We offer many types of professional development opportunities, delivered virtually and face-to-face, throughout the year.
Many of our offerings are also available by request for instructors in the U of A community. If you would like to discuss a specific offering for your department, please submit a request.
Professional Development Pathways
The UCATT Professional Development Pathways Program gives you the essential skills and knowledge you need for teaching excellence. We've created structured yet flexible learning journeys in high-impact areas that respect your busy schedule and competing demands.
Each pathway offers strategically scaffolded workshops (beginner, intermediate, and advanced) that you can complete individually or as part of a complete track. Workshops are designed as focused 3-4 hour asynchronous online experiences within a one to three-week window, making professional development accessible regardless of your teaching load.
Focus on topics you can immediately apply in your classroom while earning valuable recognition for your commitment to professional growth.
Brightspace Your Way
Pathway: Let's Talk about Tech (in Teaching)
Level: Beginner - Introduces fundamental concepts and basic applications
Ready to make Brightspace work for you? With its robust tools and integrations, Brightspace supports a range of teaching styles and engagement strategies. This workshop starts with a skills inventory that helps you reflect on your current comfort level with core tools and design practices, then guides you toward personalized strategies that fit your teaching style.
Brightspace Your Way II
Pathway: Let's Talk about Tech (in Teaching)
Level: Intermediate - Builds on Foundational knowledge
This intermediate level workshop builds on the beginner level, advancing your skills toward more complex, applied course design tasks. Through five core modules, you'll apply Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles and configure Brightspace tools to create inclusive and engaging learning experiences. You'll explore integrated technologies like Course Maker and FeedbackFruits through real-world scenarios grounded in student feedback and survey data, demonstrating how purposeful tool use directly supports student success and satisfaction.
To model personalized learning, this workshop uses Awards as a motivational tool to recognize your progress, encourage persistence, and help you take ownership of your learning journey. By the end, you'll have practical strategies and a UDL-informed framework for designing courses that embody the Brightspace Your Way approach: inclusive in design and personalized in practice.
Creating Vibrant Virtual Classrooms
Pathway: Let's Talk about Tech (in Teaching)
Level: Intermediate - Builds on Foundational knowledge
When you walk into a physical classroom, you notice the posters, books, and other elements that give context to the content being taught. In this pathway, you'll bring that same intentionality to your online classroom by learning to customize Brightspace Content to reflect your personality and course material.
You'll practice using basic HTML within CourseMaker's structured framework to customize webpages and module descriptions, including how to resize images to fit your pages properly. By the end of this pathway, you'll create at least three customized templates with banners and page formats that you can adapt for your own course sites.
Better Slides, Better Lectures
Pathway: Designing for Digital Learners
Level: Beginner - Introduces fundamental concepts and basic applications
Learn evidence-based strategies to transform your slide presentations into clear, engaging, and accessible learning tools. Drawing on cognitive science and Mayer's Principles of Multimedia Learning, you'll discover how to reduce cognitive overload, highlight key concepts, and pair meaningful visuals with narration for maximum impact.
We'll explore accessibility strategies, including contrast, perceivability, and compatibility with assistive technologies, to ensure all learners can engage with your content. Through hands-on practice, you'll create or revise a slide presentation, experiment with design techniques, and test how your slides work for both live and recorded delivery.
By the end of the workshop, you'll be able to create polished presentations that are visually appealing, pedagogically sound, inclusive, and attention-grabbing.
Build Your Digital Teaching Persona
Pathway: Designing for Digital Learners
Level: Advanced - Focuses on complex integration and innovation
Ready to create an intentional and engaging digital teaching presence? Drawing from the Community of Inquiry framework and inspired by You Need a Manifesto by Charlotte Burgess-Auburn, you'll reflect on your core teaching values and learn to articulate your online presence accordingly. You'll examine examples of strong instructor personas, analyze how tone and communication frequency shape student engagement, and develop your own "persona toolkit"—including a welcome video script, messaging plan, and engagement prompts tailored to your style and subject matter.
Building Community in Online Courses
Pathway: Designing for Digital Learners
Level: Beginner - Introduces fundamental concepts and basic applications
Experience what it's like to be part of an online learning community—and learn how to create one in your own courses. In this hands-on workshop, you'll explore what community means in online learning and see practical examples of community-building strategies in action.
You'll have the opportunity to develop your own approaches for fostering connection and engagement in your courses, then share and refine those strategies with fellow participants. Throughout the workshop, you'll experience firsthand how these community-building practices work, as the session itself models the very strategies we'll discuss.
Designing Accessible Assessments
Pathway: Designing for Digital Learners
Level: Beginner - Introduces fundamental concepts and basic applications
Want to create assessments that work for all students? You'll learn the basics of web accessibility for documents, images, and audiovisual media using WCAG 2.0 guidelines, plus discover how to use Brightspace accessibility features like alt-text descriptions. Throughout the workshop, you'll design assessments using Universal Design for Learning principles and create an accessible assessment and rubric for one of your courses.
