adjunct faculty

What if we could create these kinds of calendars and/or apps for faculty & staff as well as for students? [Christian]

On 05/10/2021, in A/V -- audio/visual, active learning, adjunct faculty, Augmented Reality (AR), Bias | Diversity Equity & Inclusion (DE&I), colleges, community colleges, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, creativity, Daniel S. Christian, digital audio, digital learning, digital storytelling, digital video, education, education technology, educational games / serious games, elearning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, experimentation, faculty, higher education, ideas, innovation, instructional design, K-12 related, law schools, learning, learning ecosystem, liberal arts, multimedia, new media literacies, online learning, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, tools, training / L&D, United States, XR - extended reality, by Daniel Christian

What if we could create these kinds of calendars and/or apps for faculty and staff as well as for students? — idea from Daniel Christian. The vehicles could be developed as analog/physical formats or in digital formats and apps. In the digital realm, one could receive a daily notification.

For faculty/staff:

Teaching and learning tips; pedagogies (flipped learning, active learning, etc.); ideas that have worked well for others
Creative experiments to try (such as digital storytelling or with an emerging technology such as AR, MR, or VR)
Tips & tricks re: tools within the learning ecosystem of one’s organization
How to make digital content that’s accessible
Items re: bias, diversity, equity & inclusion
Dates to be aware of (for processes on one’s LMS/CMS as an example)
Notes of encouragement and/or humor
Links to key resources
Other

[The Corporate Training / L&D world could do this as well.]

An example of what a page might contain within a physical flip calendar

A calendar page that says Memory if the residue of thought.

Example calendar page that states when courses will be published on an LMS

For students

Studying tips
How to take courses online
How people learn
Resources, books, people to follow on Twitter, blogs and RSS feeds, etc.
Pictures of judges, legislative bodies, law offices, corporate HQs, other
Notes of encouragement
Ethics
Professionalism
Other

Faculty and Staff Often Don’t Trust One Another. How Do We Fix That? — from chronicle.com by Jenae Cohn
Three ways to bridge divisions as academe prepares for the post-pandemic era.

Excerpts:

One of the few welcome outcomes of Covid-19, and higher education’s rapid move to remote instruction, is that many faculty members are more aware than ever of who the staff members are and what we do.

As Lee Skallerup Bessette wrote in October, staff members — anyone working on a college campus who is not a professor or an administrator — have been on the front lines during the pandemic: “We are the face that faculty members see when they have questions, concerns, or struggles with the technology they have been asked to use. We are the face that students see when they have questions, concerns, or struggles related to distance learning or on-campus policies and procedures.”

Yet however much academics and administrators have been turning to us for help now, they still rarely involve and entrust staff members with campus decision-making around teaching, curriculum development, and research.
…
It behooves every college and university to consider what authentic collaboration between the staff and the faculty might look like. How? Here are three concrete steps in that direction.
.
Step 1: Offer incentives for faculty-staff partnerships.
Step 2: Rethink hierarchical traditions.
Step 3: Create shared experiences.

From DSC:
Although I was an Adjunct Professor for over 5 years and have worked alongside faculty members for 20 years, the majority of my work and efforts have mainly been on the staff side of the house. So I appreciate The Chronicle hosting this article and I thank Jenae for writing it. It’s an important topic.

If traditional institutions of higher education are going to survive, there needs to be much broader governance, a much greater use of teams to create and deliver learning experiences, and a much stronger culture of innovating and experimenting with new ideas. At the end of the day, I think that the following two things will be the deciding factors on whether a particular institution survives, merges, shrinks, or closes its doors altogether:

The culture of a particular institution
Whether that institution has visionary leadership or not (and not just being data-driven…which comes up short again and again)

Also see:

Debunking six continuing fallacies of higher education — from universityworldnews.com by Sanjit Sethi and Elliot Felix

2021 EDUCAUSE Horizon Report® | Teaching and Learning Edition

This report profiles key trends and emerging technologies and practices shaping the future of teaching and learning and envisions a number of scenarios and implications for that future. It is based on the perspectives and expertise of a global panel of leaders from across the higher education landscape.

3 Tech Trends Shaping the Future of Post-Pandemic Teaching and Learning [Kelly]

On 04/28/2021, in adjunct faculty, analytics, blended learning, change, colleges, community colleges, credentialing, data related items, education technology, experimentation, future of higher education, higher education, hybrid learning, instructional design, IT in HE, K-12 related, law schools, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, learning spaces, online learning, open courseware and systems, pedagogy, professional development, quality, remote teaching and learning, teachers, teaching & learning, trends, United States, universities, videoconferencing, web-based collaboration, by Daniel Christian

3 Tech Trends Shaping the Future of Post-Pandemic Teaching and Learning — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly
The landscape of higher education has been transformed by COVID-19, and that impact is a major factor in the 2021 Educause Horizon Report. Here are three key technology trends to watch as the lasting effects of the pandemic play out.

Excerpt:

What’s in store for higher education’s post-pandemic future? The latest Educause Horizon Report has identified the trends, technologies and practices shaping teaching and learning in the wake of COVID-19. The potential lasting effects of the pandemic “loomed large” in the trend selection this year, the report stated, emphasizing that although it remains to be seen whether the transformations of the past year will persist into the future, “it isn’t hard to imagine that higher education may never be the same in some important ways (good or bad).”

In the realm of technology in particular, it’s clear that the pandemic-induced shift to remote learning has dominated the trend landscape. The top three technological trends identified by the report are…

From 2021 EDUCAUSE Horizon Report® | Teaching and Learning Edition

Also see:

Students Want Online Learning Options Post-Pandemic — from insidehighered.com by Lindsay McKenzie
The experience of learning remotely during the pandemic left students with a positive attitude toward online and hybrid courses, a new survey suggests.

Jessica Rowland Williams, director of Every Learner Everywhere, agreed. “The pandemic has given us the unique opportunity to pause and listen to each other, and we are beginning to discover all the ways our experiences overlap,” she said.

Udemy, an Online Course Platform Where Anyone Can Teach, Keeps Raising Money. What’s Next? [Young]

On 04/24/2021, in adjunct faculty, career development, faculty, future, generational differences, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, marketplaces, online learning, online media, platforms, professional development, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, vendors, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

Udemy, an Online Course Platform Where Anyone Can Teach, Keeps Raising Money. What’s Next? — from edsurge.com by Jeffrey R. Young

Excerpt:

Udemy has become one of the best-funded companies in edtech, having raised another $80 million at the end of 2020 bringing its total raised to nearly $300 million. So, what are its plans, and how does it see the market for online courses changing after the pandemic?

Those were some questions we brought to Udemy’s CEO, Gregg Coccari, in a recent interview.

“They become professional at this,” he says. “They have assistants that handle the questions. They work at this every day. They’re always looking for new publishing ideas, more courses, they’re upgrading the courses they have. And so these become very professional online teachers.”

But those millionaires are, by and large, the exception.

From DSC:
I read an interesting article out at Inside Higher Ed from the other day:
Rejecting Remote Proctoring — from insidehighered.com by Elizabeth Redden
University of Michigan Dearborn made a universitywide decision to reject remote proctoring and invest in faculty development instead.

At the same time many other colleges were considering whether to employ the technologies, UM Dearborn’s leadership made the choice that eproctoring was unacceptably invasive, at least when it comes to students who hadn’t signed up for that kind of surveillance.

From DSC:
Lower stakes assessments offered with a greater variety of ways to check for mastery. That fits in with what I’m reading about re: the topic of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), which offers:

Multiple methods of engagement
Multiple methods of representation
Multiple methods of action & expression <– to demonstrate what they are learning

It also reduces anxiety — something that’s needed in this period of time.

Penn students use digital platform Gather to imitate in-person office hours — from thedp.com by Isaac Lee; with thanks to Professor Sue Ellen Christian for this resource

Excerpt:

As students yearn for in-person interaction and the familiarity of their school buildings, platforms like Gather are filling the void — virtually.

Gather, also known as Gather.town, simulates buildings and classrooms on campus where students, professors, and teaching assistants can interact with one another through personal avatars during office hours. Its main feature, “Interaction Distance,” launches a video call between users whose avatars are within five steps from each other in the virtual space. As the users’ avatars walk away from each other, their video and audio quality decrease, simulating an in-person interaction.

Also see:

From DSC:
Now picture this in VR.

Improving Digital Inclusion & Accessibility for Those With Learning Disabilities [Kreisa]

On 04/17/2021, in accessibility / UDL, adjunct faculty, adult learning, assistive technologies, Bias | Diversity Equity & Inclusion (DE&I), business, colleges, communications, community colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, digital learning, education, education technology, faculty, formal learning, heutagogy, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, instructional design, K-12 related, law schools, learning, Learning Experience Design, learning preferences, media/film, more voice more choice more control, multimedia, Natural Language Processing (NLP), neurodivergent/special needs, online learning, online media, online tutoring, parents/guardians, participation, policy, productivity / tips and tricks, professional development, quality, remote teaching and learning, society, student teaching/teacher education, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, technologies for your home, tools, training / L&D, universities, usability, user experience (UX), user interface design, videoconferencing, virtual tutoring, vision/possibilities, visualizing information, voice recognition / voice enabled interfaces, web design and production, web-based collaboration, workplace, youth, by Daniel Christian

Improving Digital Inclusion & Accessibility for Those With Learning Disabilities — from inclusionhub.com by Meredith Kreisa
Learning disabilities must be taken into account during the digital design process to ensure digital inclusion and accessibility for the community. This comprehensive guide outlines common learning disabilities, associated difficulties, accessibility barriers and best practices, and more.

“Learning shouldn’t be something only those without disabilities get to do,” explains Seren Davies, a full stack software engineer and accessibility advocate who is dyslexic. “It should be for everyone. By thinking about digital accessibility, we are making sure that everyone who wants to learn can.”
…
“Learning disability” is a broad term used to describe several specific diagnoses. Dyslexia, dyscalculia, dysgraphia, nonverbal learning disorder, and oral/written language disorder and specific reading comprehension deficit are among the most prevalent.

An image of a barrier being torn down -- revealing a human mind behind it. This signifies the need to tear down any existing barriers that might hinder someone's learning experience.

Flipped Learning Can Be a Key to Transforming Teaching and Learning Post-Pandemic — from edsurge.com by Robert Talbert

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

What is flipped learning? A common and oversimplified answer is that it is an approach that asks students to watch lecture videos at home before class so that class time can be used for more interactive activities.

But the best way to describe it is to contrast it with traditional teaching frameworks. In the traditional framework, students get first contact with new concepts in class (the “group space” as I call it in my book on flipped learning) and then higher-level interactions are all on the student side through homework and so on (in the “individual space”). Flipped learning puts first contact with new ideas before group space activities, then uses the group space for active learning on mid- and upper-level tasks.

It’s worthwhile to compare flipped and traditional frameworks by contrasting the assumptions that each framework makes…

We can no longer assume that a pure lecture pedagogy is an acceptable teaching model or that banning technology is an acceptable practice.

21 Ways to Structure an Online Discussion, Part 1 — from facultyfocus.com by Annie Prud’homme-Généreux
*This is a five-part series. Each Monday, we will be publishing the next consecutive part of the article series.

Excerpt:

I searched for ways to structure online discussions, and my findings are described in this series of five articles. This first article explores ways to structure a discussion to encourage learners to apply the concepts they have learned. Articles two and three describe discussion structures that help learners explore concepts in greater depth. Article four looks at ways to use discussions for reflection, evaluation, and critique of concepts. The final article investigates ways to foster a greater sense of community by using multimedia and proposes resources for developing new discussion structures.

Below are five ideas where learners search for, recognize, and share concrete examples of a concept, or where they create examples to illustrate a concept. I am sure there are more ways to do it, and I welcome your additions in the comments below.

21 Ways to Structure an Online Discussion, Part Two — from facultyfocus.com by Annie Prud’homme-Généreux

Excerpt:

In this and the next article, I will describe ideas for structuring an online discussion when the goal is for learners to further explore a concept studied in class. I subdivided the ideas into two categories: Some are useful when the goal is for learners to engage in divergent thinking, in other words, when they are generating ideas and expanding the range of solutions or brainstorming (this article).

21 Ways to Structure an Online Discussion, Part Three — from facultyfocus.com by Annie Prud’homme-Généreux

Excerpt:

In this third article, we will explore structures to help learners explore concepts when the goal is convergent thinking, so each learner gains a deeper, richer understanding of a concept and aligns with a common understanding.

In this article, the ideas for structuring an online discussion when the goal is for learners to explore a concept through convergent thinking are:

Rebooting the final exam [Talbert]

On 04/11/2021, in adjunct faculty, assessment, colleges, community colleges, faculty, higher education, ideas, instructional design, learning, Learning Experience Design, mathematics, metacognition / metacognitive skills, Michigan, pedagogy, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

Rebooting the final exam — from roberttalbert.medium.com by Robert Talbert

Excerpts:

It’s probably better not to give final exams at all, but if you must, then here are some alternative approaches that do more to help students.

Here are some ideas for what your students might do on a final exam like this.

Create a mind map of the course or a portion of it.
Write a new catalog description for the course.
Write a letter to an incoming high school student who will be taking the course next semester.
Write a short essay about: What are the main ideas of this subject, and how do they all connect together?
Write about their metacognition.
Leave one piece of advice to the next round of students taking this course.

Nearly Half of Faculty Say Pandemic Changes to Teaching Are Here to Stay — from campustechnology.com by Rhea Kelly

Among the findings:

Fifty-one percent of faculty said they feel more positive about online learning today than pre-pandemic. Faculty were most satisfied with how efficiently they were able to communicate with students — but across the board, a majority of faculty were also satisfied with how efficiently the technology worked, how well students learned and how well students engaged in class.
Fifty-seven percent of faculty said they feel more positive about digital learning materials than pre-pandemic.
Seventy-one percent of faculty reported they make considerable use of digital materials today, compared to 25 percent pre-pandemic. And 81 percent said they expect digital material use to remain the same or increase post-pandemic.
Fifty-eight percent reported considerable use of online homework and courseware systems, more than doubling the pre-pandemic share of 22 percent. Seventy-four percent expected the use of those systems to remain the same or increase post-pandemic.
Only 8 percent of faculty said they would revert to their pre-pandemic teaching practices after the pandemic is over.

