About the Center
The Herb Innovation Center is a place where creative minds gather, share remarkable dedication, and pursue research rigor to improve education and endow a great society.
The mission of the Herb Innovation Center is to improve the profession of education by supporting innovative and sustainable educational and human science research and by offering students applied research experiences vital to their professional development.
Core Principles
These principles guide the work of the Judith Herb Innovation Center.
Strive to address the needs of all learners and educators: The Herb Innovation Center values diversity and pursues efforts to improve education for all learners and educators. Specifically, the Center aims to reach those that have the most to gain from innovation and research efforts.
Collaborate with school and community partners: The Herb Innovation Center recognizes the contribution a network of partners can make to addressing significant issues in education. Specifically, the Center aims to develop and strengthen partnerships between the Judith Herb College of Education and school- and community-based educators.
Nurture inventive and promising ideas: The Herb Innovation Center seeks to encourage and support new ideas and approaches to improving education for all. Specifically, the Center aims to encourage innovation within the College of Education and launch projects that will grow beyond the support of the Center.
What We Do
The Herb Innovation Center serves the faculty and students of the Judith Herb College of Education in ways that will grow and strengthen the work of the college in collaboration with our partners in PK-12 education and our community and agency colleagues. Guided by our core principles, the center engages in the following activities.
Providing Support for Inquiry Focused on:
- Urban Education: Projects focused on urban education will investigate approaches to support learners and educators in urban and other high-needs settings. These projects will seek to impact education for all learners in these settings. Culturally responsive approaches are of particular interest.
- Special Education: Projects focused on special education will investigate approaches to support the success of learners with diverse abilities in school and vocational programs. Approaches that support all learners to achieve academic success are of particular interest.
- Learners’ Social and Emotional Needs: Projects focused on social and emotional needs will investigate approaches to addressing the all the needs of learners and educators for social, behavioral, and emotional health. This includes projects focused on the social and emotional health of learners and educators in the Judith Herb College of Education.
- Technology in Education: Projects focused on technology in education will investigate the tools and approaches to support the work of learning and educating. Computational reasoning and approaches that enhance subject-matter learning for diverse populations are of particular interest.
- Ambitious Teacher Education: Projects focused on ambitious teacher education will investigate designs to prepare prospective, new, and continuing teachers to deliberately support students of all backgrounds in deeply understanding important subject matter ideas in ways they can use to solve authentic problems. This includes designs for any educator to grow as instructional leaders at all stages of their career and with multiple entry points into education.
Cultivating and Sustaining Partnerships With:
- Local PK-12 Schools
- Community and governmental non-profit agencies
- Faculty and students of the College of Education
Developing Resources to Encourage People and Ideas Including:
- Customized out-reach to faculty, students, and our partners
- Professional development for faculty, students, and our partners
- Program and project development resources
Who We Serve
- JHCOE Faculty: The Center provides assistance to the college faculty with an emphasis on tenure track assistant to associate with ongoing professional development and mentorship. The center is interested in supporting faculty who are interested in revitalizing their research agenda, develop a new line of inquiry, or seek external funding.
- JHCOE Students: The Center provides opportunities for students to collaborate with faculty on research initiatives to learn the aspects of research and obtain opportunities to present and grow professionally.
- School and community partners: The Center helps to answer questions or helps to design research studies to answer important questions. The Center also serves as a resource for information and data regarding teaching and learning at UToledo and in the community.
Services and Resources
Research and Development Consulting
- Early advice to get started on a new idea
- Help connecting with collaborators
- Guidance for developing budgets for external funding
- Tools for designing an evaluation plan
Team Development
- Student and/or faculty teams working on similar problems, questions, or projects
- Faculty experts to coach students and advise partners
- Student interns to support faculty projects to contribute to the mission of the college
- Student projects to answer questions to support PreK-16 partners
Resources Available
- Collaboration space
- Online resources
- Access school and community partners
The Herb Innovation Center is located in Gillham Hall 3100W in the Judith Herb College of Education at The University of Toledo
To learn more about the center, contact the Executive Director, Dr. Michael Toland (michael.toland@utoledo.edu)
To schedule a time to visit the center call 419-530-6134