Designing for Digital Learners: Content, Engagement & Accessibility
Pathway: Designing for Digital Learners
Level: Beginner - Introduces fundamental concepts and basic applications
This asynchronous workshop equips University of Arizona faculty with essential strategies for creating accessible and engaging content for digital learners. Participants explore key frameworks such as backward design, cognitive load theory, and Universal Design for Learning while gaining hands-on experience with institution-supported tools including D2L Brightspace, Panopto, and PlayPosit.
Through scaffolded activities and peer feedback, faculty learn to align course materials with learning outcomes, integrate multimedia content to enhance engagement, and apply accessibility best practices. Designed for flexibility and practical application, the workshop allows participants to revise or develop portions of their own course content while receiving feedback and support from peers and facilitators.
Upon completion, participants leave with actionable strategies and a clearer understanding of how to design inclusive, student-centered digital learning experiences.
Designing for Engagement in Brightspace
Pathway: Designing for Digital Learners
Level: Intermediate - Builds on foundational knowledge
How can you design learning experiences that engage all students and foster community across different modalities? This workshop offers practical, hands-on strategies for creating accessible, student-centered courses grounded in inclusion and interaction. You'll explore examples of effective asynchronous engagement, apply Universal Design for Learning principles, and work through modules covering building presence, designing collaboration, and analyzing learner engagement data. Each module includes guided activities, curated tools, and opportunities for reflection and feedback.
Elevating Your Online Course Design
Pathway: Designing for Digital Learners
Level: Intermediate - Builds on foundational knowledge
Want to take your online course to the next level? This workshop focuses on two powerful strategies: Regular and Substantive Interaction (RSI) and personalized learning. Both approaches help students feel seen as individuals while tailoring your course materials to their readiness level. Personalized learning techniques give students opportunities to apply knowledge, practice skills, and identify areas for improvement—all without the fear of failure that comes with grades. You'll leave with a concrete plan to immediately improve your teaching presence and content presentation.
Intro to Teaching Online
Pathway: Designing for Digital Learners
Level: Beginner - Introduces fundamental concepts and basic applications
Learn best practices for teaching online in this hands-on course. You'll explore key topics including course organization, alignment, engaging activities and learning experiences, and planning for substantive student interaction. For each topic, you'll see examples, develop your own based on your content, and share and reflect with fellow participants.
Throughout the course, you'll interact with both instructors and peers. By the end, you'll have completed one full module of activities and be ready to apply what you've learned to the remaining modules of your course.
Introduction to the UDL Framework
Pathway: Designing for Digital Learners
Level: Beginner - Introduces fundamental concepts and basic applications
How can we create a learning environment that allows all learners to thrive? Join us to explore Universal Design for Learning (UDL), a framework that reimagines teaching and learning by emphasizing flexibility, accessibility, and adaptability for all students, regardless of their abilities, backgrounds, or learning styles.
In this workshop, you'll learn about UDL's three fundamental principles—multiple means of engagement, representation, and action and expression—and discover how to apply these guidelines to your own teaching methods and assessments.
Designing AI-enhanced Learning Activities
Pathway: All in on AI
Level: Beginner - Introduces fundamental concepts and basic applications
Ready to help students use AI tools effectively while still developing critical thinking skills? This practical workshop starts with a self-assessment of your AI comfort level, then gives you hands-on experience to understand when AI helps versus hinders learning. You'll redesign one of your existing assignments to incorporate AI use, write clear instructions for students, and develop assessment criteria that fairly evaluate both AI integration and individual contributions. No prior AI experience required!
Exploring AI Feedback on Writing
Pathway: All in on AI
Level: Intermediate - Builds on foundational knowledge
Explore the importance of different types of feedback students can receive on their writing. You'll analyze sample feedback from 2-3 different sources (such as Feedback Fruits, LLMs, and Draft Coach) on the same piece of writing, extracting specific, implementable suggestions and noting each source's unique contributions.
Next, you'll design a focused activity to help students meaningfully engage with and interpret writing feedback. This could be a feedback comparison worksheet, annotation template, or guided reflection prompt.
Finally, you'll select one AI tool appropriate for your context, test it with sample student writing, and establish clear guidelines for student use, including what to look for, how to interpret results, and how to integrate it with other feedback sources.
Finalizing your AI Assignment
Pathway: All in on AI
Level: Advanced - Focuses on complex innovation and integration
This workshop will introduce you to the principles of backward design and provide brief overviews of four UA-subscribed genAI tools: NotebookLM, Copilot Chat, Gemini, and Adobe Firefly.
You'll complete three interconnected tasks:
- Design or revise one major assignment that integrates and requires students to use one of the four UA-subscription AI tools
- Take on the student role by completing and peer reviewing a cohort member's assignment
- Revise your original assignment based on peer feedback and reflect on how these changes might encourage a new approach to teaching your subject material
Prompt Engineering for Teaching and Assignment Design
Pathway: All in on AI
Level: Intermediate - Builds on foundational knowledge
Want to use AI tools to enhance your creativity in developing course materials? You'll design workflows that incorporate thoughtful prompt engineering to support all aspects of teaching—from ideation to delivery to revision. While you'll consider how students might use these tools to enhance their own creative and critical thinking, the focus is on helping you gain those insights for yourself.