Also see:

Success of Videoconferencing Could Keep a Lot of Education Work Remote — from thejournal.com by Dian Schaffhauser

Two-thirds of people in the education sector expect to see a continuation of remote work post-pandemic. Sixty-five percent of respondents in education agreed that due to the success of remote collaboration, facilitated by videoconferencing, their organizations are considering a flexible remote working model.

DC: Yet another reason to implement/support Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

On 04/11/2021, in accessibility / UDL, adjunct faculty, Bias | Diversity Equity & Inclusion (DE&I), colleges, communities of practice, community colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, digital learning, distance education, education technology, elearning, faculty, heutagogy, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, ideas, instructional design, internet, IT in HE, K-12 related, law schools, learner profiles, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning preferences, multimedia, neurodivergent/special needs, online learning, online media, online tutoring, parents/guardians, pedagogy, remote teaching and learning, society, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, telecommunications, training / L&D, United States, universities, usability, user experience (UX), vision/possibilities, web-based collaboration, youth, by Daniel Christian

DC: Yet another reason for Universal Design for Learning’s multiple means of presentation/media:

Encourage faculty to presume students are under-connected. Asynchronous, low-bandwidth approaches help give students more flexibility in accessing course content in the face of connectivity challenges.

— as excerpted from campustechnology.com’s article entitled, “4 Ways Institutions Can Meet Students’ Connectivity and Technology Needs“

How to Mitigate Accessibility & Digital Inclusion Obstacles for the d/Deaf Community [Claus]

On 04/07/2021, in accessibility / UDL, adjunct faculty, collaboration, colleges, communications, communities of practice, community colleges, health, Learning Experience Design, neurodivergent/special needs, parents/guardians, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, teaching online, user experience (UX), web-based collaboration, by Daniel Christian

How to Mitigate Accessibility & Digital Inclusion Obstacles for the d/Deaf Community — from inclusionhub.com by Christina Claus
To mitigate accessibility and digital inclusion obstacles for the d/Deaf and hard of hearing, developers must conduct critical research to understand these ongoing hurdles. This guide outlines the many challenges facing this community, shares useful insights, and provides meaningful inclusion solutions.

Excerpt:

Several commonly accepted characterizations include:

Deaf: When using the capital D, the individual conveys they communicate with sign language and have either been deaf since birth or shortly after.
deaf: The lowercase d is often utilized by those who do not identify as part of Deaf culture and typically become deaf later in life.
Hard of Hearing (HoH): Individuals who don’t experience total hearing loss or deafness often identify as hard of hearing.
Late-Deafened: This indicates the individual became deaf later in life.
Deaf-Blind: In addition to being deaf or hard of hearing, this individual also has a degree of vision loss.

These diversities can impact the individual’s ability to experience digital and online services. To create an inclusive experience for the entire community, developers must understand the obstacles each faces.

Adjunct college faculty taking the biggest hit from pandemic job losses [Busta]

On 04/01/2021, in adjunct faculty, business side of he, career development, colleges, community colleges, dangers of the status quo, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, marketing/social marketing, marketplaces, New "Amazon.com" of Higher Education, online learning, trends, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

Adjunct college faculty taking the biggest hit from pandemic job losses — from highereddive.com by Hallie Busta

Dive Brief:

Higher education institutions employed 5% fewer adjunct faculty during the current academic year compared to the year before, according to the latest annual data from the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources.
All faculty groups experienced job losses during the year, though adjuncts were hit the hardest. The cuts didn’t affect the share of women and people from racial and ethnic minority groups among tenure-track faculty.
Salaries for full-time faculty posted the lowest median annual increase since 2010, at less than 1%, as colleges grappled with budget cuts and revenue loss.

From DSC:
And a potentially-relevant item for the future if these trends continue:

How To Pre-Sell Your Online Course And Make Money Before You Launch It — from elearningindustry.com Kathy Alameda
In this article, I’m going to explain why pre-selling your online course is important as an online course creator.

Learning Ecosystems

Reflections on “Faculty and Staff Often Don’t Trust One Another. How Do We Fix That?” [Cohn]

Udemy, an Online Course Platform Where Anyone Can Teach, Keeps Raising Money. What’s Next? [Young]

21 Ways to Structure an Online Discussion, Parts 1, 2, & 3 [Prud’homme-Généreux]

Rebooting the final exam [Talbert]

Nearly Half of Faculty Say Pandemic Changes to Teaching Are Here to Stay [Kelly]

Adjunct college faculty taking the biggest hit from pandemic job losses [Busta]

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