A Year in Review: Teaching Innovation Incubator (2025) | Teaching Innovation Incubator

A Year in Review: Project Milestones, Outcomes, Challenges, and What's on the Horizon for 2026

Since the last Year in Review was published in fall 2024, the Teaching Innovation Incubator (TII) has seen some considerable changes to its operations, size, and support model composition. Among these changes include saying goodbye to some of our staff — full-time and co-op students — and welcoming new staff who have joined our unit and filled vacancies like the EdTech Sandbox Supervisor and Undergraduate Educational Research Coordinators to support the TII’s mission.

Over the last year, the TII has successfully expanded its operations and reach thanks to the endorsement of academic leaders. We announced our inaugural open call for Teaching Innovation Incubator Projects in Fall 2024, seeing growing interest from across our campus to explore unconventional approaches to supporting teaching and learning. An advisory committee comprising staff, faculty, and senior leadership was struck to assist in the adjudication and selection of the incoming TII project applications, as well as providing strategic direction for the TII's continual evolution. The advisory committee selected three inaugural projects to join the Incubator beginning in January 2025, which have since begun their incubation. Each project receives dedicated TII project coordination, research and evaluation expertise, tailored teaching and learning resources, and access to the EdTech Sandbox. You can read more about the inaugural projects and their achievements below.

During 2025, the TII soft launched the EdTech Sandbox which supports innovative educational technology exploration for the Waterloo community in our new physical space in the Dana Porter Library. This has been made possible through cross-campus collaboration with Instructional Technologies and Media Services and a new partnership with the Waterloo Libraries. We are proud to announce that our EdTech Sandbox is now available for EdTech exploration and booking through the Dana Porter Library. Learn more about the developments of this initiative here.

In October 2025, we announced our second annual open call for teaching and learning projects and look forward to three new projects joining the Incubator in early 2026. We’ve seen great examples of successful innovation in our beta projects, three of which are graduating from the Incubator come December. as well as from our inaugural projects that continue to explore and iterate on their teaching innovations. Outputs of the completed beta projects will be made available in the New Year on the Impacts at Waterloo page.

In 2026, we look forward to merging with the Centre for Teaching Excellence and the Centre for Extended Learning as part of the restructuring efforts of the Associate Vice-President, Academic portfolio review. We anticipate this strengthening our impact and ability to work with other staff members who are advancing Waterloo's efforts to improve teaching and learning.

The following TII projects are ongoing, to be joined in 2026 by three new projects emerging from the TII’s second open call for proposals.

Projects in Incubation

Accessible Education

Project Team

Aldo Caputo, Director (Centre for Extended Learning)

David DeVidi, Professor (Philosophy) | Associate Vice-President, Academic

Diana Skrzydlo, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream (Statistics and Actuarial Science) | Teaching Fellow (Faculty of Math)

Donna Ellis, Director (Centre for Teaching Excellence)

Jennifer Coghlin, Associate Registrar, Enrolment Services & Academic Policy (Registrar's Office)

Joyce Barlow, Associate Director, Disability Inclusion (Human Resources)

Rob Hill, Associate Professor (Physics and Astronomy) | Teaching Fellow (Faculty of Science)

Co-op Student Support

Erya Xu (W2025 | S2025)

Carla Stocco (F2025)

Key milestones	Second Accessible Education Day 2025 held fully online with increased student participation. Creation and launch of the Accessible Teaching website. Completed a draft of Student Academic Disability Accommodation Policy and began consultations with the broader campus. Impacts of Inaccessibility in Post secondary education were developed to highlight areas lacking in accessibility in higher education. Developed a working definition of Essential Requirements and processes to guide programs through their identification.
Challenges & learnings	Ensuring that individuals with lived experience are represented in all work conducted as part of this project, including during Accessible Education Day. Identifying a working definition of Essential Requirements that is clear, concise and functional for departments and their programs to work with. Increasing visibility and effective promotion of AE Day and accessibility initiatives and resources (such as the Accessible Teaching website).
Unanticipated benefits	Accessible Teaching website transitioning from a project-focused hub to a direct, instructor-facing resource with content designed from the ground-up. Policy drafting and revisions requiring the consultation process to be delayed, but also ensuring that the Policy being reviewed by other units has already integrated necessary changes informed by groups like Legal and Immigration services. Collaboration with University Relations to develop joint governance models (academic and non-academic) for Accessibility going forward.
Strategic connections	Accessible Education Day built awareness across the UW community about the different needs of students, staff, and faculty. Collaboration with University Relations and those involved with Digital Accessibility efforts. Coordinating with academic support units across campus to identify areas of support for ongoing accessible education efforts.
Next Steps	Finalize a long-term vision and change management plan for accessible education and seek Provost approval. Continue ongoing conversations with faculty across campus to better understand their experiences preparing to teach a course and how this intersects with accessibility efforts. Seek further opportunities to enhance awareness of UW’s accessibility efforts and to increase staff/student involvement.

