Month: April 2024

Reimagining Post-Secondary Education with Bailey Cove

Karine Hamm (Sports Science Diploma Coordinator) and I met with Bailey Cove, a former student of Karine’s, to discuss her ideas on the topic of Reimagining Post-Secondary Education. Bailey has been volunteering since high-school, and provided this list of recent positions she has served in:

  • Douglas Students’ Union (DSU) Director of College Relations (1 year) 
  • Douglas College (DC) Board of Governors (1 year)
  • Douglas Students’ Union (DSU) Director of External Relations (1 year) 
  • DSU Budget and Operations Committee (member)
  • DSU Campus Life Working Group (member)
  • DSU/DC Joint Operations (member)
  • Douglas College Education Council College Board Liaison 
  • Douglas College Campus Planning Committee (member)
  • DSU Campaigns Working Group (Chair)

Bailey shared her thoughts on the student experience of post-secondary education from a highly-informed perspective. Enjoy listening to a discussion of what works, what needs improvement, and what new directions we can imagine.


Links

Bailey Cove on LinkedIn
Bailey Cove on DSU Board of Directors

A few references from the discussion:

The reGENERATE Ideas Challenge (PEAK-Buildings Certificate program students’ submission shortlisted as #16)

Quote from Neighbourhood Houses – Edited by Ming Chung Yan and Sean Lauer: “The community problem is generally considered to comprise the following problems of connection and engagement: the avoidance and superficial level of interaction, the living together at high densities as strangers, and the feeling of isolation while surrounded by others. This can lead to alienation and a social disconnection from the social world around us. As a form of social infrastructure focused on the development of relationships and social capacity, neighbourhood houses have the potential to contribute to the ideal of creating welcoming communities in cities and societies that are often less than welcoming and supportive for marginalized, racialized, and disadvantaged groups.”

Yuval Noah Harari on storytelling – “Homo sapiens is a storytelling animal that thinks in stories rather than in numbers or graphs, and believes that the universe itself works like a story, replete with heroes and villains, conflicts and resolutions, climaxes and happy endings. When we look for the meaning of life, we want a story that will explain what reality is all about and what my particular role is in the cosmic drama. This role makes me a part of something bigger than myself, and gives meaning to all my experiences and choices.”

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” Margaret Mead

“The Trouble with Normal” by Bruce Cockburn



“Mindfulness in a rapidly changing technological world” – May 15, 2024, 2-4pm

There has been a noticeable increase in the use of educational technology, especially since the entire College went online in March 2020. Now, with the ubiquitous presence of Artificial Intelligence, and all the effects on education, work, and our lives, it is important to claim our humanity.    

A workshop with Mitra Manesh, senior mindfulness educator at UCLA’s Mindful Awareness Research Center, with four decades of experience helping people of all ages and many different cultures live, love, and lead more consciously. Mitra has created self-coaching and professional coaching programs, and her clients range from individuals to institutions seeking balance. Some of her prior experience in Canada includes working as a Human Right Commissioner in Ontario and serving as a CBC commentator/panelist. Visit Mitra’s website for more information on her work.

The in-person workshop will be in the Indigenous Gathering Place (S4650) on Wednesday, May 15, from 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm.  

Please register via this link (Click on May 15 and then 2:00 and enter your relevant information).

Please add what you are hoping to get from this workshop and any questions you have regarding the topic to the registration form. 

Transformative Education Book Club – Learning that Matters: Chapter 7

A colour charcoal drawing of an open book with stems and leaves drawn on the open pages. There are a number of items you might find on a student desk.
Image created by Microsoft CoPilot with the prompt: Create an image of learning outcomes. Make it a simple color charcoal drawing
Written by Karine Hamm

Once a month, Nathan Hall (Educational Technology and Pedagogy Coordinator) hosts a book club to discuss and apply the content of the book: Learning that matters – a field guide to course design for transformative education by Zehnder, Metzker, Kleine and Alby. The book explores the idea that meaningful learning experiences don’t just happen-they have to be intentionally designed. These well-designed, innovative courses can have a lasting impact on student learning. Since you may not have the time to read the book this semester, or to join the group of inquisitive faculty for book club, I want to present a thing or two that you can try in your course, to design a more inclusive and meaningful learning experience.

Think about a learning experience that you still remember. I suspect it involved working on a project. Project-based learning is based on the notion that “The one who does the work, does the learning”. Projects thoroughly involve the learners in the process, but they also tend to be motivating perhaps because learners have agency on the topic and/or format. Another perk is that projects have a great potential for maximizing portable learning outcomes. Even from our perspective, project work is often more enjoyable to evaluate, increasing our own engagement in the task of marking. The advantages are further listed in this Chapter but based on my experience, Douglas College faculty are no strangers to projects and their benefits so I will focus on one section of this Chapter that may be new to some: strengths-focused projects.

