[POST-CEIT-facultycouncil] FW: Informational Meetings

[Michele Dornisch]

Dear Colleagues,

For those of you who teach in the undergraduate programs - or perhaps might want to teach in the undergraduate programs, there are two very specific programs currently being supported at the administrative and faculty level.

John Lutz is leading some informational sessions on these two programs next week (specifically to encourage faculty to participate in teaching within them). He has asked that those of us on the learning communities committee share the dates/times with our constituents, and specifically note that Jeff Kane will be attended the Monday session.  The sessions will be held this coming week on Monday at 12:30 and on Thursday at 3:30.

The first of these focuses on the development of a first year experience.  As you may know, one "high impact" practice is first year experiences.  The campus has done a lot to address this, but in terms of faculty engagement, the best example (with respect to academics) is the creation of the first year seminar that is taught in connection with (linked to) a section of Post Foundations.  The Post Foundations course is to be taught by the same faculty member -- with the same students -- such that you meet them three times weekly.  The Post Foundations course has a specific curriculum but also embeds the common read (this year, Garbology) and service learning (this year, tied -- at least in part -- to sustainability).  It is possible for those teaching courses in which first-year students are often enrolled (EDI 14 - foundations of education) to propose teaching your course in this way (it carries with it one extra credit of workload).

The second area related to this idea of learning communities is in linked courses.  These can be linked within a program, within a college, or across colleges.  Next fall, for example, Nancy Frye and I are team teaching a course in the psychology department on the research and study of happiness (it has not yet been named) and linking it with Shawn Welnak's course on the philosophy of happiness. Pre-existing courses can be linked.  While it might not be possible to create new courses in education, it is possible, for example, to link courses to core courses in the liberal arts and sciences.  For example, Shaireen Rasheed and Wendy Ryden have, in the past, linked EDI 14 (foundations of education) and English 2, and insofar as I understand, this was a very successful partnership.

Please do attend the meetings if you are interested.

Go n-éiri an bóthar leat,
Michele M. Dornisch, Ph.D.
Professor
Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien. [The perfect is the enemy of the good.]- Voltaire


________________________________
From: John Lutz
Sent: Friday, October 02, 2015 8:28 AM
To: Abagail Van Vlerah; Brian Sweeney; Dulcie Stoepker; Lawrence Paretta; Lynne Schwartz; Marci Swede; Margaret Boorstein; Michele Dornisch; Nancy Frye; Rick DesRochers; Shawn Welnak; Vincent Scovetta
Subject: Informational Meetings

Dear Colleagues,

I’ve put together two informational meetings next week on Monday at 12:30 in Hillwood 221 and on Thursday at 3:30 in Hillwood 106. Would you help get the word out about these meetings and ask those who might be interested in offering either a first-year seminar or upper-level learning community to attend? I think that Jeff Kane will be attending the Monday meeting to join the conversation. He’s been a big supporter of our initiative, so it would be nice to have some faculty there. Thanks!

Best wishes,

John