Friday Memo 3/4/16
Program Review
Program Directors are doing a great job piloting a new Program Review Process. I appreciate their patience as we are "building the plane as we fly it." I have taken their feedback and am working with David Collum and Tim Delicath to design a template that is meaningful for our program directors and allows us to collect and analyze critical data for continuous improvement in all of our programs.
Business Education
Jennifer Sohn is our lead instructor for our Business Education courses, but because she teaches Business Education at Northwest High School she is not available during the school day. In her place, I attended a statewide Business Education meeting in the DESE offices at Jefferson City on Tuesday for the colleges and universities that offer a Business Education program. We discussed the new certification changes and how those changes have impacted our curriculum and programs. I realized during that meeting, once again, how grateful I am for our curriculum committee (specifically Kathleen Wendt) and the work we did over the last two years to make our curricular revisions satisfy the new certification rules and to ensure our candidates are prepared to pass the new assessments. We are further along in the process than many of the other institutions.
Program Approval from DESE
Due to the new certification rules and assessments we made many revisions to our curriculum (as noted above) for all of our initial certification programs and some of our advanced programs. We submitted those changes to DESE in summer 2015. In December 2015, we received notification from DESE that they would not accept some of our revisions. Kathleen Wendt, Angela McGowan, and I are working on providing detailed evidence (highlighted syllabi) to DESE demonstrating that all of our programs include curriculum aligned to the new required competencies. I won't go into the details here, but please know that we are working very closely with specific lead instructors to gather the evidence we hope will satisfy DESE's requirements without having to add courses.
Counseling
We are in the process of hiring two new faculty members in the Counseling Program. We hosted an out-of-town applicant applying for the position. The Counseling faculty are looking forward to adding two more team members as we move forward with our CACREP accreditation.
We are learning that students seeking School Counseling licensure in the state of Illinois may be required to take additional coursework. Mary Ann Conaway, Julia Schroder, Charlene Slates, and I are working together to make sure we are providing what the students need.
Campus Labs
Tonia Crane, Gina Walker, Nancy Sickler, and I attended Campus Labs training and learned more about how we will be using Campus Labs for program review, outcome tracking, and accreditation. Our Campus Labs support personnel visited the MBU campus so we were able to learn from them in-person.
CEEDAR
Thurma DeLoach, Charity Schlueter, Alicia Noddings, Susan Hladky and I have been working together today to review our program to ensure we are addressing scientifically-based teaching strategies to meet the needs of all students, focusing on Multi-Tiered Systems of Support. Professional Core Lead Instructors will be working together to review our course syllabi. Professional Core Lead Instructors will receive an email invitation for a meeting on Tuesday, April 5th from 10:15am - 11:45am.
CAEP Update
We will spend some time at our division faculty meeting on Tuesday learning about the standards. We will be forming standard committees soon and begin our work collecting evidence on the standards.
Important Dates to Remember
Closing Thoughts
A friend of mine sends me a daily devotional thought every day. Today's email included some practical thoughts that impact us as educators.
The following is an excerpt from the daily devotional "Make Your Day Count."
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 - Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.
"Our professions can become overwhelming at times. There are moments when I feel like I will never catch up. Whether it is turning grades in, grading papers, calling parents, making lesson plans, creating projects, or cleaning the classroom, teachers have a lot to do--not to mention life outside of school! If I'm not careful, I find myself complaining--first internally, then verbally...before I know it, everything begins to look dull and gray. The joy of teaching gets buried. During one particularly challenging day, I took my class outside for recess, and there before us was a young boy swinging without a care in the world. He was belting out the song, "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands." The scene changed my day. The boy was a familiar face at our school and was known for his very distinct limp and a few other handicaps. Yet to him, none of that mattered. He was so full of joy on that swing that all he could do was sing...in spite of his circumstances, he was thankful and full of praise! There in the midst of my seemingly gray day was a bright ray of sunshine in the form of a thankful little boy..."
