Using Action Research to Transform a Traditional Reading Practicum

This chapter describes how faculty from the University of Central Florida collaboratively worked to transform an undergraduate reading practicum course utilizing action research and case study methodology. Seeking to develop preservice educators as teacher researchers, the reading faculty responded by developing and implementing the Action Research Case Study Project. This semester-long project required faculty to redesign the course to reflect this emphasis. This chapter includes the modifications made to the course content, the creation of rubrics for evaluating the project, and feedback mechanisms employed to facilitate student success. The project has been implemented for two semesters; various data sources are shared to document the effectiveness of the project including faculty input, survey data, student work examples, and student reflections.

Enhancing Quantitative and Data Science Education for Graduate Students in Biomedical Science

Substantial guidance is available on undergraduate quantitative training for biologists, including reports focused on biomedical science, but far less attention has been paid to the graduate curriculum. In this setting, we propose an innovative approach to quantitative education that goes beyond recommendations of a course or set of courses or activities. Due to the diversity of quantitative methods, it is infeasible to expect that biomedical PhD students can be exposed to more than a minority of the quantitative concepts and techniques employed in modern biology. We developed a novel prioritization approach in which we mined and analyzed quantitative concepts and skills from publications that faculty in relevant units deemed central to the scientific comprehension of their field. The analysis provides a prioritization of quantitative skills and concepts and could represent an effective method to drive curricular focus based upon program-specific faculty input for biological science programs of all types. Our results highlight the disconnect between typical undergraduate quantitative education for life science students, focused on continuous mathematics, and the concepts and skills in graphics, statistics, and discrete mathematics that arise from priorities established by biomedical science faculty.One Sentence SummaryWe developed a novel approach to prioritize quantitative concepts and methods for inclusion in a graduate biomedical science curriculum based upon approaches included in faculty-identified key publications.

Online Developmental Education Instruction: Challenges and Instructional Practices According to the Practitioners

Using a qualitative survey research design, researchers solicited faculty input on challenges and common instructional practices applied in teaching online developmental education courses. Online was defined as 80% or more of the instruction of a course being delivered online. Participants of the study were faculty teaching developmental education courses online, primarily in 2-year colleges. They completed an online survey on faculty characteristics and various aspects of teaching online. The most frequently occurring challenges identified by field practitioners included technology issues, student engagement, time management, and basic literacy skills. The most commonly used instructional activities reported were discussion boards, multimedia, offering of feedback and synchronous sessions, and communication. Based on the findings, implications for practice are discussed, which can benefit faculty as they design and deliver online developmental education courses.

Are They Worth It?

Since 2011, the trend of digital badging has continued to rise among various organizations, including higher education. After gathering faculty feedback, input, ideas, and perspectives on structure and implementation, the faculty development center at a Midwestern university launched a university-wide digital badging program. The intent was to incorporate faculty input into the design of digital badges to gain faculty engagement. After the first year of implementation, a survey of faculty perceptions on digital badging received unanticipated results. Emerging themes from this survey indicate that faculty are hesitant towards digital badging; however, participant responses also suggest that faculty uncertainty of the digital badging program is connected to the communication process. Recommendations are presented to support the needs of faculty perceptions of a digital badging program.

Peer feedback needs practice and faculty support to be effective in simulation based education.

Background Peer evaluation drives effective self-assessment, encourages autonomous learning and enhances both metacognitive skills and critical reasoning skills. 1 Students, by commenting on the work of others, gain a better understanding of the criteria required for successful performance and develop skills of objective judgment which can be transferred to the assessment of their own work. 2 Methods Peer feedback was introduced to simulated patient history taking consultations. Students were required to evaluate the observed performance and provide verbal feedback to their peers. This was compared to facility review and end of term examination results. In interview students indicated that they benefited from the opportunity to engage in peer feedback. Students reported that they felt more comfortable receiving feedback from peers than providing feedback to peers. Results 65% of students rated peer performance as excellent which did not correlate with summative OSCE results. When students did mark the borderline grade, a significant difference was found for one individual element of the feedback score. Students ticked "lacked confidence/fluidity" significantly more frequently than any other of the 7 elements suggesting they felt more comfortable relaying this element of performance feedback as it did not address content understanding or knowledge. Conclusion Ability to give constructive feedback should be viewed as an essential skill but for success students need to be taught how to give effective peer feedback. Emotions and loyalties affect student’s unwillingness to find fault with a fellow student’s work. Students may need more opportunities to conduct peer assessment to become familiar and comfortable with this process. Co-operative learning in simulation can combine with peer feedback to produce effective social constructivist approaches; however faculty input is required to monitor and validate the feedback.

