English Department Projects at Skyline College

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English Department Project Brainstorm—Spring 2017:
This is a brainstorm from the English Department faculty of the projects-issues they would like to focus on (can also be downloaded in .doc and .pdf):

ADJUNCT & NEW FACULTY: --Preparing for Skyline: Help our part-timers with getting information/direction for their classes, such as a special L.A. orientation, active mentoring and reaching out to them to ascertain their needs. Make it clearer who they can ask for help, sharing data of who our students are (Institutional Effectiveness Committee has data that is helpful) and how best to shape policies to fit the needs/challenges of our students. Introduce all new faculty to the Rhetoric as well as support services like Psych Services, Sparkpoint, the Library, Tutoring. --Office space: Find better office space for PT teachers like they do at CSM. There is some office space at Pac Heights but no heating, no printer, no furniture, isolated and Pac Heights is going away soon. --Departmental support: Increasing tools for best practices and culturally relevant pedagogy. Having FTers facilitate a series of 30-60 minute workshops (address issues such as class pacing, scaffolding, basics of starting and ask adjunct topics they would like addressed). Deeping our mentoring between FT and PT faculty. Offering a way in which PTers can request FTers to informally sit in on classes to observe and offer helpful feedback. Offering an orientation on the different English classes and their pathways and providing information on Learning Communities: how do they work? Do they work? How can students get involved? --Connecting: Create recurring and personal contact between FT mentors and PT mentees. Create opportunities for faculty to work together to team-build curriculum. Create monthly opportunities for adjunct to meet. Following up mass department emails with individual ones.	COLLABORATING: --Threshold concepts: Looking at how we might address those skills that are perennially difficult for students to wrap their minds around (skills like main ideas, thesis writing, "analysis," etc.) in order to share approaches and hone in on specific difficulties in translation. --Commenting on essays: discuss how we can streamline and make more effective and consistent how we comment on student essays. Issues to consider: marginal and in-essay comments versus end notes, effectively using the departmental rubric, tips on grading faster, best practices in commenting, getting tutor support in the drafting stages. --Student engagement strategies: Sharing and developing student engagement activities and strategies in the classroom and strategies for dealing with diverse skills sets as well as cultural differences in learning. How to most effectively teach millennials; to meet students where they truly are; to set up clear standards, expectations, and how to teach students to react to/learn from failure. Understanding-addressing student alienation. Deciding what pedagogies to use for changing student populations; combating the vestige of "No-Child Left Behind" and "Common Core"; understanding Umoja Principles in our curriculum. --Prompt writing-Essay design: How to write good prompts, how to test them, how to teach students how to break them down. Bring our prompts to a meeting, break off into groups and exchange and talk about prompts. Also, weighting essays later in the semester more—give students hope and a fighting chance for their improvement-effort to count. --How to begin a class: Discuss and create “How to begin a class” reflective practices. Some of us start too advanced. Students need a chance to get comfortable. Best practices to “start” and help ensure retention and making students feel comfortable and invested. --Norming: Working together more regularly with a shared set of essays to discuss grading approaches, appropriate grades to assign, creating-maintaining consistency in grading. --Creating shared department philosophies on important issues: Hiring committees (how to seek out more diverse candidates); appropriate workloads; creating an Honors component in Learning Communities and other methods to increase diversity in and access to our honors courses. Using the approaches of course themes (with all thematically connected texts) and the department commitment to social justice.	ENGLISH COURSES: --Literature courses: Find ways to enhance/increase our literature classes, promote them well for more enrollment and support them even when they don't have enough students. Offering black Literature during the Fall and Spring and bringing back Lit 225. --Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs): It's time to address our SLO's, as the curriculum committee has already asked us to rethink the 846 SLOs (and we didn't!). I know that we've been developing new SLO's for 105 in our community of practice, so it might be time to do this across the board. --Course requirements: Rethink some of the "requirements" for some of our courses, including things like mandatory timed writing, teaching "literary criticism" terminology (Marxism, Psychoanalysis, etc.). So, in short, in might be time to systematically review the CORs. --Supplemental Instruction (S.I.): expand S.I. support (currently S.I.s only in 5 classes) ideally to all 828, 846 and 100 sections. Design