Gateway Academy

Building upon TBR’s success around the implementation of the co-requisite model, the System is expanding it’s focus this year to examining how gateway courses can be designed to further support the student’s successful academic progression in the first term. This academy will engage faculty in thinking about the importance of lighting the fire in the curriculum so students are actively engaged in the classroom and in their chosen area of study and future career. Specific breakout tracks for faculty in four focus areas will allow for networking and best practice sharing across TBR institutions. 

 

Campus teams (maximum of 10 attendees per institution) should primarily be comprised of faculty who are interested in leading their division and fellow faculty members in conversations that re-examine how gateway courses are taught in the first year. At least one campus administrative leader, either a division Dean or academic officer, should plan to attend with their faculty team. Teams will be asked to develop an action plan at the end of the Academy.

 

 

Details

When: Friday, October 2, 2020

Where: Virtual - Microsoft Teams (links below)

Tracks for the Academy are based on the following subject areas:

• English/Communications
• Humanities & Fine Arts: Art/Music/Philosophy
• Social/Behavioral Science: Psychology/Sociology/Economics/History
• Natural Sciences/Math

Agenda 

8:30-9 a.m.     Conference Check-In for Online Participation

9 a.m.             Welcome and Opening Remarks (Dr. Leming)

9:10 a.m.        Keynote Presentation from CCRC (Jenkins)

9:30 a.m.        Creating Glue to Cement Belonging & Emotional Safety in Your Course(Navarro)

10:30 a.m.     10-minute break

10:40 a.m.     Keynote continued (Navarro)

11:10 a.m.     LUNCH BREAK

12:30 p.m.     Afternoon Plenary: ATD Teaching Presentation (Iuzzini & Garth-McCullough)

2 p.m.            Breakout Rooms by Foci Area & Institutional Presentations

3 p.m.            Directions given in each breakout room regarding plans for them to convene in working groups to do plans; describe next steps in continuing work through spring to 2021Academy

 

Keynote Speakers

Davis Jenkins, Ph.D. is a senior research scholar at CCRC. He works with colleges and states across the country to find ways to improve educational and employment outcomes for students, particularly students of color and those from low-income families.

 

Together with Thomas Bailey and Shanna Smith Jaggars, he coauthored Redesigning America’s Community Colleges: A Clearer Path to Student Success (Harvard University Press, 2015), which has helped to catalyze the national “guided pathways” reform movement. Jenkins is currently leading research on the implementation of pathways reforms and their effects on student outcomes and college performance in 120 colleges nationally.

Jenkins is also leading research on improving bachelor’s outcomes for community college students and strengthening high school dual enrollment so it functions as an on-ramp to college. Recent publications from those lines of research include a report published with The Aspen Institute and the National Student Clearinghouse on transfer outcomes by institution and state; The Transfer Playbook, co-researched and coauthored with Josh Wyner and his team at The Aspen Institute; and a report on college outcomes for students who take dual enrollment courses through community colleges while in high school. Jenkins earned a PhD in public policy analysis from Carnegie Mellon University and a bachelor’s in religion from Princeton University.

 

Diego Navarro founded the Academy for College Excellence (ACE) in 2002 and is an Emeritus Professor at Cabrillo College after 16 years of teaching at this Hispanic-Serving community college. He helps colleges improve their teaching and learning through delivering professional development workshops, and supporting the redesign of courses to incorporate affective / non-cognitive approaches and embed 21st-century skills development. ACE has been studied extensively and replicated at numerous colleges. Navarro has been training faculty in affective learning approaches since 2006 when he was funded by the James Irvine Foundation and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation to replicate ACE. The experiential learning courses he developed have been taught both in classrooms and online. At WGU his affective course enrolls over 1,500 students per month and has served over 60,000 students. Navarro also developed the Five-day Experiential Learning Institute (FELI) to teach faculty how to employ non-cognitive learning exercises in their classrooms. Over 1,500 faculty and staff from more than 90 institutions have participated in these FELIs.

Navarro has served as a coach on the California Guided Pathways Project and received appointments as a Visiting Scholar at the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching at Stanford and the University of California, Santa Cruz. Diego received the prestigious American Association of Community College Trustees, William H. Meardy National Faculty Award in 2009 after receiving the Pacific Regional Award. Diego’s research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Carnegie Corporation of New York and other nationally-known funders.

Diego earned a graduate degree from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Business where he performed research with Rosabeth Moss Kanter and J Richard Hackman, has years of experience in social science research at Hewlett Packard Laboratories which he utilized in the design of ACE, and began higher education attending Pasadena City College.

 

 Jon Iuzzini is the Director of Teaching & Learning at Achieving the Dream. In this role he is responsible for managing programs and projects designed to build institutional capacity supporting intentional integration, professional development, and engagement of full-time and part-time faculty in fostering an inclusive, student-focused college culture.  He currently leads the Engaging Adjunct Faculty in the Student Success Movement Initiative and he collaborates with ATD colleagues on related teaching and learning initiatives that support and engage full-time and part-time faculty as change agents in their institutions.  

Prior to this appointment, Jon served as Coordinator of the Teaching & Creativity Center at Monroe Community College in Rochester, NY.  In this role, he led the collaborative work of faculty committees in designing and implementing professional development activities for full-time and adjunct faculty on each of MCC’s campuses.

Jon’s recent publications applied the theory of intersectionality to the work of faculty development and appeared in New Directions for Teaching & Learning and To Improve the Academy. He regularly facilitates workshops on inclusive educational development; inclusive leadership; and strengthening communication to enhance collaboration.

Jon has taught undergraduate psychology courses including introductory psychology, social psychology, and the psychology of stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination at Texas A&M University, Maryville College, and Hobart & William Smith Colleges.  A proud product of the New York City public schools, Jon earned his BA in Psychology at the University at Albany, State University of New York and his MS in Psychology at Texas A&M University.

 

Dr. Ruanda Garth-McCullough is Associate Director, Teaching and Learning at Achieving the Dream, Inc. In this role, Ruanda manages various programs and projects designed to build institutional capacity and student-focused college cultures. She collaborates with staff across the organization and sectors to support the strategic direction and implementation of teaching and learning services for the Network colleges’ student success agendas. 

 

Ruanda comes to ATD from the American Educational Research Association (AERA) where she managed centennial program initiatives that included a multi-city National lecture series that brought educational research to the forefront of pressing community issues. Prior to her role with AERA, she served as the interim Chief Academic Officer at Young Women’s Leadership Charter School in Chicago, Illinois where she directed the school’s academic turnaround efforts.  Before she joined the administration at the high school, Ruanda spent more than a decade at Loyola University Chicago’s School of Education, serving as a Professor in the Teaching and Learning Department. She taught graduate courses in curriculum development, classroom assessment, sociology of education, urban, and multicultural education and presented at national and international conferences on the importance of culturally relevant teaching and learning. She also founded SUCCEED Consulting, Inc. in 1999, where she evaluated educational programs that served public school students.

Ruanda earned a Ph.D. and M.A. in Education from the University of Chicago, and a B.A. in Psychology from Wesleyan University.