Professor as an undercover freshman

Dear GEDIs,

Here is the link to High Ed text on the Professor that became undercover student that had some interesting insights and wrote a book "My freshman year". Campus library has the book, if you do not want to buy it.


Best regards,
Milos

Six Tips for Teaching Diversity & A Funny HRC Blog Post

Hello all,
As we will be discussing inclusion and diversity today, I came across this article that might be related.

Six Tips for Teaching Diversity

Also, i would like all of you to read this post from the HRC blog - How internet is inseparable from today's youth - and it's funny, too!!
Most Woeful Grief

See you all!
Rose

I Want to Make Them Squirm

I read this in the Chronicle today; I found it kind of funny and a little bit disappointing. Here is the link :

http://chronicle.com/article/I-Want-to-Make-Them-Squirm/129122/

It is about a adjunct professor who got 2 bad student evaluations. He was angry about it, he figured out who really the students were by their hand writing. He was ready if he saw them again, to give them a piece of his mind. I understand the person was mad and he is in stressful position. Probably he is on a tenure track and is worried that one or two bad evaluations will cost him his job. Here is my answer: I understand he is a human just like the rest of us, he is allowed to be angry, but writing an article about the situation is crossing the line. You are supposed to be an educator, not someone who is ready for revenge (for a comment that someone wrote on evaluation). You should read those evaluation anonymously and not go searching for its owner. Take it as a thing to work on or just an opinion. Hopefully you can try to evaluate yourself and determine if it is true or not. If it is true, change you way of teaching, if it is not, then either continue the same way you have been teaching or change it up a little.
Try not to judge your own students, you are there to teach them, help them learn how to learn. Finding an opportunity to belittle them in a magazine about Higher education is very unprofessional, and proving: you Mr. Fern are maybe not that great of a teacher as you believe you are.

Embarrassed By Your Technology

GEDIs,

Here is an interesting ProfHacker blog post that talks about graduate students owning iPads and being too embarrassed to use them in public.

What do you think? Are there other technologies that might elicit these same emotions?

This is an interesting factor at play as universities move towards increasing their technological capabilities. It makes me wonder if/how this would affect students' off-campus learning.

Adam

Faculty Development Resources

Dear GEDIs,

Looking here and there for various articles and handbooks on higher education, I have ran into this cool link. It has some practical documents related to teaching techniques and student engagement, so check it out sometime.


All the best,
Miloš

We beg you, join the blog

Hello GEDIs,

This is Adam, your TA. Below is a list of potential slacker? GEDIs that have not joined the blog. Either that… or I entered your email wrong because I couldn’t read your handwriting. Either way, it’s not my fault. If you find your name on the list, please join (by accepting the invite) or re-send your Gmail address to urzsmith@vt.edu.

Andrea Swenson

Komal Keck

Yanna Lambrinidou

Sean Diehl

Sang Tak Lee

Monica Kimbell

Kelsey Pieper

John Curtis

Shawn Crawford

Rebecca Halvorson

William Pruitt

Thanks, Adam

Education Nation Summit 2011

Hey everyone,

Just wanted to let you know (in case you weren't already aware) that this week is the Education Nation Summit in NYC. A lot of video clips and newspots have been featured on the Today show and Nightly News with Brian Williams on NBC this week. This summit involves educators, parents, and leaders in politics, business, and technology in a conversation about the state of our education system. A series of interesting video clips can be found on the Education Nation website.

One I found particularly interesting and relevant to our class was Khan Academy sparks education reform debate. It highlights an online tutorial program for students as well as an active, learning-by-doing applied program in a physics classroom. There was also a cool experiential learning program for high schoolers interested in the environment featured in the Making a Difference spot on Nightly News Monday night.

See you Wednesday!

Student-centered Pedagogy

I have been working feverishly on my literature review and I just wanted to share about it. I am exploring a student-centered pedagogy called POGIL (process-oriented guided learning inquiry). It is all about group collaboration, guided inquiry, and utilizes the learning cycle. The instructor merely serves as a facillitator only stepping in when the student thought process starts to go awry. Its really cool that it started in chemistry classes (at Franklin and Marshall College) and now it is making its way into other content areas such as business and math. Some predict it may eventually stretch into the humanities. Its a really interesting method which has shown impressive results in learning.

In many of the journal articles that I am reading from the Journal of Education site our class's text by Weimer!