SI training more specifically to fit our student population. Consider setting up an S.I. intern program offering credit instead of money. --Connecting students to campus resources: In the syllabus and/or through class visits/tours, extra credit, connecting students to the Learning Center, and other support services like Psych Services, financial support, workshops that help them with time management, life struggles, etc. --Prepare for Program Review Fall 2018-Spring 2019: Review-revise English and Literature course outlines and submit to the Curriculum Committee. Clarify stages and timelines for Program Review. --English Placement: The following was requested by our counselors: (1) On the English website, create ONE questionnaire (as opposed to different sets of questions for each level) that students can easily take with a counselor that suggests a clear placement; (2) Create a side by side comparison detailing the difference between Engl 100 and Engl 105 (like we have for 828 v. 846 and 846 v. 105); (3) Offer at least one Engl 828 option; (4) Create a formal process to track students who self-place into a higher level of English than their suggested placement and create a consistent process as some students are blocked by Websmart when they try to self-place; (5) Provide a clear guide for counselors on the English website which English courses are accelerated each semester.
ENGLISH RESOURCES: --Rhetoric: Expanding the instruction, paper models, etc. for the literature section in the Rhetoric: Chapter 12. --Collection of model papers: Put together an online collection of A-quality papers for each of our English classes to help students, new faculty, and tutors in the Learning Center have a clearer sense of standards and expectations as well as the differences between the different English classes. --CTTL: Reserve space in the CTTL to run English focused workshops. Design professional development that is on-going rather than “one and done.” Design follow up to instructional workshops to reflect on effectiveness, value of the activities. --Reading Apprenticeship (R.A.): Share the materials and effective practices from those trained in R.A. so all English faculty can integrate the strategies into their curriculum. Create workshops for students focused on R.A. concepts and strategies. --Sharing materials: Create an online share-space linked to the English homepage where faculty can upload relevant articles, materials from conferences, etc. they would like to share with their colleagues. --Teaching materials: Example syllabi, assignment sheets, rubrics, lesson plans, etc.	THE LEARNING CENTER: --Increase visibility of TLC: Connect new faculty to the TLC and explain how to enroll students; how to connect use of TLC with extra credit; actively destigmatizing tutoring; make tour/class visit sign-ups easy, consistent and early on; add TLC information to every English syllabus; more advertising in the form of bookmarks, flyers in mailboxes, emails. --Tutoring: Revisit ways to make tutoring free again or better advertise to students and faculty that peer tutoring is free and how to enroll. English can more actively recruit their outstanding students for peer tutoring and guide them towards LSKL 110, the tutor training course they can take over a semester or in a shorter summer hybrid course. --Strengthen TLC-English connections: Make regular meetings with English faculty and WRL tutors to discuss tutoring challenges, session priorities, English department values, writing prompts (use March flex days?). Revisit past practice of including English faculty tutoring in TLC as part of their teaching loads. Help the TLC advocate for increased budget for more WRL-ESOL graduate and peer tutors; create a repository of current English papers prompts tutors can access and use while tutoring; introduce English faculty to the Directed-Learning-Activities in the TLC they can supplement their instruction with. --Workshops: Return to regular sign-ups for English teachers to teach workshops in TLC. Assist Jarrod and Christina as they pilot a series of composition-related workshops they will co-design and co-teach for spring.	ONLINE TEACHING—CANVAS: --Schedule regular meetings for online faculty to interact: either once a semester or yearly, have a meeting with the online English faculty—Skype and in person, and include campus Canvas experts to discuss concerns and best practices. Other suggested meeting topics: cultural-bias in online classroom design, retention and high online drop rates, feedback on each other’s classes, discuss current published articles on online teaching, discuss how we tailor what we are doing with each student based on background and preparedness. --Create a short course to prepare students for learning online: how to be a good online student, self-motivation that is needed, self-assessment if online is best for you, actively communicating with your professor, how to utilize resources; could be 2 week mini-course for credit taught by an instructor with readings, quizzes, etc. --Proposed changes to Canvas: allow threaded discussions, allow more than one due date in forums for posts and reactions, ask online teachers to first test and vet new online software, for quizzes, make the instructions visible before the quiz open date, allow a means for teachers to log in as a student so they can see an accurate student view.