P039: The iterative evaluation and development of a core and high-acuity low-occurrence simulation-based procedures training program for emergency medicine trainees

Introduction: Competency-based skills development has driven the evolution of medical education. Simulation-based education is established as an essential tool to supplement clinical encounters and it provides the opportunity for low-stakes practice of common and high-acuity low-occurrence (HALO) procedures and scenarios. This is particularly important for emergency medicine trainees working to build confidence, knowledge, and skills in the field. Methods: In the procedural training sessions, learners rotate through 6 small-group stations over a 3-hour period. Skills topics are determined from faculty input, prior session feedback, and literature reviews. Topics included chest tubes, airway intervention, lumbar punctures and trauma interventions. Online content and brief written materials are used for pre-session learning. The small groups use hands-on faculty-guided training, with real-time feedback. Printed materials supplement key learning points at the stations. A combination of low-fidelity task trainers and simulated patients are used for practice and demonstration. R3 EM residents have the opportunity to mentor junior learners. Brief participant surveys are distributed at each session to gather qualitative and quantitative feedback. Results: Feedback forms were completed by 79/85 (92.9%) learners over a period of 4 years (2015-2018). Participants included medical students (11.8%), EM residents (52.9%), and non-EM residents (35.3%). 84.8% (67/79) gave positive qualitative feedback on the sessions, citing points such as the beneficial practice opportunities, quality of instruction, and utility of the models. Updated surveys (N = 26) used a 5-point Likert scale (1 = disagree strongly; 5 strongly agree) in addition to qualitative feedback. Participants indicated that sessions were valuable, and informative (M = 4.692, SD = 0.462; M = 4.270, SD = 0.710). They reported increased understanding of procedures discussed, and they were likely to recommend the session (M = 4.301, SD = 0.606; M = 4.808, SD = 0.394). Conclusion: The ongoing evaluation of our mentor guided hands-on low-fidelity and hybrid simulation-based procedural skills sessions facilitates meaningful programmatic changes to best meet the needs of EM learners. Sessions also provide a forum for EM resident mentorship of junior learners. Feedback indicates learners enjoyed the sessions and found this to be an engaging and effective instructional modality.

RESEARCH AND EXTENSION PARTICIPATION, PERFORMANCE AND MOTIVATION OF THE LEYTE NORMAL UNIVERSITY FACULTY: INPUT TO POLICY REDIRECTION

Research and extension play vital roles in Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in the Philippines being two of the four-fold functions of State Universities and Colleges (SUC). Hence, this study aimed to determine the research and extension participation, performance and motivation of the faculty members of Leyte Normal University as input to policy redirection. It utilized the descriptive research design and used purposive sampling to get the majority of the respondents. A survey questionnaire was used to obtain data from the respondents who were available during the conduct of the study. Findings of the study revealed that majority of the respondents got only satisfactory level of participation and performance in research and extension while most of them strongly agree on the statements on intrinsic and extrinsic motivations. Lack of time came out the number one problem encountered by the respondents in conducting research and extension programs, projects and activities. Also, majority of the respondents identified proper time from among the suggested solutions on problems encountered in the conduct of university’s research and extension program, projects and activities.

Faculty Input for Future Allocation of Scarce Educational Technology Resources

Faculty are major stakeholders in the California community college (CCC) system’s ability to meet three primary mission objectives: increase student access, prepare students for transfer, and remain competitive. Educational technology (ET) can play a vital role in keeping the CCCs competitive, and modern learner-centric models rely heavily on faculty using ET, but ET is expensive. With 113 CCCs operating in an era of constrained budgets, the efficient allocation of scarce ET resources remains a challenge for the CCC system. Faculty input regarding their use of educational technology (ET) is invaluable, but no published empirical research explores the present and future use of ET by the CCC faculty. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to survey CCC faculty to determine their present ET hardware and software use, and their anticipated ET use five years in the future. Survey data from 655 active CCC faculty were analyzed using t-tests at the p < .05 threshold for statistical significance. Cohen’s D was used to describe the magnitude of anticipated change from current to future ET use. Results demonstrate that CCC faculty anticipate significant increases in their use of ET hardware and software over the next five years. Results also show that 42% of faculty had never been asked about their use of ET by an influencer, indicating that faculty are underutilized stakeholders in ET planning. Combined, these findings can be utilized by CCC administrative decision makers towards meeting their mission objectives by the efficient allocation of scarce ET resources.

Philanthropy and the Character of the Public Research University

Educational scholars have examined the relationship of philanthropy and its contributions to the public university. Yet, there has been little discussion of the influence of philanthropy on the governance space of the public research university, and specifically as conditional philanthropy may affect academic integrity and shared governance. In this chapter, we consider these larger issues in the context of a study of a recent case. Drawing on public records, interviews, and university documents, the chapter examines conditional donation of The Charles G. Koch Foundation (CKF) to the Florida State University (FSU). We suggest that the Koch Foundation gift appears to illustrate a new model of governance based philanthropy. It has done so by tying donations to control or influence of the internal governing mechanics of an academic unit of a public university. This model has generated controversy. Though there was substantial faculty and student backlash, the model appears to be evidence of a new philanthropic relationship between the public university and substantial donors, one in which donors may change the nature of traditional shared governance relationships within the university. We maintain that instances of such “new” strategic philanthropy require greater focus on and sensitivity to shared governance and faculty input as a way to ensure accountability, especially to preserve the integrity of the academic enterprise and its public mission where donors seek to leverage philanthropy into choices relating to faculty hires, courses and programs traditionally at the center of faculty prerogatives in shared governance.