Ellen Chaffee... Benchmarks of effective education
Monday, 05 November 2007
By Ellen Chaffee
A great deal of research exists to help us understand how to provide the best possible learning experiences for college students. We are always looking for ways to improve, and this research gives us valuable insights. The research can also help prospective students and parents evaluate institutions they are considering. Simply by asking the right questions, they can get some idea of the institution’s quality of instruction. To evaluate ourselves, we survey our first-year and senior students using the National Study of Student Engagement. It identifies five areas that are vitally important for quality learning. Prospective students can ask questions about these five areas, and we can identify priorities for improvement in those areas. We administer the survey every two years, and we just got the results of last spring’s survey. These are the five areas that represent the “benchmarks of effective educational practice.” Each area has dozens of related survey questions that sum up to a quality score. These are the areas: 1. Level of academic challenge: how challenging is the intellectual and creative work? 2. Active and collaborative learning: are students intensely involved in their education? 3. Student-faculty interaction: do students work with faculty members inside and outside the classroom? 4. Enriching educational experiences: do students take advantage of complementary learning opportunities? 5. Supportive campus environment: do students feel the college is committed to their success? Here are VCSU’s strong points – areas where our scores are better than our peers to a level that is statistically significant. Our first-year students are very intensely involved in their education. Both first-year students and seniors are very likely to work with faculty members inside and outside the classroom – much more than students in similar institutions elsewhere. Both groups feel that the university is committed to their success to a much greater degree than students elsewhere. Therefore, VCSU shines in three of the five benchmark areas (items 2, 3, and 5 above). Our first-year students are a little less likely to feel challenged intellectually and creatively than peers elsewhere (item 1), and our seniors are a little less likely to report having taken advantage of complementary learning opportunities (item 4). We are working to improve both areas. Some of the detailed results are notable, too. Our seniors report more involvement in research with faculty. Predictably, both student groups are much more likely to have used an electronic medium to discuss or complete an assignment. Both also gave the institution higher marks than peers had on giving substantial help as students cope with non-academic matters. Our first-year students were also much more likely to get prompt written or oral feedback from faculty. Notice that the survey does not ask about spell-binding lectures and glitzy PowerPoint presentations. Those technique can be powerful, but only if they draw students into the ideas, facts, and issues of the class. The true measure of great learning experiences is the extent to which students get personally involved. The benchmark represents teachers who create engaging learning experiences, whatever their methods. VCSU is a national leader in this, too.
Blonde on the Prairie... Mirror, mirror, on the wall
Friday, 02 November 2007
By Jodi Rae Ingstad
Mirrors. Who needs them? It’s not like we depend on them for our lives. It’s not like they provide any form of nutrition or spiritual enlightenment like the good stuff found in broccoli or in a scripture from the Bible. We have plenty of mirrors hanging here and there in our little, country cabin. I carry one or six in my purse for vain moments and it is at these times I begin my journey of wonderment. Now that I’m of age to be a contender in being the only North Dakotan to make it “over the hill that doesn’t even exist in North Dakota,” I’m walking by mirrors and noticing deep wrinkles around my eyes. Almost every early photo of me was ruined when our home flooded years ago. Mother was able to save and dry a couple but they are not clear enough to prove to me I once had skin of perfection like the kind found only on the unabashed canvas of a newborn’s face. It’s really hard to tell you how many thousands of dollars I’ve spent on potions to help me correct these wrinkles that have begun to appear. Add to the mathematic equation the fact that I began my attempt to correct the wrinkles long before I ever even got them. While visiting with my elderly, wise friends I often ask them what kind of facial crèmes they’ve used in managing to remain so young looking. “Just water,” most of the very well preserved reply. I wish I would have hung out with elderly and wise people when I was 18. They could have saved me from myself and my shriveling skin. Along with the wrinkles of age I’ve noticed something else appearing