Project Teams for Spring 2017:
Grouping the ideas from the brainstorm, we formed teams to focus on the work:

Teams, members and possible projects	Activities	Accomplishments
Team Adjunct & Colleague Connections: Members: Denise, Jarrod, Rob, John, Andrew, Lucia, Nathan, Nina and Rachel Create an English-focused orientation for adjunct (currently Dean meets with new adjunct for 1.5 hours with a sheet of policies, links, philosophies with a one hour one-on-one follow up later and Dean asks about mentor connections); make mentoring more active, on-going; secure better-consistent office space for adjunct (response from Dean—bldg 1 going offline for Fall 2017 and all moving to Pac Heights so we are losing all classroom and adjunct space there. Talks about creating a “bullpen” on 3^rd floor of bldg. 8 but a mix with English and Business; TLC has designated adjunct space); design on-going workshops to support English adjunct; create an inviting and informal system of class observations; create opportunities to team-build curriculum; meaningfully connect adjunct to campus-department resources; improve-expand teaching resources (expand literature chapter in Rhetoric, create a collection of model papers for each level of English, share best practices from Reading Apprenticeship, create online share-space for faculty to upload relevant articles, materials from conferences, as well as syllabi, assignments, lesson plans); create an Adjunct Appreciation Day potluck (Canada does this) or off-campus lunch.	(1) Email sent on 2/7 to all group members with a Doodle poll link to select a spring meeting date: http://doodle.com/poll/q74ug35ga7c8p8gw (2) Email sent to group 2/13 proposing 2 potential meeting dates: Tues, March 21^st 3-4pm OR Weds, March 22^nd 3-4pm. Date selected and Outlook invite sent 2/15. (3) Email sent to group on 3/21 with meeting notes and 2 options for the next meeting to set up the outline/structure for the English orientation: Tues, April 18^th 2:30-4pm or Tues, May 2^nd 2:30-4pm	(1) Held meeting on Tues, March 21^st 3-4pm in 8116. Attended: Rachel, Nathan, John, Denise, Jarrod, Rob, Lucia. The group set up 5 tasks they would like to focus on as stated in the notes: Meeting notes on 3-21-17. Sent follow-up email with a 2-fold approach. (2) Met with Mary on 3-30-17. She asked to broaden the proposed English Canvas space to include the whole Division. I completed the new Language Arts Canvas space on 4/7/17 and am inviting in the whole division on 4/12/17. To build the Orientation piece, Mary asked us to also broaden that to include the whole Division and she suggested we contact Erin Strauss (for ESOL), Luciana Castro & Nels Lanbauer (foreign languages), Jessica Hurless & Nina Kotelyan (Communication Studies) and Chris Gibson (Engl 105 training concepts could be incorporated into the English orientation). Mary asked at our next meeting on 5/2, to create a summer hours/cost proposal for the Orientation work (number of people? Hours?). (3) Met on Tues, May 2^nd 2:30-4pm in 8116 to set up the outline/structure for the Orientations. Agenda for 5-2-17 Meeting and Notes from 5-2 Meeting. Cost proposals and invite email to other departments. (4) On 4/27/17, Mary asked me to Chair a new committee to hire English adjunct for our pool and for the Summer Scholars 5-week program, for summer and for fall. She also asked Rob and Nathan to join the committee. Sent an email on 4/27/17 to all English faculty asking them to send on potential candidates. Meeting set to select/schedule candidates and confirm interview questions on Tues, May 16^th 2-3pm in 8116.
