Professional Development Task Force

  Friday 3/29/2013

A. Goal: Recruitment for Offsite Professional Conventions

1. Penn TESOL 11/3 – 51 UD participants,  Presenters: (10 faculty, 7+  graduate students did not reach our goal of 2/3 faculty& tutor participation(there were 68 faculty then)

2. TESOL in Dallas –3/20 23/2013– 11 UD participants,  Presenters: (11 faculty and administrator presenters and 2 other attendees), did not reach our goal of presenters and five other attendees, but we hadn’t anticipated so many presenters, so the reality is that we exceeded expectations!

follow-up discussion for idea sharing by TESOL attendees is scheduled for 4/4 12:45 – 1:45pm 108 E. Main Street Room 209

Proposal writing for TESOL 2014 will be coached in meetings scheduled for 4/19 and 5/20/2013

3. Other conventions (educational technology, 4C’s, etc) have been promoted by PDT members via email and personal recommendations as applicable Ex. (Presenters: Symposium on Second Language Writing: Nigel Caplan; Christian English Language Teachers: Phil Rice, Russ Mason; Higher Education Teaching and Learning: Rachel Lapp, Karen Asenavage; International Leadership Association: Karen Asenavage )

B. Goal: Establish Faculty Mentoring partnerships –

a. 5 pairs of mentors and mentees who applied have been paired– plus a research group of four faculty members ,

b. new faculty members have been invited to be paired with a mentor during their second session of employment

c. reporting form added to facbook to monitor at 6 month mark if pairs are still meeting and satisfied

 

C. Goal: Organizing Local Training Events at ELI  –

Survey sent out 11/2012 to determine interests of faculty for upcoming training events to be held at ELI

Suggested:

Series on phonological challenges for particular linguistic groups (ie, Chinese, Arab, Spanish, Korean, Japanese, Thai speakers),  – yet to be addressed

how to give effective conference presentations,  -indirectly addressed through peer mentoring and proposal writing workshop

guidelines for peer observation,   addressed through peer mentoring

devising action research – addressed through research writing group

Panel Discussions on Saudi vs. American and Chinese vs. American Academic Cultures – 2/15 Reem Aleissa, 4/11 John Liang and 2 grad students

Twitter training and networking – yet to be addressed

Strategies for teaching non-readers – to be addressed in Lower Level Coordinator meetings

Error correction in writing instruction – roundtable 4/12

Genre based writing – workshop to be offered in June 2013

2. Faculty Professional Development     Retreat Friday April 12 2013

Plans in progress

Theme to be addressed: Humanizing Grammar Instruction

Keynote presenter chosen: Dr John Liang of Biola University

Facilities arranged: Deerfield Golf Club

Schedule planned

Materials being obtained

Publicity created: Invitations conveyed via email to ELI, UD’s MA TESOL & Foreign Language Departments, as well as Consortium schools (UPenn, Drexel, etc)

g. Post-event evaluation to be conducted via Qualtrics survey

3. Faculty Planning Retreat May 16-17 2013

Will suggest theme –  to be addressed by April 15th

Keynote/presenter suggested –  by April 15th

D. Development of Individually Accessible Materials

1. Orientation Packet updated and distributed to new faculty – done

2. Completion of video library – still in process

3. Two new members on PDT – Amy Vazquez, Jack Crist – done

4. List of faculty presentations and publications obtained and added to the faculty website  – done

5. Professional Development Blog created and pioneered by TESOL attendees – done

6. Discussion of how to best re-implement “What Works” – Faculty meetings, Level meetings, electronically?  – yet to be accomplished

 

EAP Task Force Report, April 2013

Since the task force is an ad-hoc committee, it does not set an implementation plan. Here, then, is a report on our activity in our first year of existence.

  1. ELI student needs analysis: We conducted a survey of ELI students in levels IV and above. Almost 300 students (around 60% of the population) responded. We are continuing to analyze the data and apply it to our discussions, but some preliminary findings are attached below.
  2. UD student needs analysis: We are currently conducting a survey of matriculated international students at UD. At the time of writing, we have over 150 responses, and the survey will remain open for about another week. These results will give us a picture of students’ perceived needs.
  3. UD faculty needs analysis: The survey has just been distributed to UD faculty via department chairs. Together with the student survey, it will highlight skills, tasks, and areas for instruction in our EAP program.
  4. We have begun discussing possible program models and revisions to the EAP, including: course structure and requirements, entrance/exit testing (for which we will liaise with the Testing Committee), Bridge, and length of session. We are still at the brainstorming stage, so we are not able to make any specific recommendations at this time.
  5. Other universities’ EAP/CAP programs are being examined for ideas.

 

Goals for 2013-2014

  1. Complete and report on the needs analyses, including follow-up focus groups and interviews.
  2. Solicit feedback and suggestions for the EAP from ELI faculty.
  3. Make specific proposals to the administration and faculty for revision of the EAP program.

 

Respectfully submitted,

Nigel Caplan (Chair), Karen Asenavage, Kendra Bradecich, Ken Cranker, Scott Duarte, Russ Mason, Scott Stevens

4/16/13

 

Professional Development Taskforce

Nonie Bell, Chair, Ken Hyde, Julie Lopez, Nigel Caplan, Leslie Criston, Amy Vazquez, Jack Crist

 

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