Through hands-on practice, you'll research and experiment with tools, reflect on real practices, and develop a workflow that improves both quality and productivity.
Online Mini-Courses
These offerings are facilitated online courses in Brightspace, ranging from 1-2 weeks in duration. Expect to devote 30 minutes to one hour per day to engaging in learning activities and interacting with colleagues in a mini-course.
Location: Virtual
Length: 1 week
Discover the impact of instructor presence, collaboration, personalized learning, and social networking in the development of community, connectedness, and learning in online courses.
Location: Virtual
Length: 1 week
Create a plan for collaborative and group learning in courses.
Location: Virtual
Length: 1 week
Establish assessment strategies and techniques that can be implemented at the course level to measure student learning, course design, and teaching practices.
Location: Virtual
Length: 1 week
Develop clear AI use policies and assignment directions to effectively communicate expectations and limitations of GenAI tools to students.
Location: Virtual
Length: 1 week
Explore strategies for designing and facilitating effective online discussions that expand student exposure to curriculum, deepen learning, and increase student engagement.
Location: Virtual
Length: 1 week
Refine and revise an existing course plan and syllabus using the methodology of backward design and the principle of alignment.
Location: Virtual
Length: 2 weeks
Focus on foundational reflections to introduce strategies for intentionally building and strengthening instructor-student relationships.
Location: Virtual
Length: 2 weeks
Experience taking an online course while learning about methods, tools, and best practices for teaching hybrid and fully online courses.
Location: Virtual
Length: 1 week
Weave personal stories into teaching, drawing upon cognitive science, neuroscience, and psychology research.
Location: Virtual
Length: 1 week
Learn strategies and techniques that engage and motivate students in large online classes.
Self-Paced
These offerings offer maximum flexibility while still providing high-quality learning opportunities.
Self-paced asynchronous tutorials are available at any time via BrightSpace Explore and EDGE Learning
Location: Virtual
Length: 4 self-paced guided modules
Take a deeper dive into the online course development design process.
Location: Virtual
Length: 5 self-paced guided modules
Learn the process of online course design: creating content, organizing and presenting content, and creating successful online learning environments for students.
Webinars
These offerings are designed to educate and engage you on specific topics. These range from 15 to 60 minutes in duration.
Location: Virtual
Length: 15 minutes
Learn about the UDL framework to apply principles of universality and accessibility in online courses.
Location: Virtual
Length: 15 minutes
Gain insight to increase visibility and personality within online courses to create a culture of connectedness.
Location: Virtual
Length: 30 minutes
Monthly webinar series covering a variety of D2L-related topics with 20 minutes for presentation and 10 minutes for Q&A.
Location: Virtual
Length: 30 minutes
Webinar series covering D2L topics related to the start of the academic year with 20 minutes for presentation and 10 minutes for Q&A.
Location: Virtual
Length: 60 minutes
Discuss challenges and share creative ideas for combining tech with pedagogy.
Location: Virtual
Length: 30-60 minutes
A review of the new features in Brightspace.
Location: Virtual
Length: 60 minutes
Provides an informational overview of some of the various instructional technology tools that instructors can utilize within their courses (e.g. Panopto, PlayPosit, Pressbooks, VoiceThread, Zoom).
Location: Virtual
Length: 60 minutes
Learn about recent updates and new features that Zoom has released.
Location: Virtual
Length: 60 minutes
Each month of the academic year, we take a deep dive into one of the Quality Matters Rubric Standards. These webinars are open to anyone who designs and/or teaches online or blended courses at U of A.
Quality Matters Workshops
Quality Matters workshops are free, professional growth opportunities offered to all U of A instructors. Participants who complete the APPQMR will receive certificates from Quality Matters.
Location: Virtual
Length: 2 weeks
Take a deep dive into the QM rubric to learn the underlying principles of the QM rubric and develop an understanding of the quality assurance process.
Location: Virtual
Length: 2 weeks
Use the QM Rubric as a framework for assessing and revising your own online course.
Location: Virtual
Length: 2 weeks
Create a plan for course improvement using the Specific Review Standards of the Quality Matters Rubric.
Location: Virtual
Length: 3 weeks
Learn how to build accessible and inclusive online courses that includes a deep dive into the principles and practices of Universal Design Theory.
Workshops
These offerings are in multiple modalities where the outcome is a product or specific knowledge that can be implemented immediately.
Location: Virtual
Length: 8 weeks
Join your colleagues to learn how to develop your online course with an instructional designer facilitating the experience.
Adobe
We offer app-specific online workshops, host regular one-on-one office hours for your creative projects and ideas, and host special events throughout the year.