Team Learning Center Connection: English Members: Jarrod, Kathleen, Michael, Andrew, Susan, Nina and Rachel (Lucia, Jim & Denise-email) TLC Members: David, Jessica B, Christina, Raymond Increase visibility-use of TLC and WRL (tours, class visits, advertising, incorporating TLC in syllabi); collaborate with writing tutors (perhaps 3/8 Flex afternoon meeting with tutors and English faculty); recruiting good student tutors; strengthening Supplemental Instruction (S.I.)—connect with current S.I trainer Timurhan Vengco vengcot@smccd.edu (650) 738-7084; re-instituting English faculty tutoring as part of their teaching loads (feedback from Dean: this was discontinued by the last VPI because of the high cost of using faculty as tutors; maybe leverage faculty to be more productive—outline the vision); help TLC advocate for expanding tutoring budget; recruit more English faculty to teach writing-reading workshops. Setting up standing meetings for Flex during spring and fall for WRL tutors and English tutors to collaborate; inviting English faculty to discipline specific tutor training a week before school starts each semester.	(1) 2/7 email exchanges with TLC to confirm a date for a Writing Tutors-English Faculty Collaborative Meeting on Flex day: March 8^th in the afternoon. Chanel confirming date/time this week or early next. Followed up with a 2/13 email to Chanel to check on this date. (2) Email sent on 2/7 to all group members and TLC staff with a Doodle poll link to select a spring meeting date: http://doodle.com/poll/q74ug35ga7c8p8gw (3) Kathleen got discussions going via email with Mary, Pearl and David about reinstating English faculty tutoring in the WRL. All responses so far positive but need to fine-tune details. (4) Email sent to group 2/13 proposing 2 potential meeting dates: Tues, Feb 28th 3-4pm OR Tues, March 28^th 3-4pm. (5) 2/28 meeting scheduled to plan 3/8 flex event. Email sent on 2/17 inviting whole TLC Connection group to attend or send ideas for the meeting. (6) On 2/28, sent an invite to the TLC to all the upcoming English meetings in case WRL staff/tutors would like to attend.	(1) Held meeting on Tues, February 28^th 3-4pm in TLC to plan the Writing Tutors-English Faculty Collaborative Meeting for 3/8 with David, Jarrod, Rachel, Christina, Raymond, Michael and Chanel. At the meeting we created the Agenda for the Writing Tutors-English Faculty Collaborative Meeting. A flyer was also created for the 3/3 English meeting advertising the event and asking for prompts. (2) Confirmed and booked Flex Day afternoon, March 8^th 2-3:30pm in the Learning Center for the Writing Tutors-English Faculty Collaborative Meeting. Outlook invite sent to English faculty 2/14. On 3/10, shared Flex notes with the English Department: Notes from Flex Session on 3/8 (3) Held spring meeting date on Tues, March 28^th 3-4pm in 5100. Attendees: Andrew, Jarrod, Rachel, Christine, Raymond. Notes from 3-28 Meeting. (4) On 4/14/17, David Reed sent the English Department 3 items: a Success Team Syllabus template for English 846, a Success Team Syllabus template for English 100, and 40 Things You Can Do to Retain Students.
Team English Course Outlines: Members: Kathleen, Liza, Jim, Chris and Rachel (Denise-email) Follow through on the Curriculum Committee’s request that we revise our English SLOs; enhance/increase literature course offerings and recruitment (Dean suggestion: target English majors more directly); rethink-review course outline requirements (i.e. timed writing, teaching literary criticism); prepare for English Program Review: officially begins Fall 2018.	(1) Email sent on 2/7 to all group members with a Doodle poll link to select a spring meeting date: http://doodle.com/poll/q74ug35ga7c8p8gw (2) Email sent to group 2/13 proposing we meet on Weds, March 29^th 3-4pm OR Thurs, March 30^th 3-4pm. These dates didn’t work for the group. (3) Email sent to group 2/15 proposing meeting dates of Tues Feb 28^th 2-3pm OR Weds March 22^nd 3-4pm. (4) Information to consider from the 2/28 meeting: The latest Science Fiction Literature course can be looked at to form a working model template for the Lit. Courses. In regards to Lit. offerings and recruitment: the Lit courses that are not taught every 3 years are banked. There are required