Adapting the SLICC Framework to Encourage Self-directed Learning at University of Waterloo

Project Team

Katherine Lithgow: Senior Educational Developer, Integrative and Experiential Learning (Centre for Teaching Excellence)

Mariam Mufti: Associate Professor (Political Science) | Associate Chair, Undergraduate Studies

Emma McDougall: Project Manager, SLICCs TII Project

Co-op Student Support

Brent McCready-Branch (W2025 | S2025)

Key milestones	Validated the need for SLICCs from the institution and instructors navigating experiential learning, and also from students who shared through testimonials and interviews that the SLICC experience was novel, important and had a lasting impact on the academic and career journey. SLICCs Framework has been integrated into 5 additional courses: BME 261, INNOV 311, ACTSC 625, PHIL 693/695 and PHIL 498. Hosted multiple pedagogical sessions, including: An Instructor workshop, UW Teaching and Learning Conference presentations, and met with several groups on campus, including the Undergraduate Affairs Group (UGAG), the Teaching Fellows, and the strategic enrolment team, amongst others.
Challenges & learnings	UW’s decentralized organization and faculty divisions have made creating a unified approach to SLICC introduction and integration challenging.
Unanticipated benefits	Growing budget constraints and structural changes are impacting department and faculty-level willingness and ability to experiment with new teaching frameworks. Priority concerns surround scalability, time commitment and sustainability. Budget constraints and structural changes also mean that educational support for SLICC integration is limited.
Strategic connections	Strengthening alignment with support units such as Work Integrated Learning (WIL) to confirm long-term housing of shared resources.
Next Steps	4 new SLICC courses launching in Winter 2026. Discussions with Actuarial Science to explore the program-level integration of the SLICC Framework. Continue demonstrating how SLICCs can be successfully tailored to faculty needs, supporting scalable integration into courses and programs so that SLICCs can continue at the University of Waterloo without requiring ongoing support from a dedicated SLICC team.

AI Meets EDI: Virtual Simulations for Culturally Safe Indigenous Healthcare

Project Team

Jeff Nagge, Clinical Associate Professor (School of Pharmacy)

Cassandra McLelland, (Anishinaabe, M'Chigeeng First Nation), Clinical Pharmacist & Indigenous Content Expert

Savannah Sloat, (Tuscarora, Six Nations of the Grand River), Associate Director, Science Indigenous Initiatives

Cynthia Richard, Associate Professor | Associate Director, Curriculum (School of Pharmacy)

Kelly Grindrod, Associate Professor | Associate Director, Clinical Education (School of Pharmacy)

Co-op Student Support

Nithyla Chandrakumar (W2025 | S2025)

Jessica Hoang (W2025 | S2025)

Avean Ayati Ghaffari (F2025)

Carla Stocco (F2025)

Key milestones	Created three AI-powered scenarios that meet cultural competence and clinical-accuracy criteria. Organized and developed resources for a practice OSCE where the tool will be piloted. Hired and worked alongside various Indigenous individuals to ensure the utmost accuracy and respect throughout the project.
Challenges & learnings	Ensuring that each Indigenous culture is accurately represented through the hired actors. Ensuring that the AI platform housing these scenarios has the appropriate cultural sensitivity when engaging with learners. Deciding whether the practice OSCE’s evaluation should be based purely on cultural competency or both cultural competency and clinical aspects (the former was chosen).
Unanticipated benefits	Identifying that other faculty members may find benefit in these types of AI-powered scenarios not necessarily only for topics dealing with culturally sensitive topics, but as a way to deliver curated, AI-enabled content outside of class time. Developing methods to prevent Indigenous standardized patients from facing unintentional microaggressions during the practice OSCE.
Strategic connections	Reinforces existing Indigenous equity efforts across campus and addresses TRC’s Calls to Actions. Improves future pharmacists' cultural competency. GenAI scenario model has potential utility in other patient-facing programs.
Next Steps	Pilot the AI-powered scenarios in a Pharmacy course, which will be analyzed by running a practice OSCE (Spring 2026). Share resources across various departments and faculties to support others developing similar GenAI-powered scenarios. Evaluation of incoming data from pilot.

