2024 Community Leadership Award Recipient

Adam Finkelstein

Associate Director, Learning Environments, Teaching and Learning Services, McGill University

For advancing higher education through collaborative initiatives and innovative projects that enhance teaching and learning; for leading the design of cutting-edge learning environments at McGill University; for contributing to EDUCAUSE with dedication, expertise, and a commitment to the global academic community.

The 2024 EDUCAUSE Community Leadership Award recognizes Adam Finkelstein for his commitment to advancing higher education through collaborative community initiatives, meeting the challenges of new and evolving expectations through innovative projects that capitalize on the potential for technology to improve teaching and learning. He is the first recipient of this award from a Canadian institution of higher education.

Adam Finkelstein is Associate Director, Learning Environments at Teaching and Learning Services, at McGill University. Over the past 24 years he has built a career developing innovative digital and physical learning environments—designing them, teaching in them, and assessing them. He has helped thousands of instructors improve their teaching with initiatives including active learning strategies and assessment, both online and in the classroom.

Adam was hired at McGill over two decades ago as part of a team to manage and provide faculty development for the first university-wide LMS. As part of McGill’s first learning technology team, Adam also led the instructional design of award-winning multimedia and educational software. Over time, he managed transitions through multiple LMS changes. As McGill became more interested in online learning, Adam led the team that developed the university’s first MOOCs for hundreds of thousands of students. More recently, he and his team led the initiative to pivot McGill’s teaching online during the pandemic, including investigating and deploying an ecosystem of teaching and learning tools. He and his team are currently developing resources and online modules to help instructors effectively use generative AI in their teaching and assessment.

During his entire career, Adam has played a critical role in the development of McGill’s teaching and learning spaces. Since 2009, he has worked with architectural teams to design all renovated classrooms and teaching labs at the university, including McGill’s first active learning classrooms, the first in Canada. He has designed a diverse range of learning spaces, from active learning classrooms and active learning lecture halls to STEM labs, informal spaces, and indigenous learning spaces. For the past 10 years he has been the chair of the university-wide committee responsible for the selection, design, and renovation of all teaching and learning spaces at McGill.

Adam has been active with EDUCAUSE for 20 years and currently co-leads the Learning Space Design Community Group. For over 10 years, he has been a core team member and co-author of the Learning Space Rating System (LSRS), the only evidence-based rubric to evaluate the potential of formal learning spaces to support multiple modes of teaching and learning. The LSRS has been used by hundreds of institutions to inform their planning, design, and analysis of teaching and learning spaces.

Adam completed his graduate work at McGill and has published numerous articles and book chapters as well as given numerous international keynotes, presentations, and workshops in many different areas such as learning science, learning technologies, and learning spaces. He lives in Montreal, Quebec, with his wonderful wife and three children. He leads an active outdoor Canadian lifestyle with his family and just completed his SCUBA certification. Adam has a never-ending drive to improve teaching and learning and help instructors take advantage of the amazing affordances that diverse learning environments can provide.

This EDUCAUSE Award is sponsored by Moran Technology Consulting, Mission Partner.