Lit. classes for the English majors (American Lit 1 & 2, English Lit 1 & 2, World Lit) and the other courses are electives that we would need to recruit for to fill. (5) As follow-up to 2/28 meeting: Rachel will send out Doodle Polls to set up 2 course outlines meetings (Lit and Core Courses). Meeting purpose: to create a “model template” with a bullet-list approach of course contents with parallel SLOs based on level/content. Then we can plug the content of all English and Lit. course outlines to fit this model to create clarity and consistency. Once we complete this work, we can pass it through the Curriculum Committee before English Program Review in Fall 2018.	(1) Meeting scheduled for Tues, February 28^th 2-3pm in 8116. Outlook invite sent 2/19. Attended: Rachel, Kathleen, Chris, Liza (2) We decided at 2/28 meeting to create two sub-groups: one focused on Literature course outlines (with members Liza, Anna, Rachel, Kathleen and inviting others). For models, we can use recent Lit courses: LIT 277 and LIT 156. And we can create a second group focused on Core course outlines (with Chris, Rachel, Kathleen and inviting others) to schedule one spring meeting (late April/early May). Be sure to stay focused on CID requirements: https://c-id.net/descriptors.html. (3) Kathleen, Mary and Rachel had a meeting on 3/14 at 3:30-4pm in 8112 to ask Mary questions that came from the 2/28 meeting. March 14^th Meeting notes (4) Rachel, Chris, Liza and Kathleen created course templates fro the Core English courses and for the Literature courses.
Team Streamlining English Placement: Members: Chris, Michael, Lucia, Kathleen and Rachel (Denise-email) The following was requested by our counselors: (1) On the English website, create ONE questionnaire (as opposed to different sets of questions for each level) that students can easily take with a counselor that suggests a clear placement; (2) Create a side by side comparison detailing the difference between Engl 100 and Engl 105 (like we have for 828 v. 846 and 846 v. 105); (3) Offer at least one Engl 828 option; (4) Create a formal process to track students (through Banner codes?) who self-place into a higher level of English than their suggested placement and create a consistent process as some students placing in 828 are blocked by Websmart when they try to self-place into 846; (5) Provide a clear guide for counselors on the English website which English courses are accelerated each semester.	(1) Email sent on 2/7 to all group members with a Doodle poll link to select a spring meeting date: http://doodle.com/poll/q74ug35ga7c8p8gw (2) Email sent 2/8 to group to start work on the counselors request for: “Create a clear comparison detailing the difference between Engl 100 and Engl 105 (like we have for 828 v. 846 and 846 v. 105)” (3) Through emails with the group and with Jacquie Escobar, we created a revision of the Engl 100 vs. 105 descriptions. (4) Email sent to Connor Fitzpatrick 2/8 to find out how we can upload the revisions (once approved by group and counseling) to Engl 100 vs. 105 page: http://www.skylinecollege.edu/english/100vs105.php (5) Email sent 2/28 to Chris, Michael, Lucia and Kathleen asking about the following: (A) Can we take the current questions we use for placement and create one placement tool for counselors we can link to the English Department page under “Track Placement”? http://www.skylinecollege.edu/english/index.phpc (B) Can we address the other questions from the counselors?	