Education & Instruction

Strategizing Faculty Engagement in Curricular Reform

A Tale of Two Universities: Faculty members and administrators at Boise State University and Miami Dade College joined forces in this session to share their two stories. Their hope was that the similarities between reform processes at two dissimilar institutions could suggest a few best practices for faculty engagement.

Here are four overarching strategies with specific ideas for investing in each:

Build and Leverage Conditions and Structures to support faculty engagement
Conditions and structures might include:

• Faculty Open Forums
• Drafting faculty beyond “the committee”
• Connecting curriculum to other activities
• Developing ideas based on the university’s mission and values
• Utilizing existing structures (discipline, CETL, IT infrastructure) and new structures (that might add to the university)

Engage Faculty through Intentional Professional Development
Intentional Professional Development might include:

• Faculty work sessions on outcomes-based learning
• Summer course design institutes
• Faculty learning communities for course development
• Campus workshops
• Peer Facilitation Series
• Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Seminars
• Symposia
• Analysis of Teaching
• Adjunct Faculty Workshop Series
• Known Course Development Standards: Know the outcomes, ensure they are on the syllabus, intentionally integrate them into the course, and create rubrics to assess each
• Authentic Assessment

Foster Community Dialogue around Curriculum
Examples of community dialogue opportunities:

• Task Force Open Sessions
• Faculty Information Sessions (Online and Face-to-Face)
• Student Information Sessions, presented by students
• Annual Executive Briefings for Senior Leadership
• Campus-wide Updates as Launch Parties for Assessment Results

Student-based Collaborations that inspire faculty engagement

• Make collaborations written and tangible
• Use a common language across campus
• Employ iterative change
• Identify a champion
• Mapping with Student Services
• Utilize centers and special programs

Thanks to Sharon McGuire and Susan Shadle from Boise State University and Jose Donis, John Frederick, and Marina Rodriguez from Miami Dade College for these specific and tangible ideas.

Threats to Curricular Innovation and Faculty Engagement

We have to face the fact that we have designed curricula that no longer resonate with our students and do not promote the learning the need to succeed in today’s society, says Susan Gano-Phillips, Professor of Psychology at University of Michigan-Flint. Faculty should be able to engage with general education in a way that causes our curriculum alongside societal needs.

I thought this set of talks might give strategic and specific examples of ways that universities might “build cultures of faculty engagement” (which incidentally was the title of the session). Instead, I left with a list of current trends and controversies that threaten and impede innovation and engagement:

1. Productivity: “A narrow conception of productivity threatens to trump student learning and innovation in the curriculum,” Gano-Phillips continues. “Students hate this, Faculty hate this. Yet, we continue to do it.” This threat can be diminished through a learning-outcome-based model of education.
2. Contingent Faculty: Faculty employment also threatens curricular reform. Universities cannot rely on contingent faculty as pinch-hitters or liabilities. Rather, we need to view them as allies in reform processes and innovation.
3. Changes in Technology: Both a threat and a rallying force, technology is daunting for some and an experimental laboratory for others.
4. Disparity in Faculty and Student Identity: Minority faculty appear more in contingent ranks than full-time positions. Yet, student profiles are increasingly diverse.
5. Disciplinary Silos: Faculty departments, libraries, and student affairs leaders tend to silo themselves and divide themselves into like parties. All need to be included in the conversation through integrated general education programs.
6. Surrounding Communities: Major events and crises in a college’s surrounding community can hinder innovation, but if successfully harnessed, can create opportunities for faculty to collaborate, innovate, and engage the community.

These trends were compiled from the collected presentations on this panel, which included Robert Collins, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Dillard University; Michele Cuomo, Associate Dean of Academic Affairs at CUNY Queensborough Community College; Cynthia Gomez, Instructor at Portland State University; and Norman Jones, Professor of History at Utah State University, in addition to Gano-Phillips.

Creative Inquiry: engaging students in real-world problems

The creative inquiry project at Clemson University has the goal of “a research project for every student,” says Barbara Speziale, Associate Dean for Undergraduate Programs at Clemson. It supports a intensive, discovery-oriented approach to learning for all students.

