FACULTY DEVELOPMENT OPPORTUNITIES
There are two additional professional development opportunities open to all BRCC faculty. The first occurs on October 8 and continues our Blackboard Series. This interactive workshop will focus on the Gradebook function and there will be a session for beginners and for more advanced users. The two sessions will begin at 3:00 and 4:00 PM that day. On October 10 the Teaching+Learning Center will present a workshop about test preparation. It will focus on the areas of alignment, rigor, and reliability. You will also learn about using a blueprint to build the perfect test. This workshop will be held in 311 Magnolia and begin at 3:00 PM. Look for registration information in your email-box in the very near future but save the dates now.

THE PLIGHT OF OUR ADJUNCT COLLEAGUES
The recent discussion about the effectiveness of adjunct faculty at our nation's colleges, reminded me of a study focused on this area. Although it was published in 2011, it bears a second glance. As the number of adjunct faculty continues to grow on campuses across the U.S., there is growing concern that due to a lack of training and/or time, most adjunct faculty are not using effective teaching methods. Roger Baldwin and Matthew Wawrzynski, two faculty at Michigan State, conducted the research and stressed in an interview that they fault the conditions part-time instructors work under, and not the instructors themselves, for their failure to use effective teaching methods more often. The researchers found that, compared with full-time adjuncts or tenured or tenure-track faculty, part-time adjuncts "are less likely to use learning-centered strategies such as essay exams, term research papers, multiple drafts of written work, oral presentations, group projects, or student evaluations of each others' work," the paper says. Such learning-centered practices are generally regarded by practitioners as some of the most effective means of teaching students and are certainly what the Division of Innovative Learning and Academic Support is suggesting all of our faculty use in their courses.

FREE YOUR MIND ONLINE
Audrey Heinesen has written a fascinating opinion piece about the need for more faculty who are willing to teach using the online course delivery method. She notes, "Online instructors can revel in a newfound ability to defy some of the most fundamental aspects of a typical classroom. The whiteboard is no longer erased at the end of the day. Your best moments reach beyond students in your physical presence. Your teaching can be set free in your online classroom. You’re free to structure content in new ways to reach your students. Try different types of content and multimodal teaching strategies that might not work in a traditional setting. Experiment with new course ideas that are harder to champion in more structured environments. Backward design, flipped classroom, video-based instruction? Instructors can return to a creative place by developing new ideas around curriculum and teaching." As we continue to expand our eLearning offerings, we are certainly looking to add to the number of faculty who are certified to teach using the online delivery method. Contact your dean or department chair if you are interested in receiving the training to teach for our eLearning department.

STOPPING BULIMIC LEARNING
One of the ideas recently discussed at the Common Reader Faculty Learning Community was the topic of comprehensive testing. The idea is to have each test that you give in your class not only build on the previous test but actually include material that should have been learned before. Craig Nelson, a biology instructor from Indiana, notes that comprehensive tests help us to avoid creating bulimic learners. He explains that this is the student who learns things for the test and then purges the information, thinking they will never have to use it again. Research shows however that continued interaction with content increases the chances that it will be remembered and can be applied subsequently. An article in the August/September 2013 issue of The Teaching Professor also supports this claim. Preparing for Comprehensive Finals contains a number of great suggestions that we can use to help our students prepare for their encounter with this type of assessment.