Introduction

Since the inception of the Ohio Learning Network Learning Community Initiative in 2002, the Faculty Professional Development Center has held January Learning Institutes at Kent State. These 1 to 2 1/2 day events, jointly sponsored by OLN and KSU and held in the Moulton Hall Innovative Learning and Technologies Center on the KSU Kent campus, bring together colleagues for a purpose and project of self and campus development. The institutes are designed for exploring a topic of interest to all learning community members (i.e. curriculum design for engaged learning, student development and technological support for learning; education across the ages: from baby boomers to the net generation). There are usually invited specialists (e.g. Jim Pellegrino, Van Weigel, Dan Madigan, Chandralekha Singh, and Stewart Ross ) who participate in the entire institute acting as facilitators as well as a speakers. Participants have time to work on new ideas presented at the institute as well as to engage with fellow learning community members to further develop their group work during the institute.