At Clemson, creative inquiry is for all students at all levels. Faculty and staff mentors work with small teams of students over multiple semesters. Creative Inquiry projects are either faculty-developed projects or department-embedded projects. The team-orientation of this program is one of its key characteristics.

Clemson’s creative inquiry projects are available on the program’s website.

Connection to the institution became a core component of Ohio Wesleyan University’s attempt at creative inquiry, says the university’s Dean of Academic Affairs Charles Stinemetz. According to Barbara Andereck, Associate Dean of Accreditation and Assessment, the OWU Connection Program includes a first-year seminar, course connection networks, travel learning courses, student individualized projects, and theory-to-practice grants.

Course connection networks combine faculty members toward discussion and collaboration on shared learning outcomes. Theory-to-practice grants include travel (both abroad and in the US), supplies, and resources to support individual students in the programs who want to continue the work initiated in the program’s experiences.

Core issues for developing institutional creative inquiry programs:

• Funding for or endowing these programs
• Examining budget models for faculty load time
• Maintaining both team-based and individualized approaches for students
• Embedding requirements for inquiry across general education and/or within individual majors

A Rich Archive Creates Better Reflections of Learning

E-portfolios are bodies of work that rely on collection, selection, and reflection, says Kathleen Blake Yancey, Professor at Florida State University. The e-portfolio has the ability to bring together multiple types of learning in a single place. It can showcase a deliver curriculum, an experienced curriculum, and a lived curriculum (which may or may not be the same thing).

Every institutional model for an e-portfolio should be deeply tied to the mission of the institution. But, portfolios should not be tied to classes, but rather tied to competencies. They might ask students to recognize parallels between and among disciplines and apply knowledge, skills, etc to student experience.

Learning is not bound by our set of courses, but is rather bound by the experiences afforded to our students. A new learning model based on outcomes can be reflected in a reframed e-portfolio model. Directions must be explicit, specific, and intentional. And reflections must include specific examples from any point in the student’s experience.

If we focus on student learning, do we really need courses?

Barbara Wright, Vice President of Western Association of Schools and Colleges suggests that our biggest threats build on these demographics, but also our changing perceptions of technology, assessment, learning-outcomes, and alternative higher education.

At colleges, the old business model relied on of knowledge, instruction, learning, degrees, social networking, cultural opportunities, and personal development. All of these things are available outside of college except validation of learning and conferring of degrees.

So, if we want to value and validate learning, do we really need courses? If we no longer sell course and credit hours, how do we measure learning? Assessment. Assessment becomes the vehicle for substantive conversation about quality, proficiency, and learning.

Student work changes. Responsibility and directed learning become the hallmarks of student experience.

Faculty work changes. Courses have a place, but they may also be the box we need to climb out of as we consider student learning. Courses might be replaced by advising, tutorials, and guided study.

Administrative work changes. Planning, budget, and revenue are dramatically affected. A robust assessment structure would be required.

Policy work changes. High quality learning would replace retention at the center of accreditation.

Is this all just a fantasy? Is it plausible? Could it ever work?

Institutions that prioritize outcomes will be the decision makers.

An Exploration in Digital Literacy

I’m embarking on a journey through an untested classroom. At Queens University of Charlotte, the university is investing in a prototype for faculty-student interaction through seminars that explore a specific question or inquiry.

I’ve agreed to be part of the pilot project taking place this spring. Fifteen brave students and I will examine the landscape of digital literacy and ask questions about how a person becomes literate in 2012.

Using Howard Rheingold’s “Attention and other 21st century literacies” as a starting point, our group will investigate the nature of contemporary literacy in a digital environment and its relationship to the interplay between technology and society.

Each week, we’ll be engaging in a weekly inquiry project. The inquiries will be posted here and I hope that the conversation on each point of inquiry expands to include not only the people in our seminar, but also thinkers and leaders in the digital literacy field who engage with our topic. You’re invited to explore with us.

To kick off the conversation, what is your one must-read article (or must-view video) on the topic of digital literacy?

Spaces of Learning meet User Experience Design

Those planning construction or renovation projects for educational facilities might want to study the people using the proposed space as part of the construction and planning process. Dr. John A. McArthur makes this case in an article in the American Clearinghouse on Educational Facilities Journal. The publication, titled “Practical Lessons from User-Experience Design for Spaces of Learning,” uses information design theory to advocate for user participation in facilities improvement and management.

