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I&IT Learning Centeredness Task Force 7/24/06 Meeting
Present: Denny Mosier (Chair), Debra Brum, Sui Cheung, Chris Crudo, Stephanie Doda, JoAnn Karns, H. Keita, David Levin, Candie McDougall, Lori Okamoto and Marci Payne.
Item 1: University-Wide Learning Centered Task Force Update (Sui) Handout: Cal Poly Pomona: A Learning-Centered university that:
Per Denny, this is part of Gil Brum’s Learning Centered activities with the University-Wide task force. We will look at the 16 principles that CSU Northridge came up with and see how they can work for Cal Poly Pomona. This is leading up to a month long series of events that will occur in October 2006. Per Denny, #8 Learn-by-Doing is one of our mottos. We need to think about what is unique about Cal Poly Pomona as compared to the other CSU campuses.
Per Sui, we are a polytechnic university. Per David, regarding on line classes we have been developing models that allow us to be more intentional and purposeful in the way that we approach e-learning. DOLCE is a good example of how we changed the approach which is dominant in universities. More faculty need to drive their courses to the needs of the students and the institution rather than the needs of the faculty. The team approach makes it easier for faculty to identify and highlight what the learning outcomes are for the students as opposed to what the individual faculty member is trying to achieve. For online courses among the CSU we are not among the leaders. But now the approach we have for redesign is among the best for meeting the Learning Centered goals.
Debra’s perspective for the I&IT Division is that we are doing better about communicating to the campus community who we are and what we do. But we still have a ways to go to fulfill our communications plan. What matters is what we can do for the campus community not how we are organized. We are making progress. Our communications with university technical personnel outside of I&IT is a lot better.
Per Debra, some things that are unique about Cal Poly Pomona is hat we do particularly well working across divisional lines. An administrator has moved from Student Affairs to Academic Affairs and one from Academic Affairs to I&IT. This has given people a better picture of the different areas. Per Debra, we at CPP are good at accessibility, commitment and friendliness of our faculty and staff.
Per Candie, it is difficult when you are in a classroom in the evening and the equipment is not working and sometimes the faculty just send you home for the night. It is really hard when you can’t get the resources you need after hours. Per Keita, here we have a condition after hours where there are fewer resources, but on the P&R side we tend to shrink this help down to meet our budget. We have this conflict. Per Candie, it is the same with passwords. People can’t do their assignments because they can’t reach the right people. Per Debra, assessment is the link between P&R and Learning Centeredness.
Per Debra, regarding #8 “everyone is a learner.” The CSU Northridge list almost focuses on Student Centeredness instead of Learning Centeredness. David thinks CSUN staff is trying to say is “understanding the role of teaching and learning.” Per Debra, the faculty want to see teaching in the picture here. We are a long way from a world where people learn without assistance. Teaching is structuring and experience that helps people learn.
Per Debra, at the last University-Wide Learning Task Force meeting we discussed themes for the month-long focus. But this just didn’t seem to jell at the last meeting. It could be one of those things where there isn’t a right answer. When we have themes it will help I&IT to see how to fit in and how we can provide opportunities to help people.
Per Candie, another important learning-centered mechanism involves students. I&IT staff members learn much from our student assistants and they learn from us.
Item 2: What Northern Michigan University Learned About Their Student Laptop Program (Sui)
In 2000 Northern Michigan University purchased laptops for its students. The program was funded by a 19% tuition increase. Students are hired to handle the laptop support. Every thing on the laptop, including software, is universal – one model. Northern Michigan University is a public institution.
David has not received any significant feedback in the last year from faculty on the lap top program. He takes this to mean that the faculty are happy. Per Candie, some faculty don’t like it. They can make it work on campus, but not at home. The biggest problem is with email especially for the Mac users. Per Chris, if it is set up properly by the techs then it should be OK. Sometimes they are locked down so tight that they don’t work at home. You have to work some kind of a compromise and this is the responsibility of the campus technicians outside I&IT.
Per Debra, is there a best practice for laptops? Per Chris, we talked about this, but each of the colleges have their own needs (specific software requirements). Per David, we could get some of the techs from the colleges that understand the problem to work on it. If we work with them we might be able to put together some sort of best practices. Per Denny, we could put examples up saying something like this is how we did it in the College of Business, etc. Per Debra, setting up a best practice would help the techs giving them generally acceptable best practices to work with. Also, we could go to the Deans and say something like your techs are not giving your faculty the best service that they could be receiving. Per Debra, on a good note some faculty have said to her that they love their laptops.