(1) Revised and updated the description and distinctions between English 100 vs. 105 on the English Department website: http://www.skylinecollege.edu/english/100vs105.php (2) Held meeting on Weds, March 1^st 2-3:30pm in 8116 to address the counselor’s questions and we created one joint online placement questionnaire to guide students and counselor’s in English course placement. Attendees: Rachel, Chris, Michael, Lucia. Next steps, set up a meeting with Dean, counselors and web-designer to answer follow-up questions and to get the new survey revised and instituted. (3) On 3/9, Connor set up a draft placement survey using the placement questions the committee created: https://surveys.smccd.edu/n/zz1sh.aspx and Jacqui Escobar and Mary Gutierrez sent the committee some feedback. (4) met on Tues, April 11^th 2-3:30pm in 8116 to revise and finalize the placement tool. We revised the survey and set the scoring parameters and shared what we created with counseling, our Dean and asked our web-developer, Connor, to make the changes. (5) Michael met with Conner on 4/21 and they found that Novisurvey cannot do the calculations we need for accurate placement. Conner is looking into other options. If we stay with Novisurvey, this will require hands-on guidance for the students.
Online Teachers: Current online teachers: Greg, Anna, Jessica, Rachel Teachers just completed Canvas training: Chris, Liza, Nathan, Paula Canvas campus support/trainers: Bridget, Ricardo and Bianca Set up a spring meeting for the current and future online English teachers with some campus Canvas experts. Possible discussion topics: best practices, cultural-bias in online classroom design, retention and high online drop rates, feedback on each other’s classes, current published articles on online teaching, tailoring what we are doing with each student based on background and preparedness, a possible short course to prepare students for the online environment, how to make changes/improvement to Canvas i.e. allow threaded discussions, allow more than one due date in forums for posts and reactions, ask online teachers to first test and vet new online software, for quizzes, make the instructions visible before the quiz open date, allow a means for teachers to log in as a student so they can see an accurate student view.	(1) Email sent on 2/2 to all group members with a Doodle poll link to select a spring meeting date: http://doodle.com/poll/wq3ecvnzu9bvabtg (2) On 2/8, outlook invite sent to group members for a meeting on Tuesday, March 14^th 2-3:30pm. (3) Marisa is booking a room with tech support for those who will be joining remotely.	(1) Online teachers met on Tuesday, March 14^th 2-3:30pm in 7-108C Attendees: Chris, Bianca, Anna (remotely), Nathan, Paula (remotely), Rachel, Jessica (remotely), Bridget, Liza Agenda for the March 14^th Meeting Meeting notes from the March 14^th Meeting (2) Online teachers are planning to set up “visits” to each others’ classes for a designated time period and post feedback, comments and questions to one another on courses that are both being built and are live. Participants: Anna, Jessica, Rachel, Liza, Chris and Paula (observer). The observations window selected was the first 2 weeks of May (5/1 to 5/15). (3) Email sent on 4/19 to online observation participants with observation preparation instructions: I. If you are inviting the group into a live class, you can send your class an email letting them know that for the first 2 weeks of May, they will see some "observers" in the class and that these are Skyline teachers checking out the class to get ideas for their own online classes.  II. If you are sharing a course or courses, before Monday, May 1st, please add our group:                  (a) Click on the course you're sharing                 (b) Click on "People"                  (c) Click "+People                 (d) Add our emails separated by commas:  gibsonc@smccd.edu, bellr@smccd.edu, erwerta@smccd.edu, erpelol@smccd.edu, silvap@smccd.edu, powersj@smccd.edu                 (e) In the drop-down menu, select "Observer" and click "Next" III. Go to our online live Google doc, and enter in which classes you are inviting us into and if you like, include an overview, or quick walk-through, and/or areas you'd love focused feedback: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1HThZGNA07QjPnm223zQqrp-27OcZ5-zCLu3Za8scO2Y/edit?usp=sharing

