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The 2008 Faculty Development
Institute continues an increased effort to allow greater customization
and personalization of attendance options for spring and summer workshops.
This increased customization is in recognition of faculty research travel
commitments during summer. Specific times for personal project development
with lab assistant support are planned for all 2008 summer workshops.
Sessions of Tracks
C, D, E, L, M, N, O, S, W,and X will be offered in the end of January through March as an alternative
to summer attendance. Enrollment is limited in these spring offerings.
FDI
2008 Summer Workshop Track Descriptions
Note: Brief descriptions
of each track are provided below to help clarify the scope of each workshop's
objectives and prerequisites.
Track A - Computing for New Faculty (Summer Only)
This summer track is intended for faculty who were recently hired at Virginia Tech (within the last 12 months). This program will provide an overview of teaching, learning, and computing resources available to all faculty at our institution. A panel of exemplary faculty and scholars from multiple disciplines and at varying career stages and ranks will provide guidance and insight into working at Virginia Tech. Opportunities for interaction with these faculty as well as other new faculty hires will be hallmark activities within this workshop. In addition, optional afternoon break-out sessions covering topics of interest to new faculty will be offered. These will include teaching best practices as well as the most commonly needed computing skills, such as Blackboard, distance learning systems, and other tools.
Track B - Teaching with a Tablet PC to Engage Students in the Learning Process (Summer Only)
This summer-only track will familiarize faculty with tablet computing in instructional environments. Topics will include an exploration of the built in tablet/ink features within the Microsoft Office suite, the Tablet PC version of the Windows operating system, and a Tablet PC hardware overview. A variety of interactive, classroom-based software will also be explored, including Microsoft OneNote and DyKnow. Faculty currently using and teaching with Tablet PCs will be integral to the delivery of this track to ensure that technical skills are coupled with informed pedagogical practice. Faculty who select a Tablet PC as their computer of choice will find this track to be of exceptional value. Sessions will alternate between hands-on and faculty-led discussion.
Track C -
Using the Web for Instruction with Blackboard and Other Tools (Spring and Summer)
The summer iteration of this track will provide a broad overview of how the web can be utilized to enhance traditional course activities. This track is intended for faculty that are new to or have some experience utilizing Blackboard; however, extensive instructional use of the web is not a pre-requisite. Exemplary course environments will be examined, interactive teaching methods will be discussed, and best practices regarding the use of Blackboard and other tools will be provided. The most important new features in the latest version of Blackboard (version 7) will be shown, and faculty will gain in-depth, hands-on experience with Blackboard's question pool manager, enhanced discussion board, and other capabilities. Blackboard’s gradebook, in conjunction with Microsoft Excel, will also be explored. In addition to Blackboard 7, participants will learn how to use Macromedia Dreamweaver and Adobe Acrobat to create high quality web documents, both of which can be uploaded into Blackboard. Further, emerging technologies and instructional strategies will also be discussed. Faculty are encouraged to come to this track with a project in mind; time and one-on-one assistance will be provided for faculty so that they can develop their own course materials. Additionally, participants will be allowed to customize portions of the track to more accurately meet their technological and pedagogical needs.
Description and details for Spring Track C are located here.
Track D - New Strategies and Tools for Teaching with Technology (Spring and Summer)
This summer track is intended for the faculty member who is already using various technologies in his/her courses and would like to explore the latest tools, strategies, and methodologies that will enhance and extend his/her current practice. Topics will range from the theoretical (social networking, student culture and technology, learner-centered pedagogy, and more) to the practical (Scholar, ePortfolio, Daylert, concept mapping software, Second Life, student response systems ("clickers"), Dreamweaver, podcasting, and more). Given the emergent nature of Web 2.0 applications, it is likely that the summer iteration of this track will cover some topics that are not yet visible on the horizon. Hands-on experiences with emerging technologies, as well as opportunities for discussion concerning the functionality and pedagogical applicability of these tools, will be hallmarks of this track. Faculty speakers will also be an integral part of this track, ensuring that technical skills are coupled with informed pedagogical practice. Participants are encouraged to bring syllabi and other documents on which to work during this track.
Description and details for Spring Track D are located here.
Track E - Creating and Utilizing Media Content for Instruction (Spring Only)
Description and details for Spring Track E are located here.
Track F - Developing and Delivering Online Instruction at a Distance (Summer Only)
This track will focus on Institute for Distance and Distributed Learning (IDDL) course development, delivery considerations, and strategies for teaching distance learning courses via synchronous and asynchronous methods. Participants will have opportunities to use a variety of instructional tools and course development software that facilitate the process of delivering instruction at a distance. Topics within this track include test creation for distance learners; creating online presentations (PowerPoint as well as tutorials); using online meeting spaces for office hours, group meetings, and lectures; creating accessible multimedia; and assessing distance learning students. In addition to the hands-on sessions, participants will have the opportunity to meet with distance learning faculty of varying levels from a variety of disciplines.
