Administrative Services

I am a Teacher!

4 Comments
 

When I tell people I work at a community college, they usually ask if I teach and I always say no I work in the business office. Earlier this week I realized that I do teach, but my students are not enrolled in courses taught at GCC, my students are the faculty and staff at GCC. We know in the Business Office that it is not easy navigating the fiscal processes. On the Fiscal page of our website it says, “Our goal is to provide employees with the tools and guidance necessary to secure the goods and services essential to providing a quality learning experience to our diverse student population.” We are here to teach and guide and we do that so we can all succeed in our jobs and not pull our hair out while doing it.

As a fellow employee stated to me earlier this week, “Every day is a learning experience.” I am glad I make a small contribution to the overall learning going on at GCC.

Administration

Making a Small Difference with Faculty Observations

1 Comment
 

One of the most enjoyable aspects of my role at GCC is having the opportunity to observe and evaluate our faculty teaching in the classroom.  This evaluation occurs for our probationary faculty members and is a chance to see our talented faculty in action.

Although I do not proclaim to be a teaching expert (we can always grow as an instructor), I do believe I have some expertise to offer through my experiences teaching middle school and community college English courses, as well as my having completed over 50 evaluations in my four years at GCC.

This process is even more rewarding when I have the opportunity to observe a faculty member for a second time during his or her first five years.  This past fall semester, I observed a few instructors for the second time; I found this to be very productive as it gave me an opportunity to witness firsthand their growth as instructors.  In multiple instances, I observed faculty members intentionally modifying their teaching style to increase opportunities for student engagement.  I observed faculty members paying close attention to their movement and position in the classroom.  I observed faculty members strategically calling on a number of students to respond, to ensure students have equal voice during discussions.  And, finally, I observed faculty members using informal classroom assessment techniques to check students’ understanding of the day’s content.

By no means do I think those changes occurred because of direct comments I made or because of the evaluation summaries I wrote.  But, I do think these pedagogical changes occurred because those faculty members took the time to reflect on their teaching practice, something I hope I stress when I talk to faculty members’ after an observation.  Classroom evaluations are very meaningful for me; and, this process is even more gratifying when I have the opportunity to see the incredible growth and enhancements to faculty members’ teaching practices.

Write6x6

Top Five Changes in Higher Education in Reference to Compliance

 

By: Jay Kahl, PhD, Compliance Coordinator

When we think of higher education, we often think of ivory towers, hounds tooth jackets, and late-night study sessions.  Well some of us do.  Others experience higher education as part of their path while they work/parent full-time, trying to fit yet another task into their day.  While our collective experiences differ, higher education has experienced many large tide changes over the years, many in respect to Compliance. Below are 5 of the biggest changes in my opinion:

1 – Title IV Alignment – each institution that accepts Title IV funds from the federal government has to meet certain requirements.  These run the gambit from how funds are dispersed to whether Constitution Day is celebrated on your campus. Over the past 20 years, these rules have become increasingly complex, asking institutions to do more in order to remain eligible for Title IV funds.

2 – Program Integrity/Gainful Employment – in essence, these rules were brought forth to ensure that students would not leave an institution with a mountain of debt and be unemployable. While the reporting requirements are nebulous at times and we may question how useful this information is to students, this is another requirement to item #1 above. Where reporting in the past has looked to student success as indicators, we now see that new indicators may point to long-term program feasibility.

3 – NCAA/NJCAA (National (Junior) Collegiate Athletic Association) – recent developments have highlighted the need for these rules, but the NCAA/NCJAA has seen a large increase in changes regarding player eligibility, recruiting, and gifts.  Lately, student athletes have been attempting to unionize as they feel they have been cut-out of the overall profit margins.

4 – ADA/504 (Americans with Disabilities Act) – with more advanced technology, students with disabilities have more access to educational resources than they have in the past. This increase in access also means that students who may have not pursued higher education in the past are more willing to give it a go. ADA and Section 504 ensure that students with disabilities are not discriminated against, and these rules need regular updating as increased access is realized.

5 – Title IX – similar to the above, Title IX ensures that students are not discriminated against based on gender. With recent reports regarding the proclivity of sexual assaults occurring on college campuses, these rules have garnered more national attention. Institutions are being asked to take a much more active role in preventing, investigating, and (sometimes) litigating cases of assault on their campus as well.

Where will we be in the future as it relates to Compliance in higher education?  I would argue that we will see some streamlining of reporting and disclosures, but that each of the above items will continue to be further delineated and expanded upon.  More than likely, that means gainful employment for those of us who can stomach Compliance.