English Department Accomplishments Summary—Spring 2017
GROUPS:	ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
TEAM ADJUNCT & COLLEAGUE CONNECTIONS: Members: Denise, Jarrod, Rob, John, Andrew, Lucia, Nathan, Nina and Rachel	* Met on 3/21 and decided to focus on 5 projects: (1) Create a more comprehensive orientation for new faculty; (2) Enhance the Mentor Program; (3) Create an online Canvas space with question/answer boards for new faculty, space to post/share/access assignments and writing prompts, share sample student papers, post sample syllabi and lesson plans, share teaching articles, and list all the English faculty with pictures and brief overviews of their specialties and interests so new faculty know who to contact with particular questions; (4) Set up an informal system to visit each other’s classes; (5) Advocate for a dedicated adjunct space. * Met with Mary on 3/30 and she asked us to include all of Language Arts in the new online Canvas space and to also include representatives from each department to help build the new faculty Orientation. * On 4/7 the new Language Arts online space in Canvas was completed and invitations sent to all members of Language Arts. To log in, visit: https://smccd.instructure.com/. * On 4/27 a hiring committee for new adjunct was formed with Nathan Jones, Rob Williams and Rachel Bell as chair. From this process, 6 new English adjuncts were interviewed, selected and hired for Fall 2017. * Met on 5/2 to set up the outline/structure for the Language Arts orientation. Afterwards, Mary approved summer funding to create the orientation and include representatives from other Language Arts Departments to build the more general orientation pieces. * In July, members from each department Erin Strauss (for ESOL), Luciana Castro (via email) & Nels Lanbauer (foreign languages), Nina Kotelyan (Communication Studies), and Rachel Bell, John Calavitta, Rob Williams (English) built the Language Arts orientation including division-wide best practices and department specific nest practices. To see the complete Orientation in .pdf and PowerPoint formats, visit the online Language Arts space in Canvas. * On August 12th, Jarrod Feiner and Denise Benavides presented the new Language Arts Orientation to the new Language Arts faculty and toured them through campus.
TEAM LEARNING CENTER CONNECTION: Members: Jarrod, Kathleen, Michael, Andrew, Susan, Nina, Rachel, Christine, Raymond, Jessica, and David	* Met on 2/28 and designed the agenda for the Flex event: Writing Tutors-English Faculty Collaborative Meeting. * Held the 3/8 Tutor-Faculty Flex event and focused on breaking down prompts the English faculty supplied and how we would best guide students. Attended by: Joshua Paras, Justine Baker, Monique Ubungen, Nicu LoBue, Michael Gunnon, Kristy, Wisnia, Katrina Benedicto, Orionne Malool, Scott McMullin, Jessica Belluomini, Susan Zoughbie, Christina Trujillo, Chanel Daniels, Nina Floro, Rachel Bell, and Jarrod Feiner * Met on 3/29 to discuss other ways for English and TLC to collaborate. Discussed two main areas: (1) Making the WRL more visible to students by including WRL-info in each syllabi; creating dedicated WRL advertising listing how to sign up with CRNs, how to access drop-in and booked tutoring, a list of the English-focused workshops, and other WRL support services/resources; creating a more comprehensive class visit/TLC Tour sign-up process for faculty; and creating a more defined space for adjunct in the TLC (2) Visiting re-instituting English Faculty in the TLC as part of teaching loads and looking at ways they could be used beyond tutoring such as co-creating and co-teaching writing and reading workshops with tutors; mentoring peer and grad tutors; helping facilitate tutor-training; assisting in the WRL advertising and doing class visits/TLC-tours; assisting in Supplemental Instructor training.
TEAM ENGLISH COURSE OUTLINES: Members: Kathleen, Liza, Jim, Chris and Rachel	* Met on 2/28 and decided to create two general templates: (1) One focused on Literature course outlines and (2) One focused on Core course outlines. * Met on 5/22 with Kathleen, Liza, Chris and Rachel created paired down, bullet-pointed templates for all of the core English courses and all of the Literature courses to make them more user-friendly, consistent, and clear. Next steps: vet the templates with department; transfer all English/Literature course outlines into the templates; take them through Curriculum Committee; and complete the work in time for English Program review in Fall 2018.
TEAM STREAMLINING ENGLISH PLACEMENT: Members: Chris, Michael, Lucia, Kathleen and Rachel	* Met on 3/1 and addressed the counselors’ requests to help streamline English placement and we accomplished the following: (1) We revised and updated the description and distinctions between English 100 vs. 105 on the English Department website: http://www.skylinecollege.edu/english/100vs105.php (2) We created one join online placement questionnaire to make it easier to self-place and for counselor’s to guide students. * Met on 4/11 and revised and finalized the placement tool and we shared what we created with counseling, our Dean and asked our web-developer, Connor, to make the changes. However, the survey tool the district is using could not accommodate for the complexities of the survey. Connor is looking into replacing the survey tool.
ONLINE ENGLISH TEACHERS: Teaching online or recently underwent Canvas training: Jessica, Greg, Anna, Rachel, Liza, Paula, Nathan, and Chris	* Met on 3/14 with campus-Canvas experts Bridget and Bianca present and discussed reactions to Canvas; what we should consider in the “big picture” in teaching online (course design, best practices in online interaction, scaffolding, feedback); what we should consider in the “nitty-gritty” (how best to use discussion forums, announcements, emails); and overall problems/challenges. * For 2 weeks in May, English online instructors informally “visited” each other’s classes (both live and under construction) and gave each other feedback and got ideas from one another.

