or AS LRU Pr » » VOLUME XII, NUMBER 26 t INNOVATION ABSTRACTS PUBLISHED BY THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR STAFF AND ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, THE UNIVERSITY OF aes ree WITH SUPPORT FROM THE W. K. KELLOGG FOUNDATION AND THE SID W. RICHARDSON FOUNDATION Distinguished Teachers Receive Support for Special Projects As the coordinator of faculty development at Colum- bus State Community College, I coordinate the Distin- guished Teaching Award program. We annually honor as many as four distinguished teachers, primarily student-nominated. They are awarded $1000, a framed certificate, and a medallion. They are offered the opportunity of attending a teaching excellence confer- ence, such as NISOD or a Great Teacher Seminar. In return, we ask them to help select the next year’s award recipients (by performing classroom observations) and to consult with other faculty upon request. And, unique to our college, these Distinguished Teachers may conduct a project that is of interest to them and serves the entire college. In the past three years, Distinguished Teacher projects have included training and assistance in writing computer simulations; researching “questioning that promotes critical thinking” and conducting a faculty workshop; observing classes to determine factors affecting collaborative learning; developing and coordinating a voluntary faculty mentoring program, developing a faculty advising manual; and conducting classroom research. In addition to the obvious benefits of such projects to the college, the faculty who complete them have been energized and revitalized. They have made collegial contacts that otherwise would not have been made and have gained many new perspectives from those teach- ing in different subject areas and divisions. One of our Distinguished Teachers describes her project. SCC CE Investigating Teaching Styles Determining a focus for my Distinguished Teaching project proved to be easier than I had expected. Fora long time, I had recognized a personal need to know more about other departments and divisions at Colum- bus State in the areas of teaching styles, effective learning settings, and both “old” and “new” ideas for working with students. The college encouraged me to e develop this need (and curiosity) into a project which New allowed me to make classroom observations in every academic department on campus over a period of four months during the spring and summer quarters, 1989. First, the purpose and rationale for the project was communicated to faculty and chairpersons within the 22 departments on campus. | included the following information in a memo: 1. The primary purpose of this project is to develop and facilitate cross-campus awareness of teaching tech- niques among faculty. It is my perception that faculty in different divisions (and, to some extent, within divisions) are not sharing their teaching expertise and experiences. 2. A second purpose is to generate a list of faculty and the teaching technique(s) they utilize which can be used as a resource guide by others. I know that we have excellent educators at Columbus State, but I think we fail to access the available in-house re- sources. 3. An additional purpose is to create a mechanism for “tooting the horn” of our faculty, who are actively trying new ways of challenging students, continually updating and refining existing skills and techniques. Everyone wants to be recognized. This project at- tempts to create an additional channel for such recognition and attention. In addition, I felt it important that fellow faculty members be secure with my presence in their class- rooms and not feel pressured by the observations. Therefore, the memo also specified the following: 1. I will consider the observations a privilege granted by one faculty member to another. There will be no attempt to evaluate or judge any of the faculty members observed. 2. My preference is that faculty members volunteer to be observed and choose the class session to be observed. 3. Iam also willing to talk with other faculty about techniques and methods which cannot be observed directly. Although I would strongly prefer to see faculty in action, I am aware that this may not be possible in all cases. EDB 348, Austin, Texas 78712 THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR STAFF AND ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT (NISOD) Community College Leadership Program, The University of Texas at Austin —