Workshops and Digital Badges
Digital Badges
Offered through the Academic Success Center, digital badges are available for faculty to assign or students to complete independently. Comprised of a specific sequence of interactive workshops, critical thinking, organization, prioritization, and analysis are just a few of the skills that can be developed through active participation. The digital badges have been created to focus on a specific set of skills that will benefit students in and out of the classroom, and many of the activities in the workshops are framed to provide that broader view.
- Time Management
- Goal Setting
- Interactive Communication
- Professional Communication
- Academic Resiliency (reserved for Coll-115)
Faculty, full badge modules are available for download in Canvas Commons and are updated each semester, but you may request links for individual workshops that would be most applicable to the skills needed for your class. For more information, or if you would like to preview a specific workshop before incorporating it into your course, please email tutor@bucks.edu for more information.
Workshops
All workshops earn Bucks+ credit. As students complete workshops, they will receive an emailed credential that can be submitted through the application so points can be awarded.
Students, once you have made a selection, sign in as instructed at the outset of each workshop to ensure you receive credit. Email tutor@bucks.edu with questions or concerns.
Spring 2025 In-Person Workshops
- The First Week: Checklists and Checkpoints - TBA
- Let's Talk about Scholarships! - TBA
- Enter the Spotlight: How to Write about Yourself in a Personal Essay - TBA
- Let's Get Workshopping! - TBA
All Face-to-Face workshops will take place in the ASC and on Zoom.
Online Workshops
- Decisions, Decisions: Making the Best Choices to Make the Best Choices – In this workshop, you will explore your decision making process and focus on decision prioritization and avoiding decision fatigue. Understanding conscious versus unconscious decisions as well as the difference between importance and urgency are also discussed.
- Enter the Spotlight: How to Write about Yourself in a Personal Essay – In this workshop, you will learn about structuring and writing personal essays including scholarship essays and cover letters. How to approach the process and what to include, will be part of the discussion.
- Higher Ed Terminology – The transition into higher education can be difficult. In this workshop, terminology used in higher education, in general as well as terminology specific to, are explored. Gaining familiarity with higher education terminology can help to smooth the transition.
- Let's Talk about Scholarships! – Did you know that there are lots of scholarships available to Bucks students? Want to learn more about how to find them? This workshop provides an overview of the scholarship opportunities at Bucks as well as some tips about applying for them.
- Moving Forward: Analyzing Past Tests – Past tests are a great tool for understanding and developing our study habits. In this workshop, we will discuss how to use past performance to understand our study and test taking habits in an effort to improve.
- Now Presenting: Presentation and Oral Communication – In this workshop, we will explore strategies for effective and engaging oral communication in one-on-one and group settings. Topics like body language and informal versus formal communication are covered.
- Organize It! Organizing Your Way Toward College Success – This workshop focuses on organizational skills with an emphasis on how to approach the process. The skills and strategies discussed can be applied to educational and personal pursuits.
- Peer Review Workshop: Giving Meaningful Feedback – In this workshop, the peer-review and workshop processes are explained from collaborative rather than purely instructive perspectives. The roles of the reviewer and reviewee are explained. Students will have the opportunity to puts these new skills to use.
- Raise Your Hands Up: Strategies for Class Participation – In this workshop ways to participate in class to get the most out of the learning experience will be discussed, with an emphasis on preparation. Participation in-person as well as participation online, in a more asynchronous setting, will be explored
- Ready, Set, Go! Planning Ahead with Long and Short Term Goals – In this workshop long-term and short-term goal setting using the SMART Goals model will be explored. Students will get some experience setting goals and understanding the need to adapt as new challenges arise.
- Real World Communication – This workshop is designed to help students develop the soft skills, often sought after in the job market. Recognizing elements of communication in varying levels of formality and varying modalities will be discussed, including composing emails and phone etiquette.
- SMART Goals – This workshop focuses on understanding the SMART goal model. It is a great resource on its own, or as a supplement to the SMART Goals module in the COLL101 course. In this workshop, students will gain a better understanding of how SMART Goals can work for them as they gain some experience setting them for a model student.
- Sylla-What?! – This workshop explores the parts of the syllabus so that students understand how is can be used in their efforts to be successful in their coursework. This workshop explores the syllabus as a time and task management tool, and explores options for schedule keeping.
- Take Note: Notes on Effective Note Taking and Annotation – This workshop explores best practices for note-taking and keeping. Linear and associative note-taking strategies are explored. Both hard copy and digital note-taking and annotation are discussed, including the how, when, what, and why of the notes we take.
- The First Week: Check Lists and Check-Points – The transition from high school into college can be difficult for many students. In this interactive workshop students can get a glimpse of expectations in their first week so that they can be as prepared as possible. They will get an overview of the various services and a few tips about how to build the connections and community needed to persist in a college environment.
- Time Keeps on Tickin': How to Use What You Have to do What You Can – This workshop incorporates strategies for organization, decision making, and the use of the SMART Goal model to make the most efficient use of the time we have. Multi-tasking versus task batching is also discussed.
- Vocabulary Building: Building Bridges – Strategies for building vocabulary including effective annotation are covered in this workshop. Strategies can be applied to developing a larger vocabulary if you are interested in personal development or learning English as a Second Language. These strategies can also be adapted for getting more adept at learning a new language.