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Other
Institutional Cases l
Flashlight
Evaluation Handbook, Table of Contents
Melissa Pedone, Professor of Mathematics
Valencia Community College
Valencia Community
College is a large, multi-campus institution located in
Central Florida. In 1999, Valencia was awarded a Title V
grant designed to use technology to promote the development
of learning communities and improve learning outcomes.
Valencia became a member of the
TLT/Flashlight
Network to help support the investigation of the
effectiveness of technology-enhanced Title V pilot courses.
Since that time, the use of
Flashlight Online
to inform teaching and learning practices at Valencia has
expanded dramatically to include all areas of the
institution.
The following factors
have influenced the expansion of the use of Flashlight for
assessment, evaluation and the scholarship of teaching at
Valencia:
-
Five years of consistent, reliable promotion and use
through the Title V Faculty Development Program.
About 90 full-time and part-time faculty went through
the Title V program over the course of five years.
Valencia has almost 400 full-time faculty and another
600-700 part-time faculty in total at Valencia.
- The
strong desire of executive administration to create and
support a culture of assessment at the institution.
- An
introduction to Flashlight Online is included in the
orientation of all new faculty members. Faculty accounts
are established at their hiring dates.
-
Demonstration of a) the ability to assess learning and
b) the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning are
required parts of every faculty member’s pre-tenure
portfolio. Flashlight Online studies have been used
for both purposes.
Click here to see more about Valencia's tenure process.
-
Stipends are available for faculty who conduct
classroom research projects. Stipends for classroom
research projects range from $500-$1500 with most being
in the $1000 amount.
- The
Flashlight Local Administrator is part of the college
professional development team.
-
(Editor's note: Dr. Pedone also serves on many College
committees and often used surveys to gather data useful
for a committee; in the process, she demonstrated how to
gather the kinds of data that could help make better
decisions.)
Sample Studies:
-
Humanities Professor Roberta Vandermast has used
Flashlight in a number of classroom studies. Unhappy
with the written responses she received to the
open-ended questions on the final course evaluation,
Prof. Vandermast wondered if a different format would
produce better results. She used Flashlight Online to
administer the course evaluation online. She received
longer, more detailed student responses in the online
format than in the traditional paper-pencil form. She
was also so pleased with the convenience of the
Flashlight analysis that she added a mid-semester course
evaluation in Flashlight.
- Title
V Project Director Jackie DiMartino used Flashlight
Online to help evaluate the effectiveness of classroom
technology enhancements to the development of a sense of
community in the classroom. Students in the
technology-enhanced pilot courses reported feeling more
connected to other students in their pilot courses than
students in the control classrooms.
-
Nursing Professor Anita Kovalsky used Flashlight Online
to investigate student reactions to the introduction of
SIM MAN, a mannequin that simulated human health
conditions and responses, to their introductory nursing
courses. She wanted honest answers which were
facilitated by the anonymity Flashlight Online provides.
Students informed her how much they enjoyed working with
SIM MAN, but that they wanted more hands-on time with
him in smaller groups of students.
-
Valencia has recently updated its policy on traditional
office hours, now allowing faculty to elect to have some
of their office hours served online. Several faculty are
using Flashlight Online to survey their students to
determine whether virtual office hours would be
desirable, and if so, under what conditions.
Other
Institutional Cases l
Flashlight
Evaluation Handbook, Table of Contents
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