Per Debra, the spam situation is very bad. We will look at prioritizing the SMTP aspect of the Intranet replacement. We really want to plan the Intranet replacement. Per Denny, we want to look at the whole picture; we want to fix the spam situation, but it needs to be a logical task within the entire project and not simply done hurriedly and out of line, possibility affecting other tasks within the project.
Item 3: Fresno State and CSUN Learning Centered Survey (Sui) Learning Centeredness needs some drive from the top down. Faculty feel they are doing great as they are now. Why should they engage in other stuff? The challenge is getting people to engage in Learning Centeredness.
Item 4: Learning Centered Implications of Someone Reporting a Security Hole by Finding a Vulnerability (Mike Fowler). To be discussed at a later meeting.
Present: Debra Brum, Gil Brum, Karen Brzoska, Sui Cheung, Christa Copp, Chris Crudo, Stephanie Doda, Mike Fowler, JoAnn Karns, H. Keita, David Levin, April McKettrick, Denny Mosier, Marci Payne, Susan Reese, Tisha Roby and Pauline Salim
Handouts: The Faculty Community on Learning Centeredness; The Faculty Learning Community on What is a Learning-Centered University; Month-Long Focus on Being Learning-Centered (A Proposal from the University Learning-Centered Task Force; and, I&IT Team Brainstorming Activity: Month-Long Learning-Centered Focus
Dr. Gil Brum presented some background on how we got to where we are today with the Learning-Centered philosophy of how to run a Learning-Centered University. About two years ago a group of six individuals from Cal Poly Pomona attended an American Association of Higher Education Conference. At this conference they learned how different campuses were building community and building concepts. They learned the concepts of the Assessment Café to further Learning Centeredness with faculty and administrators and the Exchange Lounge where students were asked to address the same questions that faculty and administrators were asked. The idea here is to build new linkages by involving people with one another to share what they know with others. After these events the ideas will be incorporated into what the University Learning- Centered Task Force does. At the AAHE conference there were also roundtables where different people from different areas were brought together to share ideas on how to build community and to build new linkages that cross disciplines and divisions. Everyone would learn from one another. This group of six that visited AAHE came back to Cal Poly Pomona with a plan to get everyone working on assessment for the campus. Gil then went to the President’s Cabinet and asked for support for a University Learning-Centered Task Force. He was given the support and we now have that task force working.
Per Gil, the next thing we did was to hold several Learning-Centered events on campus. We held the all university Exchange Lounge where we brought faculty, administrators, staff and students together. We put together 29 teams from around the campus and brought experts in to teach us more about assessment techniques. We also held the University Assessment Conference and two Learning-Centered Retreats.
Gil talked about the Learning-Centered Continuum. CSU Monterey Bay was designed from the ground up to be Learning Centered. So they are close to 100% on the Learning-Centered Continuum. Cal Poly Pomona is somewhere between 40% - 60% on the Learning-Centered Continuum. We have yet to build all the linkages that we need.
Gil reviewed the back of the handout (The Faculty Learning Community on What is a Learning-Centered University?) comparing faculty responses with student responses. This was an exercise that we asked faculty to participate in. We asked them what their most recent teaching challenge was, how they solved it, and how they assessed it and if the solution was effective.
Gil asked this group to participate in an exercise that he called Think, Pair, Share. Everyone was asked to think about what they felt the most common teaching challenges were that faculty reported. These would be challenges that would include a role for I&IT. Then the groups paired up and shared their ideas with one another. The value of this exercise was that there may be something that you may not think of that is in someone else’s mind. This enables us to learn from one another and to have our thoughts validated.
Following are some of the suggestions that were made by the I&IT Learning-Centered group: Using equipment in classrooms; teaching on-line courses; and training students in software that is specific to courses.
Per Gil, some of the faculty brought up the above ideas. They also talked about how the technology was different from room to room. Some faculty had frustrations with their laptops. They worked in some rooms and not in others. Gil will get a list of teaching challenges to JoAnn to send out to this group.
From Sept. 18 through Oct. 18, 2006, the university will have a month-long focus on being Learning-Centered. The goal is to create a month-long series of events and activities that will focus the entire campus on becoming more Learning-Centered; inform the campus community of the principles of a Learning-Centered University; engage all members of the campus community in Learning-Centered activities; provide venues for celebrating best Learning-Centered practices throughout campus and foster Cal Poly Pomona as a community of learners; and, Cal Poly Pomona as a learning institution.
After Gil left Debra talked about the month-long focus event. We could have posters that show case things people do that show Learning-Centeredness. We could place the posters on the long blank walls of the CLA building and in other places where faculty, staff and students would walk. At some point we need to think about what posters I&IT could provide.