Track G - Northern Virginia Track: New Strategies and Tools for Teaching with Technology (Fall-semester only in Falls Church, VA – September)
This track, intended for faculty at Virginia Tech's Northern Virginia Center, will provide a broad overview of how the web can be utilized to enhance traditional course activities. The most important new features in the latest version of Blackboard (version 7) will be shown, and faculty will gain in-depth, hands-on experience with Blackboard's question pool manager, enhanced discussion board, and other capabilities. Blackboard’s gradebook, in conjunction with Microsoft Excel, will also be explored. In addition to this focus on Blackboard, a complimentary focus on distance learning tools and emerging instructional technologies will be provided. Given the emergent nature of Web 2.0 applications, it is likely that this track will cover some topics that are not yet visible on the horizon; however, participants can expect to learn about Tablet PCs, podcasting, clickers, Second Life, and more. Discussion with a focus on the challenges of teaching with technology, often at a distance, will be a hallmark of this track.
Track H - Student Learning Outcomes: Identifying, Teaching, and Assessing What Matters Most (Summer Only)
This summer-only track, a collaboration between the Office of Academic Assessment and the Faculty Development Institute, will provide an overview of the process for assessing student learning outcomes for degree-granting programs. It is designed for individuals who will be working with their programs to develop and assess student learning outcomes as part of university and accreditation requirements. Participants will be provided the context for outcomes assessment at Virginia Tech, learn how to identify and write learning outcomes statements, discover ways to measure learning outcomes through student assignments already in place, and determine ways to improve programs based on the analysis of these program assessments. Specific topics will include using ePortfolios as a collection tool, developing rubrics for consistency in assessment, and effectively designing measures such as focus groups and surveys to gather data. Participants will also be introduced to WEAVEonline, an electronic assessment management system, now being used on campus. (NOTE: Much of the content of this workshop was presented in the series of workshops presented by the Office of Academic Assessment during the 2007-2008 academic year.)
Track I - Curriculum as Design: Constructing 21st Century Engineers (Summer Only)
Since 2000, faculty who educate engineers have grown increasingly familiar with the move toward incorporating professional skills in the technical curriculum. Motivated by ABET criteria, demand for ‘industry-ready’ graduates, and the economic necessity of globalized research and development, these faculty are redesigning ‘the engineer’ by redesigning assignments, classes, and even entire curricula. Our collective goal is now to educate engineering leaders who integrate technical competence with critical thinking, interdisciplinarity, global literacy, communication, and collaboration. But what does this lofty goal look like in the classroom? Instructional technologies, active learning, writing assignments, team projects, and more are now standard in the narrative of teaching and learning. But how can we best leverage these tools to embed complex critical thinking, and with it the full range of professional skills, into an exponentially increasing technical knowledge base? And how do we do so for students whose incoming skills and experiences are shifting dramatically in response to the technologies that dominate their social and professional worlds?
This summer-only track, a collaboration between FDI, the Virginia Tech Engineering Communication Center (VTECC), and faculty both inside and outside the College of Engineering, will re-introduce the idea of curriculum as design and help participants construct individually tailored assignments, activities, and teaching practices they can integrate into their classes. Instructors in the College of Engineering will review promising instructional technologies and pedagogical practices, then demonstrate how they are putting these tools to work to construct engineers able to meet the challenges of 21st century practice. Rather than focusing on a single technology or single teaching technique that may not fit every situation, we will explore ways to select, integrate, and combine these powerful tools to enhance the effectiveness of teaching and learning.
Track J - Fostering Student Engagement, Learning, and Development (Summer Only)
This summer-only track, a collaboration between FDI, the Center for Liberal Education (CLE), and the Center for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching (CEUT), will focus upon strategies and practices that have proven to increase students’ engagement and success throughout their post-secondary academic careers. Participants can expect to receive a packet of readings several weeks prior to this track that will provide background and a foundation for the forthcoming discussion and activities. Learner-centered curriculum design which fosters learning while instilling a sense of community will be a key area of focus. Applications of technology that support this development and engagement will be highlighted in practice. Participants can expect to leave this track equipped with strategies, tools, and a community of colleagues that will support their development of instructional practices designed for 21st century learners. Faculty and staff from FDI, CLE, and CEUT as well as key faculty from a variety of disciplines around Virginia Tech and beyond will facilitate track activities.
