Bishop's Blog

Student Professional Organizations Yesterday we had a Meet & Greet at the Perk for the main campus students interested in participating in SMSTA/SASCD/KDP. Thanks to Ricki Roth and Nichole Dales for their work and leadership with this meeting. We had an excellent turnout with over thirty students in attendance. I am anxious to support the work of this group in the future. The first official meeting will be January 12th at 11:00am in FLD 308.   Abigail Jones, Ricki Roth, and Kyle Benz Mark Engelhardt and Emily Woodall, T/W SMSTA student, went to the MSTA state convention last week in Columbia. Thanks, Mark, for giving your students many opportunities for professional experiences. Mark and Emily General Session Speaker Jack Berckemeyet - middle school teacher, consultant, and author Birthday Luncheon We continued the celebration of Kathleen's birthday at Olive Garden. What a blessing to spend some time fellowshipping with friends. Program Evaluat...

The Leader in Me Presentation Mark Engelhardt and the T/W Student Chapter of ASCD sponsored and organized a fantastic event for his students at the Troy/Wentzville RLC Monday night. Kristi Garland and the Leader in Me Team of Teachers from Elsberry Elementary School shared about their experiences with the Leader in Me program in their school. Feel free to encourage your students (even if not from the T/W RLC) to attend What Pre-Service Teachers Need to Know about District Hiring Practices on November 30th at 5:00. They are also invited on February 8 to hear from MSTA Online Community Coordinator, Aurora Meyer, as she presents Protecting Your Online Reputation . MoPTA Celebration The MoPTA Celebration is one of my favorite events to attend, as I thoroughly enjoy listening to our student teachers discuss their experiences. Although they are overwhelmed with all of the requirements of the MoPTA, they all had wonderful things to say about their student teaching experience...

St. Charles Community College Presentation Every fall I am invited to present to the education students at St. Charles Community College. Three other local universities also share with these students about their education programs. I was very encouraged when I walked into a packed auditorium. We were told to prepare for 75 students and there were about 125 in attendance. I am hopeful that the crowded room is an indication that more students are pursuing the field of education, and possibly joining our program in the coming years. This year I decided to invite one of our excellent graduates who attended at SCC prior to becoming a Spartan. Wally Fergson accepted my invitation and joined me during the presentation.  I interviewed Wally while on the stage and asked him a variety of questions. We did not rehearse his responses and I was so pleased with the way in which he answered the following question, "How was your experience as a student at Missouri Baptist?" Wally related hi...

  MACTE Conference The Fall MACTE (Missouri Association of Colleges of Teacher Education) conference was Monday - Wednesday. Alicia Noddings, Erica Bumpers, Tonia Crane, Susan Hladky, and I attended a variety of meetings ranging in topics from MoPTA to MEES to Instructional Technology. For summaries of the workshops attended, please see the Education Division's Professional Development Course Shell found on all division faculty members' list of Canvas courses. Image Source: www.macte.net Visit to Lindbergh Schools Shelton Smith and I met with one of our doctoral students, Suzanne Bright, along with Brian McKenney, Lindbergh's Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources. Thanks to those of you who serve on doctoral committees. I would like to encourage those of you who serve on committees to go the extra mile with your doctoral students. Respond to emails in a timely manner and help guide your doctoral student(s) through the arduous dissertation pro...

Lighten Up Committee Luncheon As the faculty were enjoying Monday off during Fall Break, the staff were here working. But thanks to the Lighten Up Committee, we enjoyed a delicious lunch and participated in a pumpkin carving contest. The Education Division got Honorable Mention for our creation. Look out, Gina has a knife! Ellen and Melanie cleaning out the guts of the pumpkin. Mary Ann, Gina, and Melanie frantically finishing before the deadline. Our final creation The group with our pumpkin. Professional Learning Committees Tuesday morning the faculty met to begin our PLC work. We created three groups - two groups that will focus on making sure we prepare our students to utilize school data effectively & one group that will be working on improving the way we prepare our students to differentiate their instruction. We all met together for a general overview of the PLCs, a look at some data, and then we split up into groups. Each group identified a l...

State-Wide MoPTA Task 4 Webinar at MBU Thanks to those of you who attended the event and a special thank you to our IT department for ensuring that we had the adequate technology set up and ready to go at 6:00pm so that we could connect between webinar facilitators located in Princeton, New Jersey, Jefferson City, MO, and from our campus in the Field Academic Building. Hap Hairston, Director of the Office of Educator Quality at DESE, traveled from Jefferson City to host the webinar on our campus. The first few MoPTA webinars have taken place in Springfield and Warrensburg. We are thrilled that we were invited to host to the Task 4 - Video - Webinar. Hap Hairston, DESE Director of Office of Educator Quality State-wide webinar being broadcast from MBU's Field Academic Building MoPTA Task 4 Webinar Slide Troy/Wentzville RLC Appreciation Meeting Mary Sue Thompson, Dean of the T/W Regional Learning Center, each fall invites deans, division chairs, and the provost to...