Educause: Changing the Landscape of Higher Education
Monday, March 14, 2011
Faculty Focus: Fostering Student Interaction in the Online Classroom
By Mary Bart
When you first start teaching online, there's the temptation to put on your Superman cape and try be ultra responsive and ever-present. So intent on ensuring that each and every student has a successful learning experience in your class, you answer student emails at any hour of the day or night, respond to every discussion board post, and design elaborate assignments that take advantage of all the latest technology tools available.
Unfortunately, this approach leaves instructors exhausted, frustrated and burned out; vowing to never teach an online class again. Meanwhile, the students wait passively for the instructor to spoon feed them every step of the way; never learning how to take an active role in their learning, solve problems or forge a bond with others in the class.
The good news is it doesn't have to be that way. With proper planning and course design, online instructors can be more efficient and effective with their time, while implementing learner-centered activities that keep students involved and engaged.
In How to Balance Instructor Workload and Learner Needs, Tammy Stuart Peery, assistant professor and English department chair at Montgomery College in Germantown, Md., and Samantha Streamer-Veneruso, an associate professor and English department chair at Montgomery College in Rockville, Md., provided strategies for establishing what they call "an invisible presence" in your online courses.
"I'm still present in the class — students know I'm there, they know I'm answering questions — but at the same time I'm not the whole course," said Peery. "The students know that they are responsible for their learning; that they are responsible for themselves as well as for each other. That takes the maintenance load off me and allows me to focus on providing substantive feedback about the content of the course ... and I don't have to be in my class 24x7."
Striking the right balance between instructor workload and student needs is a three-phase process that requires adapting course materials and assignments, fostering student-to-student interaction, and managing instructor presence. During the seminar, Peery and Streamer-Veneruso provided detailed guidelines for accomplishing each phase.
For example, in terms of fostering student-to-student interaction, they offered the following checklist to support the course design and implementation:
• Provide guidelines for group participation and group roles
• Provide low-stakes opportunities for groups to work together
• Create a system to monitor group interaction to ensure that groups are not sabotaged by those who don't participate fully
• Include opportunities for students to assess their own participation as well as other members
• Ensure that groups are neither too big nor too small
• Plan for adjusting group membership if necessary
• Provide enough time for groups to work together
• Provide suggested steps and guidelines for completing work as a group
• Create activities that require authentic opportunities to communicate
• Provide clear goals for the group assignment
• Use activities that encourage shared goals and cooperative learning
• Give students feedback on their participation in the group
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Faculty Focus: Faculty Hiring: Guidelines for Promoting Diversity
February 28, 2011
By Bonnie Snyder
University Business: Going the Distance
Campus leaders are deciding whether to centralize or decentralize distance education operations, with some even choosing both.
By Elizabeth Millard / March 2011
As distance education programs expand at many colleges and universities, administrators are faced with a question: Is it better to have a centralized distance education office, or should individual departments handle distance education on their own?
Dillard University DUROP Series: 2011 ALGEBRA RELAY
2011 DUROP Series
Sponsored by
Office of Undergraduate Research and Department of Mathematics
Students Register today! Prizes!
Algebra Relay
Wednesday, April 6, 2011 * PSB 135
Relay: 11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Being able to explore a topic independently or in a group and to communicate what is learned is a vital skill for anyone pursuing a career in any field of endeavor. This competition offers Dillard students in any major an opportunity, under the mentorship of a faculty member, to participate on a team in creative interdisciplinary research in a public forum.
--
Lynn Y.R. Strong
Director, Undergraduate Research
Institutional Review Board (IRB)
Dillard University
Professional Schools Bldg., Rm. 250
2601 Gentilly Blvd.
New Orleans, LA 70122
Tel: 504-816-4446
Fax: 504-816-4313
lstrong@dillard.edu
Dillard University 2011 Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program Series: A Contemporary African-American Scientist
Sponsored by: Office of Undergraduate Research
Center for Minority Health and Health Disparities & Nursing Program
A Contemporary African American Scientist
Featuring: Gary Gibbons, Ph.D.
Director Cardiovascular Research Institute (CVRI) & Chairperson, Department of Physiology, Morehouse College
Students are invited into the research laboratory with Dr. Gary Gibbons, through visuals, to explore research topics which will lead to a better understanding of health disparities.
Learn how scientists choose their field of study, mentors who influence them, challenges and obstacles they faced growing up and how they achieved career goals.
