VPAL Annual Report 2022

Annual Report 2022

Mission Statement

Harvard’s Office of the Vice Provost for Advances in Learning (VPAL) seeks to shape the future of education by discovering new ways to build the competence, curiosity, and confidence of learners on our campuses and around the world. We create engaging and scalable learning experiences, cultivate inspiring ideas, and connect a global community of learners while developing tools, technologies, platforms, and policies to reduce friction throughout the learning lifecycle.

The last eighteen months at Harvard have renewed familiar and beloved classroom traditions and brought the promise of continuing innovation and growth in the areas of teaching and learning. In the Office of the Vice Provost for Advances in Learning, we have been hard at work continuing our dedicated mission of shaping the future of education, acknowledging the lessons learned during the remote teaching period of COVID - 19, and carrying those lessons forward into a reimagined future for education at Harvard and beyond.

In March 2022 we published the Report of the Harvard Future of Teaching & Learning Task Force, a multi-School effort to gather and assess the learnings from online and remote teaching during the prior decade, and particularly from the pandemic-era experience. I encourage you to read the full Report, which lays out a clear roadmap for three strategic action areas, focused on reimagining the classroom, enriching content, and expanding community.

Our efforts in VPAL have aligned with these goals. A robust internal strategic planning process led to org-wide alignment on breakthrough objectives that placed the FTL Report at their heart. Our instructional development teams were hard at work, creating awardwinning new courses for the edX and HBS Online platforms. We have developed new capabilities in the areas of marketing and short-form content production. We launched new VPAL and Harvard Online websites, unifying our branding and providing a streamlined process for learners and businesses to consider our courses. The Harvard Initiative for Teaching and Learning (HILT) – launched in 2011 through a generous gift from Gustave and Rita Hauser – continued to convene our community at cross-School events and the annual HILT conference, identifying and facilitating the best pedagogical innovations across Harvard. Finally, our VPAL offices moved to 114 Mt Auburn, and our new state-of-the-art studio opened at 124 Mt Auburn.

We have also helped Harvard establish two important forward-looking initiatives in the past year: the non-profit tCRIL and the learning experience platform HOPE. While both are in the early stages of development, they will – in synergistic alignment – advance the future of teaching and learning through a commitment to pedagogical innovation, advanced technology, and a dedication to building community.

I invite you to read more of the achievements of our incredible team at VPAL in the following Annual Report for 2021-22. Thanks to all of you for your support and guidance along the way.

Bharat Anand

Vice Provost for Advances in Learning, Harvard University

Harvard Future of Teaching & Learning Task Force

Task Force Members

Bharat Anand (VPAL/HBS), Chair

Catherine Breen (VPAL)

Glenn Cohen (HLS)

Nancy Coleman (DCE)

Suzanne Cooper (HKS)

Erin Driver-Linn (HSPH)

Lisa Haber-Thomson (GSD)

Anne Harrington (FAS)

Randall King (HMS)

Karim Lakhani (HBS)

Bridget Terry Long (GSE)

Anne Margulies (HUIT)

Martin Puchner (VPAL/FAS)

David Roberts (HMS)

Michael D. Smith (FAS/SEAS)

Dustin Tingley (VPAL/FAS)

Martha Whitehead (Harvard Library)

The Harvard Future of Teaching & Learning (FTL) task force was convened in spring 2021 to surface, assess, and synthesize the many lessons learned and solutions uncovered during the transformative pandemic-era period of remote learning, as well as from the prior decade’s experience with online learning. Three working groups – led by Vice Provost Bharat Anand, Dean Bridget Terry Long, and Professor Michael D. Smith – helped produce a comprehensive report in the spring of 2022.

Core Principles for the Future

The Task Force proposed the following principles to anchor all of Harvard’s future efforts around teaching and learning:

Offer teaching and learning experiences that are “uniquely Harvard,” whether they involve interactions with Harvard faculty and teaching fellows; Harvard museums, library, and archive assets; Harvard digital content; or other aspects of the Harvard campus experience.

Thoughtfully and creatively incorporate the benefits of technology and remote education, always remembering that technology is to enable teaching and learning and is not an end unto itself.

Engage students wherever they live, whether in Cambridge/Boston or elsewhere, and without necessarily increasing our physical footprint.

Challenge the assumption that high-quality education must only be in-person. Although our various learner experiences won’t be identical, Harvard will seek to deliver excellent outcomes.

Diversity, equity, and inclusion will inform all teaching and learning activities.

Innovations and investments in teaching and learning will continue at multiple levels - the faculty and course level, the program and school levels, and at the university as a whole. Innovation on the front lines will be facilitated by central support, leveraging shared insights, dedicated resources, and fixed investments across Harvard.

