The Office of Equity and Inclusion (OEI) invites you to join Training and Case Manager Ever Hanna (they/them) for a discussion about how UMBC can improve business processes, technologies and apps (such as People Soft and G-suite), and overall climate for transgender, gender non-conforming, and non-binary employees.
OEI is in the process of partnering with several offices across campus to continue to increase inclusion of trans, GNC, and non-binary employees. The feedback collected in these sessions will be reported back anonymously to appropriate offices. OEI is especially interested in hearing from directly affected individuals as well as hiring managers and payroll preparers from across campus.
These sessions are open to any faculty or staff member at UMBC:
Tuesday, February 16th from 2-3 PM
Friday, February 19th from 2-3 PM
Friday, February 26th from 10-11 AM
This session is open only to employee members who identify as trans, gender non-conforming, non-binary, or any other identity that falls outside of the gender binary:
Thursday, February 18 from 1-2 PM (The guest list for this event will be hidden and the meeting will be locked at 1:15 PM)
OEI will post a list of questions that may be asked during the sessions ahead of time. If you require additional accommodations to be able to access the meeting, please email EverHanna@umbc.edu with your request.
Note: The Office of Equity and Inclusion encourages any individual who has currently or formerly experienced discrimination on the basis of their gender identity or expression to report this discrimination through our online reporting form. Disclosures of discrimination that may occur during these listening sessions will not be considered reports to OEI.
The session facilitator will take notes, but these sessions will not be recorded.
]]>In a survey of more than 900 students from fall 2020 who completed courses that utilized no-cost or low-cost Open Educational Resources (OER), UMBC students said they appreciated saving money on instructional materials and would recommend an OER course to others.
Nearly 90% of students said the quality of the OER course materials was of similar or higher quality than non-OER course materials. In the surveyed courses, faculty replaced traditional print textbooks with OERs and provided supplemental digital homework tools. Forty-five percent of students who completed the survey said they would be fairly likely or very likely to enroll in an OER course again, while 53% said they would recommend an OER course to others.
Instructors Sarah Bass (CHEM 101), Tara Carpenter (CHEM 102), and Maria Manni (SPAN 101/103) replaced traditional print textbooks with OERs and provided supplemental digital homework tools.
Open Educational Resources are teaching, learning, and research materials in any medium (digital or otherwise) that are released under an open license that permits no-cost or low-cost access, use, adaptation, or redistribution (UNESCO, 2002). OER can include textbooks, syllabi, supplementary materials, quizzes, assessment rubrics, homework, or labs.
About 60 comments were provided about students’ experience with OERs. The majority of written feedback focused on positive engagement with the digital resources and homework tools that supported students’ ability to practice problems or equations and learn vocabulary.
Students offered additional comments about how they would use money saved from OER toward paying tuition or other fees (64%), covering personal expenses (55%), buying textbooks or materials for other classes (46%), or taking an additional course (19%). Some expressed challenges with the materials themselves, such as relevance to course content, impact on learning style, or ability to annotate online content vs. printed material.
Additional observations:
A total of 551 students completed the survey from the 917 invited to participate. The survey was distributed to students using Blackboard’s native Enterprise Survey tool.
Explore how you can adopt OERs for your course:
Attend upcoming virtual events:
Contact OER co-chairs Erin Durham (edurham@umbc.edu) or Susan Biro (sbiro@umbc.edu) for more information on OER at UMBC.
]]>Today's talk is How your brain responds to stories - and why they're crucial for leadersby Karen Eber. How do the world's best leaders and visionaries earn trust? They don't just present data -- they also tell great stories. Leadership consultant Karen Eber demystifies what makes for effective storytelling and explains how anyone can harness it to create empathy and inspire action.
VoiceThread is a collaborative, multimedia slide show that holds images, documents, and videos and allows people to navigate slides and leave comments in several ways – text, voice, audio file, or webcam. VoiceThread is available to any instructor who would like to incorporate this engagement tool into their digital toolkit for academic continuity. With VoiceThread, faculty and students can:
Demonstrate procedures to help students prepare for a practical exam
Explain decisions when selecting subjects for a painting’s composition
Foster greater community in large, lecture-based classes
Debate the pros and cons of a controversial issue
Practice foreign language skills during role-play
Critique a classmate’s composition
To learn more about Voicethread and to expand your use of Voicethread in your teaching, please consider attending these webinars:
Using VoiceThread in Blackboard
Feb. 9, 2021 at 1:00pm ET - Register here
In this hands-on workshop, you will learn how to create VoiceThreads and then add them to your Blackboard course as lessons or assessments.