Track K - Community of Practice: A Development Opportunity for Instructors (Summer Only)
This summer-only track, a collaboration between FDI, the Center for Liberal Education (CLE), and the Center for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching (CEUT), is designed to specifically meet the professional development needs of instructors. Virginia Tech’s new “instructor career ladder” is designed to recognize and validate the work of instructors and reward their academic excellence. It is in this spirit that this track seeks to provide a development opportunity that will serve to further and support the career of instructors on our campus. It also aspires to offer an opportunity for instructors to interact with one another and develop an interdisciplinary community of practice. The majority of the instructional content of this track will focus on student engagement techniques which research has shown increase the likelihood of students’ success early in their post-secondary academic careers. Applications of technology that support this development and engagement will be highlighted in practice. In addition to this clear focus on pedagogy, additional topics that may be of value in the instructor ladder process will be provided. These will likely include advice on dossier development, action research, grant writing, and publishing. Participants in this track may wish to couple their summer FDI experience with participation in another spring or summer track. This is welcomed and encouraged. Faculty and staff from FDI, CLE, and CEUT as well as key faculty from a variety of disciplines around Virginia Tech and beyond will facilitate track activities.
Track L - Community of Practice: A Development Opportunity for Librarians (Spring Only)
Description and details for Spring Track L are located here.
Track M - Faculty Inquiry Group: Tablet PCs and the 21st Century University Student (Spring Only)
Description and details for Spring Track M are located here.
Track N - Faculty Inquiry Group: Learner-Centered Teaching and Technology (Spring Only)
Description and details for Spring Track N are located here.
Track O - Faculty Inquiry Group: The Art of the Question (Spring Only)
Description and details for Spring Track O are located here.
Track P - Statistics: Statistical Data Exploration, ANOVA, and Regression using JMP (Summer Only)
This hands-on summer track provides an introduction to SAS' JMP desktop statistical discovery software. An overview of JMP, its philosophy, and its extensive graphical data exploration capabilities will be at the heart of this track. Participants will learn how to perform exploratory data analysis (EDA) and discover natural patterns in data. Participants will also learn how to navigate through JMP's menus, dialogs, and results; manage data; save and present results in various formats; use decision trees in the EDA context, and obtain and interpret descriptive statistics. In addition to these introductory topics, participants will go on to learn how to use JMP for important statistical concepts and tests such as confidence intervals, t-tests, analysis of variance (ANOVA), linear regression, and analysis of covariance (ANCOVA). Interaction effects will also be reviewed, and a discussion regarding how to evaluate assumptions using JMP's extensive diagnostic capabilities will be included. While no knowledge of JMP is required prior to attending this track, it is recommended that those that sign up have some statistical training. Academic support staff and graduate teaching assistants may also participate with faculty as a 2-person project team.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Beginning October 1, 2006, Virginia Tech entered into a five-year license agreement with SAS that makes JMP available for free to all faculty and students. You can download it now from http://www.ita.vt.edu/Apps/WebObjects/SoftwareWeb.woa
Track Q - Advanced Statistics: Design and Analysis of Experiments using JMP (Summer Only - 2 Days)
This hands-on summer track will teach participants how to design and analyze experiments using SAS' JMP desktop statistical discovery software. While emphasizing the principles of experimental design, this track will demonstrate a variety of designs. Both classical designs and newer custom approaches to design will be covered. Specific designs taught during this track include randomized complete block design, randomized incomplete block design, split plot designs, full factorial designs, the 2k factorial design, full factorial screening designs, fractional factorial designs, and blocking with screening designs. Those with no experience with JMP will likely struggle during this track; however, those that attend the "Statistics: Statistical Data Exploration, ANOVA, and Regression using JMP" track will be well prepared for this more advanced track. Academic support staff and graduate teaching assistants may also participate with faculty as a 2-person project team.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Beginning October 1, 2006, Virginia Tech entered into a five-year license agreement with SAS that makes JMP available for free to all faculty and students. You can download it now from http://www.ita.vt.edu/Apps/WebObjects/SoftwareWeb.woa
Track R - Using LabVIEW (Summer Only)
This hands-on track will explore the fundamentals of building a robust test, measurement, and/or control system with LabVIEW and data acquisition and instrument control hardware. Participants will gain hands-on experience with LabVIEW and learn how its graphical development can help reduce development time and create flexible applications that easily integrate with thousands of I/O devices from hundreds of vendors, getting you to a solution faster. This track is designed for engineers, scientists, and technicians who build test, measurement, process monitoring and control, and/or research and analysis applications. Academic support staff and graduate teaching assistants may participate with faculty as a 2-person project team.
Track S - Life Cycle of a Sponsored Project: Research Administration (Spring Only)
Description and details for Spring Track S are located here.
