Four Tips from Four Faculty: Navigating a Unique Learning System

Bass Connections provides great opportunities for faculty members to pursue research interests, mentor students, and gain connections through community partnerships. Since this experience provides a unique learning experience unlike any other, four faculty shared advice on leading a project team.

Thoughtful Recruitment Planning

Recruiting team members is key. In the recruiting process, Jason Somarelli, Assistant Professor in Medicine, tries to draw students from different backgrounds and learning levels. “Be thoughtful,” he said. Keep in mind project goals, how those goals will be communicated, who is needed on the team, and who is needed to develop tools for the project. “Think comprehensively about what skillsets you need.”

This includes recruiting one to three graduate students and a designated project manager. Somarelli strongly advocates for having a project manager, describing them as a “critical bridge between faculty and undergraduates.”

Inspiring New Learning Methods

In Bass Connections, students participate in collaborative research teams for credit. It gives students the chance to learn in an entirely new way and changes the faculty-student dynamic. “I don’t know the answer to this question that we’re asking together,” Anna Gassman-Pines, WLF Bass Connections Professor of Public Policy, would tell her students in the fall, “but we’re going to figure out part of the answer or at least get ourselves closer to the answer by working together this year.”

Not knowing the answer is exciting, she said. Students collected data for the project themselves. One student talked to someone at a bus station, while another stood outside a grocery store and convinced a woman to do a survey.

Gassman-Pines set up the question, but the direction of the project was student-driven. The different dynamic creates an exciting atmosphere. It combines research and student engagement opportunities in a unique way.

Create an Achievable Grading System

For the first assignment, Tamara Fitzgerald, Associate Professor of Surgery, asks students to consider what grade they want in the class and write down what they are going to do to earn that grade. “As long as you live up to that [expectation for yourself], you get an A,” said Fitzgerald. It can be difficult to grade performance when everyone is bringing something different to the project. Before implementing this grading system, Fitzgerald said students struggled with taking risks and voicing their opinions, only really saying what they believed the team leaders wanted to hear. She wants the students to give the best to a project not because they want a good grade, but because they “want to change the world.”

Engaging Members through Meetings

Lavanya Vasudevan, Assistant Professor in Family Medicine and Community Health, planned regular team meetings, team building meetings, and training around topics in vaccines, global health research and methodologies. Regular meetings were key, according to Vasudevan. She made sure to have food at the meetings, which was a hit among team members.

Vasudevan found that students were happier with team building meetings. For the team building meetings, they all visited the Duke Health Clinic and spoke with a nurse about how vaccines are stored and record keeping. They also visited a vaccine factory to see how they’re developed. There was less cohesion in her third team, which didn’t have as many of these opportunities.

Learn More

• Discover more faculty perspectives.
• Explore highlights from the 2022 Fortin Foundation Bass Connections showcase.
• Read about four faculty appointed to Bass Connection professorships.