Lori Mumpower
Executive Director
Center for the Advancement of Teaching Excellence
Pronouns: she/her/hers
Contact
Building & Room:
Teaching Excellence Building (TEB) Room 106
Email:
College Contact for:
College of Education, College of Engineering, College of Social Work
About
Dr. Lori Mumpower is Executive Director of the Center for the Advancement of Teaching Excellence (CATE) at the University of Illinois Chicago. Her work focuses on how institutions create conditions that support meaningful and sustained change in teaching and learning.
As an educational developer, researcher, and organizational leader, she works with faculty, departments, colleges, and institutional leaders to design faculty development systems, peer observation programs, teaching evaluation processes, and professional learning opportunities that support evidence-based teaching practices.
Dr. Mumpower was selected to the Fulbright Specialist Roster (2026–2029), a U.S. Department of State program that supports short-term international collaborations in higher education. She has engaged with scholars and institutional leaders from Taiwan and Kazakhstan on topics related to faculty development, teaching excellence, and organizational change.
Her current scholarship examines why some teaching innovations are adopted and sustained while others are not. She is currently developing a book project, Why Evidence Isn't Enough: Designing Environments for Faculty Change, which explores how institutional environments shape faculty decision-making and educational change.
Prior to joining UIC, Dr. Mumpower directed the Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and held faculty appointments at Valdosta State University and the University of Alaska Anchorage. Dr. Mumpower is the recipient of the 2024 Robert J. Menges Award for Outstanding Research in Educational Development for "Driving and Resisting Pedagogical Change: Lessons Post-Pandemic." She is also the recipient of the 2023 Professional and Organizational Development Network Innovation Award for "Small Teaching, Big Results: Leveraging Department Chairpersons to Improve Teaching and Learning."
When not working, Lori enjoys cycling, exploring Chicagoland with her husband Janson and daughter Aurelia, and harassing her cat.
Areas of Expertise
• Faculty Development Strategy
• Institutional Change and Faculty Engagement
• Building and Scaling Teaching and Learning Centers
• Peer Observation and Teaching Evaluation Systems
• New Faculty Development and Mentoring
• Mid-Semester Student Feedback Programs
• Evidence-Based Teaching Adoption
• Educational Development in STEM
Selected Publications
Mumpower, L. A. (2025). Small teaching, big results: Leveraging department chairpersons to improve teaching and learning. To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development, 44(1), 8. https://journals.publishing.umich.edu/tia/article/id/5333/
Mumpower, L., Rohrbacher, C., Caulkins, J., & Korentsides, J. (2024). Measuring pandemic change: Analyzing syllabi for student-centeredness over time. To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development, 43(2), 311–338. https://journals.publishing.umich.edu/tia/article/id/5339/
Wojton, J., & Mumpower, L. (2024). Assessing and supporting the needs of mid-career faculty mentors. In V. Baker (Ed.), Building your academic mid-career toolkit (pp. 96–107). Taylor & Francis. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003428626-11
Wojton, J., & Mumpower, L. (2021). Current practices in a STEM university: Toward a networked mentoring approach. Chronicle of Mentoring and Coaching, 5(14), 537–541.
Mumpower, L. A., Branham, C., Clevenger, A. D., Faulconer, E., & Watkins, A. (2020). Digital literacies in the classroom. In E. Alqurashi (Ed.), Handbook of research on fostering student engagement with instructional technology in higher education (pp. 116–138). IGI Global. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-0246-4.ch006
Branham, C., Blomstrom, S., Mumpower, L., Kissh, K., Wiley, J., Liu, Y., Miller, K., Bryant, Z., & Reedy, B. (2019). Digital studio tutors as partners. International Journal for Students as Partners, 3(1), 140–149. https://doi.org/10.15173/ijsap.v3i1.3652
Blomstrom, S. A., Hayford, B., Mumpower, L., & Bobinsky, A. (2016). Service-learning and STEM literacy. In Research in science education (Vol. VII): Science and service-learning (pp. 19–48).
Hayford, B., Blomstrom, S., & Mumpower, L. (2015). Formation and evaluation of a tool to evaluate STEM literacy in service-learning projects. Journal on Excellence in College Teaching, 26(4), 73–101.
Mumpower, L. (2014). Visualizing causality: A peer-review exercise. In R. Brickey et al. (Eds.), The write book: Classroom exercises for the composition instructor (pp. 161–164).
Soria, K., & Mumpower, L. (2012). Critical building blocks: Mandatory prerequisite registration systems on student success. NACADA Journal, 32(1), 30–42.