BLACKBOARD EXPERTS ON THE RISE AT BRCC
The day started with a bang as several of your colleagues new to Blackboard began their training session at 9:00 AM in the Teaching+Learning Center. eLearning Program Manager Susan Nealy and IT Technical Support Manager Lenora White are facilitating the training sessions. The intermediate-level Blackboard users began their session at 11:00 AM. The training concludes with our advanced group at 1:00 PM today. The comments from the participants have been very positive about our latest version of Blackboard. Many are impressed with the analytics feature that will allow them to drill deep as they monitor their students progress during the semester. Next up is the eLearning teacher certification program planned for the summer. Those selected to participate in this year's program should be receiving their notification via email very shortly.

BEGIN SMALL WITH ACTIVE LEARNING
We have been encouraging the use of active learning as we move towards a learner-centered institution. One of the reasons that many faculty tell me they don't want to try using active-learning techniques is that they are comfortable lecturing and research shows that "they may find innovative instructional techniques intimidating." Paramount among your concerns is the fear of “losing control” of the class. In addition, some faculty may avoid incorporating active-learning strategies into their classrooms because they think that students will react negatively. Faust and Paulson note in their research, "A complaint we often hear is, “I tried active learning, but my students didn’t like it.” Indeed, most of us have had the experience of attempting to initiate class discussion and being faced with silence. These two issues are related, for both students and faculty tend to be comfortable with what they are trained to do. Thus, as long as faculty lean primarily on lecturing, students will expect to sit and listen (and often hide or sleep in class)." Faculty development experts suggest that you begin using active learning in small ways at first. You need to become comfortable with the approach before you can fully realize its potential. Some of the learning experiences listed in the revised Active Learning Manual that would be easy to try are the Muddiest Point or One-Minute Paper. The idea is to do something active each time you meet in a face-to-face class. You are building your expertise at the same time as you are creating expectation in your students. Let me know if you want a copy of the latest version of the Active Learning Manual.

CAN YOU HELP ME FIND A JOB
Why did you decide to go to college? Asking that question of new students in a more formal way might help colleges find ways to encourage more students to complete their programs, according to a new study from University of Rochester education researchers published in The Journal of College Student Development. The study found that students motivated by a desire for autonomy and competence tended to earn higher grades and show a greater likelihood of persistence than did other students. (The findings were controlled for academic background and various other factors, and were based on surveys of 2,500 students at a community college and a liberal arts college that were not identified.) The study also appears to validate other research that says that linking the subject matter to a student's current interests improves learning.