For more info about POGIL, go to www.pogil.org

Opportunities through CSECP

GEDI friends,

I know I shared one of these with you already, but I wanted to share all three of our grant programs (social entrepreneurship, a student organizations program, and conference travel) now that they are all live. See you in a bit!

take care,
jake

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Conference Travel Funds Program

Will you be presenting at a conference and need funding for travel and registration? CSECP's Conference Travel Funds Program is now available to students presenting at conferences or professional meetings on research that promotes civic engagement. We wish to fund applicants who have incorporated engagement into their academic and personal pursuits. Two cycles will be awarded, Fall and Spring.

*The application deadline for Fall Cycle is October 21st

If you would like more information on the grant and application process, please see the attached announcement or you can find it here: http://tinyurl.com/travelfundsannouncement

The online grant application can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/ConferenceTravelFundsProgram

If you have any questions about developing your application or the grant process, please contact Jake Grohs, CSECP, at jrgrohs vt.edu.

-----
Organization Funds Program

Are you part of a student organization looking for funds to complete a project or event? Will your project create an impact on the community and fulfill the university mission of "Ut Prosim"? The Organization Funds Program is now available to registered student organizations who wish to complete a project or event that impacts the community and is service-oriented. Your organization could be awarded up to $1000 to make the project/event a reality.

It is simple to apply! Read the attached announcement for more information and details about applying or click here: http://tinyurl.com/OrganizationFundsAnnouncement

To apply, fill out the online application, found here:http://tinyurl.com/OrganizationFundsProgram11-12

APPLICATIONS FOR FALL CYCLE ARE DUE OCTOBER 14TH, 2011

If you feel like you still need some help honing your ideas or have logistical questions, please feel free to contact Jake Grohs, CSECP, at jrgrohs vt.edu.

-----
SOCIAL ENTREPRENEUR STUDENT GRANT

Do you have a unique idea that could help improve your community? Do you want to work with a community organization to create a lasting impact? The Social Entrepreneur grant is now available to help you do this. This grant can provide seed money for students who have a creative project or idea in mind to address a specific need in their community. You could be awarded up to $1000 to start your project! A cycle will be offered in fall and spring for this program.

It is simple to apply! Read the attached announcement (or view it here: http://tinyurl.com/SESGPFallAnnouncement for a more detailed description of the program and the requirements.

The application can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/SESGP-Fall2011

APPLICATION DEADLINE FOR FALL CYCLE IS OCTOBER 10TH

If you could use some help developing your ideas, recruiting community partners or a faculty advisor, tying the project into your academic pursuits, etc., please feel free to contact Jake Grohs at CSECP by emailing jrgrohs vt.edu.

--
Lauren Kennedy
Graduate Student
Human Nutrition, Foods, & Exercise
kennedy0 vt.edu

Ever notice the slight sag of the shoulders or heavy sighs or rolled eyes when you tell students they must work on a team project for the semester? It is a method of constructing what we tell the students is "the way it works when you're out there in the world," and yet it's so contrived as to be void of creativity, and certainly novelty! I've noticed that some of our students have 4 or 5 team projects per semester during their junior year.


One dedicated faculty member at North Carolina State University, Dr. Robert Beichner, developed a new approach to teaching the funamentals of physics - not a simple undertaking! This method, known as SCALE-UP (Student-Centered Active Learning Environment for Undergraduate Programs), has so many benefits that I don't believe I can express it all well in a short blog. I will encourage you to explore the possible use of this approach in your classes. There are two critical components of this learning environment that, in my opinion, make this program increibly valuable:


1. The teams are designed by the faculty to have a distribution of students with different academic records/performance. While it was expected that the honors students would be bored and would carry the group, that was not the case at all. In fact, the students with the highest GPAs learned more than those they guided though the material.


2. The test format is designed to guide the students through the fundamental questions; to learn to frame the problem and identify the approach to solve it. Once the student has addressed the problem, he or she has the opportunity to make the connection as to what the answer actually means.


The website where you can learn more about SCALE-UP is http://www.ncsu.edu/PER/scaleup.html.

Presidential Global Scholars

Hello GEDIs,

Last week, Dr. Carlson stopped by to talk about the Presidential Global Scholars study abroad program. You can find more information here.

- Adam

Is it worse than we thought?