Any meaningful expansion of Harvard’s teaching and learning activities will be guided by the principle of engagement at scale, not one or the other. To achieve both high touch and global reach, we will foster online communities that preserve the core of the Harvard experience.

Strategic Action Areas

Three Strategic Action Areas can enable Harvard to create a new type of learning and research community, working to address the world’s most challenging issues while advancing Harvard’s mission of education and scholarship.

Reimagining the Classroom

Blended Classrooms, Courses, and Curricular Pathways That Enhance the Student Experience

• Meet students where they are: accommodate learner needs, honor identities, and tailor instruction

• Prioritize interactive pedagogy and peer-topeer teaching and learning

• Blend multilocal experiences through hybrid programs

• Build lifelong community engagement

Enriching Content

Creating a New, Unified, and Coherent Strategy for Digital-First and Short-Form Learning Experiences

• Create modular online learning experiences for use in residential courses and online offerings

• Meaningfully expand the impact of Harvard's teaching beyond the physical classroom

Expanding Community

Reimagining Harvard’s Global Online Learning Experience

• Develop a new platform for connecting the global Harvard community

• Explore new ways to translate a residential component to online programs

• Connect the research community, learners, and alumni

Create

We develop online content. We leverage our experience to create engaging, learner -centric content, and we foster cross-university collaboration to tackle big, cross -disciplinary ideas.

New Studio

Following VPAL’s move to 114 Mount Auburn, the VPAL Studio was packed and moved to a larger and more equipped space at 124 Mount Auburn. The 560 sq. ft. space supports content creation for a range of formats and functionalities. In addition to video and audio recording, the space includes a control room, storage room, and seating area. The new VPAL Studio can support two shoots a day with state-of-the-art technology.

This Year…

230+ Shoots

132 Active Course Offerings

2.9M+ Unique Learners

60K+ Certificates Issued

13 New Courses Launched

200+ Course Waves

3.9M+ Total Enrollments

25.6M+

Cumulative Enrollments

HarvardX

Eight new Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) were launched between July 2021 and December 2022:

• CS50: Introduction to Programming with Python

• CS50: Introduction to Programming with Scratch

• Leadership: Creating Public Value

• Managing Happiness

• Digital Humanities in Practice: From Research Questions to Results

• Introduction to Data Science with Python

• The Jewish Bible: Its History as a Physical Artifact

• MLOps for Scaling TinyML

• Received the EdX $100K Development Award for AppliedPsychology:IncreasingEmotionalAwareness andPersonalResilience

• Launched Harvard’s first MicroBachelors program on edX in University Chemistry.

• Launched Spanish-language version of popular course FinTech

• Had two finalists for the edX Prize for Exceptional Contributions in Online Teaching and Learning:

ExercisingLeadership:FoundationalPrinciples

Ronald Heifetz (faculty lead; HKS)

Walter Blazewicz (VPAL)

Andrew Rawson (VPAL)

Jascha Smilack (VPAL)

MechanicalVentilationforCOVID-19

Dr. Susan Wilcox (faculty lead; HMS)

Thomas Piraino (St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto)

Rafael Benedetti (VPAL)

Maria Kobrina (VPAL)

Casey Roehrig (VPAL)

Exploring the meaning of happiness in the HarvardX course

Students practice Python programming and coding in the HarvardX course IntroductiontoDataSciencewithPython

“Thewholecoursewaseyeopening.Iexperienced leadershipfromawhole differentperspective.”

- Cohort 1 Learner

Create

Harvard on Contemporary Themes

Acuratedseriesofonlinecoursesthatcombine facultyanddisciplinesfromacrossthe University.

Our series is designed to prepare learners to understand the complex and serious challenges our world faces today. The courses provide learners with a thorough understanding of the intricacies within a complex idea.

We designed the Harvard on Digital series to showcase the breadth of faculty teaching and scholarship in the areas of data science and digital transformation, and to enable learners to think critically about these important and timely subjects.

We launched five courses as part of the current Harvard on Contemporary Themes series on digital and health care leadership in 2021 and 2022:

• Big Data for Social Good

• Data Privacy and Technology

• Open Innovation

• Digital Health

• Health Care Strategy

In addition, we have begun exploring course development for two new series: Climate Change, and Race & Social Justice.

“Ithoroughlyenjoyedcommunicatingandlearningwith innovativethinkersfromaroundtheworld.Thiswasagreat experience,andIamgratefulmyadministrationinvestedin meinthiswaytocontinuelearningandgrowing.”