Debra would like to lead a technology planning effort next year. We could host a workshop called something like, “We need to learn how satisfied you are and what you need that we aren’t providing.” The foundation for this planning process is what should we be providing to students, faculty and staff? Susan suggested that we have a roundtable with students, faculty and IT professionals to discuss what some of the technology challenges are that they face in the classroom. We could get some feed-back on what is helpful to them and what is not helpful to them. Stephanie suggested a session on technology at home. Per Denny, a session on technology at home is a good idea especially in view of the pandemic and the myriad of calls that the Help Desk will be receiving in the event that the pandemic happens. David mentioned a session on what is needed in electronic classrooms. It was suggested that we have a series of roundtables on different topics. Marci likes the idea of doing different things weekly throughout the month. One item could be that we tell people they can bring their computer from home and we will set up spy ware and clean it up for them. It seems that faculty get more use from the Help Desk than the students. Students may not know what we really do at the Help Desk. Stephanie mentioned that we could help students with virus software if we had a technology fee. Denny brought up that people might be interested in how Academic Affairs works. It was suggested that we call this something like, “Demystifying Academic Affairs.” Debra mentioned that you could take a pair of people and one Friday a month they would shadow one another. This gives the opportunity for people to walk in each others’ shoes. Per Stephanie, we could get all the people together who have technology titles to share what they do. Debra will discuss an IT professional development day with the VP’s and the President. We would ask people to release their staff for a half day or a full day. We could do this in the summer. Per Susan, we could have topics where we share information with the group. Per Debra, we could bring professional people on campus. Stephanie suggested that we could tape this and make it available to the campus community. She also mentioned that we need to talk about Social Security Numbers again. Susan suggested that we need to discuss what private information is. Per Debra, our technical people need a higher level of training. Someone has to be responsible. Per Mike, we need to solve the fundamental problems first.
Stephanie asked if we should be doing something in P&R. Per Debra, Gil hears that there are too many initiatives. One of the things we need to do in the month-long focus is that we need to convince people that Learning-Centeredness is the umbrella. It is the perfect umbrella for P&R. P&R is a Learning-Centered activity. We could recommend this, but not necessarily be the head of it. Denny suggested a session from the Unions. Debra elaborated on this topic saying that there could be something on what the Unions do or the role of the Unions in the Learning-Centered University. David mentioned that we could do an assessment on how well Bronco Sunrise worked. Denny will circulate these suggestions to the group and give their feed back to Gil.
It was mentioned that we need to have students more involved in Learning-Centeredness. They need to take responsibility for their learning. It is not all the professor’s responsibility. If students don’t take responsibility then they are not going to learn as much. We need to help students see their responsibility.
Present: Denny Mosier (Chair), Karen Brzoska, Debra Brum, Mauricio Calderon, Sui Cheung, Curtis Clark, Chris Crudo, Mike Fowler, Rita Haerr, Imran Hamid, JoAnn Karns, David Levin, April McKettrick, Marci Payne, Teshia Roby and Pauline Salim.
1. Introduction: we get results – CTTi book store opening later (Denny)
Per Denny, at a meeting that we had earlier in the year Marci Payne and Marcy Wright mentioned that the CTTi bookstore was closing at 5:00pm. Debra made a few calls and we talked to Paul Storey. The CTTi book store has now agreed to stay open a little longer. On Monday through Thursday they are open until 7:00pm and this Saturday they will be open from 10:00am – 3:00pm. They are listening to us.
2. Summary of Gil Brum’s university-wide task force meeting of 03/23/06 (Denny, Team)
Per Denny, at Gil Brum’s university-wide task force meeting on 3/23/06 we kicked a lot of ideas around. Now we need to think about how to put them into action. We broke up into two teams and talked about some of these ideas. One idea was that mentoring be required. We would require seniors to have a two or three unit class where they would actually mentor freshman. This is done at other universities. Per Debra, the other team worked on how to get everybody focused on Learning Centeredness. One outcome was to have a month long event starting with Fall Conference. They also discussed doing a series of posters on how we contribute to learning and having them in places where they are highly visible like in the hallways in the CLA.
3. Presentation on Learning Centeredness and Classroom Learning (Karen)
This presentation will be rescheduled.
4. Discussion Topic: how can we help Classroom Learning? (All)
Denny asked how we can improve classroom learning. Per Marci, we have the Classroom Project. Seventeen classrooms have been completed. Four more were just completed for this quarter. We are installing a podium with a Dell computer, a DVD, an amplifier with speakers, a motorized screen, a projector, and a document camera. Per David, what you can do with document cameras is to capture images or short videos. Per Marci, we project to have completed 30 more classrooms this summer. Per Debra, we met with some Biology faculty in the College of Agriculture. We go into labs and talk with the faculty and they are really grateful. We are close to finishing up the rooms in the College of Agriculture.
