Professional Development

Faculty express their professional development needs and present them informally to the chairs and the Dean. For example, last year faculty members requested and received support to start using Moodle in their classes.  A wide variety of technological innovations are an integral part of the School of Education’s instruction. Since the last review a new tenure/track faculty has joined the SOE (Dr. Jessica Parker). She has worked with faculty to assist them in the critical analysis and selection of technological tools to enrich their teaching. This has resulted in a number of faculty developing and/or modifying existing courses that now introduce and utilize web based activities, such as wikispaces, voicethread, online discussions, and other tools. There are 21 tenure/tenure-track faculty including two FERP faculty (FERP = Faculty Early Retirement Program) and 23 teaching adjuncts. On the faculty survey, 39 or 87% of T/TT and teaching adjuncts responded positively to the survey question about how the professional development had improved their technology and teaching (Table 5.3.g).

The School of Education provides systematic and comprehensive opportunities for professional development of the faculty, through (1) Assigned Time for New Faculty, (2) Sabbatical Leave, (3) CSU Research Grants, (4) SOE Dean Support for Faculty Professional Development, Workshops, Seminars, Meetings, Retreats, and (5) Travel Reimbursement. Annually most faculty participate in the following professional development activities: on campus workshops, off campus conferences, technology support, SSU speakers, School meetings, Department meetings. For example the University currently offers many campus activities with a focus on diversity.