Big News for Improving Team Dynamics

Launch August 15, 2025

You are officially invited to participate in the first semester of data collection for Improving Team Dynamics. This will be the first true experiment enabled by the network, and we will be evaluating team contracts as a way to improve functioning of student groups!

In order to participate in this study, you will need to agree to the following conditions:

  • You MUST get Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval from your institution before you start participation; this project’s primary IRB approval will be housed at Cornell University. Many IRBs will be happy to approve your participation after looking at the Cornell protocol, but others will require you to submit your own application. This should be a straight-forward process based on the content of the Cornell protocol.

  • Students and instructors each take survey at the beginning and end of the term. There is also a two-question mid-semester check-in for instructors.

  • Your class must include group work over 3+ weeks that counts for at least 10% of the course grade.

  • Groups should generally be small, but larger than pairs; three to five people per group is ideal but there may be a bit of flexibility on the group size.

  • Participants must stay together in the same group for at least three weeks.

  • For each course you teach in a term, you must be willing to either (a) solicit team contracts from students during the term, or (b) you must be willing to NOT solicit team contracts for assigned group work. Your assignment of either (a) or (b) for each course you teach will be randomly determined shortly before each term you participate in this study.

  • There must be at least two deliverables through each project, and at least three weeks between first and last deliverable; the first deliverable will be either the team contract or a short alternate assignment at the beginning of the project (templates will be provided).

If you have one or more courses that you believe will be eligible for participation in the Fall term, please fill out this survey. You will also need to join EENE if you haven’t already.

We plan to run this study in both Fall 2025 and Spring 2026 terms, and we will be sending out another invitation before the Spring 2026 term starts. If you know of other faculty willing to participate in this study in later terms (or have other questions), contact John Hartman.

The deadline to fill out the survey is September 1. You do not need IRB approval to fill out the survey, but you will need approval before participating in the data collection of this study. The Cornell protocol will be posted and shared with members in the next few days. We apologize for the tight deadline for the Fall term and plan to provide more time before later terms of data collection.