Developing Social Capital of Community College Developmental Education Faculty to Influence Student Success PDF Download

Author: Eric C. Leshinskie
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Community college teachers
Languages : en
Pages : 91

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Book Description
To improve course success rates and the overall success of students in developmental level courses, I designed a professional development experience to strengthen developmental education faculty members' social capital, connecting faculty with peers who also teach developmental level courses. Twelve full-time faculty members participated in an interdisciplinary professional learning network (PLN), where they engaged in shared critical dialogue and conducted and received a peer observation. I designed a mixed methods action research study where participants completed a pre- and post-survey measuring the influence of this professional development experience on their social capital and their use of effective teaching practices. Additionally, participants completed reflective journal responses, and I interviewed six participants to determine if participation in the PLN and conducting and receiving an interdisciplinary peer observation would transform their teaching practice. Quantitative results indicated that participation in the PLN had little influence on developing participants' social capital and little influence on transforming teaching practice. The qualitative data indicated that participants' confidence in their teaching practice increased. Participants' social capital was strengthened as they developed an informal support network that grew from a sense of trust and common purpose. Furthermore, interacting with instructors from a different discipline expanded their ideas about effective teaching practices. Ultimately, participation in the PLN and conducting and receiving a peer observation led some participants to consider a transformation of individual practices and in a few instances, modifications to teaching philosophy.

Author: Deborah J. Boroch
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0470606614
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 198

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Book Description
Student Success in Community Colleges As more and more underprepared students enroll in college, basic skills education is an increasing concern for all higher education institutions. Student Success in Community Colleges offers education leaders, administrators, faculty, and staff an essential resource for helping these students succeed and advance in college. By applying the book's self-assessment instrument, colleges can pinpoint how their current activities align with the most effective proven practices. Once the gaps are identified, community college leaders can determine the best strategic direction for improvement. Drawing on a broad knowledge base and illustrative examples from the most current literature, the authors cover organizational, administrative, and instructional practices; program components; student support services and strategies; and professional learning and development. Designed to help engage community college leadership and practitioners in addressing the practices, structures, and obstacles that enhance or impede the success of basic skills students, the book's strategies can be tailored to various institutional levels, showing how to unite faculty, staff, and administrators in a cooperative effort to effect institutional change. Finally, Student Success in Community Colleges reveals how investing in a comprehensive basic skills infrastructure can be a financially sustainable model for the institution as well as substantially beneficial to students and society. "This is a most unusual and valuable book; it is packed with careful analysis and practical suggestions for improving basic skills programs in community colleges. Compiled by a team of practicing professionals in teaching, administration, and research, it is knowledgeable about what has been done and imaginative and practical about what can be done to improve the access and success of community college students." K. Patricia Cross, professor of higher education, emerita, University of California, Berkeley "For its first hundred years the community college was committed primarily to access; in its second hundred years the commitment has changed dramatically to success. This book provides the best road map to date on how community colleges can reach that goal." Terry O'Banion, president emeritus, League for Innovation, and director, Community College Leadership Program, Walden University "This guide is the most comprehensive source of information about all facets of basic skills or developmental education. It will be invaluable not just to community college educators across the nation, but also to those in high schools and four-year colleges who share similar problems." W. Norton Grubb, David Gardner Chair in Higher Education, University of California, Berkeley

Author: Lisa S. Kelsay
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 100098107X
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 194

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Book Description
Co-published with This timely volume addresses the urgent need for new strategies and better ways to serve community colleges’ present and future students at a time of rapid diversification, not just racially and ethnically, but including such groups as the undocumented, international students, older adult learners and veterans, all of whom come with varied levels of academic and technical skillsThe contributing researchers, higher education faculty, college presidents, and community college administrators provide thorough understanding of student groups who have received scant attention in the higher education literature. They address the often unconscious barriers to access our institutions have erected and describe emerging strategies, frameworks, and pilot projects that can ease students’ transition into college and through the maze of the college experience to completion. They offer advice on organizational culture, on defining institutional outcomes, on aligning shifting demographics with the multiple missions of the community college, on strengthening the collaboration of student and academic affairs to leverage their respective roles and resources, and on engaging with the opportunities afforded by technology.Divided into three parts – understanding today’s community college campuses; supporting today’s community college learners; and specialized populations and communities – this book offers a vision and solutions that should inform the work of faculty, administrators, presidents, and board members.