Interdisciplinary Grad Student Designed and Led “Wicked Problem” Courses

Project Team

Brian Laird, Associate Professor (School of Public Health Sciences) | Associate Dean, Graduate Studies (Faculty of Health)

Bradley Pomeroy, Associate Professor (School of Accounting and Finance) | Associate Dean, Graduate Studies (Faculty of Arts)

Co-op Student Support

Nithyla Chandrakumar (W2025 | S2025)

Key milestones	Three PhD Candidates designed (W25) and taught (S25) Wicked Problem of Accessibility course. Wicked Problems included as an exemplar for Capstone variation as part of funded Global Futures 1.0 project. Starting conversations around future of Wicked Problems and its integration into the broader capstone ecosystem at UW.
Challenges & learnings	Continued concerns about the value proposition of co-taught course despite it receiving strong feedback from instructors and students alike. The use of Special Topics courses to accommodate interdisciplinary courses like this continues to pose challenges due to faculty permissions and student inability to easily locate courses for enrolment.
Unanticipated benefits	Beginning conversations with instructors/organizers of iCapstone course in Engineering to collaborate on a future iteration of the Wicked Problem experience.
Strategic connections	Collaborating on “Building Canada’s Largest Capstone Ecosystem” Global Futures Fund 1.0 Project.
Next Steps	Work with iCapstone course team to identify model that aligns with iCapstone. Continue to develop digital assets for reuse in other courses.

Learning by Teaching a Large Language Model

Project Team

Prashanth Arun, Graduate Student (Computer Science)

Pascal Poupart, Professor (Computer Science)

Igor Grossmann, Professor (Psychology)

Co-op Student Support

Erya Xu (W2025 | S2025)

Brent McCready-Branch (W2025 | S2025)

Natasha Cardinal (F2025)

Rahmah Bacchus (F2025)

Key milestones	Development of Chrysalis, an AI companion that embodies and encourages learning by teaching pedagogy. Piloted Chrysalis in three academic courses (PSYCH 101, CS 486, and ERS 215). Beginning broader public rollout of Chrysalis on a trial basis for any UW student to use, requiring a communications plan to further market Chrysalis and inspire uptake.
Challenges & learnings	Lower participation in pilot studies than anticipated. Intention to pilot Chrysalis in secondary school faced barriers due to concerns about GenAI in school board and a need to have more evidence of its efficacy. Long-term viability and broader deployment contingent upon server capacity, with potential leads resulting in delays.
Unanticipated benefits	A workshop in collaboration with the EdTech Sandbox is emerging (Jan 2026) as an opportunity to showcase the LLM and include faculty perspectives. Redesign the UI to more closely mirror LEARN, improving familiarity and ease of use. Chrysalis now incorporates a tutor and protégé mode so that learners can benefit from both forms of interaction for their learning.
Strategic connections	Intention to align project scope with Global Futures Fund initiatives to secure additional funding for development and connect with other units/individuals working in this domain. Seeking interest from other school boards across Ontario to trial Chrysalis in secondary school. As a broader GenAI strategy is developed at Waterloo, interest in an institutional learning tutor will increase and Chrysalis could be positioned to support that need.
Next Steps	Plan to increase awareness and pilot opportunities for instructors, especially in first-year courses, to broaden early-term use cases and gather feedback. A workshop is being developed to explain Chrysalis, peer-to-peer learning benefits, and responsible GenAI use for instructors and teaching staff.