Teshia mentioned that she sat in on a session on designing learning spaces. She suggested that it would be good for people who are involved with designing learning spaces to meet with the faculty who use the spaces to see what their teaching style is. They may need movable furniture or need the projector or the jacks in specific locations.
Per Debra, in the area of scheduling we had challenges in Biology, because all the floor space was taken up. Some of the spaces were never ADA compliant. When we went out and talked to them about ADA issues it made them realize that there are faculty that they should not be scheduling in some spaces.
Per David, we started a small pilot project in Learning with about 12 faculty regarding their use of the clicker student response system. They are using different systems. We looked at what was available with an eye to ultimately find a standard that we can support in I&IT.
Per Mike, we need to think about services from a network standpoint. Hopefully, there is or will be some kind of a standard rule set across campus for firewalls. Per Marci, there was some talk about V-Lans, because sometimes they can’t get to where they need to get.
Denny asked the group to think about newer technologies. Per April, she went to a session that I-Tunes was doing on uploading faculty content into an I-Tunes format so students can download content. You sign a one year contract. They are doing this at Sanford and Duke. We hope to bring Apple to campus to give us a demonstration. We would like to have a small group of students to watch to see how they handle the technology. With I-Tunes you don’t need an I-Pod. You can download on other MP3 players and watch it on your computer.
Miscellaneous
Rita discussed the CATS conference. CATS (California Academic Technology Staff) was held this year in Monterey. CATS and Learning Centeredness can go together. It helps you better understand how you can be part of the CSU. The connections that you make with other people are great. She went to a couple of sessions on E-portfolios and accessibility. She learned that our web pages need to be ADA compliant. Rita would encourage anyone to go to this conference. Per Denny, E-portfolios is a very interesting item. It is something that students really need. Per Rita, there was a Help Desk session where you share practices and you can really learn from other people. They are trying to put together small groups to create policy for some of the things that we all do.
Karen just went to a CSU system-wide E-portfolio meeting. About 40-50 people attended. There were some faculty and some directors of academic technology programs throughout the CSU. They found that they had a number of common challenges. We are trying to put our efforts together so we are all working on the same page.
Present: Denny Mosier (Chair), Debra Brum, Karen Brzoska, Mauricio Calderon, Sui Cheung, Curtis Clark, Chris Crudo, Stephanie Doda, Mike Fowler, JoAnn Karns, H. Keita, David Levin, Candie McDougall, April McKettrick, Marci Mitri, Teshia Roby, Pauline Salim, Marcy Wright, and Erick Zelaya.
Sui had the idea that staff who were or are now students could share their classroom experiences and relate ideas that could help with the learning experience.
Marcy related that there is a great advantage in being a staff member and a student. She is working on a Masters’ Degree. Having both student and the staff experience is really useful in assisting the faculty and students. She knows who to go to for information about the university and has become somewhat of a contact person for students. They email her or talk with her on break to get answers to their questions. It makes her feel that she is part of the institution. It is also helpful that she has been involved in security in both Public Safety and in I&IT. Per Debra, BroncoDirect now serves our students better and allows us to provide more timely information to our students. Per Sui, she took what she learned from students about their frustrations and turned this input back to the people who are working on BroncoDirect. Per Marcy, on the technical side a lot of people didn’t know where to go for help. They didn’t know there was e-help.
Per Marci, she started here in 1998 as a student. She has a lot of loyalty towards the students and the faculty. Because she is working with the ITRP project she has become very familiar with different faculty and deans. From Marci’s perspective it has been more helping the faculty then the students.
Candie wanted to get her degree when she came to the university. She worked about one and half years as a temporary employee. Now she is a permanent employee and a CIS student. She works with many instructors and they tell people that she is in the Help Desk. Having administrative privileges in BroncoDirect has been really helpful to Candie. Also, she can still log in as a student and can walk people through BroncoDirect when they need help. Per Debra, Candie’s son got a letter that he shouldn’t have received. So Candie turned it around and worked with those who sent the letter to help them better understand the process. Being an employee helped her to do this.