For more information on Compliance, please visit http://www2.gccaz.edu/departments/administrative/spa/accountability

Administrative Services

What if your ability to keep your job was contingent on the success of your client?

3 Comments
 

Last week, during our weekly department meeting, I proposed this to my staff: What if your ability to keep your job was contingent on the success of your client? What if you didn’t get paid until your clients were happy and successful? What if every employee was responsible for their own salary?

Do you know how many students you would need to guarantee are successful each year? Just for illustration purposes, multiply your salary by 37% (that’s about how much of your paycheck comes from tuition). Now divide that number by $71 (that’s how much GCC gets from the District per credit hour); now take that number and divide it by 24 (that’s 12 credit hours per semester). That equals the approximate number of full time students you need to make sure are successful this year to equal your paycheck.

The point of that exercise is to ask this: If your job depended on those students staying at GCC, paying tuition and re-enrolling for another year, would you be more proactive in their personal academic success? Would you march them over to the Enrollment Center and personally see to it that they are enrolled and paid their tuition? Would you shepherd them through the process of financial aid? Would you ask how their grades are, escort them to tutoring, make sure they studied hard? Would you ask how else you can help them be successful?

While we have a duty to educate and raise up our students to be independent, contributing members of society, they are still, after all, our client. Meaning, they can take their tuition dollars elsewhere. They are paying for a service (an education) just like any number of us do at other establishments. And the first rule of customer service is to picture them with dollar signs on their forehead.

Marketing people are familiar with the old adage: If someone has a good experience, they might tell three people. If someone has a bad experience they will tell 11. Now, this was before social media! So go ahead and add a couple zeros behind those numbers to account for a mass online audience. This effects a student’s motivation to enroll a great deal.

Word-of-mouth is a powerful tool. In fact, more than 37% of our students are here because of a friend or family member! Another 10% are here because of a relationship they formed with a recruiter. Another batch are here because our online community through social media. A successful, cared for, student is a happy student who is willing to tell others about GCC.

In all reality, that’s your paycheck walking around out there on campus. How many students are you responsible for? Would you serve a student as if your job depended on it?

Administration

Visioning: An Exercise

Leave a comment
 

It has often been quipped that individuals are as afraid of speaking in front of an audience as they are of facing the IRS in an audit or the dentists’ chair. As with all true learning, public speaking needs rehearsal and practice in order to be accomplished in a captivating, coherent and convincing way.

There is a practice I have used (having been a speech teacher in a previous life) that has come to serve me well whenever I step up to the podium. (Yes, even seasoned public speakers get a case of the nerves from time to time). The practice is called visioning.

Borrowed from the sports arena, visioning entails seeing yourself as delivering that speech successfully before you ever say a word. Not unlike the great basketball player who “visions” himself sinking the 3 point shot, the successful speaker “visions” the speech to be flawless, articulate, teeming with great information and yes even humorous. The way I tell my students about it is to sit quietly in a chair an hour or two prior to the speech, close your eyes and actually “see” yourself from introduction to conclusion in delivering the speech. The act of “visualizing” success is tantamount to foretelling that indeed a successful speech is about to take place…from your words and your delivery!

The great Wayne Gretzy is often quoted, “You must skate to where the puck will be” and the same is true of speaking…you must envision yourself as the successful orator!

Administration

A Life Changing Event

 

When I was a student at MCC I worked in the tutoring center helping students with Math, Chemistry and German. I remember assisting several students but one in particular changed my life.

I was a Chemistry major at the time. All through high school I helped many of my friends with their homework and that is why I chose to work in the tutoring center when I got to college. I have always liked helping people. One morning while I was walking across the mall area at MCC on my way to class a female student, that I had been assisting regularly in the tutoring center helping her with math, screamed out my name and came running across the green grass at me. The mall of course was full of students changing classes. She came up to me and jumped in my arms. I was taken completely off guard. I had been helping her with math that she had a lot of struggles with. There was no relationship between us besides tutor to tutee. After she strangled me she said “I got an A on my math test! I got an A on my math test! I got an AAAAA!!!” I had never seen anyone so happy about a grade before in my life. That experience felt really great and I decided after that day that I would become a math teacher. As they say, the rest is history. It was one of the best decisions I’ve made in my life and I have a student to thank!

Write6x6

Seeing ourselves

Leave a comment
 

I like diversity, even though sometimes being with people who are very different from me can make me uncomfortable. It is the kind of uncomfortable that challenges me to grow as a person, as a teacher, and as a scholar and I appreciate that kind of uncomfortable. I am sharing that because I want to encourage all of us to go outside of our comfort zones when it comes to diversity because I think it benefits our students if we do.