within me. It’s this underlying belief that perhaps every single good thing is really a conspiracy for hiding a bad thing. So it was while I was looking in one of my many mirrors that it donned on me, “Perhaps it’s the ingredients in all of these expensive potions and serums and crèmes and pomades and lotions that’s causing me all of these wrinkly wrinkles?” I bolted into the spa room of our cabin and began grabbing all the bottles, tubes, tubs and cylinders that housed all my facial goop. I have so many different ones because usually what happens is my sensitive, predominantly Norwegian skin gets red, irritated, lumpy, bumpy or raw from using them. That requires me to retire them to the storage container of makeup and other facial products that I spent lots of money on but cannot use. The manufacturers use impressively big scientific words to woo me into believing I can find youth in a bottle. One serum boasts, “It contains patented QuSomes- The great new anti-wrinkle breakthrough of the 21 century.” Another brags, “Copper peptide serum with antioxidants for smooth, radiant skin.” A most impressive tube advertises, “GABA-biox lifting complex offering instant and cumulative results without painful injections and multiple visits to dermatologists.” The container I bought that said the following was my sure bet to the fountain of youth. It reads,“This formula contains the universally recognized Argireline. The active ingredient in Argireline is acetyl hexapeptide 3 (AH3), a deep penetrating, powerful amino peptide that helps to relax the intensity and frequency of facial muscle contractions. Argireline formula also deters the degeneration of collagen and elastin which smoothes the skin, and reduces the depth of lines and wrinkles.” How did I even think I’d trust my face to a bunch of words I can’t even pronounce? “Mirror, mirror on the wall…what’s the best anti-aging secret of them all?” “Thank you for asking my dear child. Be kind, pray, smile often and get lots of sleep. Use the water I’ve provided you to maintain the face I picked out just for you. Then throw away all your mirrors!”
Prairie Lite... The ghosts of Versailles
Thursday, 01 November 2007
By Carla Kelly
Halloween is over. We still have candy, which is never a good thing, considering that we buy too much of what we like (anything with chocolate), under the fiction that it will all go to trick-or-treaters. Now that’s scary. I’m not a fan of horror movies. Who in her right mind would wander around a deserted hospital? Go into a dark room and then turn on the lights? Get into a perfectly operational car when trying to escape? It won’t start. Doesn’t she know that? What really scares me is Pakistan, an unstable country with the atomic bomb. I’m equally frightened of wildfire marching over a ridge and all I have is a garden hose. There’s something about the supernatural that gives us that “zero-at-the-bone” feeling Emily Dickinson mentioned in her poem about snakes. It’s chilling, but we’re intrigued. In 1901, two English academics on holiday visited the gardens of Petit Trianon, near Versailles. This faux farmhouse had been built during the reign of Louis XVI for the entertainment of his wife, Marie Antoinette. She liked to dress as a milkmaid, go there and pretend she was doing something useful. As Anne Moberly and Eleanor Jourdain followed the paths in search of Petit Trianon, they sidestepped into history. They described the event in their book, An Adventure, published in 1911. Moberly and Jourdain claimed to have walked into 1789, seeing people and things that could only have been there in those pre-Revolution days, when the king and queen of France still had their heads. After feelings of oppression and gloom settled on them, the women insisted they saw a repulsive-looking man, several gardeners dressed in 18th century livery, and someone warning them they were going the wrong way. They were English ladies of the stiff-upper-lip type, so they ignored the warning and continued to Petit Trianon. Here, Moberly said she saw a women in old-fashioned clothing, sketching. Soon, a footman hurried up, telling them the entrance to Petit Trianon was around the building. They went around, and found themselves back in the twentieth century. Later, Moberly saw a painting of Marie Antoinette and realized it was the women she saw. She described the woman to her friend, and discovered that the other teacher hadn’t seen the queen. She had seen other things, though. They decided to record their own accounts of the experience at Petit Trianon, and discovered they had been visiting Versailles on the anniversary of the attack on the Tuileries in Paris in 1792, when the Swiss Guards protecting the king and queen had been slaughtered by the mob. Moberly and Jourdain began to wonder if what they saw at Petit Trianon was Marie Antoinette’s stored memory of better times. Further investigation unearthed the fact that the queen had indeed been at Petit Trianon in 1789, when word came that the Parisian