The Centre for Learning Futures (CLeF) designs and implements initiatives to support teaching and learning in the University. The Centre offers courses in academic reading and writing, and workshops in study skills.
It also offers, through its Learning Initiatives, opportunities for curricular experimentation, pedagogic innovations and platforms for integrating learner-centric technological solutions in higher education.
Reading and Writing Courses at Ahmedabad University have been designed with a focus on writing and comprehension skills in a practical and hands on manner. The three courses being offered, Elements of Writing (COM100), Effective Reading and Comprehension Skills (COM101), Advanced Writing (COM102), train students in different aspects of the communication process including close reading, comprehension, and presenting and evaluating arguments and evidence, listening, speaking, and formal writing. The courses are sequenced to be progressively complex and students shall take one, two or three of these courses based on their scores in the General Skills Assessment to be held during the Orientation Week prior to the beginning of the term.
Writers’ Studio is a consultancy service offered to both students and faculty members to get their term-papers, theses and research papers improved from the point of view of presentation, brevity and readability. The Studio works with students to improve the quality of their written output, rather than offer a complete text-editing service.
Ahmedabad University conducts a General Skills Assessment to assess English, Mathematics and Computer competencies of the incoming batch every year. The students are placed in relevant courses based on the test results to upgrade their skills in those domains where they face the highest challenges.
Language Lab is an English learning programme that prepares the participant to communicate in English with clarity and confidence. The digital course offers support in terms of continuous evaluation, content, teaching expertise and methodology with a dedicated computer language lab space.
This project documents a wide range of pedagogic experiments at Ahmedabad University that focus on innovative and novel forms of learning. Along with providing a description of such experiments, the project also aims to create a repository of effective pedagogic experiments that can enrich the educational experiences of both students and instructors.
Students and faculty can access a range of online resources and consultative help. Apart from being an information source, the website provides tips for teachers based on inputs from members of the teaching community at Ahmedabad University on different aspects of teaching.
Learning Initiatives is the outcome of the University’s belief that learning takes root in an environment where students can appreciate the context of what they are being taught, understand critical concepts of their disciplines, and develop the ability to apply them to real world situations. It consists of the following programmes.
Independent Study Period is a two-week period in December where students have a chance to experiment with their passion. The University offers a range of courses, rooted in disciplines like literature, design, science, language, heritage, humanities, and more, but cutting across areas and specialisations. These include block courses, studio-inspired experiential courses, courses focussing on skill building, innovative experiments in learning, and more.
Ahmedabad University has evolved a unique framework in partnership with Olin College of Engineering, Massachusetts, to facilitate learning by devising solutions to real-world problems. The University has introduced “Engagement and Application Based Learning and Education", or "ENABLE", where students are empowered to learn on their own through various techniques like Project Based Learning, Flipped Classroom, Discovery Based Method, etc. while the faculty act as facilitators.
The Learning Coalition is a faculty-driven activity to reflect on and to advance our own practice of project based learning and experiential learning courses, and ensure alignment between course objectives, outcomes, pedagogy and assessment. It is also an opportunity for faculty to develop new courses collaboratively and seek feedback on the curricula they have developed.
Industry Lab is the equivalent of a capstone project offered at Ahmedabad University where students’ team up to solve a real-world industry problem proposed by the Industry Sponsor. Students work in an interdisciplinary environment to solve problems of which no solution may have been developed so far. The lab emphasizes on industrial partnership to provide students a strong managerial experience and industrial exposure to the real-world problems.
Ahmedabad University’s access programme aims to make students aware of the possibilities and opportunities that may await them in fields as diverse, engineering, technology, science, management and the liberal arts, including professional and research options in such fields. This is a means by which Ahmedabad University contributes back to the needy sections of the society.
Aditi has 6 years of experience in teaching of foreign languages. She has worked with Manav Rachna University in setting up their Foreign Language Centre. She also worked as the Curriculum Head at Notch Up, an organisation set up to impart 21st century skills to its learners. She worked as a Senior Teacher with the British Council, monitoring and supervising 20 teachers who delivered Spoken English courses in government schools across Delhi. Aditi has worked with CBSE and IB boards in designing and delivering foreign language curriculum. Fluent in almost 6 languages, she is now learning Spanish from Instituto Cervantes, New Delhi.
At Ahmedabad University, Aditi teaches courses on Academic Reading and Writing.
Sheila is a 2019 Fulbright-Nehru Academic and Professional Excellence Scholar at Ahmedabad University and a senior lecturer in the Emory University English Department and Writing Program. She was an international journalist for more than two decades and spent 12 years in Asia, including five years covering the subcontinent. She served as a correspondent and bureau chief for The Christian Science Monitor in New Delhi, Bangkok and Beijing, reported for the Chicago Tribune and The Atlanta Constitution, and has written for many other publications.
She served as Emory Journalism director from 2000 to 2009 and has taught multimedia writing and technology to prepare students in journalism, the liberal arts and sciences, and business to explain intricate topics for the public. She has been involved in developing science-writing curriculums for more than a decade and in recent years has collaborated with science faculty to teach multimedia techniques to health students and a combined climate science and multimedia curriculum. She has co-led Emory student delegations to the annual United Nations climate talks and worked with students to produce websites, videos, podcasts and other multimedia to share their experiences. She holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Wisconsin and a master's degree in economic history from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Ashley was an English Language Fellow at Ahmedabad University for 2019-20 and an English Language Specialist for 2020-21 as part of the English Language Programme hosted jointly by Ahmedabad University and the Regional English Language Office, US Embassy. She holds an M.Ed. in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), as well as a Graduate Certificate in Instructional Design & Technology, and has taught English in a variety of settings in the United States and internationally. Most recently she worked at Arizona State University, teaching in the university's Intensive English Program, and at the University of Arizona, working with faculty to design and develop online courses across disciplines.
Gena has an Ed.D., from the University of Southern California, LA, and is a passionate teacher-trainer with more than 20 years of experience in curriculum development, teacher-training, and needs assessment, both in person and online. She has trained resource persons to use curriculum in Djibouti, wrote the career development curriculum used to train over 2600 Access English students in the Palestinian Territories and developed the curriculum for middle and high school teachers in China in an online course. She has also led a team of trainer-of-trainers consultants that worked with the Ministry of Education in Laos to create the competency-based curriculum and train the faculty in the Strengthening Higher Education Project (SHEP) and developed the curriculum for the communicative, cooperative, and service-learning course used to train Moroccan teacher-trainees as an English Language Fellow in Morocco.
Gena Rhoades was an English Language Specialist at Ahmedabad University for 2020 as part of the English Language Programme hosted jointly by Ahmedabad University and the Regional English Language Office, US Embassy. She coordinated a Curriculum Review and Reforms committee for communication courses at the University.