Track T - The New Age of Interdisciplinary Projects: More Bang for the Buck (Summer Only)
(formerly: Merging Online Resources and Technologies to Jumpstart Your Research Agenda)
This summer-only track, a collaboration between the Office for the Vice President of Research and FDI, is designed for faculty members who wish to pursue ("new age") funding for research at Virginia Tech or pursue large multidisciplinary research projects. In recent years, sponsoring agencies have been looking for “more bang for the buck” and maximizing research dollars by soliciting for collaborative interdisciplinary research proposals. This track will focus on providing faculty with information that will enable them to understand the magnitude of managing the pre-award proposal development and post-award management process of large interdisciplinary projects. Participants will utilize tools and technologies, such as Scholar which support the development of collaborations across disciplines. These tools can assist faculty from the initial stages of searching for funding through the proposal development stage and beyond. Core topics within this track include finding funding through online resources; finding potential collaborators through the expertise database; using Scholar to assist in facilitating collaborations with colleagues at Virginia Tech and universities across the world; tracking your proposal milestones through Microsoft Project; managing the proposal submission process through electronic research administration (Grants.gov), and post-award project management.
The instruction within this track will be led by a variety of Office of Research faculty and staff. In addition to the aforementioned topics, participants will have many opportunities to meet and develop rapport with those at the university who provide support for the faculty in pursuit of sponsored projects.
Track U - Creating Database-driven Web Sites with PHP & MySQL (Summer Only)
This summer-only track will present the issues involved in creating "dynamic" database-driven web sites through a series of hands-on activities. These activities will enable participants to create dynamic web sites from materials provided during the workshop. Central concepts involved in creating dynamic web sites will be taught, and a discussion of web-based databases will be integral to this track. Applications and technologies that will be taught during this workshop will include Dreamweaver, PHP and MySQL. This track can be used as a companion to Tracks C and/or D, and academic support staff and graduate teaching assistants may participate with faculty as a 2-person project team.
Track V - Parallel Programming (Summer Only)
This summer-only track is designed to assist faculty in understanding how to develop parallel computing applications for use on large scale resources like Virginia Tech's supercomputing assets: System X, Inferno, Dante, etc. Parallel programming concepts will be central to this discussion, and participants should have an applications development background. Participants will learn the basics of the Message Passing Interface (MPI) for distributed memory systems as well as code optimization for Symmetric Multiprocessing (SMP) shared memory systems. Emphasis will be placed on numerical research applications in the computational science and engineering disciplines, but other disciplines are always welcome. Academic support staff and graduate teaching assistants may participate with faculty as a 2-person project team.
Track W - Visualization and Research Computing: Deep Media for Research and Education (Spring and Summer)
This summer track will introduce faculty to the production and deployment of Deep Media. "Deep Media" refers to interactive, 3D virtual spaces that may include "rich media" types such as images, sound, video, and animation. Beginning with an introduction and overview to Deep Media, participants in this track will learn the various ways Deep Media content can be delivered through the presentation of examples from a variety of disciplines. The pros and cons of Deep Media in research and education will also be outlined early in this track. From this introduction, participants will learn to use various tools which assist with 3D graphics publishing, modeling and animation. Visualization design techniques will be explored and will include an overview of recent research into human perception and cognition that informs design choices. An overview of the creation process of dynamic, scripted 3D environments, and immersive environments (e.g., stereoscopy, large screens, and CAVE technology) will conclude this track. Any media / computer-savvy faculty member will be able to be productive in this track; however, as it progresses, a knowledge of client-side (e.g., Java, ecmascript, etc.) and server-side (e.g., Perl and PHP) technologies will aid in understanding but are not required of all participants. Upon completing this track, participants will be able to plan and execute basic interactive visualization and 3D content production. Academic support staff and graduate teaching assistants may participate with faculty as a 2-person project team.
Description and details for Spring Track W are located here.
Track X - Independent Study / Project Development (Spring Only)
Description and details for Spring Track X are located here.
Track Y - LIKES (Living In the KnowlEdge Society) Preparation for Students: How to Enhance Your Courses, How to Participate in the Themed Core (Curriculum for Liberal Education Pathway) (Summer Only)
Students completing undergraduate degrees at Virginia Tech should be prepared, if they are interested, for Living In the KnowlEdge Society. The LIKES project has NSF support through 2009 to help promote this at VT, our 3 partner institutions, and eventually across the nation; the project will be sustainable afterward. Faculty interested in this theme should take this FDI track so they are part of a growing team of instructors involved in LIKES. VT graduates eventually will be able to claim completion of the LIKES program by taking 2 one-credit courses (e.g., 1st semester freshman year, 2nd semester sophomore year) and picking from the Curriculum for Liberal Education (aka the core) courses that support LIKES. Faculty can enhance their courses so they better support LIKES. This FDI track will help faculty engage in LIKES, and help expand the virtual LIKES community..
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