LEARN Center Workshops 2007-2008

Tuesday, 20 November, 2007
12:30pm - 1:30pm (Lunch Provided)
Library 2254

• Did you ever wonder why some students take their tests in a special setting (and whether or why that is necessary or appropriate)?
• Do you want to know more about the accommodation process at UW-Whitewater?
• Do you wonder what the research says about appropriate accommodations?

This lunchtime workshop will begin to answer those questions and explain the concept of "universal design." The workshop will be led by Tim O'Connor and Elizabeth Watson.

Tim O'Connor, Senior Student Services Coordinator of Testing and Evaluation Services at UW-Madison, has over 18 years of experience working with testing and evaluation both academic and standardized testing. Tim also has extensive experience working with students with disabilities.

Elizabeth Watson is the Director of the UW-Whitewater Center for Students with Disabilities and has over 20 years experience working with individuals and persons with disabilities. She is also an adjunct faculty in the Counseling Psychology Department at UW-Madison.

Email LEARN@uww.edu or call X5242 to reserve a lunch.

Tuesday, 18 October, 2007
12:30pm - 1:30pm (Lunch Provided)
Library 2254

This luncheon workshop is designed especially for senior faculty and considers issues of particular relevance to those in their last decade or so on campus.

A panel of seasoned faculty will lead us in an exploration of the following questions:

1. What issues and challenges are particularly salient for faculty and staff toward the end of their careers? That is, what potential problems are senior faculty likely to face?
2. What strategies help faculty cope with or transcend these challenges?
3. What are potential joys and benefits of being in late career? That is, how can one thrive in late career?
4. Lastly, what can or should the institution do to assist faculty in their last decade on campus?

Email LEARN@uww.edu or call X5242 to reserve a lunch.

Tuesday, 28 August, 2007
9:00am - 3:00pm (Lunch Provided)
Upham 142

Each September, this university enrolls 1800+ first-year students. About three-quarters of these students will return for a second year. This workshop will examine what UW-W does to teach, mentor, and engage new students in the classroom and campus.

Over the past two decades, the attention that colleges and universities including UW-Whitewater have paid to the first-year experience has grown exponentially.

Questions emerge:

• Are we doing what really matters in our classrooms, curriculum, and programs to engage first-year students in the educational experiences that lead to success?
• What evidence do we have about the effectiveness of our current efforts?
• How might we move forward to improve or expand what we do with first-year students?

Join colleagues from across campus in this timely and thought-provoking examination of how we teach, mentor, and support our first-year students. This hands-on workshop will feature presentations by UW-W faculty and staff who will share their expertise experiences and data from their work with the New Student Seminar, Peer Mentor, and Learning Communities programs. And at the conclusion of the workshop, participants will have the opportunity to help plan new campus initiatives aimed at enhancing first-year students' academic expectations and engagement.

Session Leaders: Liz Hachten, Interim Assistant Dean, College of Letters and Sciences, and Associate Professor, History Department; Diana Rogers-Adkinson, Director, UW-W Learning Communities Program, Chair and Professor, Special Education Department; Kim Moistner-Bartlett, Asst. Dean of New Student Programs/First Year Experience.

email LEARN@uww.edu or call X5242 to reserve a lunch.

Thursday, 30 August, 2007
8:45am - 10:00am (Breakfast Provided)
McGraw 125

For more than ten years, postsecondary leaders and faculty development professionals have steadily promoted a shift from an "Instruction Paradigm" to a "Learning Paradigm." This shift has moved the emphasis away from what is taught to what students learn, understand, or discover.

This participatory workshop will focus on commonalities between exemplary teaching and successful strategies for promoting student learning. Attendees will examine the many challenges that make it difficult to shift from a focus on teaching to a focus on learning. Strategies for making the shift will also be examined.

Facilitator: Jim Winship, Associate Professor of Social Work, and former Director of the UW-W Teaching Enhancement Center

Thursday, 30 August, 2007
8:45am - 10:00am (Breakfast Provided)
McGraw 121

This workshop provides vital information that will increase your chances of writing and submitting successful grants. Topics include intramural grant opportunities (sponsored by UW-Whitewater, UW System, and UW-Extension), services offered by the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs, and strategies for identifying and competing for grant funding.

Participants will learn to set and determine funding priorities, comprehend the diversity of intramural and extramural funding opportunities, research and identify potential funding sources, initiate contact with funding agencies, and develop strategic planning skills to improve grant seeking and grant writing skills.

Facilitator: Denise Ehlen, Director, Office of Research and Sponsored Programs

Thursday, 30 August, 2007
10:15am - 11:30am
McGraw 121

In this engaging, hands-on session, the facilitator will share an informal assessment technique that offers faculty a way to verify students' class preparation in a format that promotes learning. Attendees will participate in a hands-on demonstration of the IF-AT scratch-off multiple-choice testing technique. IF-AT is short for Immediate Feedback Assessment Technique; also "If at first you don't succeed."

It has several pedagogical advantages over standard multiple-choice testing procedures and, unlike an instant lottery ticket, the instructor can't lose.

Facilitator: Linda Reid, Associate Professor, Finance and Business Law Department

Thursday, 30 August, 2007
10:15am - 11:30am
Library BI Lab L2211

A natural by-product of the marked increase in student plagiarism is an increase in faculty anxiety. "The first reaction," notes Wilfried Decoo in Crisis on campus: Confronting academic misconduct (2002, Cambridge: MIT Press), "is often bewilderment, anger, or fear."

This hands-on workshop will introduce attendees to a new service sponsored by the University Library: a wiki restricted to UW-W faculty and staff, providing a platform for you and your colleagues to share your experiences and knowledge with other faculty via the wiki on topics such as designing plagiarism-resistant assignments, creating exams for online courses, and working with parents. Attendees of this workshop will learn how to:

• access the Academic Misconduct Wiki; and

• post questions and comments to the wiki directed to other faculty and teaching staff about academic misconduct matters.

Facilitator: Ronna Hoeper, Reference/Instruction Librarian, University Library