The Dartmouth Center for the Advancement of Learning (DCAL) improves teaching and learning by providing resources, removing barriers, promoting evidence-based practices, and building partnerships to cultivate a culture that values and rewards teaching for all members of Dartmouth’s scholar-educator community.
Dartmouth's teachers will have the resources and recognition necessary to engage fully as scholar-educators, employing evidence-based practices to advance learning and elevate Dartmouth as a national leader in liberal arts education.
In pursuing its mission and vision, DCAL serves all who engage in teaching at Dartmouth, including faculty in all ranks, schools and disciplines, along with librarians, educational designers, graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, deans, and directors.
DCAL helps all educators at Dartmouth to practice learner-centered course design, implementation and assessment.
DCAL aims to shift the culture of teaching and learning at Dartmouth from one that regards its mission as delivery of knowledge to one that sees its task as facilitating learning. Knowledge cannot be delivered; it must be constructed anew by each learner.
DCAL promotes ongoing reflection and assessment as essential components to effective learning both for teachers and learners.
DCAL pays special attention to matters of diversity, focusing on the benefits, challenges, opportunities, and obligations such matters present in a learning community.