Dr. Lindsey Keith-Vincent AssociateDeanforResearch, Outreach,andInnovationinthe CollegeofEducationandDirector oftheScienceandTechnology EducationCenteratLouisiana TechUniversity Student of OpenInnovation

“ThecoursecompletelyfulfilledallIwantedto learnaboutthehealthcareindustryinthe UnitedStates.Iwouldhighlyrecommenditto anyonestartingoutinthehealthcareindustry asabusinessleader.Iparticularlyenjoyedthe casestudiesbecauseitgavereal-world applicationexamplesofhowbusinessisdone. IalsolearnedaboutpioneersthatIwasableto discusswithmymanageratwork.”

Tracy Lyn De Silva Consultant,CWHAdvisors

Student

Strategy

Enable

We inspire new ideas and approaches. By convening faculty and educators, surfacing and exchanging best practices, and communicating what we learn, we strive to enable innovation everywhere.

The Harvard Initiative for Learning and Teaching (HILT) produced 24 new issues of IntoPractice between July 2021 and December 2022. This biweekly e-letter for instructors highlights engaging pedagogical practices led by a broad range of innovative Harvard faculty, supported by local resources and educational research. There are now almost 19,000 subscribers, with 123 total issues.

IntoPracticeTopics

Virtual Community

System-Level Thinking

Team-Based Learning

Intentional Technology

Skill-Building

Building Better Teams

Empowering Students

Experimental Courses

Shifting STEM Culture

Using Podcasts to Build Relationships Identity, Vulnerability in Discussion

Open-Minded Conversation

Practicing New Skills

Creativity in the (Virtual) Classroom

Cultural Competencies Through Music

Designing Solutions

Peer Learning Exercises

Power of Virtual Reality

Learning Effectively Through Teams

Collaborating with the Art Museums

Cultivating a Convivial Academic Setting

Transferring Best Practices

Encouraging Equity

Structuring Participation

Tamara Kaplan (HMS) Fawwaz Habbal (SEAS)

Doris Sommer (FAS)

Carrie Conaway (GSE)

James Kim (GSE)

Christina Warinner (FAS)

Hong Qu (HKS)

Scott Westfahl (HLS)

Phuong Pham (HSPH/HMS)

Archie Jones (HBS)

Henry McGee (HBS)

Jeffrey Bussgang (HBS)

Robin Gottlieb (FAS)

Matthew Potts (HDS)

Christina Villarreal (GSE)

Aravinthan Samuel (FAS)

Linda Kaboolian (HSPH)

David Atherton (FAS)

Taiwo Ehineni (FAS)

Martin Bechthold (GSD)

Mary Tolikas (SEAS)

Salil Vadhan (SEAS)

Candace Bertotti (HKS)

Matt Andrews (HKS)

Kaighin McColl (FAS)

Janet Gyatso (HDS)

Aisha Yousafzai (HSPH)

Flavia Peréa (FAS)

Luke Miratrix (GSE)

The 55-member Teaching and Learning Consortium (TLC), consisting of academic professional staff and academic technologies representing all Harvard Schools, Museums, and Libraries, met throughout the year to share best practices and challenges in teaching and learning and to crowdsource resources and solutions for common challenges.

HILT hosted 10 Colleague Conversations with over 100 faculty and academic staff attendees from across all Harvard Schools to share their challenges, questions, and interests about teaching at Harvard.

Colleague Conversations Topics

How Can We Create Better Connections Between Humanities and Professional Schools?

The Future of Harvard’s Online Content

Inclusive Teaching Group/Team Work

Using Humanities Skills to Solve Problems Across Disciplines

The Future of Learning and Teaching Climate Change Student Agency

Colleague Conversations Hosts

Bharat Anand (VPAL/HBS)

Martin Puchner (VPAL/FAS)

Zahra Ahmed (DCE)

Dustin Tingley (VPAL/FAS)

Sejal Vashi (HSPH)

Kate Hamilton (HKS)

Connect & Learn

We connect a global community of learners. Even as we enable active and social learning, we continually learn and exchange ideas.

VPAL Signature Events

Continuing the livestream events that VPAL hosted during the pandemic, we held 15 cross-University Signature Events on key topics for 1,117 attendees including faculty, staff, students, and alumni. 35 speakers from 10 Harvard Schools were featured.

Over 300 attendees participated in the 10th and 11th Annual HILT Conferences in the fall of 2021 and 2022, respectively. In 2021 it explored how to prepare students to address global challenges through active learning, collaborative groups, and engaged scholarship. In 2022 it focused on approaches to collaborative learning and the successes and challenges in facilitating group dynamics.