Author: William Darrell Hess
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 134

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Book Description
Evidence suggests that social capital developed through social networks is critical for individuals to succeed in education and in careers. The on-campus college residence hall is one environment where college students have the opportunity to build social networks that support their academic and social development. On today's campus learning communities are often used to provide additional influence. However, not all students develop positive social relationships in these settings. This qualitative study investigates how fourteen male and female first year students of various ethnicities navigate the social networks in a variety of different residential living learning communities. The study was conducted at a large public university and focuses on how the students gain information that contributes to their academic experience. Findings suggest that participants perceived the overall impact of the learning community and the residence hall experience to be positive. More specifically, insight is provided into students' drive to succeed, social ties with small groups, social ties with faculty and staff, and the impact of the built environment. Implications for practice are discussed and suggestions are made that may help to cultivate and direct the development of social capital for students in the residence hall and in the learning community setting.

Author: Robert D. Putnam
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1476769907
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 400

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Book Description
"The bestselling author of Bowling Alone offers [an] ... examination of the American Dream in crisis--how and why opportunities for upward mobility are diminishing, jeopardizing the prospects of an ever larger segment of Americans"--

Author: Ian R. Haslam
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 9463006516
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
Much has been written of late about the need to reform school systems across the world. In like manner there have been many attempts to change school systems for the better but without a great deal of success. This, in part, has much to do with the inertia in school systems and the nature of the work. The professional isolation of teachers from one another in schools is no excuse but it is a key factor in the development of system wide professional capital. This book explores the importance of school leadership and the use of digital media to develop social capital in schools. Particular examples of school reforms that focused on developing professional capital with varying degrees of success are to be seen in the UAE, in reforms to the Australian middle school, and in attempts to reform the Community College in the USA. Throughout the book there are three powerful ideas associated with successful large scale reforms. First, there are the structural elements that all successful school systems have in common including revised curriculum standards, a reliable assessment system, technical skills of teachers and school leaders, a comprehensive data system, rewards and remuneration of workforce and policy documents to support change. Second, strategic imperatives such as the singular focus on teaching and learning for student success, the need to build workforce capacity in schools, the need to ensure system wide implementation of reforms and the importance of collaboration and team building. Third, the systematic development of professional learning communities and teacher leadership will increase social capital in schools which will ensure student success. This book looks at overcoming the inertia to school reform in education systems caused by structural deficiencies, strategic shortfalls and implementation procedures.

Author: Mary Helen Pavia Martinez
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : College teachers
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
Faculty professional development is an essential component in the fabric of community colleges. Nationwide research studies indicate that students who begin their post-secondary studies underprepared and enrolled in developmental education are less likely to complete a college degree. Developmental education has been under reform for the past few years with the goal of accelerating students' success and transitioning them into college-level courses. Given the present state of reform, more research is needed on faculty preparation in teaching developmental education, specifically on the role of professional development in preparing faculty in developmental education. Faculty in developmental education are central to the success of students completing a degree or certificate. During this current state of reform in developmental education, professional development represents a probable solution to preparing faculty to provide condensed versions of developmental education course models. This research study examined perceptions of community college faculty in developmental education on professional development. This study utilized a qualitative case study design with the use of focus groups, semi-structured interviews, and surveys. The findings were (a) the majority of participants reported that sharing with other faculty members was beneficial and perceived the sharing of practice with like-minded individuals as a professional development activity, (b) participants' primary challenges to participating in professional development were limited funding and time away from classroom, and (c) participants expressed apprehension regarding the state of reform in developmental education. Insights from faculty on needs, challenges, and perceptions may enhance the effectiveness, timeliness, and quality of faculty development programs.