Did anyone catch tonight's NBC Nightly News? The opening story was a discussion on the decreased value of a college degree, especially given the rising costs of tuition. Statistics show that 80% of graduates leave college at least $25,000 in debt, and parents and their children agree that their college experience wasn't worth the debt. This lead me to question, is poor teaching going to prevent students from seeking higher education?

From some of the discussions in class, I am assuming that most of you didn't have a college experience similar to mine. I went to a private, liberal arts college with a total student enrollment of about 1,000 students. This equated to class sizes no more than 20 (often around 7 in upper level classes), and professors that were contracted to spend about 70% of their time devoted to teaching. It was in that setting I fell in love with learning and really found a subject to be passionate about. Professor office hours were long, learning through unconventional methods (lecture, field work, discussion, heavy writing and speaking), and I graduated having no doubt that I walked away from the college a more well-rounded, educated individual. I am also confident that that person who graduated last in the class shares that opinion.

I also left with more than my fair share of debt, but I would go back and do it in a heartbeat. Like most college graduates, I left with lifelong friends and some pretty crazy stories. But is that all most students are paying for? Is it now rare to leave more educated? Analyst predict that soon the costs of education will prevent students from seeking higher education. What will that mean for the development of the nation?

It is sad, and perhaps biased of me, to think that this discussion ultimately results in an argument about whether big, state schools are better, and more worth the money, than smaller, private schools (especially since many private schools are now offering four-year degree guarantees). Among the professors in my department, there has been a significant angst about the caliber of students that are graduating from the college. As professionals, they realize that their students cannot survive in the workplace, yet many seem indifferent about trying to amend their classes in order to prepare their students. Is the status quo at large universities, places that are supposed to be centers that offer the best education, going to hinder future generations?

I could argue about this for a long, long time……

Hey, GEDIs --

It's great--it is wonderful and highly encouraged, actually--to engage with your colleagues and let them know about info they might find interesting relevant to teaching and learning. Please use the course blog (rather than email messages) for the postings and conversation about cool links, articles, etc.

Thanks, Kacie, for sending out this video about the Dallas Science and Engineering Magnet Public School. (You can use the link icon, next to the text box icon, to allow folks to click on the highlighted text to view the video.)

If you'd like to chat about it, use the comment tool below.

Thanks!
Shelli

A New Look for our Scholar Site

Welcome to the new view of the GEDI Scholar course site!

In the spirit of demonstrating a variety of ways to use technology tools to spark student collaboration and engagement, we wanted to show you how easy it is to embed a free tool into Scholar. Previously, we asked you to use the "Forums" tool for collegial eConversation, and now we invite you to use the course blogger tool to generate collegial dialogue, announcements, posting of links, and so forth.

This blogger tool is one in the Google suite, so you should have (or will receive) an email invite to participate via your gmail. We are using this tool to create an open course blog. (This is a different use of a blog tool than Dr. C talked about in seminar, and we'll chat about the different intent and purpose.) All of you will be authors (once you accept your gmail invitation), and that allows you to both post and comment as much and as often as you would like.

You'll note that over on the right are some widgets. The first is a "Seminar Announcements" text box. Adam and I will use that to remind you of any important last minute "stuff" for seminar, etc. We have also brought in RSS feeds from several things you may already read, or if not, might want to think about perusing.

This entire section on this left side will be for all of us to eEngage and eConverse with each other. It becomes an ongoing, archived conversation, so you can always go back to a previous post, even if it has disappeared from view. If a colleague posts something, please feel free to have an ongoing conversation via the "comments" tool. And, any time you wish to start another strand of conversation, just create a post, and do so. The purpose of the course blog is to foster engagement beyond the seminar meetings. So, whether you want to pick up on and expand a conversation that occurred in seminar, start a new conversation, or post announcements and info for your colleagues, this is where you can do that. Active engagement is encouraged and smiled upon and we all benefit when we tap into our collective, interdisciplinary wisdom, so step right up and jump into the course blog conversation!

By way of example for posting additional links that some of your colleagues might find useful, here is the link to the Chronicle of Higher Education article, "Let's Get Serious About Cultivating Creativity," that is located as a PDF in the Resource folder for this week. This non-PDF version gives you access to the commentary the article generated. (You should be able to view it, thanks to our library subscription, via VT-wireless.)

See you in seminar!
Shelli & Adam