HILT Conference

HILT’s 4 Affinity Groups (Learning Data & Analytics, Learning Design, Learning Spaces, and Research-Informed Teaching & Learning) hosted 12 events for 662 members on topics including designing and teaching hybrid courses, Canvas dashboards, assessment tools, tours of Library renovations and Museum teaching spaces, and flexible classrooms.

HILT Affinity Groups

HarvardX courses grew within the edX Online Campus program, with 400+ unique universities consuming Harvard content, and resulting in ~60,000 enrollments and 13,000 completions.

edX

Online Campus

Civic Engagement

Connecting Scholarship with Action

Food Insecurity

During the Pandemic

Organizational Trust and Honesty

Scholar Activism

The Medical Field through Storytelling

Diversity in the Workforce

Featuring:

Colleen Ammerman (HBS)

Steve Ansolabehere (FAS)

Neal Baer, M.D. (Showrunner)

Jeff Behrends (FAS)

Sara Bleich (HSPH)

Gretchen Brion-Meisels (GSE)

Dan Carpenter (FAS)

Robin Ely (HBS)

Mark Fagan (HKS)

Paul Farmer (HMS)

Jody Freeman (HLS)

Frances Frei (HBS)

Francesca Gino (HBS)

Trystan Goetze (FAS)

Jasmine Graves (FXB Center)

Erica Kenney (HSPH)

Arthur Kleinman (FAS)

Suzanne Koven (HMS)

Natalia Linos (FXB Center)

Marianna Linz (FAS/SEAS)

Magda Matache (FXB Center)

Tim McCarthy (GSE/HKS)

James Mickens (SEAS)

Julia Minson (HKS)

Vincent Pons (HBS)

Martin Puchner (VPAL/FAS)

Hannah Riley Bowles (HKS)

Mayra Rivera (HDS)

Davin Rosborough (ACLU Voting Rights Project)

Theda Skocpol (FAS)

Lucas Stanczyk (FAS)

Robert N. Stavins (HKS)

Jim Stock (FAS)

Alora Thomas-Lundborg (HLS)

Dustin Tingley (VPAL/FAS)

Ethical Reasoning for Computer Scientists

When Gender Matters in Negotiation

Storytelling and Climate Change

Engaging in Productive Disagreements

Climate Change and the Law

Teaching Climate Change across Disciplines

Voting Rights and the Supreme Court

2022 Midterms

Measure

We analyze impact. Using educational research and data analysis, we seek to improve practice and reduce friction throughout the learning lifecycle.

The VPAL Date Science & Technology team developed a modernized data pipeline infrastructure to enable a variety of data processing and analysis functions, including reporting on marketing and course data from edX.

They also supported the ongoing operation of university-wide applications related to teaching and learning such as Syllabus Explorer and Harvard Link, while launching intensive discovery for a new learning experience platform (described on the next page).

In January 2022, LabXchange moved to VPAL from the Department of Molecular & Cellular Biology.

LabXchange is a global science classroom open to every curious mind. Created at Harvard with support from the Amgen Foundation, this powerful digital tool makes highquality science education accessible and gives learner and educators, everywhere, the courage to chart a meaningful path in science – for free.

LabXchange envisions a world with equitable access to science learning and career resources.

Innovate

We drive pedagogical advances. By emphasizing learner-centric content and inductive learning methods we improve online, residential, and remote learning.

To meet the opportunities identified in the Harvard Future of Teaching & Learning Task Force Report, VPAL and HUIT, in joint partnership with HBS, and in conversation with a cross-Harvard consortium, have begun development of a cutting-edge Learning Experience Platform (LXP) called the Harvard Online Platform for Education (HOPE), for use across all of Harvard and beyond.

HOPE will empower Harvard to scale the development and impact of:

• Harvard’s unique pedagogical perspectives on blended and asynchronous learning

• High-demand content modalities, like short-form

• A virtual campus that brings the intimacy of the Harvard experience to a global community of learners

The goal of HOPE is to deliver an integrated, scalable, and extensible learning platform that delivers a transformational, learner-centric experience across a diverse range of learning modes.

It will reach a global community of learners, including providing support to minorityserving institutions, and will allow Harvard to lead and enable innovation in pedagogy and learning.

The first learner-facing release of HOPE is currently targeted for summer 2023.

Areas of Focus

• Harvard Online courses bring an extensive catalog of expertise and research to learners around the globe as well as curated series of courses that combine faculty and disciplines from across the university.

• Data Science & Technology combines expertise in data science, data engineering, software development, and education research to produce analytics and tools that help to transform the entire teaching and learning lifecycle.