Leveraging Artificial Intelligence (AI)-insights and CEE-Faculty partnerships to evolve Work-Integrated Learning at the University of Waterloo

Project Team

Judene Pretti, Interim Associate Provost, Co-operative and Experiential Education

Tonya Elliott, Analyst, Strategic Enablement Team (Co-operative and Experiential Education)

Jennifer Woodside, Director, Centre for Career Development

Esteban Veintimilla, Director of 1Mentor Partnerships w/QS Quacquarelli Symonds

Co-op Student Support

Brent McCready-Branch (W2025 | S2025)

Nithyla Chandrakumar (W2025 | S2025)

Natasha Cardinal (F2025)

Avean Ayati Ghaffari (F2025)

Key milestones	Met with many accreditation programs to discuss use cases of the platform. Piloted 1Mentor in various non-academic courses (PD1, We Accelerate, CFE, WIL 601). Pivoting project goals to align more with alumni insights rather than strictly a student interface for career mapping.
Challenges & learnings	Discovering unforeseen limitations in 1Mentor’s functionality. Limited interest in 1Mentor from various accreditation programs and schools. Accreditation programs already have advanced evaluation techniques to capture data on skill acquisition, so 1Mentor’s niche is less applicable for them.
Unanticipated benefits	Inferring where gaps exist in accreditation programs’ processes. Accessing alumni insight data from 1Mentor database has been the most well-received aspect of the tool. Other free to use tools, as well as GenAI, can produce some of the same functionality as 1Mentor.
Strategic connections	Connecting with various accreditation programs at UWaterloo (ex: Health, Pharmacy, Social Work, Science, Accounting and Finance). Made connections with the Advancement Team and Alumni Relations on campus. Attendance and project sharing at various committees (meetings with CCD, IAP, EdTech Advisory, Teaching Fellows, AIWG, etc.)
Next Steps	Complete application to receive funding from the BHER program. Researching various free data sources. Analyzing the data from the pilot courses. Pivoting away from focusing exclusively on 1Mentor and instead on the utility of these tools to help learners identify skills and relevant careers with a focus on developing an instructor toolkit.

EdTech Sandbox

Project Team

Benny Colussi, Manager, Facilities Services, Library Systems & Facilities Services

Kyle Scholz, Interim Managing Director, Teaching Innovation Incubator

Marcel David, Manager, Presentation Services, Information Systems & Technology

Rebecca MacAlpine, EdTech Sandbox Supervisor

Sarah Seabrook, Strategic Projects, Communications and Community Engagement Specialist

Scott Anderson, Manager, Educational Technologies, Information Systems & Technology

Tim Ireland, Librarian, Research & Learning, Libraries

Tanya Snyder, Communications Manager, Libraries

Co-op Student Support

Jessica Hoang (W2025 | S2025)

Rahmah Bacchus (F2025)

Key milestones	Soft launch of the physical sandbox space in October 2025. Creation of the Core-Operations group to oversee the creation and implementation of the Sandbox ecosystem, including the operational plan. The hiring of the EdTech Sandbox Supervisor to manage the space and design and implement educational programming.
Challenges & learnings	Supporting faculty, staff, and student access to the EdTech Sandbox while also considering loss prevention. Determining how to best leverage infrastructure and procedures across three departments to support the implementation of the Sandbox operating procedures.
Unanticipated benefits	Leveraging the Libraries space planning initiative to collaborate on the Sandbox, resulting in the new physical sandbox space in Dana Porter. Unanticipated infrastructure challenges in LIB-329 requires updates to support the emerging tech now located in the classroom. Exploring ways to utilize the Sandbox to support testing and piloting technology across campus.
Strategic connections	Signed a three-year memorandum of understanding between the Libraries, ITMS, and the AVPA office to pilot the Sandbox in LIB-329, located in Dana Porter Library. Renewal and repositioning the potential role of the Sandbox in the EdTech 2.0 project to support unbiased testing of new and emerging educational technologies.
Next Steps	Design and circulate technical manuals for the equipment in the Sandbox. Design and implement training for the various technologies in the Sandbox, as well as a suite of programming to support the incorporation of EdTech in the classroom. Explore how best to support student use and access outside of operating hours.