Strength-focused projects is based on the notion that students solve problems more efficiently when taught to utilize their strengths to tackle a problem. Students find projects more meaningful when they are designed to foster reflection and develop their strengths. To apply this finding, you can use the ‘Values in Action (VIA)” website. Students complete a survey to find their five strongest strengths. In strength-focused projects, you would ask the students to either choose from their list or choose any of the strengths listed on the website to develop within the project. Ask your students to write about what it might look like to develop these strengths throughout the project. At the end of the project, students again reflect, noting how they used and developed that strength. With this priming, the project’s purpose and significance increases as the learners work on developing strength that will be useful elsewhere, while developing content knowledge. This quick exercise increases the likelihood that students will value the project and judge it to be worthwhile. Connecting student strengths to knowledge-based projects lead the way to exceptional projects.

Exceptional projects are generally authentic, collaborative and transparent, traits shared with connected assessments discussed in the previous post. Offering real-world problems to be solved by collaborative groups of students. Developing those collaborative skills while making the purpose and expectations of the project clear. These topics are beautifully described in Chapter 7 of the book and I encourage you to read further or join the Book Club meetings.

Transformative Education Book Club – Learning that Matters: Chapter 6

A colour charcoal drawing of an open book with stems and leaves drawn on the open pages. There are a number of items you might find on a student desk.
Image created by Microsoft CoPilot with the prompt: Create an image of learning outcomes. Make it a simple color charcoal drawing
Written by Karine Hamm

Once a month, Nathan Hall (Educational Technology and Pedagogy Coordinator) hosts a book club to discuss and apply the content of the book: Learning that matters – a field guide to course design for transformative education by Zehnder, Metzker, Kleine and Alby. The book explores the idea that meaningful learning experiences don’t just happen-they have to be intentionally designed. These well-designed, innovative courses can have a lasting impact on student learning. Since you may not have the time to read the book this semester, or to join the group of inquisitive faculty for book club, I want to present a thing or two that you can try in your course, to design a more inclusive and meaningful learning experience.

In Chapter 6, the authors reflect on the importance of connecting the assessments to course design. I challenge you to reflect on why assessments matter in your courses. Assessment matters to our institution (and our students) because course assessments are tied to grades and grades are used to evaluate and “sort” students. The authors define “assessment” as a tool used to make learning visible so as to inform your decision-making when assigning grades. Thoughtfully designed assessments can do more that determine grades, they have the potential to foster learning. The authors argue that for learning to be equitable and transformative, a significant number of assessments need to be designed to be connected and formative. Let’s define these words.

Connected assignments align with student learning outcomes and are designed to be transparent, holistic and affirming. You can imagine standardized tests as unconnected because the multiple-choice format is far removed from the learning experiences of the student. To create connected assignments, start by aligning them to the learning outcomes. If a learning outcome is to “compare and contrast”, a multiple-choice test would be a poorly aligned assessment because it would not allow students to compare and contrast. Second, design the assessment to be transparent for the students. Ensure that the students clearly understand the expectations, purpose and criteria for success associated with an assignment. Provide a marking rubric and perhaps a sample assignment from a previous student (with their permissions of course). Third, design the assessments to be holistic. Providing students with opportunities to express their learning in multiple ways helps reinforce learning for all students. Holistic connected assessments focus on more than just cognitive domains, they also include skills and dispositions. Remember the discussion on portable learning outcomes from a previous post? Lastly, you should aim to design assessments that are affirming to the learner. Instead of ending our relevant and authentic activities with a paper or a test, taking off points for errors and miscalculations, consider taking into account how you have ensured that students can show their learning. You can ask yourself “Have I ensured that students can demonstrate meeting the learning outcomes in multiple ways with plenty of room for improvement, feedback and support.”

Feedback is an important piece around connected assessment. It fosters learning by helping students modify their behaviour or actions. Formative assessments are great for this. You can provide feedback in anticipation of the ‘final’ assessment. Providing feedback is crucial for learning but it can sometimes make us feel overwhelmed. Especially in writing intensive courses. Although some feedback must come from you, here are other sources of feedback that can be great:

  1. Peers – but keep in mind that you will need to teach students how to give quality feedback.
  2. Self– the use of self-reflections can be powerful.
  3. Tech/Low-Tech –  use of flashcards, online quizzes or apps, can provide feedback on what students know and don’t know yet.

A truly connected approach to assessment is to co-design the assessment and evaluation strategy with your students. Consider inviting students into the conversations and ask they how they would like to demonstrate that they have achieved the learning outcomes. Consider providing feedback instead of grades early in the semester. Provide options for the ways students can demonstrate their learning and ask students to be involved in the development of the marking rubric.

This Chapter contained so much information and tips of developing an assessment plan, with a focus on connected assessments. Consider picking up the book and joining the book club for further discussion.