Stopping to Smell the Roses

My first post for GSE admissions last year was "Plight of the Part-Time Student."  Now that I'm in my final year at GSE a a part-timer, I'm hoping to take in more of what Penn has to offer. It's really easy to get caught up in work-school-go home mode.  So now I'm trying to stop and smell the roses a little!

Ahhhhh....

One of the ways I'm trying to do this is to slow down and get to know people at Penn a little more.  Which leads me to give a shout out right now to my LST's, the students in the Learning Science and Technologies program. As the old-timer in the program (I can't believe I'm saying that) I feel a sense of duty to try to share as much from my experiences as an LST student as I can. I have been taking the time to STOP and chat with them so far this semester and they are all very motivated to do some great things this year. Our LST program is small, but powerful. 

So that's my goal this year.  Besides the whole finish my Master's Paper, get a Degree, and all that life-changing stuff, I want to smell the roses.   Even as the part-time student, full-time employee, and all-the-time husband, I think I'll be able to pull it off.


Photo from: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Small_Red_Rose.JPG

In Memory

I'd like to use my first post in this academic year to honor one of our own who passed away on August 19th. 

Wendy Shung was a student here at GSE who was studying for a Master of Philosophy in education, with a major in professional counseling.  As I've come to found out, she was incredibly involved, including serving as the president of GSE's student government organization and a graduate assistant at Hill College House.

I only knew Wendy Shung for one semester.  But one encounter, let alone one semester, is enough time for someone to have an impact in another person’s life.

Wendy and I sat next to each other in the Developmental Theories and Applications with Young Adults course in Summer Session 2.  This, unfortunately, turned out to be her last course.  It saddens me to hear of her passing.  She was, as has been described by many, a very intelligent, genuine soul.  Most of all, she was kind.  My biggest memory of her will be how we gave encouraging words to one another, not about the course, but rather about life in general.  She was that genuine, to even connect in such a way with a relative stranger within a short period of time.

To her parents and family, I especially give them my prayers. To everyone who knew her, even for a short amount of time like myself, let us take this time to continue to remember her for the bright spirit she brought to this world.  

Wendy will truly be missed.

Interview with Penn GSE Dean, Andrew Porter

In August 2007, Dr. Andrew Porter became Dean of Penn's Graduate School of Education, bringing in over 40 years of experience working in higher education.  As Dean and the George & Diane Weiss Professor of Education, Dr. