Volume I Number 1
October 1994

Faculty Center Advisory Board Active

During the Spring 1994 semester, faculty members were invited to participate in the process of developing plans for a center for teaching excellence on campus. The volunteers served as a planning group for what we are currently referring to as the Faculty Center for Teaching & Learning. 

Some planning group members visited centers for teaching excellence on other campuses, such as the Community College of Philadelphia, Northwestern University, and Miami Dade Community College. Others investigated, by telephone or over the Internet, centers for teaching, such as the Bok Center at Harvard, the Teaching Resource Committee at Wesleyan University, and the Center for Faculty Development at the University of Southern Connecticut. Open forums were held in April for all interested faculty to learn what we had found on other campuses and to discuss what it is we at Bucks want to accomplish through the Center.

 In May, based on the open forums, on models provided by other colleges' centers for teaching, and on the planning group's many hours of thought and discussion, the group forwarded to Dean Conn a Proposal for the Creation of The Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning at Bucks County Community College. The plan lays out the philosophy, goals, and organizational structure of the Center, along with proposals for its location, some project ideas, and a budget. With submission of the proposal, the planning group became the Center's Advisory Board for 1994-95. The fifteen faculty members on the Advisory Board selected Maureen McCreadie to serve as the Director of the Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning for the first year.

Keep reading for a copy of the latest draft of the proposal for the Center and to learn what the Advisory Board is planning for this, our first year. Inside you will find the text of the draft (on which we welcome your suggestions), some professional development opportunities, and requests for your participation. We welcome your comments and ideas.

Proposal for the Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning (Draft)

The Advisory Board for the Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning is planning the Center in keeping with the vision and agenda described in Bucks County Community College: Year 2000 Agenda, excerpted below:

OUR VISION

Bucks County Community College will excel in providing high quality, accessible higher education to the citizens of Bucks County. We will exceed expectations for providing comparable freshman and sophomore level transfer education, for delivering career/occupational programs that meet area needs, for realizing collaborative projects with business and government, for developing arts and cultural programming in keeping with the rich tradition of the County, and for designing and delivering continuing education programs that meet community needs. We will be self-renewing, committed to continuous institutional assessment to measure our success and responsiveness.

OUR AGENDA

• We will emphasize teaching excellence as the cornerstone of our work and success.
• We will develop a Center for Teaching Excellence on our campus to provide a locus for our staff to share formally and informally those successful teaching strategies used by our staff.
• We will establish the college as technically proficient, forward looking, innovative, and effective
• We will encourage the development of innovative teaching strategies using technology by providing seed money, release time and flexible schedules to faculty. . . we will integrate new communications technologies with information, communications, and computing needs; we will bring the best technology possible to the service of our students.¹

The Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning will draw on and encourage the growth of the talents and abilities of the faculty in order to better help the College achieve its educational mission in a world that is in a state of constant social, economic, and cultural change.

¹ Excerpted from Bucks County Community College: Year 2000 Agenda, September 1993, pp. 1, 2, 3.

II. GOALS 

• To encourage and promote teaching effectiveness at Bucks County Community College; 
• To foster individual and professional growth among faculty;
• To encourage the professional esprit de corps of the faculty.

It is the strong conviction of the Advisory Board that the Cooper Homestead provides the ideal site for the Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning. To optimize the Center's success, it must operate from a central location and with a clear institutional identity. The Cooper Homestead's centralized location is symbolic of the primary importance of teaching and learning in the mission of the College.

A center for teaching and learning is most likely to succeed when it is located where it does not become the "possession" of the office or division to which it accidentally finds itself nearest.

The Advisory Group will select a Director to plan and oversee the operations of the Center. The Director will be selected from among the full time faculty, ordinarily for an academic year, renewable annually. The Director will be awarded release time.

The Planning Group will serve as the Advisory Board for the first year of the Center's operation. Among other charges, the Board is expected to develop a charter to provide the opportunity for representation from the academic divisions and departments covered in the collective bargaining agreement between the College and the Bucks County Community College Federation of Teachers.The Advisory Board and the Director will invite proposals from any full-time faculty member to serve as a Facilitator.

The Advisory Board recognizes that every faculty member excels in some context and, therefore, has skills, knowledge, talents, and/or experience from which other faculty can benefit. Ordinarily, the term of appointment will be either one semester or one academic year, providing the opportunity for as many faculty as possible to serve as Facilitators. Facilitators will be granted one course reduction per semester. Faculty will be asked to indicate teaching/learning needs that Facilitators might address.

The Advisory Board and the Director will consider those needs in selecting the Facilitators.Advisory Board Members: Susan Bushnell, Betsy Farber, Blaine Greenfield, Gwen Kerber, Barbara Korb, Pat Laser, Maureen McCreadie, Linda MacGregor, Tom Mazurek, Kay Mengers, Marilyn Puchalski, Anita Rau, Michael Schwartz, Carol Starrels, Betty Tsai

Director: The Advisory Board has selected Maureen McCreadie to serve as Director of the Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning for the first year, 1994-95.