mob was marching on Versailles, which “explained” the teachers’ oppressive feelings. Was it a hoax? Probably. Evidence suggests Moberly and Jourdain did research the whole event, and “bent” history, in their zeal for others to see what they thought they saw. Maybe it would have been more convincing if they hadn’t embellished the event. Who’s to say that sometimes there isn’t a window left open for a glimpse into the past? Still, it’s best to take Versailles with a grain of salt. And yet. For years, I’ve hung onto “The Day We Saw Angels,” a story that appeared in “Guidepost Magazine” in 1963. The event described took place in the 1930s in Massachusetts, on a morning Ralph and Marion Harlow went for a walk. As they walked, they became aware of muted voices coming from behind them at a speed more rapid than they were walking. They turned around, but couldn’t see anyone. When they realized the sound was above them, they looked up to see “glorious, beautiful creatures.” Six young women dressed in white glided along, engaged in a conversation the couple could hear, but not really comprehend. Unaware of the Harlows, the six creatures floated past, until the conversation faded out and they disappeared. That was all. Shaken, Ralph asked Marion to describe exactly what she saw. She did, and it clicked with his view. This story convinces me because it’s so ordinary. What it suggests is there are forces around us we can’t explain, and shouldn’t try to. All the same, stay out of abandoned hospitals, OK?
Ellen Chaffee... Another win-win
Monday, 29 October 2007
By Ellen Chaffee
Valley City State University is en route to more online students through a unique and prestigious partnership between the Boston Museum of Science and the university’s undergraduate and graduate programs in technology education. Vice President Joe Bessie, professors Don Mugan and James Boe and I spent a day with top officials in Boston last week to develop partnering plans with the museum’s National Center for Technology Literacy (NCTL). Yannis Miaoulis, the Museum’s CEO, secured a major federal grant to establish the center, whose mission is “to enhance people's knowledge of technology nationwide by introducing engineering as a new discipline in schools and by presenting technology as a partner equal to science in museums and science centers.” Major sponsors of the NCTL include Cisco Systems, Intel Foundation, Lockheed Martin Foundation, and GE Foundation. The private sector and federal government provide strong support because there is a critical shortage of expertise and general public awareness of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The four fields are so closely linked that the acronym STEM is becoming commonplace in both education and industry. Many believe that the future of the US economy is most promising in areas that require strong STEM skills to drive significant innovations in every sector. That is, the US needs an innovative, knowledge-based economy. Common estimates are that such an economy requires 20-40 percent more four-year college graduates than predicted, many of whom need to be proficient in STEM-related fields. In addition, the widespread use and high potential of various technologies to change lives and society require that all of us become much more “technology literate.” Issues such as cloning, stem cell research, artificial intelligence, and global warming are subject to public debate and personal decision-making, both of which will be wiser if people understand more about the principles behind them. The Museum’s NCTL produces curriculum materials for elementary, middle school, and high school classes to increase knowledge of engineering and technology for all Americans. Both the NCTL and the VCSU program are based on national technology literacy standards published in 2001. The VCSU program already uses some of the NCTL’s curriculum materials and will use more as they are published. The partnership with VCSU will be the NCTL’s first opportunity to reach pre-service or in-service teachers with academic program credit for their curriculum. Schools need those teachers, especially in several Eastern states. For example, starting with the class of 2010, all Massachusetts high school students must pass a test in Science and Technology/Engineering (STE) to graduate. The schools need technology teachers to supplement science classes. VCSU prepares those teachers. NCTL is offering dozens of workshops for current teachers to learn their materials. VCSU can be a hub for offering workshops in the upper Midwest. VCSU is the only university that can offer academic program credit for those workshops, wherever they are delivered. We will develop an academic STEM certificate program for new and current teachers in other fields, as well as our existing technology education degree programs. The potential for NCTL, VCSU, and especially teachers and students is tremendous, and we are eager to launch a formal partnership. You will be among the first to know.
