Pandemic Adaptations for PECOP and the 2022 ITL!

The American Physiological Society (APS) Physiology Educators Community of Practice (PECOP) and Institute on Teaching and Learning (ITL) were created to build connections among physiology educators and to promote the sharing of evidence-based teaching practices in physiology education. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 ITL and other PECOP activities were shifted to a virtual format. Virtual ITL Week included daily two-hour interactive sessions. Session topics and speakers were selected from the original conference schedule, with emphasis on topics that would assist educators during the pandemic. Registration was free, attracting nearly 500 registrants, a five-fold increase over normal ITL attendance. International educator participation was more than double that of previous ITL meetings. Long-term impacts of this unplanned “experiment” include plans for virtual components at some future ITL meetings, a PECOP webinar series open to the public, and an online professional skills training course for new physiology educators. An editorial describing these outcomes has recently been published in Advances in Physiology Education (https://journals.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/advan.00245.2020). Please join PECOP for free by registering your email at the LifeSciTRC (https://www.lifescitrc.org) and select “PECOP Member” in your user profile. The 2022 APS Institute on Teaching and Learning will be June 21-24 in Madison, WI (https://www.physiology.org/professional-development/meetings-events/itl-2022?SSO=Y). The institute will engage educators in interactive sessions on best practices in teaching, learning and assessment. Whether you are an experienced educator or new to teaching, ITL will challenge you to gain the skills needed to design and implement educational research in your classroom and learn how to share your findings with colleagues. The institute includes plenary talks, concurrent workshops, poster sessions and time to network and connect with your colleagues. Please keep checking the website to see when registration is ready!