• The Harvard Initiative for Learning and Teaching (HILT) forges University-wide collaborations to surface teaching and learning innovations that require the combined efforts of individual students, faculty, and staff, and the coordination of programs, centers, departments, and Schools.

• VPAL, on behalf of the Provost and as advisory to the Corporation, oversees the formal process of reviewing and approving new degree programs within the University. In fall 2021, this process resulted in the approval of a new Master in Real Estate (MRE) degree by Harvard’s Graduate School of Design .

VPAL Online Council

The VPAL Online Council was formed in October 2021 to gather leaders across the University to share best practices on teaching and learning, identify priorities across the Schools, and inform the strategic planning of VPAL and Harvard Online.

Members:

Bharat Anand (VPAL/HBS)

Catherine Breen (VPAL)

Glenn Cohen (HLS)

Nancy Coleman (DCE)

Suzanne Cooper (HKS)

Erin Driver-Linn (HSPH)

Lisa Haber-Thomson (GSD)

Klara Jelinkova (HUIT)

Matt Miller (GSE)

Martin Puchner (VPAL/FAS)

David Roberts (HMS)

Dustin Tingley (VPAL/FAS )

Luis Viceira (HBS)

Looking Ahead…

Following the sale of edX to 2U in June 2021, Harvard and MIT partnered once again to establish a new nonprofit organization using the proceeds from the transaction. The organization – currently named the Center for Reimagining Learning (tCRIL) – will focus on addressing long-standing inequities in education by making learning effective, accessible, and relevant to a diverse network of learners and institutions.

Over the past year, leadership from Harvard and MIT have been conducting a rigorous learning process to deepen our understanding and clarify opportunities for impact. This process has been drawing upon existing stakeholders, including faculty at Harvard, MIT, and other University partners, and is developing new partnerships with institutions and organizations.

Mission Pillars

• Encourage and support digital education technologies

• Foster communities of innovation to support online learning and education

• Expand access to high-quality learning experiences

tCRIL Board

• Cindy Barnhart, Provost, MIT

• Alan Garber, Provost, Harvard

• Bharat Anand, Vice Provost for Advances in Learning at Harvard University, Henry R. Byers Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School

• Eric Grimson, Vice President for Open Learning, Chancellor for Academic Advancement at MIT, Professor of Computer Science, Bernard M. Gordon Professor of Medical Engineering, MIT

• Glen Shor, Executive Vice President and Treasurer, MIT

• Alan Spoon, Chairman, Fortive Corporation (FTV), MIT Corporation member

• Bridget Terry Long, Dean, Saris Professor of Education and Economics at the Harvard Graduate School of Education

• Meredith Weenick, Executive Vice President, Harvard

Enabling Difficult Conversations

Under the direction of President Larry Bacow and Provost Alan Garber, a cross-School committee has been established to explore how to enable difficult conversations in our classrooms and on our campuses and overcome concerns about self-censorship that students and faculty can experience.

Much work is already underway at our Harvard Schools to address these complex issues, including efforts around intellectual vitality and academic freedom. The faculty committee is currently focused on establishing the nature and expression of self-censorship in our various Schools and among student and faculty populations; through a process of discovery with colleagues from various Schools, identifying and sharing best practices and initiatives already underway; exploring a Harvard-wide convening on these topics; and identifying solutions that scale.

Committee Members

• Bharat Anand, Vice Provost for Advances in Learning; Henry R. Byers Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School

• Erica Chenoweth, Frank Stanton Professor of the First Amendment at Harvard Kennedy School; Susan S. and Kenneth L. Wallach Professor at the Radcliffe Institute

• Jeannie Suk Gersen, John H. Watson, Jr. Professor of Law at Harvard Law School

• Rakesh Khurana, Danoff Dean of Harvard College; Marvin Bower Professor of Leadership Development at Harvard Business School; Professor of Sociology in the Faculty of Arts & Sciences

Photo credits: Veritas shield (cover), Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard University; Students working in the SEC Active Learning Laboratory (p. 4), Kris Snibbe/Harvard University; Student using tablet in class (p. 4), Kris Snibbe/Harvard University; Crowd of students at lecture (p. 4), Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard University; Interior of VPAL Studio, VPAL; Holworthy Hall (p. 11-12), Jon Chase/Harvard University; Students showcasing instrument design at SEC (p. 14), Kris Snibbe/Harvard University; Columns of Littauer Center (p. 16), Kris Snibbe/Harvard University; John Harvard statue (p. 17), Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard University; Students in Sever Hall (p. 18), Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard University.