Legislative Report: Substance abuse a top concern
Monday, 29 October 2007
I was recently appointed to serve on the governor’s Alcohol and Drug Prevention Advisory Task Force. Our task force recently heard testimony on a number of troubling statistics regarding the use and abuse of alcohol and drugs in our state. The report below is one of the most alarming. The State Epidemiological Outcomes Work Group (SEOW) was initiated in 2006 by the North Dakota Department of Human Services Division of Mental Health and Substance Abuse. Funding for the project was provided by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental health Services Administration. (SAMHSA). The mission of the state association is to utilize relevant state, tribal, and local data to guide substance use prevention planning, programming and evaluation. The following information includes some excerpts from the results of the review: North Dakota has the highest rates in the nation in recent alcohol use and binge drinking, regardless of age group. For example, among North Dakotans age 12 to 20 years, 42.7 percent consumed alcohol in the past 30 days and 32.3 percent engaged in binge alcohol use in the past 30 days (National Survey on Drug Use and Health). Both of these figures are the highest in all 50 states. In a similar vein, the state ranks near the bottom among U.S. states regarding the percent of persons who perceive great harm associated with drinking five or more drinks at a time on two or more occasions in the past month. The finding strives to understand why binge drinking rates are so high in North Dakota: Many simply perceive no or little, mental or societal harm associated with this behavior. There is evidence that alcohol use and abuse is generational in North Dakota: Children and young adults are following the example of the state’s adults who use and abuse alcohol at the highest rate in the country. Now, North Dakota children and young adults, those who are not of the legal drinking age, are also number one in the nation for recent alcohol use and binge drinking. Further, North Dakota students grades 9-12 are substantially more likely than their U.S. counterparts to have recently driven a vehicle after consuming alcohol. Among recent DUI arrests in the state, people age 21-24 are the most frequent offenders and their arrest rate has substantially increased in recent years (N.D. Office of Attorney General, 2006). A harsh potential consequence of alcohol use is prison time. In 2002, 823 inmates entered prison in North Dakota. Of this number, 42.6 percent were drug and alcohol offenders; 35.2 percent were property offenders; 14.6 percent were violent crime offenders; and 7.5 percent were sex offenders. In the years 2004 to 2005, 884 male offenders entered the North Dakota prison system for the following criminal offenses: drug and alcohol (40 percent); property crimes (25 percent); violent crimes (21 percent); sexual crimes (seven percent); DUI (four percent); and other (three percent). In that same year, 168 female offenders entered the North Dakota prison system for the following criminal offenses: drug and alcohol (55 percent); property crimes (32 percent); violent crimes (seven percent): DUI (four percent); and sexual crimes (two percent). The human and other costs associated with these statistics is indeed alarming. Child abuse and neglect is one of the many serious consequences of this behavior. We continue to experience traffic fatalities, high rates of incarceration coupled with the associated costs to the judicial system. Additionally, there are costs to social services, performance or lack thereof in workplace, costs to our system of health care, the list goes on and on. We are also losing family, friends and loved ones. There is no way we can ever begin to place a cost on the loss of lives.Our task force will continue to meet and attempt to identify programs and initiatives that will serve to curtail these alarming statistics. Our task is monumental. The concern is real. There are many areas in which North Dakota is proud to be in a leadership position. This is certainly not one of them.Until next time, please contact us with your thoughts and or concerns:
; pmueller @nd.gov or
Editor’s Note: Robinson is a senator in North Dakota’s legislature. He is a Democrat and lives in Valley City.
