Work in Progress - Faculty Training on Team Management in the Classroom

Faculty at the National University of Tachira (UNET)-Venezuela frequently use the team approach as a learning tool. However, faculty has to deal with the barriers for students´ team success such as free riding and team conflict. It is a common practice that professors bring a group of students together and assign them a task. Students receive only task guidelines and behavioral rules, mostly addressing negative reinforcement to avoid free riding. Research on teams has found that there are many variables having impact on team performance. For this reason it is necessary that faculty members receive training to learn how to manage students teams in the classroom to minimize the impact of the variables affecting team performance. This study expects to determine the impact of faculty training on team management in the classroom using the Effective Team Player- Training Program for Faculty (ETP-TPfF) developed at the UNET