, writing learning objectives, designing a summative assessment, or drafting an AI policy
- Attend optional workshops on topics determined by the interests of the cohort
- and/or consult with staff from CELT, ETS, and the StAAR Center, as well as students from CELT’s pedagogical partnership program (10:30-2:30)
Receive feedback from colleagues on your work (2:30-3:30)

The institute offers protected time, flexible structure, and a supportive community to help you progress toward your goals for the upcoming year. This program is open to all Tufts instructors (including post-docs) who are planning to teach in AY 2026-2027.

CELT’s Asynchronous Canvas Course Design Tutorial

The Center for the Enhancement of Learning and Teaching (CELT) created this tutorial to guide you through the process of designing a new course or revising an existing course with a lens of inclusive, learner-centered teaching. This asynchronous and unmoderated course is designed to model design features and tools you may wish to include in your own course. It will also provide you with the opportunity to experience the perspective of being a student in an online course. Instructors at Tufts can access this tutorial at any time and from anywhere - click here for the link to view the course within Canvas and enroll yourself.

Mini-CDI's

CELT also offers throughout the year more compact Mini-CDI.

Past participants have said:

"This opportunity to participate in this institute was eye-opening, insightful, and overwhelming (in a good way!) I appreciated the learning strategies and hearing from other faculty their feedback, ideas, and creative suggestions to reinforce learning outcomes/intentions/student goals in the course."

"I learned new teaching strategies which I think will improve the students learning and keep them engaged."

"It gave me a lot of ideas about how to make a class interactive while still delivering a lot of course content. It also gave me a lot of ways to make a course more widely accessible and inviting to students."

"As a first-year instructor, there is a lot that I didn't really know about course design that I feel more confident about now, and the practical strategies were really helpful in my decisions around assessments and class activities."

For more information, contact celt@tufts.edu

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