One of the ways that faculty and administrators can go outside of our comfort zones is to have honest conversations about the racial diversity on campus among the faculty and staff. Personally I don’t think that trying to have the faculty and staff reflect the diversity of our student population is an ambitious enough goal. I think every student deserves to be able to encounter someone on the faculty and staff with whom they can identity.

As a student at The University of Oklahoma, I had two African-American professors. One of them was a psychology professor. She was a Princeton and Stanford graduate, and she was the most amazing person I had ever met (in fact, she is still the most amazing person I have ever met).  She inspired me to pursue my own graduate education. Meeting her was like opening up an entirely new world to me. I had not considered the possibility that someone like me could go to graduate school and become a professor until I met her. Now maybe I am unusual in that way (I know I am unusual in other ways) but I doubt it. I needed to see it to believe it, and I don’t think our students are that different from the way that I was as a student. Yes, I know, there are a lot more ways for students to be exposed to people who can model behaviors for them, there is all the information we can access on our tablets and smartphones, however there is no substitute for one-on-one contact with someone who can do more than just show us that it is possible to succeed. There is no substitute for having access to a real live person who can help us to learn the culture of the professional world.

There is no substitute for students being able to see themselves in us.

 

Student Services

Knowing their Stories

1 Comment
 

Sometimes we don’t really know or understand the barriers to learning that some individuals experience in school. We might look at the ease of our own ability to organize our time, our belongings, our ability to read, write, study, type, make everyday decisions, socialize and converse among other people. We might tend to look on others and wonder why they don’t try harder, why they are in college, or wonder whether they will ever amount to anything.

Here are a small portion of students’ stories from my personal experience: (Names have been changed)

Amy volunteered to sit on a panel with other students with disabilities to share experiences with faculty and staff during a brown bag event. She began sharing when she was diagnosed with a learning disability during grade school and moved into talking about her high school experiences. All of a sudden she began to cry and ran out of the room. She shared with me later that as she was sharing with our group, the emotions and pain she experienced in K-12 began surfacing and her emotions got the best of her. She began to remember the childhood ridicule and how instructors would be impatient with her telling her to try harder. I hugged her and thanked her for her courage to share and that even in her reaction to cry and flee spoke volumes to the listeners.

Brad was the male lacrosse player who was diagnosed with ADHD. He confined in me that the school partying scene and expectations of the team camaraderie was getting to him and not a good contributor to focusing on academics. He decided to transfer back to his hometown college and commute from home.

Kert was a football player with a learning disability that cried in my office when we were discussing his academic standing and his learning struggles for that semester. What seemed so easy in high school was now so overwhelming to him transitioning to a residential college. The rigors of practice, workouts and games along with his reading difficulties was just so overwhelming.

Timothy was the veteran returning to civilian life only to return with a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Wanting to move forward and obtain a college degree, he was hampered at times with the lingering memories of wartime experiences. He needed to sit at the back of the classroom so no one would be in the back of him. That really wasn’t good for his focusing to sit so far back but he needed to feel safe in the room full of strangers. He used to have a great memory and could retain information, but now this is more difficult and it makes test taking troublesome.

Carl had ADHD, anxiety and Asperger Syndrome. He needed to be in a separate room to take tests so that he could pace when dictating his responses to test questions. For long exams we would split the test in ½ so he could take a break and returned to complete the exam.

There are countless ongoing stories of students such like those mentioned above that seek higher education and we, as faculty and staff, have the challenge and the privilege to journey with them as they explore and move mountains to achieve their goals.

PS: Meeting with Carl often left me feeling really stupid. His passions were Shakespearean literature, the Beatles and an avid movie buff. Every time we met, he would quiz me on films or literature. Even the Beatle questions left me stumped since I had no idea what years each song was produced. I even grew up listening to the Beatles. I should have known the answers!

Write6x6

Big Lesson in a Small Moment

1 Comment
 

Last spring, I was leaving the college later in the afternoon on a Friday. Anyone who has stayed late on a Friday knows that there aren’t too many people around after about 3:30. About that time on this day, I realized I was a little late for picking up my son, so I added a dash of hurry as I crossed the north parking lot to my car. The lot was almost empty, open and still like a sea of pavement.

I tossed my work bag in the back seat, hopped in and pulled around near the Life Science building to head toward the exit. In the distance, I saw two young men at the fringe of the lot, near the Tech buildings, waving at me with both arms over their heads as if to hail me. I thought to myself, “Do they need help? If they need help, I’m going to have to refer them to security. I just don’t have time to help anyone right now.” But I turned the car in their direction.