English Department Meetings from Spring 2017
(all meeting notes are posted in the online Language Arts canvas space:
https://smccd.instructure.com/courses/8220/discussion_topics/19827)

Meeting Topic/Activity:  Selecting Meeting Content and English Projects:

Friday Feb 3^rd 3:30-4:30pm in room 6206
Meeting Organizers/Facilitators:  Rachel

AGENDA:
(1) Examine the English department generated brainstorm of issues and projects and decide what to focus on, how to complete the work, who would like to participate, and when we would like to complete the activities.
(2) Examine the English department generated brainstorm (focusing on the category of “Collaborating”) to choose what activities to do for the 3 spring semester English meetings and ask who would like to lead these activities.

OUTCOMES:
(1) A faculty-generated prioritized list of issues/projects the English department would like to address along with the participants, desired outcomes, and timelines.
(2) A faculty-generated list of hands-on activities and facilitators for the upcoming 3 spring semester English meetings.

Meeting Topic/Activity: Threshold Concepts with a focus on making thesis claims

Friday March 3^rd 3:30-5pm in room 8319
Meeting Organizers/Facilitators:  Chris, Lucia, Michael, Rachel

AGENDA:
10 mins: Overview of Threshold Concepts and sharing pertinent parts from the article “Threshold Concepts and Troublesome Knowledge: Linkages to Ways of Thinking and Practising within the Disciplines” by Jan Meyer and Ray Land (this reading can be located in "Articles on Teaching")

In small groups discuss: 
(1) What about making thesis claims is especially difficult for students to understand? Where do they get most stuck?
(2) Shared answers
(3) Everyone shared different successful approaches to teaching thesis they have used (ideas, examples, and the pedagogy informing the approach)

OUTCOMES:
To discuss the challenges in teaching thesis and decide on different successful approaches that can be used. 

Meeting Topic/Activity: Successful Texts, Assignments & Themes
Friday March 31^st 3:30-5pm in room 6206
Meeting Organizers/Facilitators: Denise, Nathan, John, Rachel

AGENDA:
Instructors shared successful fiction or non-fiction texts (i.e. articles, short stories, books, plays, etc.) that students have loved or reacted well to or that produced great essays.   Some also shared the lessons, paper topics, and other materials related to those texts.  Some also shared successful course themes and the texts taught within that theme.

OUTCOMES:
To have a shared collection of successful texts, lessons, themes, activities, and technologies English instructors are using in the classroom.

There is an "English Assignment" packet which contains the lessons the instructors shared and is posted in "Assignments and Writing Prompts": https://smccd.instructure.com/courses/8220/discussion_topics/19828. 

Some of the readings the instructors discussed are posted in "Good Readings to Teach": https://smccd.instructure.com/courses/8220/discussion_topics/19830

Meeting Topic/Activity: Providing Quality Feedback for Students

Friday May 5^th 3:30-5pm in room 6206
Meeting Organizers/Facilitators: Liza, Jarrod, Rachel

AGENDA:
I. GATHERING IDEAS (20 mins): There will be 4 poster boards around the room for instructors to post answers to the following questions:

            1. What are your "Student-Feedback Philosophies"?
            2. How do you apply your feedback philosophies when conferencing with students about their papers? 
            3. How do you apply your feedback philosophies when providing written comments on student essays? 
            4.  What challenges do you face?  What would you like to improve?

II. SHARING IDEAS (30 mins): Reading the posts on the 4 topics and discussing.

III. BEST PRACTICES (30 mins): In two groups, using the ideas posted and discussed, create two lists:
            1. "Best Practices in Conferencing with Students" 
            2. "Best Practices when Giving Written Comments on Student Essays" 

IV. SHARING BEST PRACTICES (10 mins)

OUTCOMES:
To have a list of agreed upon “Best Practices” when giving students feedback in-person during conferences and when giving written comments on student essays.