Teaching-LearningAcademy

Dialogue Highlights 7-8 May 2008

60 people (37 students, 16 faculty, 5 staff, 1 administrator, 1 community member) participated.

Note: See theme folders for complete group notes, but here are some recurring themes and recommended actions emerging across the four dialogue groups:

Interdisciplinary Studies

  1. Identify interdisciplinary models and structures in use at other institutions comparable to WWU.
  1. Build a community of WWU faculty, staff, and students interested in establishing interdisciplinary linkages (both in person and online).
  1. Articulate what we know about IS: Define “interdisciplinary studies”; summarize current challenges; outline benefits; identify existing resources and opportunities (e.g. create a brochure).
  1. Create a set of recommendations for Interdisciplinary Studies at WWU and present to an appropriate audience (new president?).

Teaching Evaluations

  1. Urge the use of midterm evaluations and provide support and resources (e.g. a bank of questions to tap).
  1. Create set of recommendations for improving the current course evaluation forms and recommend to the Committee on the Assessment of Teaching and Learning (CATL) and the Office of Institutional Assessment, Research, and Testing (OIART) including

a)reducing number of items.

b)focusing more on comments, less on bubble items.

c)clarifying focus on teaching evaluation vs. course evaluation.

  1. Create a set of recommendations for enhancing the currentprocess forevaluating teachingand recommend to CATL and OIART, including

a)moving from opt-in to opt-out process so more faculty would use evaluations.

b)providing ample time for students to complete forms thoughtfully.

c)revising introductory remarks/instructions to clarify purpose.

d)providing some normative information so professors would understand final ranking in terms of performance on similar courses.

e)providing incentives for administering and completing evaluations, such as electronic tools.

f)urging and supporting multiple methods for evaluating teaching in addition to student evaluations, such as peer evaluation and course portfolios, as well as dialogue opportunities to talk about how to use information to enhance teaching practices.

  1. Consult with CATL and OIART on ways to enhance current forms and processes. Note: Richard Frye from OIART will be joining the Thursday, May 22, course evaluation dialogue group.

Learning Commons

  1. Focus on the interactive dialogue feature as that is the dimension that most people want in building a stronger communication community at WWU.
  1. Provide for student-generated content and student-facilitated dialogue, e.g. perhaps tap into the Communication 339 practicum student pool for facilitators.
  1. Consider how to cluster the dialogue threads, e.g. providing for profiles so users could select strands of interest/having theme-based dialogue groups, including grouping by majors, minors, transfer students, residence halls, and status (first-year, sophomore, junior, senior, graduate student).
  1. Consider including a calendar of events and online tools.
  1. Perhaps TLA could seed the initial phase of the dialogue forum, including emergent ideas and recommendations regarding interdisciplinary studies, course valuations, and comments to the incoming president.
  1. Invite broad-basedcampus recommendations for naming, designing, and implementing this forum.

President’s Letter

1. Review and compile suggestions from all TLA groups into one letter or consider writing multiple letters.

2. Use the specific language from WWU’s mission statement to frame letter(s).

3. Introduce TLA and invite incoming president to sign up for a regular TLA dialogue group.

4. Use letter(s) to highlight specific TLA recommendations on this year’s topics e.g. interdisciplinary

studies, learning commons, and teaching evaluations, as well as past suggestions, e.g. learning

commons at the Waterfront and support for service-learning.

  1. Identify creative and rhetorically effective ways to deliver the letter(s), e.g. send early in the summer

and then again in early September; make an appointment for a group of TLA students, faculty, & staff

to deliver the letter in person; consider presenting letter in visual form as well as a narrative.