FAculty Collaborations for Course TransformationS

Collaborative faculty teams working together across colleges, to transform course design for Developmental Mathematics

Distinguished Experts Join FACCTS+ Advisory Panel for 2010-2011

June 6, 2010 by · No Comments · People

One of the innovations in the next generation of our collaborative work, the “FACCTS+” project in 2010-2011, is the creation of an Advisory Panel who can complement our work on Implementation and Adaptation of innovative teaching methods and resources. The FACCTS+ Advisory Panel members listed below are all distinguished project leaders working on new methods and resources to improve teaching in Developmental Mathematics, including projects within the state (de Wit, Harrington, Illowsky), in other states or regions (Moore, Balog), and national projects in innovative teaching approaches (Asera, Rotman). These experts have agreed to provide feedback to insure that our FACCTS+ program is developing the absorptive capacity in faculty and institutions to mobilize the knowledge and resources being developed in their projects.

We will convene distributed meetings twice a year to review our progress and the results emerging from these parallel projects, and to discuss how we can insure a convergence of interests to align the capacity and “distribution channel” we are developing with the results these other projects will want to share. Here are the current Advisory Panel members:

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DMC Connect project proposes new work to integrate Dev Math Collection with ongoing work

June 6, 2010 by · No Comments · Proposals

The collaborative team working on the Dev Math Collection,  composed of faculty and researchers from San Diego State University and the San Diego Community College District, has proposed further work in a project submission to the National STEM Digital Learning Initiative:

DMC Connect: Integrating the NSDL Developmental Mathematics Collection with Faculty Resource Exchange and Collaboration – Departmental, Regional and State-wide

The Developmental Mathematics Collection is being incorporated in the NSDL as a component of the MathDL Pathway in Fall 2010, as a result of an NSDL collection project initiated in late Fall 2009. This collection addresses a critical need for student success, especially in two-year institutions: almost 60% of two-year college students enrolled in mathematics in the fall term are enrolled in courses designated as pre-college level or developmental. The courses leading to college transfer credit include pre-college Algebra and often fundamental mathematics and Arithmetic. The success rate of this sequence is low, typically 1 in 6, forcing many students to drop out of college entirely.

The DMC Connect project will integrate the Developmental Mathematics Collection with complementary initiatives in California at the departmental, regional and state levels. This will promote use of – and contribution to – the NSDL Dev Math Collection within these initiatives. It will also extend the Dev Math Collection with ongoing addition of resources, and provide a sustainability model for continued evolution.

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Update on the NSDL Dev Math Collection

June 6, 2010 by · No Comments · Progress report

The collaborative faculty team from San Diego State University and the San Diego Community College District has achieved the following milestones as of May 1, 2010:

  • established and tested Recommendation and Review policies and processes for the Collection, based on existing collections such as MathDL and the MERLOT Mathematics Community;
  • adapted a categorization of pedagogical content reflecting a range of impact scopes: learning activities, lesson plans, teaching strategies (including assessment), course designs, curriculum plans, and content objectives (plus other professional development resources);
  • prepared descriptions and reviews for an initial pilot collection of 20 resources, and revised the Recommendation/Description and Review processes based on a formative evaluation of results;
  • liaised with the NSDL Technical Network Services staff, including training on the use of the NSDL Collection System
  • agreement for TNS to extend the MSP2 metadata framework with an additional item in the Student Populations controlled vocabulary – College/Post-secondary Developmental – to  allow targeted search by Developmental Mathematics faculty for resources with Educational Level in the secondary school range for a student population in post-secondary institutions.
  • trial collection established within the NSDL by making visible 10 of the selected resources with metadata created by DMC team members.

The team is on target to complete the initial Developmental Mathematics Collection with 200 resources by December 2010, including the following activities:

  • June 30 2010:    40 resources in the DMC visible to NSDL, including instances of each

pedagogical content category

  • Aug 30 2010:     100 resources in the DMC visible to NSDL
  • Dec 30 2010:     200 resources in the DMC visible to NSDL, including contributions from the DMC team and from faculty in 4 other colleges in the San Diego Dev Math cooperative team

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FACCTS project teams collaborate on NSF proposal

June 6, 2010 by · No Comments · Proposals, Related Research

One of the intended outcomes of the FACCTS project was to move the leadership role away from San Diego State University into the partner colleges. A major achievement in that direction is the collaboration between LA Pierce College and San Diego City College to produce a Collaborative Research proposal to the National Science Foundation’s program for Transforming Undergraduate Education in STEM disciplines. Here is a summary of the proposed work, submitted in May 2010 under the leadership of Principal Investigators Dr. Bruce Yoshiwara [LA Pierce College] and Dr. Karon Klipple [SDCC]:

Dev Math KEN Collaborative Research Project: Pilot Study of Faculty Knowledge Exchange Networks for Developmental Mathematics

Using new learning materials and teaching strategies to improve student learning often requires faculty to acquire new knowledge and skills in order to revise their curricula and teaching practices. The Dev Math KEN project focuses on faculty mobilizing knowledge and resources – from colleagues, from research, and from repositories of open educational resources – in order to implement exemplary teaching innovations in their courses. Past research projects have shown that faculty need understanding and skills in the discovery, adaptation and exchange of methods and resources, and also organizational capability to support faculty leadership roles in new forms of professional development and interchange.

Past work has also shown the effectiveness of regional collaborations to provide a critical mass of engaged faculty colleagues and also a sufficiently local focus to promote faculty ownership and responsibility in the exchange network. This pilot project focuses on faculty who teach in Developmental Mathematics, a priority for improvement in student success in California and nationally. The Dev Math KEN pilot study will develop innovative methods to engage faculty in professional collaborations to share resources and knowledge to improve student success, including strong links to the new National Science Distributed Learning [NSDL] Developmental Mathematics Collection and the state’s strategic Basic Skills Initiative Professional Development program.

The Dev Math KEN pilot project aims to improve student learning through the following components:

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Assessment results from FACCTS 2009-2010 teams

June 6, 2010 by · No Comments · Evaluation results

An assessment of the current collaborative process for FACCTS teams was carried out by independent evaluator Dr. Flora McMartin of Broad-Based Knowledge [Richmond CA]. The evaluation demonstrated that faculty found this adaptation of the SPECC and FIN models to be effective in enhancing their teaching for student success, and energizing in terms of commitment to mobilizing knowledge and resources for teaching. For example:

“Over 65% of faculty participants indicated that they had tried to figure out ways to adopt new pedagogical practices and over 85% had sought out resources to help them adopt new or different practices. Half of the participants reported having an experience that caused them to rethink their ideas about teachers and students. And, as a result of this rethinking, they undertook actions to make changes. They also realized that they were not alone in this thinking and that their efforts to change were supported through interactions with their team members, campus colleagues… All the faculty participants noted that participating in the project gave them the ‘permission’ and collegial support to implement changes that they had been thinking about for some period of time.”

The evaluation also identified a number of issues to be resolved in creating a sustainable model, of which several are addressed in the revised FACCTS+ model: [Read more →]