Faculty Development in Acceleration Programs:
A Key Component for Gateway Course Completion
Jenny Schanker Associate Director
Michigan Center for Student Success
Susan Gabriel Associate Professor, English
Community College of Baltimore County
Conference on Excellence in Gateway Course Completion
April 2013
Center as Strategy:
Overview of MCSS
Jenny Schanker, Associate Director
Michigan Center for Student Success
Michigan Center for Student Success
• History and Context:
– Michigan Association of Community Colleges
– Challenges:
• Keep up with emerging student success initiatives
• Connect practitioners/disseminate promising practices
across the state
• Bring additional opportunities to Michigan
– Awarded a 3-year grant from Kresge Foundation
– Additional resources from AtD and other sources
Center as Strategy
From Jobs for the Future:
Student Success Centers organize a state’s
community colleges around common action to
accelerate their efforts to improve persistence and
completion. The Centers provide the vision, support
and a shared venue for colleges as they work in
partnership on a collective student success agenda.
Centers currently operate or are in development in
Arkansas, Michigan, Ohio, New Jersey and Texas.
Center as Strategy
The primary functions of the Centers include:
- Convening and engagement: colleges to come together around
reform; faculty leadership; in-state networks and communities
of practice; cross-sector alignment and collaboration;
attendance at national convenings
- Coherence: mapping and aligning student success initiatives,
creating an umbrella framework
- Research and knowledge management: includes newsletter,
policy briefs, mapping college initiatives, identifying solid
models nationally (crosses over to convening)
- Policy: includes agenda setting, systems change, capacity
building, legislative, institutional policy
- Data: includes metrics, sharing, transparency and use
Vision and Goals of MCSS
• Vision
– Provide support to Michigan’s 28
community colleges
– Emphasize linkage between practice,
research, and policy
• Goals
–
–
–
–
Convene communities of practice
Promote use of data and metrics
Establish a research agenda for Michigan
Recommend and support policy efforts
Guiding Student Success Framework
Priority Areas/Momentum Points
Faculty Leadership Initiative
and ALP
Faculty Leadership Initiative Mission:
Identify, develop and promote faculty members as leaders within
a broader student success agenda at Michigan community
colleges. MCSS provides a forum where existing and emerging
faculty leaders are supported through networking, professional
development and recognition.
ALP Connection:
ALP is a faculty-driven initiative to increase student success in
developmental and gateway composition courses. Through the
Michigan ALP network, faculty connect with their peers to learn
and share strategies to support student learning.
CCBC Students
Community College Baltimore County
credit students
33,817
average age
29
female/male
58/42%
students of color
50%
full/part-time
34/66 %
A
A
L
P
The Accelerated Learning Program
THE ACCELERATED LEARNING PROGRAM at CCBC
Reduces stigma
Improves attachment
Provides stronger role models
Encourages cohort effect
Changes attitude toward the
developmental course
Allows more individual attention
Allows time for dealing with noncognitive issues
Allows coordination of the ALP
and credit courses
ENG 101
ENG 052
A
L
P
The Accelerated Learning Program
Why is faculty development necessary
in accelerated developmental
courses?
A
L
P
The Accelerated Learning Project
THE ACCELERATED LEARNING PROGRAM at CCBC
Reduces stigma √
Improves attachment √
Provides stronger role models √
Encourages cohort effect √
Changes attitude toward the
developmental course √
Allows for individual attention √
Allows time for dealing with noncognitive issues √
Allows coordination of the ALP
and credit courses √
ENG 101
ENG 052
A
L
P
The Accelerated Learning Program
“Turning the Tide”
[F]ew of the Round 1 Achieving the Dream colleges engaged in
the type of systematic professional development that is
recommended for truly changing practitioners’ work; these
colleges tended to focus instead on shorter workshops,
conferences, or presentations by various speakers as a way to
influence practitioners’ work. While those activities may be
useful tools for exposing faculty and staff to new educational
research, they are less likely to influence their classroom or
support practices.
Achieving the Dream may wish to place more emphasis on
developing or supporting concrete and systemic professional
development in community colleges.
CCRC & MDRC
2011
Which of the following best describes your graduate
preparation to teach writing? (N = 48)
30
20
10
0
no courses
in teaching
writing
one or two
courses in
teaching
writing
3 or more
courses in
teaching
writing
degree in
rhet/comp
30
Which of the following best describes your graduate
preparation to teach developmental (basic, remedial)
writing? (N = 47)
20
10
0
no courses
in teaching
basic writing
1 courses in
teaching
basic writing
2 or 3
courses in
teaching
basic writing
>3 courses
in teaching
basic writing
Which of the following best describes your graduate
preparation to teach writing in an ALP classroom? (N = 47)
50
40
30
20
10
0
no courses
in teaching
ALP
1 courses in
teaching
ALP
2 or 3
courses in
teaching
ALP
>3 courses
in teaching
ALP
What exactly is “Faculty Development”
and what makes it difficult?
A
L
P
The Accelerated Learning Project
Approaches to Faculty Development
for ALP at CCBC
Two-hour orientations
Half-day workshops
 Integrated reading and writing
 Financial literacy
 Non-cognitive issues
ALPIN
Alpples & Oranges
Faculty Development Institutes
A
L
P
The Accelerated Learning Project
ALP Institute Topics in Michigan
ALP Foundational Concepts
Backwards Design
Active Learning
Thinking Skills
Integrating Reading and Writing
Addressing Non-Cognitive Issues
Improving Student Editing Skills
Responding to Writing
Grading in the ALP and Credit Classes
Aligning syllabi for the ALP and Credit Class
A
L
P
The Accelerated Learning Project
Faculty Development in Accelerated Programs:
A Key Component for Gateway Course Completion
Contact Us
Jenny Schanker
[email protected]
Susan Gabriel
[email protected]