In 1995, Robert B. Barr and John Tagg published “From Teaching to Learning: A New Paradigm for Undergraduate Education,” an article that soon became part of the SoTL canon, arguing that
“A paradigm shift is taking hold in American higher education. In its briefest form, the paradigm that has governed our colleges is this: A college is an institution that exists to provide instruction. Subtly but profoundly we are shifting to a new paradigm: A college is an institution that exists to produce learning. This shift changes everything. It is both needed and wanted.” (p. 13)
Recognizing the difficulty of change in focus–from teaching to learning–Barr and Tagg carefully outline the distinction as it influences the mission of the university, its criteria for success, the structures of teaching and learning, learning theory, measures of productivity, and the nature of the roles of various members of the campus.
In light of this change, the language “the scholarship of teaching” fell short of capturing the aims and assumptions of this research: improving teaching does not necessarily lead to student learning. The two processes must be understood and investigated together. Shulman and Pat Hutchings explain this kind of thinking about learning, claiming that SoTL
“requires a kind of ‘going meta,’ in which faculty frame and systematically investigate questions related to student learning—the conditions under which it occurs, what it looks like, how to deepen it, and so forth—and do so with an eye not only to improving their own classroom but to advancing practice beyond it.” (1999, p. 10)
Thus, Boyer’s initial term “scholarship of teaching” was transformed into the “scholarship of teaching and learning.”
