Faculty Senate Staff Recognition Luncheon
May 27, 2016
11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Table Rock Campus, Room 184
Present:
Pat Ashley
Kori Bieber
Elijah Bunnell, Award Recipient
Katy Callies
Andrew Childress
Kevin Culhane
Tracy Davenport
Robert Felthousen
Kiersta Fricke-Gostnell
Michael Grutchfield
Liz Hardy
Jeanine Henriques
Bryan Jeffs
Felishia Jenkins
Jessica Kitchen
Kristi Kowalski
Zachary Malatesta
Victor Matoush
Melissa Merryman, Award Recipient
Kristi Mersino
Susan Miller
Glen Moulton
Diana Moynahan
Deborah Murphy
Carolyn Oates
Jim Shaw
Midge Shaw, Award Recipient
Carolyn Shaw Straus
Jeremy Smith
Lori Sours, Award Recipient
Serena St. Clair
Marty Steiner, Award Recipient
Dorothy Swain
David Underwood, Award Recipient
Verne Underwood, Award Recipient
Randy Wade
Valerie Wallace
The Faculty Senate Staff Recognition Luncheon was heldin Room 184 of the Table Rock Campus. Rogue Eats provided a delicious menu of assorted wraps, mixed greens, quinoa salad, seasonal fruit platter, fresh vegetables with hummus, ice tea, strawberry lemonade, cookies and brownies.
The following Faculty Senate award recipients gave brief presentations:
Lori Sours, Best/Promising Practices
Lori has been working with several departments to develop or revise their program learning outcomes this year. Why map curriculum? 1) Faculty engage with each other. 2) Faculty see their courses in context and know how their courses relate to prior courses and courses that follow. 3) Students see their path to their goals; it’s the student’s journey. Lori explained the process she used with the Dental Assistant program to map their curriculum; it pointed out where the core courses should go, and it met program learning outcomes. From mapping the Medical Assistant curriculum, feedback came from students about redundancy in content (resume writing). It was taught in two different places and in two different ways. They looked at course learning outcomes.
A team of mapping facilitators will be formed from these departments: Early Childhood & Elementary Education, Emergency Medical Services and Fire Science. If interested in being a part of the team, contact Lori Sours.
Marty Steiner, the Unsung Hero
Since math teachers would rather do math problems than give speeches, Marty prepared an exercise for the group to work on and then went through it with them. It was about determining polygon angle sizes and developing a formula to determine the size of each interior angle in any regular polygon. Mary said there are a lot of unsung heroes in our classrooms, i.e., veterans, single mom and dads, people who make poor choices, or who lost their jobs. He has had a wonderful opportunity to teach (he’s retiring after 47 years). Without RCC, the students could not have accomplished what they have done.
Melissa Merryman, Student Advocate
Melissa has been a student government advisor at RVC for five and a half years. She works with students to develop their leadership and management abilities and to explore different styles. She teaches students how to think, not what to think. She loves what she does and considers it a privilege to do it every day.
David Underwood, Promoting Career Awareness
David came from the corporate world into education later in life. His passion comes from the students. He teaches them the mechanics and structure to survive in the business world. Students get their dream jobs – and it is the letters from students that keep him going. He also teaches an ESL class with seven women who work outside the home and then come to school to make their lives better. He will continue tutoring with them through the summer. Teaching is a privilege for him to do. He once had a student who suffered from PTSD who flunked his class twice, but on the third attempt, he got a B! It just goes to show that you don’t give up on people; they are your students forever. Encourage students to greatness.
Midge Shaw, Faculty Achievement
Midge spoke about a connection with her students. In her writing classes, she learns a lot about her students through their writing. She wants to be transparent with them in return. She shared an exercise she uses with her students. She asks them to write a description of a person based on a job title, i.e., nursery school worker, soccer parent, maintenance person, greeting card designer and salesperson, calligrapher, missionary, and school principal. After a period of time of working in groups on this, she says she will bring in the people and see how close we have come to the actual person. She leaves the room through one door, enters the hallway and comes in another door without anyone else. All those jobs were actual ones she had throughout her life!
Verne Underwood, Community Engagement and Partnership
Verne spoke abouta project of Robert Pinsky, Poet Laureate of the United States, who founded the Favorite Poem Project. Videos were done of individuals reading and speaking personally about poems they love. Verne shared the video of Michael H. Lythgoe reciting the poem Facing It by Yusef Komunyakaa as he stands in front of the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C.
Congratulations to all of the Faculty Senate Awards Recipients!
Next meeting
Saturday, June 11, 5:30-6:30 p.m. at Redwood J-2 (prior to commencement).
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