USG Teaching & Learning Conference 2016

Paula Bryant, Teresa Teasley

Colleges and universities are being challenged to increase the number of students who complete college on time in the state of Georgia. The purpose of this presentation is to describe how one school of nursing created an advising and counseling center focused on retention and graduation as a new approach to Complete College Georgia. This presentation will describe an innovative approach for student retention based on individual counseling, intrusive advising, and engaged learning strategies to improve progression and retention rates. This session will address best practices for promoting critical thinking skills by using engaged student learning strategies, which support institutional plans for Complete College Georgia. The audience will be involved by participating in one of the active learning strategies used across our curriculum, adaptive quizzing promoting critical thinking skills.

Josh Pfiester

David Brooks stated in a 2011 TED talk that "the fact is, people learn from people they love. And if you're not talking about the individual relationship between a teacher and a student, you're not talking about that reality. But that reality is expunged from our policy-making process." This presentation will discuss research literature, strategies, and lessons learned in building student-instructor relationships in a face-to-face multicultural undergraduate course. Strategies to be discussed include use of the Panorama Education Survey, autobiographical presentations, and a (literal) web-building activity. Relationships promote trust and trust is necessary for risk-taking. The intended audience are all instructors (whether face-to-face, hybrid, or online), but especially those who struggle with building relationships with their students.

Robert Bledsoe, Deborah Richardson, Gina Hammock, Eric Zuckerman, Adam Wyatt

This panel describes a Complete College Georgia initiative that helps academic programs engage in curricular changes and faculty development aimed at improving student success. In the Curriculum Design Academy, teams from designated programs review the principles of learning and work through the principles of course design. Programs subsequently submit proposals for curriculum change that are eligible for internal grant support. Courses targeted by the first cohort experienced an average 10 point decrease in percentage of students receiving a D, F or W. Presenters will describe the program, present evidence of its effectiveness, and feature projects from Chemistry and the Psychological Sciences. The session should appeal to administrators of CCG initiatives, faculty developers, and individuals engaged or interested in course- or program-level curricular innovation.

Dustin Worsley, Stephanie Lahnala

Pro-active Academic Advising has contributed to the increase of retention and progression of students at Columbus State University (CSU). The Academic Center for Excellence (ACE) and Preceptorship Advising and Clinical Experience (PACE) advising centers at CSU are leading efforts with regards to pro-active advising. Best practices in pro-active advising by professional staff advisors at CSU includes using technology to pro-actively identify at-risk students and provide timely interventions, five intentional contacts with advisees per semester, participation in the "15 to Finish" initiative, and supporting students holistically. Join representatives from ACE and PACE as they present proven strategies that utilize technology and innovative advising practices that have positively impacted Complete College Georgia (CCG) and transformed the culture of advising at CSU. Discussion will include how you can incorporate these practices at your home institution.

Mark Eister

Veterans arguably represent one of the most complex and diverse populations on campus. This session will present the current situation and trends surrounding student veterans. You will be presented with examples of proven strategies, practices, and policies that promote successful transition of veterans to postsecondary education, including training developed specifically for campus faculty and staff who interact with them. You will hear from a student veteran who has experienced the challenges of transitioning from military life to college and civilian life and how they were able to overcome those challenge and succeed academically. Finally, you will have the opportunity to ask the presenter and the student pointed questions to better understand how you might be able to improve the learning success and overall outcomes of student veterans on your campus.

Danilo Baylen, Erin Duckett

This presentation describes and discusses ways of improving comprehension, retention and recall of concepts in introductory Biology courses using multiple note taking strategies. Using color-coded notebooks (blue, yellow or green), students were asked to employ one of the note taking strategies (traditional, concept mapping, or visual mapping) in creating study guides for each chapter included in the course assessment. Relationships between a specific note taking strategy and student performance in multiple end-of-unit assessments were investigated. This presentation will engage interested audience through the sharing of experiences based on data collected during a 14-week term. Presenters discuss the challenges experienced from data collection and analysis. This presentation session will be beneficial to those working with college students who are interested in designing strategies, techniques, and efforts that support institutional plans for Complete College Georgia.

Nirmal Trivedi, Hillary Steiner, Lori Lowder, Laura Ruhala, Ruth Goldfine

This presentation describes the result of a collaboration between several faculty members on two campuses to develop a course that will equip first-year engineering majors with the skills and strategies they need to succeed in STEM courses. Supported by a Complete College Georgia Incubate grant, this course, to be offered in fall 2016, is rooted in literature on self-regulation and active learning and is based on a similar model that promoted student success and engagement among first-year biology and chemistry majors. Conference participants interested in learning more about engaging first-year programs and how they can adapt them for their own institutions are invited to attend.

Katherine Kipp, Laura Ng, David Slutzky, Steve Smith

Our university offers Accel, or dual-enrollment, college courses that are taught by university faculty in the high school. The program supports Complete College Georgia by offering core courses tuition free to high school students so that they can enter college after high school with a year's worth of credits accumulated, thus reducing the time and expense needed to complete their degree. We are presenting a panel discussion of our experiences as faculty teaching these courses. We will discuss the obstacles we encountered in the high schools and how we dealt with these issues to create an engaging learning experience for the students. Our panel consists of English, Economics, Math, and Psychology instructors. The audience will have the opportunity to engage in discussion and we will provide a Tip Sheet of issues to expect and ways to ease the transition from college classroom to high school classroom.

Sara Selby, Molly Smith, Lisa Howel

Many of the current techniques for promoting engaged student learning rely on technology, and many institutions of higher learning are fortunate enough to have technologically advanced campus networks and highly skilled and motivated faculty members who embrace cutting-edge strategies. What happens, though, if the digital superhighway is full of potholes due to lack of funding? Or, what happens when the superhighway suddenly collapses altogether and technology fails completely? In this presentation, participants will review their own teaching styles; view multidiscipline demonstrations of how technology can be used to facilitate student engagement in any environment; and leave with a multitude of resources for designing active learning strategies suitable to their own academic disciplines. This presentation will be beneficial for anyone wishing to incorporate active learning strategies using current technology with limited resources.