V. PROJECTS

Short-Term Projects and Programs

1. Develop a charter and operating procedures for the Center. 
2. Collect and provide access to writing and research materials and educational media resources.
3. Obtain and install furniture. 
4. Purchase and install computer, print, photocopy, and telephone equipment. 
5. Hold an open house for faculty, administrators, staff, and the Board of Trustees at the Center to inaugurate the Center as a new part of the College community. 
6. Conduct surveys among faculty to identify their needs and concerns related to teaching. 
7. Provide opportunities for informal interaction among faculty. 
8. Invite speakers from within and outside the College to address the faculty. 
9. Organize and coordinate discussion groups, workshops, and seminars both within and outside of the College community. 

Long-Range Projects

1. Develop strategies that help faculty and staff to implement the new core curriculum.
2. Help faculty and staff to develop and implement writing-intensive courses.
3. Help faculty and staff to develop and implement the Integration of Knowledge courses. 
4. Coordinate efforts with the Director of Academic Computing to help faculty develop and implement strategies for the use of the computer both within and outside of the classroom. 
5. Establish a voluntary mentoring program for new and adjunct faculty.
6. Help faculty to develop new courses as well as to revise existing courses.
7. Develop strategies that will help faculty play a significant role in student retention.
8. Help faculty to develop strategies that enable them to incorporate elements of critical thinking in the curriculum. 
9. Organize events each year to highlight the Center's mission to help develop teaching excellence at Bucks County Community College. 
10. Seek and apply for external funding to support the projects of the Center. 
11. Develop a comprehensive professional development plan for faculty based on needs assessment. 
12. Offer resources to help faculty stay abreast of new educational trends and issues.

Professional Development

Professional development is an important part of what the Advisory Board sees as the role for the Faculty Center. The following provide some opportunities to consider. If any are of particular interest to you, please contact Maureen McCreadie (extension 8055) for further information.

Calls for Papers

Access or Excess The 52nd Annual Conference of the Pennsylvania Association of Two Year Colleges. Sheraton Station Square Hotel, Pittsburgh, PA, April 5 - 7, 1995.

Potential topic areas: Making colleges accessible, faculty development, teaching vs. learning, role of placement testing, counseling and advising, making computers accessible, distance learning, technology excess, colleges without walls, ADA issues, retention.

Conferences

What's In a Name?

The Advisory Board has been referring to The Faculty Center for Teaching & Learning. How do you like that name? Do you have better suggestions? All ideas are welcome. What about this newsletter? Can one of you do better than, Newsletter of the Faculty Center for Teaching & Learning? We are counting on you to come up with something with more pizzazz, more character.

We are still optimistic that we will be moving into the Cooper Homestead. Until then, we have plenty to do, so we are getting started anywhere we can.

Activities in the Works

 The Advisory Board is currently developing the following programs to offer in the near future. Please fill out the form that follows the listings and return to Maureen McCreadie, L210, to let us know which programs interest you.

Informal Series on Teaching

Sets a framework for discussion and interaction among participants

Example: Sabbatical Reports

Anyone who missed Lou Camp's sabbatical report to the Academic Affairs Committee of the BOT last Spring deserves another opportunity to listen to Lou on sabbaticals, their purpose, and their relation to teaching.

Additional topic possibilities: Critical thinking, other sabbatical reports, Key Resource Faculty update, teaching across the curriculum, assessment--do we do what we say we do?

How-To Workshop Series

Provides background and procedural information on topics that can be addressed in one or two sessions Example: The Committee Structure

Session 1: Provide history of our committee structure, along with current contractual implications of committees.

Session 2: Invite in-house experts on the pragmatics of the committee structure, including what is appropriate to send to committee, pertinent forms and deadlines, responsibilities of the committees and their chairs, and meeting schedules.

Additional topic possibilities: Personal financial planning. Invite in-house experts to talk on mutual funds, retirement planning, tax considerations for educators, etc. The Sabbatical Process. Provide guidance in applying for sabbatical leaves, deadlines for application and reporting, models for proposals and reports, etc.

The Grants Process. Co-sponsor with the Director of Grants Coordination workshops on the grants process.

Brainstorming Sessions

Provide opportunities for faculty to consider and to offer ideas on a range of pedagogical issues

Example: Ideal Teaching/Learning Environments

Hold a series of discussion sessions in conjunction with those working on the Perkins Grant, the Teaching/Learning Subgroup, and the Instructional Resources Committee to offer demonstrations on how to apply teaching enhancements, such as multimedia or cyberspace connectivity, and to initiate some dreaming sessions about how we envision ideal teaching/ learning environments. The aims are to guide planning and budget-building and to establish a basis for external funding.

Faculty Showcase

Colleagues showcase their work, allowing recognition of talents and accomplishments and highlighting of capabilities

 Example: Individuals offer a taste of what goes on in the classroom or an application of what they teach, or they reveal a hidden talent unrelated to what they teach.

Center Sampler on In-Service Day

Several or all of the ideas listed above can be offered on In-Service Day, providing an opportunity for faculty to try out what the Center plans to offer, for others to learn in what direction the Center is heading, and for the Advisory Board to get feedback from faculty on what is of interest and what else to pursue.

Now It's Your Turn

 For each of the proposed activities listed below, kindly indicate your level of interest in attending. Please, also, use this form to convey suggestions for improvement, to submit names for the Center and our newsletter, and to propose additional projects or programs the Center might offer.

Please return your completed form to the Faculty Center by November 11.

• Informal Discussions on Teaching
• How-To Workshop Series
• Brainstorming Sessions
• Faculty Showcase Series

Please return to Faculty Center for Teaching & Learning, c/o M. McCreadie, L210, ext. 8055