They kept waving as I drove toward them. Finally, one guy broke into a run, heading straight for the car, leaving his friend behind him, so I stopped and rolled down my window.

“Hey! You’re driving with your trunk open!” he shouted. I don’t know how I hadn’t noticed. But I hadn’t. When I checked the review mirror, the view was indeed blocked by a sheet of silver.

At this point, he was nearing the car. “Do you want me to close it for you?”

“Sure,” I mumbled.

Gratefully.

He slammed it shut, and I saw him in the rearview mirror waving amiably as I headed for 59th Ave. I waved thanks to him out the window.

The lesson for me at that moment was clear: we all need help even when we don’t know that we need help. The best I (or anyone) can do is let myself receive help gratefully when it comes–especially when it arrives before I even know that I need it.

Adjunct Faculty

Let’s Talk About Extra Credit

Leave a comment
 

Extra credit seems to me to be one of those “teacher taboos,” one of those things rarely talked about openly for fear of being shunned forever or banned from the faculty lounge.

I believe you can meet the course competencies and requirements in the allotted class time AND ALSO engage and reward students through extra credit opportunities – but it takes creativity, control and discipline.

And ok, a tiny little bit more grading.

What’s an extra credit opportunity look like? Here are a few I use:

  • In composition courses, prewriting and invention are competencies, part of the writing process taught. But an extra credit opportunity BEFORE the prewriting assignment, where students share initial ideas about what they are going to write about with other students in a Canvas or other (safe and controlled) discussion forum, is an added (but useful) perk.
  • Peer review is another composition competency. I use a “standard” Word form with ten questions about drafts that students must complete. If students complete the peer review forms correctly, sufficiently, and on time, they can also submit an MS Word “Track Changes” red-line review (i.e. direct electronic markup) on the same papers for extra credit (and learn/practice a new technical skill they’ll potentially use in their careers).
  • F2F Creative Writing courses are often known for their “workshop” format, where writers openly analyze and discuss fellow student papers in a real-time circle.   In my online CRW courses, I have what I call “virtual workshops” at the end of each module: Students must complete the required writing process steps to participate — but the “virtual workshop” is a discussion forum at the end where they can (1) share their story with others in the class, and (2) get comments from/give comments to any other student in the class. Not every student MUST post their story, not every student MUST (or can) comment – but if they can and/or do, they get some extra credit points.
    • In my combined introductory and intermediate CRW courses, posting and commenting in the “Virtual Workshop” is optional for beginning students, but mandatory for advanced students. Look at all the cross-training and exposure that happens!

Where’s the “discipline” element in extra credit come in? You have to set up rules and regulations to make sure extra credit is actually a reward for good work and not an open path to grade inflation. Therefore, make your extra credit opportunities:

  • Meaningful.
  • Fairly difficult and/or challenging, above-and-beyond the expected norm.
  • An added opportunity, not a replacement for required assignments.
  • Not worth more than 5% of the total grade, so that extra credit alone can’t change a student’s letter grade.

For me, the most compelling reasons to use extra credit are:

  • Extra credit is a great motivator – human beings fall all over themselves to do something if they think they are getting something free or “extra.”
  • Extra credit soothes student fears and obsessions with grades – it helps them learn more “right stuff” more easily.
  • Extra credit gives students hope. Students (and other humans?) need hope to continue. When their hope dies, so does their confidence, their self-esteem, their motivation, and usually any chance at a passing grade and a better life.
  • Extra credit is a great way to judge initiative. In the last two weeks of a course, when students typically flood you with questions about what they can do to get a better grade, all you have to do is look back at the extra opportunities already given to see if they had the initiative and took advantage of what was already offered.  Makes it clear they, not you, are accountable.
  • Extra credit balances out all that extra work we instructors do to help struggling students that are performing below expectations — by rewarding those Type A students capable of and wanting to excel above and beyond.  “Catch people doing something right — and tell them.”

Extra credit? Let’s bring it out in the open and talk it over, exchange ideas. I’ll be in the faculty lounge, munching down cookies.

 

EXTRA (HAH! Gotcha): How do you do extra credit in Canvas? Set the extra credit assignment up like you would any other assignment (title, details, due date). But assign a point value of “zero.” That way, the points earned in the extra credit (specify the value in assignment details so students know and you don’t forget) is mathematically “extra” as well and computes correctly into the total course point percentage as “extra.”

 

Get Your Kicks on Write 6×6