Do you use teaching practices that relate teaching and learning to our community and environment? How does the environment relate to our teaching and learning? The Sustainability Across the Curriculum Faculty Learning Community (FLC) is exploring those questions and more as they move towards having an academic minor available at LU on this topic. Drs. Tony Piereira and Matt Hoch are facilitating the FLC that is also discussing the possibility of creating a recycling program for the campus. The ecology of teaching and learning is certainly attracting attention worldwide and the International Institute for SoTL Scholars and Mentors annual conference will hold its annual conference May 31 through June 3 in Los Angeles, CA. Skip Downing, creator of the On Course program, says that successful students "accept self-responsibility, discover self-motivation, master self-management, and adopt life-long learning" among other things. The On Course program will come to LU in the Fall of 2012 in the form of the University Success Seminar (USS). Look for information coming soon about the opportunity to teach one of the USS sections. If you don't think you have time to attend all of the faculty development opportunities offered by CT+LE, Dr. James E. Lang offers another suggestion. He says, in his book On Course: A Week by Week Guide to Your First Semester of College Teaching, to be nosy. If you see that a colleague in your department or perhaps someone who teaches a class next to you is having success, ask them what they are doing. We even have a group of folks, ACES Fellows, who have been through a year-long course redesign process. They are filled with great ideas that they tried so you get the benefit of their mistakes. There is a complete list of current Fellows and alums so send them an email, call them or drop by their office for a chat. CT+LE is also here and we accept walk-ins all the time. There is still time to register to attend the workshop Habits of Mind: What do Students Believe about Knowledge and Knowing? to be held on February 6 at 1:00 PM. Dr. Patricia Alexander is an excellent scholar who will share her thoughts on the idea of academic development as opposed to learning measured through high-stakes testing.