Project Graduating From the Incubator

Accelerating Integration of Sustainability into the Curriculum

Project Team

Mathew Thijssen, Director (Sustainability Office)

Mallory Ball, Curriculum Integration Assistant (Sustainability Office)

Jana Khanfer, Curriculum Integration Assistant (Sustainability Office)

Key milestones	Over 300 students registered for the Sustainability Leadership Certificate, and more than 300 completed the literacy assessment. Continuation of Sustainability Integration in Curriculum Grants program through Sustainability Action Fund. Completion of project in Fall 2025.
Challenges & learnings	Focusing on early champions proved essential, showing that meaningful progress comes from supporting willing innovators through a bottom-up, community-building approach. Ensuring meaningful integration of Indigenization within a project scoped solely for environmental sustainability created pressure to expand beyond the project’s manageable limits. Rapid institutional changes (budget crises, hiring freezes, restructuring) created burnout and reduced units’ ability to engage.
Unanticipated benefits	Waterloo became designated as an AASHE Centre for Sustainability Across the Curriculum (one of only three in Canada). Loss of dedicated staff capacity significantly slowed progress, as key relationship-building and strategic work could not be sustained without a staff lead.
Strategic connections	Findings contributed to interest in revising Undergraduate Degree Level Expectations (UDLEs) to include sustainability and other emerging topics that are seen as institutional priorities.
Next Steps	Expand staffing or secure new resources to support program development, deepen integration work, and sustain strategic relationships. Maintain and enhance the various outputs of this project (e.g., Certificate, Grants, Toolkit). Clarify long-term shared ownership between the Sustainability Office and curriculum-supporting units like CTE.

Evaluating LEARN Tools - Creator+

Project Team

Pam Fluttert, Director (Instructional Technology and Media Services)

Scott Anderson, Supervisor, Learning Environment (Instructional Technology and Media Services)

Co-op Student Support

Jessica Hoang, Undergraduate Research Coordinator (Teaching Innovation Incubator)

Key milestones	Campus-wide survey conducted to understand student and instructor use of interactive course content (n = x). Creator+ Champion Model and Showcase Established. Communications and Recruitment Strategy Implemented. Continued technical exploration and costing progress. Completion of project in Fall 2025.
Challenges & learnings	Lower than expected Creator+ uptake primarily due to concerns about time investment. Instructor capacity and appetite for interactive course design; seen as “extra work”.
Unanticipated benefits	GenAI outpacing C+ and other interactive tools for creating course content. D2L purchased H5P and integrated it as an alternative to Creator+. Fewer interactive tool users than anticipated – many expressed interest but didn’t follow through with actual use.
Strategic connections	Discovered in-house efforts to integrate existing interactive tools (i.e., H5P) within CEL’s Hive system. EdTech Advisory Committee and EdTech Steering Committee identified as key decision and feedback bodies for the long-term viability of interactive content creation at Waterloo. Academic Support Unit Collaboration – technical and pedagogical support models established both during project and for ongoing support.
Next Steps	Clarify the H5P/Hive pathway for interactive course content at CEL Support instructors migrating their content from Creator+ to other interactive formats.

Evaluating LEARN Tools - Performance+

Project Team

Pam Fluttert, Director (Instructional Technology and Media Services)

Scott Anderson, Supervisor, Learning Environment (Instructional Technology and Media Services)

Daspina Fekekos, Computing Consultant (Instructional Technology and Media Services)

Sean Warren, LMS User and System Support, Learning Environment (Instructional Technology and Media Services)

Paige Doherty, Faculty Relations Manager (Student Success Office)

Matthew Babela, Faculty of Mathematics Liaison (Centre for Teaching Excellence)

Dolapo Oladiran, Project Manager (VPAF Project Management Office)

Co-op Student Support

Jessica Hoang, Undergraduate Research Coordinator (Teaching Innovation Incubator)

Key milestones	Launch and expansion of the pilot to include instructors and academic advisors. Clarified governance and data access models for academic advisors. Structured evaluation of Performance+ with feedback from instructors and staff. Completion of project in Fall 2025.
Challenges & learnings	Lower than anticipated adoption and engagement by instructors and advisors. Permissions and access complexity make using Performance+ more challenging than it should be. Tool usability, performance, and feature gaps.
Unanticipated benefits	Technical side-effects of role design in P+ make accessing data for a specific user challenging and unintuitive. Lower than expected advisor uptake despite early advocacy from advisors about needing better data for at-risk students, suggesting even in identified use cases that the tool is lacking in helpful functionality.
Next Steps	Ongoing engagement with campus governance and leadership around an institution-wide data analytics strategy. Power BI and Data Lake as a strategic alternative to P+. Internal expertise in Power BI and APIs plus the data lake infrastructure has positioned an in-house analytics ecosystem as a more sustainable long-term path than vendor specific tooling.