Dr. Gibbons answers personal and professional questions about his life and work.
Monday 28, 2011
10:00 a.m.
PSB 131 & 135
Office of Undergraduate research * PSB 250 * 504-816-4446 * lstrong@dillard.edu
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
In Memory of Dr. LeDon Bean: Dr. Bean goes to Washington -- University that is!
by Elizabeth Kumru, University Nebraska Medical Center Public Affairs
When LeDon Bean, Ph.D., walked onto UNMC's campus eight years ago as a master's program student, he brought with him a desire to inspire minority students to follow in his footsteps.
That desire led him to initiate the annual "Stepping Forward and Reaching Back" program in 1999 to encourage students to seek higher degrees in math and science.
His love of mentoring spread to other minority professionals who were asked to participate in his program. He hoped the experience would make a difference.
"I wanted to expose our youth to students in pursuit of their professional goals as well as professionals from all walks of life including science, engineering, law, and politics, who occasionally have had to work harder than most for their education," Bean said.
The program, sponsored by UNMC's Office of Student Equity and Multicultural Affairs (OSEMA), touched the lives of hundreds of middle and high school students from North Omaha for the past seven years.
Now the program may end as Dr. Bean strides, with doctorate in hand, to his new post-doc research position at Washington University in St. Louis.
Curiosity and compassion -- two characteristics ingrained in Dr. Bean since youth -- are what he tried to pass on to the young students he met through his and various summer research programs on campus.
He told them about seizing opportunities in the present and being responsible to family and career.
"Our centers of education are beacons of opportunity for our youth. We need to give them a variety of reasons to come on campus," Dr. Bean said. "Every act of concern, every minority faculty member, student or administrator they meet on campus, is another affirming incentive for our youth to believe that they can achieve their goals as well."
Although he has not followed every student who participated in his program, Dr. Bean knows some who are now attending various colleges and universities and he is aware of at least one student planning to attend UNMC this fall.
"It's wonderful to know that what I've done has had some benefit," he said.
As a child, Dr. Bean spent many hours on the University of Southern California campus, which was next door to his grandparent's house.
"I was just a child, but I read in the university's library, played football on the field and even saw movies on campus. Everyone welcomed me. No one turned me away," Dr. Bean said.
So naturally, that's the college he chose and in 1994 graduated with a degree in chemistry. He came to Omaha to attend Creighton University, which at the time had a special program to encourage minorities to enter medical school. But the program dissolved, leaving Dr. Bean looking for options.
He transferred to the University of Nebraska at Omaha to pursue a master's degree in biological sciences with an emphasis in physiology. The majority of his courses were offered at UNMC, which initiated his eventual pursuit of a doctoral education with a neuroscience emphasize.
"I initially wanted to pursue medicine as a physician, however, I am now engaging medicine as a neuroscience researcher," Dr. Bean said. "A lesson I attempt to instill in our youth is that through education a variety of avenues can be traveled and that the goal is to have strategies for success and goals for accomplishments."
His time at UNMC has been spent researching the effects of diabetes on the brain, primarily how N-Methyl-D-Aspartate (NMDA) receptors act in rats with Type I diabetes.
"These receptors are involved with many brain functions, such as hypothalamus regulation, cell migration and synaptic formation, and they're also involved with learning and memory," said Dr. Bean, who works with Daniel Monaghan, Ph.D., professor of pharmacology and experimental neuroscience, and director of the biomedical research training program.
As part of his research, he was first author of an article that appeared in the Oct. 18, 2006, edition of Brain Research, contributed to a chapter in a book on neuroscience, published abstracts and presented his research at international conferences. He also has represented UNMC at various multicultural conferences.
But, as life goes, it's now time to move on. At Washington University, where he began July 2, Dr. Bean will continue to study NMDA receptors as part of a research project in the department of psychiatry. He says he'll probably become involved in community outreach programs at his new home campus.
His dedication to reaching back and role modeling for others in the Omaha minority community was truly appreciated and will be missed, said Mary McNamee, Ph.D., assistant vice chancellor for academic affairs and director of OSEMA.
"LeDon is a rare human being. Although heavily involved in his doctoral program classes and research, he never forgot where and when he got 'turned on to science.' He taught us all that there are many ways of giving back to the community," Dr. McNamee said.
Date Published: Wednesday, July 11, 2007
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