Per Marci, from a student perspective online classes are great. The more we can offer online the better. Marcy Wright had a Saturday class one summer that just met twice a month so students were able to dedicate just those two days to attending class. April waited for an English class to come online and it really made a lot of difference. April has been taking classes off and on since 1997. She takes two classes per quarter. She is taking the Bachelor of Fine Arts in Graphic Design in ENV and has added the Digital Media Minor out of CLASS because it relates to what she is doing in her job. Just a few years ago she was a photographer and now she is a video producer. Per April, faculty do come to you. In an Art History class she went to the professor and said you really need to try to get these slides into a secure site in BlackBoard. The faculty member did this and now loves using BlackBoard. April showed her the benefits of using it. The students loved it and were thanking April for leading the faculty member to the BlackBoard technology. Denny asked how many faculty need training and/or encouragement to get into the modern age. Per April, most are very willing to enhance their class. They ask her how to do this by using WebCT or BlackBoard. Per Karen, it is helpful getting to see the student’s perspective. Karen has also had the opportunity to teach in a lecturer’s position. It has been a valuable experience to see the faculty member’s perspective of trying to get the technology to work. Per Marcy, half of her professors could update their skills in the classroom. Students are disappointed because some of the faculty don’t use BlackBoard. Candie suggested that maybe we should see who is checking out those overhead projectors and see if we can persuade them to learn the new technology. Per Debra, we could tell them that we would facilitate their learning by helping them update their skills and by providing technology that facilitates learning rather than getting in the way of it. Per Marci, we could offer a little web class for faculty. Mauricio commented that the skill sets of students have changed. The expectation from the students is higher. The student body is now more technologically advanced than they were a few years ago. Per Pauline, she was a student and was helping her professor and it was her first time using the BlackBoard. Lona had been training the faculty member and Pauline was able to help her with some general questions. It was the first year with BlackBoard when they were doing the beta project. It was mentioned that some faculty never use email because of the spam and junk mail they get so we need to post instructions to prevent spam and junk mail. The information pages just aren’t reaching the faculty and even if they are the faculty aren’t using them. Per Debra, what you could do is educate the person about how they report something. Sui asked, what can she tell the instructor who doesn’t want to try to use any multimedia, but wants students to use more traditional forms. How can we convince them to use technology? Per David, first we need to find what the faculty member’s objectives are. They may be legitimate. They may want you to work on your oral skills. A positive way to get them to think about it is to ask what are the various ways that you can get your students to present material like with PowerPoint or video.
Marcy thinks wireless in the classroom is a really big issue. In her Master’s degree program, students are required to have a laptop. Then you get into the classroom and there isn’t a port or the wireless doesn’t work. The consistency in the classroom isn’t there. Per Candie, they have a similar problem in Building. 89 when they try to use wireless. April mentioned that in the Art Lab the teacher asked them to bring Zip disks. Probably half the class had I-pods. Per Marci, if she wasn’t a CIS major she doesn’t think she would know that she has web space available to her. Pauline suggested that maybe we can approach student orientation to let them know that space is available. Denny said that Candie does this now. Per David, we had three hours with faculty at the last Bronco Sunrise. Nest time we could ask them what we could do for them to make learning more helpful to students. Stephanie wanted to know if registering for classes is working well through PeopleSoft. Per Candie, you know what you want, you plan ahead and you have an alternate plan. In two minutes you are done. Mauricio asked how well it works in terms of getting the classes you want. It was mentioned that the class you want is not always available. Per Candie, we don’t have a “wait list” functionality.
Per Debra, the team that we are sending to the University Task Force will have the opportunity to make recommendations outside of the I&IT Division. Per Debra, a research student survey, that was associated with the task force, showed that registration was one of the problem items. Per Karen, students talked about classes being set up in a course sequence. If they couldn’t get the first class then they are behind by a full year. Per Mauricio, there is a demand report that tells us when students can’t get classes that they need. Per Marci, when your classes get dumped there is no notification given to the student. Per Debra, it is the responsibility of the College or School to notify the student when they cancel a class. The Registrar’s Office sends notification when something goes wrong technically. Per Denny, another complaint area that he hears about is problems with the Registrar’s office.
Per Marcy, the masters’ program only sells books at the CTTi book store, which closes at 4:00 p.m. Many masters’ classes begin at 6:00 p.m. Also the book store is closed on weekends. Per Debra, this is something that should be looked into.
Per Debra, regarding Open University, we can’t add students to Open University classes until we have satisfied the demand for State students. The reason behind this is that we would be charging students Open University fees for no good reason. So part of the problem comes from the fact that they can’t register before the first day of classes and technically they can’t register before our registration is over which we don’t reinforce. If they can’t register they can’t be put into the system and if they aren’t into the system they can’t get the services. David suggested something like a tentative registration.
Per Denny, now we have a few ideas to take back and discuss.
