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teacher, and assessing it impartially can be even more difficult. As Ken Bain points out in his book What the Best College Teachers Do, good teachers know they always have something new to learn—if not about teaching techniques, then about each new group of students and their particular aspirations, confusions, misperceptions, and levels of ignorance. Some teach- ers are tempted to mentor their students so closely that they're practically completing projects vicariously. But not only is that a poor way to teach students to be cre- ative, such an approach also makes it nearly impossible for the teacher to evaluate the students' work. I've found that one of the best ways to evaluate student creativity is through a peer critiquing session, which can be useful for a couple of reasons. It helps students learn to assess what makes an idea new or valuable; it also provides multiple viewpoints about the ways a creative idea did or did not succeed. Such a wide set of considerations helps students refine and improve their ideas. When I want peer feedback on a student project, I design a critiquing rubric that contains a scoring system but also allows for open-ended commentary. If it seems important for the feedback to be anonymous, I allow students to submit their critiques electronically via Black- board or Moodle, or I collect all the commentary and consolidate it into a brief review for each student. I find that student assessments of creative exercises add layers to my own evaluations and give students many different avenues for improving their projects. Future-Ready about structure and grammar—so they can simply focus on concepts. With each blog, I also require them to post a link to one mainstream article written in the last two years that highlights points made in the chapter. This assignment helps reduce textbook information overload; in addition, it helps students deepen their knowledge of particular principles, because writing about a topic makes it more memorable. Moreover, students often extend the conversations they have on the blog site into the classroom, which allows me to evaluate how well students understand the concepts I'm teaching and how well they're interacting with each other. Relying on Peer Critiques While creativity is an essential skill for today's students to master, teaching it can be a daunting task for the A. Danielle Way is an assistant professor of marketing at Wood- bury University's School of Business in Burbank, California. BizEd March/April 2012 59 My marketing classrooms have been enriched every time I've incorporated elements of student autonomy and peer critique, and I believe these approaches will work for professors in any discipline. Even as the world changes around us, and the content and delivery methods of my classes evolve, I expect these teaching methods to remain viable in the future. Today's business professors must always strive to combine creative lectures with assignments that provide students opportunities for fluid thinking. I am confident that, when professors incorporate these key elements into the classroom, they will be steps closer to under- standing the learning culture of students today. IMAGEZOO/GLOW IMAGES