Author: A. Traver
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137355735
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 340

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Book Description
This volume brings together a breadth of new research on how service-learning - combining community-based experiential learning with classroom instruction - can best be employed at community colleges. It discusses outcomes and best practices for all involved, covers both theory and practice, and draws on both qualitative and quantitative methods.

Author: Susan M. Sipple
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 9781579228453
Category : Community college teachers
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
This book introduces community college faculty and faculty developers to the use of faculty learning communities (FLCs) as a means for faculty themselves to investigate and surmount student learning problems they encounter in their classrooms, and as an effective and low-cost strategy for faculty developers working with few resources to stimulate innovative teaching that leads to student persistence and improved learning outcomes. Two-year college instructors face the unique challenge of teaching a mix of learners, from the developmental to high-achievers, that requires using a variety of instructional strategies and techniques. Even the most experienced teachers can find this diversity demanding. Faculty developers at many two-year colleges still rely solely on the one-day workshop model that, while useful, rarely results in sustained student-centered changes in pedagogy or the curriculum, and may not be practicable for the growing cohort of part-time faculty members. By linking work in the classroom with scholarship and reflection, FLCs provide participants with a sense of renewed engagement and stimulate collegial exploration of ways to achieve educational excellence. FLCs are usually faculty-instigated and cross-disciplinary, and comprise groups of six to fifteen faculty that work collaboratively through regular meetings over an extended period of time to promote research and an exchange of experiences, foster community, and develop the scholarship of teaching. FLCs alleviate burnout and isolation, promote the development, testing, and peer review of new classroom strategies or technologies, and lead to the reenergizing and professionalization of teachers. This book introduces the reader to FLCs and to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, offering examples of application in two-year colleges. Individual chapters describe, among others, an FLC set up to support course redesign; an "Adjunct Connectivity FLC" to integrate part-time faculty within a department and collaborate on the curriculum; a cross-disciplinary FLC to promote student self-regulated learning, and improve academic performance and persistence; a critical thinking FLC that sought to define critical thinking in separate disciplines, examine interdisciplinary cross-over of critical thinking, and measure critical thinking more accurately; an FLC that researched the transfer of learning and developed strategies to promote students' application of their learning across courses and beyond the classroom. Each chapter describes the formation of its FLC, the processes it engaged in, what worked and did not, and the outcomes achieved. Just as when college faculty fail to remain current in their fields, the failure to engage in continuing development of teaching skills, will equally lead teaching and learning to suffer. When two-year college administrators restrain scholarship and reflection as inappropriate for the real work of the institution they are in fact hindering the professionalization of their teaching force that is essential to institutional mission and student success. When FLCs are supported by leaders and administrators, and faculty learn that collaboration and peer review are valued and even expected as part of being a teaching professional, they become intrinsically motivated and committed to collaboratively solving problems, setting the institution on a path to becoming a learning organization that is proactive and adept at navigating change.

Author: Terrell L. Strayhorn
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135045070
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 171

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Book Description
Moving beyond the theories traditionally used to describe college student development, this engaging book introduces social psychological theories that address the most relevant issues in higher education today. Covering theories of ecological systems, sense of belonging, prejudice and discrimination, positive psychology, social capital, personality theory, mentoring, and hope theory, this book promotes the understanding and application of social psychological theories to various higher education contexts. Examples from diverse student populations encourage learners’ application to situations in their own contexts. Comprehensive enough to be used as a main text but accessible enough to be used alongside another, this important textbook bridges research, theory, and practice to help practicing and aspiring higher education and student affairs professionals effectively work with college students. Special Features Include: • Reflective exercises that combine theory and practice and help students apply their knowledge solving problems. • Case studies and scenarios for further connections to the reader’s university and college settings. • Guiding questions that encourage students to think beyond the current literature and practice. • List of further readings and references for readers to explore topics in more depth.