Dr. Crystal Aschenbrener, Lecturer/Social Work, University of Wisconsin, Whitewater; Dr. Terry Berkhouse, Interim Executive Director for Academic Enrichment, University of Montana; and Dr. Paula Dehn, Vice-President for Academic Affairs, Kentucky Wesleyan College, will participate in a panel discussion on strategies to enhance applied learning regardless of the challenges.

Dr. Janet Eyler, Professor of the Practice of Education, Vanderbilt Peabody College in Nashville, will help us discover why service-learning, or other community based learning, is better learning through the impact of the instruction on deeper understanding and transfer of learning.

Dr. Jeff Osborn, Dean of the School of Science and Professor of Biology at the College of New Jersey, will discuss new strategies for faculty and institutions to use for undergraduate research, scholarship and creative activity. Strategies and ideas will be emphasized with information regarding all forms of applied learning.

Dr. Janet Eyler and Dr. Patti Clayton will share insights on the ways to support applied learning initiatives.

Applied learning creates situations where the boundaries between teacher and student are often blurrier than in traditional classroom settings. The fuzzy nature of these boundaries can make it difficult for faculty to know how much help is too much and when it is appropriate to step in and help a failing student. As part of his recovery process, Dr. David Daniel, Professor of Psychology at James Madison University, will recount his journey as a popular, professional enabler and his battle with pedagogical and interpersonal co-dependence.

Toward what ends do we support our students in applied learning opportunities--what are our "north stars" or ultimate purposes as educators? What value might be added to our students' journeys through a developmental approach that combines multiple applied learning opportunities, building one on another and integrating multiple pedagogies? In what ways might our own growth as educators and scholars be intertwined with that of our students as we journey alongside them? We will bring the 2012 conference to a close as Dr. Patti Clayton, Independent Consultant PHC Ventures, facilitates a reflective exploration of these and related questions. Her own work with service-learning over the last decade has been significantly shaped by her student colleagues' framing of their experiences together as a "shared developmental journey" and has grown from a single-pedagogy emphasis to a broader, deeper, and more integrated orientation to teaching, learning, and knowledge generation. Patti will invite us to apply her students' metaphor to our own work, engage us in collaborative critique, and solicit implications and alternatives.