New Assignment Features Workshop
Feb. 16 at 7:00pm ET - Register here
In this workshop, you will learn how to turn new assignments on for your courses and begin using them with your students. We will review all of the workflows, new features, and options for your VoiceThread assessments.
New Assignment Features Workshop
March. 9, 2021 at 1:00pm ET - Register here
In this hands-on workshop, you will learn how to create VoiceThreads and then add them to your Blackboard course as lessons or assessments
As announced last semester, a redesigned VoiceThread (VT) assignment tool is now live. The new interface provides new features with streamlined workflows and enhanced options. Clear, dynamic checklist requirements, grading requirements, and submission status are all new features of the new VoiceThread assignment tool.
In addition to determining the playback and sharing settings for all VT assignments, instructors may now automatically have edit access to student-created VoiceThread submissions. A new Student Gallery option provides students with a central area to see all VoiceThreads for a single assignment, allowing them to view and comment on their peers’ submissions.
Faculty may set start dates and due dates for VT assignments, which hide activities before you are ready for students to see them. New grading features are also available including checking the status of student submissions as unattempted, in progress, or submitted. Automatic reminders to submit can be sent to students. Grading is done with the VoiceThread interface and will automatically synchronize with Blackboard’s gradebook. Grading is based on a percentage-based or pass/fail format.
Faculty who would like to learn more about the new VoiceThread assignment may wish to review these tools:
Review the new assignment features in this VoiceThread training recording
As always, if you have any questions about teaching, learning and technology at UMBC, please consider the following options:
PIVOT | Academic Continuity | Keep On Teaching | Student Technology Resources
Follow the Instructional Technology & DoIT myUMBC groups
Request a consult with instructional technology staff
Today's talk is How to foster true diversity and inclusion at work (and in your community) by Rosalind G. Brewer. When companies think of diversity and inclusion, they too often focus on meeting metrics instead of building relationships with people of diverse backgrounds, says Starbucks COO Rosalind G. Brewer. In this personable and wide-ranging conversation with TED current affairs curator Whitney Pennington Rodgers, Brewer invites to rethink what it takes to create a truly inclusive workplace -- and lays out how to bring real, grassroots change to boardrooms and communities alike.
If you do not have an account, QM will walk you through the process of creating an account.
If you have questions about Quality Matters at UMBC, please open an RT ticket to contact QM Coordinators: Dr. Mariann Hawken or Dr. Susan Biro. ]]>
- Fill out the form with your information. When you get to the institution, enter our campus identity EXACTLY as you see here: University of Maryland-Baltimore County
Following Sherri Braxton’s departure as Senior Director of Instructional Technology, I am pleased to announce the following changes in staffing and assignments:
Mariann Hawken (Manager of eLearning) has agreed to serve as Acting Director of Instructional Technology. In addition to helping lead development and support of this summer’s PIVOT program, as well as the Alternate Delivery Program (ADP) and Quality Matters initiative that informed it, Mariann has also led DoIT’s focused initiatives in accessibility and campus migration to Blackboard Ultra.
Susan Biro (Online Learning Coordinator) has agreed to serve as Acting Manager of Online Learning. She will be the primary point of contact for existing initiatives, including DoIT’s partnership with the Division of Professional Studies (DPS) to grow and support online courses and programs, particularly at the applied master’s level. With more than 18 years of experience in distance education, Susan brings expertise in many facets of designing, developing, implementing, and administering online programs.
Collin Sullivan (LMS Specialist) has agreed to serve as DoIT's primary point of contact for Blackboard and maintain responsibilities of third-party instructional technology integrations that support teaching and learning. A former president of the UMBC Student Government Association (SGA) and current Master’s student in Public Policy, Collin has helped lead DoIT’s and UMBC’s efforts to support students during the Pandemic.
Please join me in thanking Mariann, Susan and Collin, as well as the entire Instructional Technology team, for their expertise and willingness to serve the campus through the Pandemic push to online instruction and beyond.
Sincerely,
John Fritz
Assoc. VP, Instructional Technology
UMBC Division of Information Technology (DoIT)
Today's talk is How creative writing can help you through life’s hardest moments by Sakinah Hofler. Have you ever seen or experienced something and wished you spoke up? Writer Sakinah Hofler makes the case for writing as a tool to help you process difficult memories and reclaim the power they may hold. Pick up a pen or pull up a keyboard and follow along as she walks you through how to unburden your mind and inspire reflection.