In the Editor’s Note, Mark Littleton writes, “John McArthur provides an eloquent discussion of user-experience design, a discussion that centers on facility design which favors spaces designed for learning over spaces designed for teaching.”

Dr. John A. McArthur is an assistant professor and director of undergraduate programs in the Knight School of Communication at Queens University of Charlotte.

Read the article – “Practical Lessons from User-Experience Design for Spaces of Learning” - in the journal’s online edition.

Ballin’ on Burris – Journal of Critical Incidents

Dr. Steve Cox and Dr. Brad Brooks, of the McColl School of Business, and Dr. John A. McArthur, of the Knight School of Communication, at Queens University of Charlotte collaborated on a publication in the 2011 edition of the Journal of Critical Incidents. The journal, one of three case study journals published annually by the Society for Case Research, publishes real-world decision points with attached teaching notes.

The article, titled “Ballin’ on Burris,” focuses on the Coordinated Management of Meaning, a practical theory in communication. The incident depicts a decision point for a chief operating officer of a university who faces a critical decision that pits two constituences against each other along generational lines.

Dr. Steve Cox is an associate professor and director of undergraduate programs in the McColl School of Business. Dr. Brad Brooks is an associate professor of marketing in the McColl School of Business. Dr. John A. McArthur is an assistant professor and director of undergraduate programs in the Knight School of Communication. All three are members of the faculty at Queens University of Charlotte.

Twitter and Teacher Behaviors

Does Twitter influence student perceptions of teacher behaviors? As part of a session surrounding new and emerging technologies in instruction, I presented my research (co-authored with Kristen Bostedo-Conway) on Twitter’s role in the classroom at the National Communication Association 2011 National Convention in New Orleans, LA.

We conducted this research in Spring 2010 to better understand the role of Twitter in the classroom. Our findings give preliminary evidence that student-instructor interaction on Twitter has a relationship with student perceptions of teacher behavior. Most interestingly, students’ perceptions of a teacher’s non-verbal immediacy was heightened by out-of-class Twitter use.

These findings, the full text of which is under review for publication, have inspired us to continue this research into Twitter uses in the classroom.

Below is our handout from the convention which contains the research abstract and demonstrates the correlations identified between standard measures of student perceptions of teacher behavior (instructor credibility, content relevance, and immediacy) and instructor and student Twitter use:

Academics and Technology: Early Adopters or Left Behind?

Alexis Carreiro, assistant professor in the Knight School of Communication, offers that the adoption of technology might be a strange marriage of Goldilocks and Marshall McLuhan: “When we rush to adopt technology, it’s too hot. When we wait awhile to adopt technology, it’s too cold. How do we adopt it so it’s just right?“

We are surrounded by first-rate communication technology. How do we know when to adopt technology and how to use it in the classroom? If we don’t act as early adopters of technology, we get left-behind. But, if we adopt the wrong technology, our investment can become a short-sighted waste of time.

Today’s colloquium – sponsored by the Knight School of Communication and led by Dr. Carreiro — brought together faculty, staff and students at Queens University of Charlotte to discuss and debate the role of technology in university life.

The conversation was split on issues of timing, practice, incorporation into classrooms, and comfort level. Some participants incorporate technology into their classrooms and work life. Others shy away from it. Still others would like to explore using it, but desire the time and training to use it well.

Nevertheless, participants agreed that the role of universities, academics, researchers and students is to call for critical reflection of technology and its role in our lives.

The critical reflection on and incorporation of technology come with social and ethical imperatives. In technology, we often default to the question, “What can we do?” But the question we might more readily ask is “What should we do?” Or, how should we adopt, organize, and apply technology as a portion of our increasingly digital lives?

It is true that all technology can be used for good or ill, and that the technology itself cannot be separated from its designer, its user, and its context. These issues, which McLuhan chronicled in his work across the last half of the 20th century, concern the constant interplay between human use of technology and  technological transformation of humanity.

These ideas plague our reflective understandings of technology and leave me wondering about the timing of teaching technology skills in the educational process. Perhaps the beginning of the solution is for academics to adopt the conversation, even if all of us aren’t quite ready to adopt the technology.