Program Directors are doing a great job piloting a new Program Review Process. I appreciate their patience as we are "building the plane as we fly it." I have taken their feedback and am working with David Collum and Tim Delicath to design a template that is meaningful for our program directors and allows us to collect and analyze critical data for continuous improvement in all of our programs.
 |
| Image Source: http://publicserviceworks.com/what-we-do |
Business Education
Jennifer Sohn is our lead instructor for our Business Education courses, but because she teaches Business Education at Northwest High School she is not available during the school day. In her place, I attended a statewide Business Education meeting in the DESE offices at Jefferson City on Tuesday for the colleges and universities that offer a Business Education program. We discussed the new certification changes and how those changes have impacted our curriculum and programs. I realized during that meeting, once again, how grateful I am for our curriculum committee (specifically Kathleen Wendt) and the work we did over the last two years to make our curricular revisions satisfy the new certification rules and to ensure our candidates are prepared to pass the new assessments. We are further along in the process than many of the other institutions.
Program Approval from DESE
Due to the new certification rules and assessments we made many revisions to our curriculum (as noted above) for all of our initial certification programs and some of our advanced programs. We submitted those changes to DESE in summer 2015. In December 2015, we received notification from DESE that they would not accept some of our revisions. Kathleen Wendt, Angela McGowan, and I are working on providing detailed evidence (highlighted syllabi) to DESE demonstrating that all of our programs include curriculum aligned to the new required competencies. I won't go into the details here, but please know that we are working very closely with specific lead instructors to gather the evidence we hope will satisfy DESE's requirements without having to add courses.
 |
| Image Source: http://dese.mo.gov |
Counseling
We are in the process of hiring two new faculty members in the Counseling Program. We hosted an out-of-town applicant applying for the position. The Counseling faculty are looking forward to adding two more team members as we move forward with our CACREP accreditation.
We are learning that students seeking School Counseling licensure in the state of Illinois may be required to take additional coursework. Mary Ann Conaway, Julia Schroder, Charlene Slates, and I are working together to make sure we are providing what the students need.
 |
| Image Source: http://isbe.net |
Tonia Crane, Gina Walker, Nancy Sickler, and I attended Campus Labs training and learned more about how we will be using Campus Labs for program review, outcome tracking, and accreditation. Our Campus Labs support personnel visited the MBU campus so we were able to learn from them in-person.
 |
| Emily Rose-Barry from Campus Labs |
CEEDAR
Thurma DeLoach, Charity Schlueter, Alicia Noddings, Susan Hladky and I have been working together today to review our program to ensure we are addressing scientifically-based teaching strategies to meet the needs of all students, focusing on Multi-Tiered Systems of Support. Professional Core Lead Instructors will be working together to review our course syllabi. Professional Core Lead Instructors will receive an email invitation for a meeting on Tuesday, April 5th from 10:15am - 11:45am.
CAEP Update
We will spend some time at our division faculty meeting on Tuesday learning about the standards. We will be forming standard committees soon and begin our work collecting evidence on the standards.
Important Dates to Remember
- Canvas Shells Live Today, 3/4
- 1st 8-week grades are due at noon Monday, 3/7
- Retirement Celebration Monday, 3/7 2:00pm The Perk
- Faculty Meeting Monday, 3/7 3:00pm Recital Hall
- Division Faculty Meeting Tuesday, 3/8 10:15am Field Conference Room
- Spring Break March 12-20
A friend of mine sends me a daily devotional thought every day. Today's email included some practical thoughts that impact us as educators.
The following is an excerpt from the daily devotional "Make Your Day Count."
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 - Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.
"Our professions can become overwhelming at times. There are moments when I feel like I will never catch up. Whether it is turning grades in, grading papers, calling parents, making lesson plans, creating projects, or cleaning the classroom, teachers have a lot to do--not to mention life outside of school! If I'm not careful, I find myself complaining--first internally, then verbally...before I know it, everything begins to look dull and gray. The joy of teaching gets buried. During one particularly challenging day, I took my class outside for recess, and there before us was a young boy swinging without a care in the world. He was belting out the song, "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands." The scene changed my day. The boy was a familiar face at our school and was known for his very distinct limp and a few other handicaps. Yet to him, none of that mattered. He was so full of joy on that swing that all he could do was sing...in spite of his circumstances, he was thankful and full of praise! There in the midst of my seemingly gray day was a bright ray of sunshine in the form of a thankful little boy..."
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