I think it would be helpful to see the actual items that make up the factors that are presented in the summary data. This would give us some specific weaknesses, and might guide our discussion. For example, are we talking about having fewer large lecture sections of first year courses, or are we talking about changing the way that large lecture classes are conducted? Of course the answer can be “both,” but seeing the items would help me focus on what could indeed be changed.  

Anecdotal feedback that I have received from students indicates that they are not being challenged by coursework in the first year. I don’t know if this is because gen ed forces them to be taking the same general coursework they completed in high school, or if the expectations are simply too low.

 Joanne

From: Teaching Breakfast List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Steve Perry
Sent: Thursday, April 02, 2009 10:17 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Follow-up to TB Group

Hi Jim and TBer’s,

Patty Francis and I appreciate the opportunity to share the NSSE data and talk about student engagement with the Teaching Breakfast  group. I have attached the NSSE presentation for anyone interested.

In addition,  there were some good questions about what institutions noted as having high levels of student engagement do. The following link should take anyone interested to three articles about the DEEP project.  Here is an excerpt from one describing DEEP (Documenting Effective Educational Practice). Researchers “spent almost two years immersing themselves in the daily work of twenty campuses. The institutions studied during the project are small, large, urban, rural, historically black, majority white, commuter and residential, highly selective, and not selective at all. Their common denominator is that they all have participated in the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) and have scored better than predicted across some or all of this survey’s five benchmarks of effective educational practice: level of academic challenge, active and collaborative learning, student interaction with faculty members, enriching educational experiences, and supportive campus environment. All twenty also enjoy a graduation rate that is higher than predicted after taking into account relevant student and institutional characteristics. The Project DEEP team, working through the NSSE Institute, used student engagement as a proxy for quality because engagement has been shown to be the best predictor of student success,

after controlling for past academic performance and preparation.”  (Kinzie, J., & Kuh, G. D. (2004). Going DEEP: Learning from campuses that share responsibility for student success. About Campus, 9 (5), 2)

http://nsse.iub.edu/html/pubs.cfm?search_keywords=DEEP&allyears=

Steve Perry

From: Teaching Breakfast List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Jim Greenberg
Sent: Thursday, April 02, 2009 8:34 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Apologies to TB Group

My apologies to Steve Perry and to the Teaching Breakfast group for missing today’s get together.  Can someone let me know how it went (or didn’t go).  

:-(

My bad.

Mr. James B. Greenberg
Director Teaching, Learning and Technology Center
Milne Library
SUNY College at Oneonta
Oneonta, New York 13820

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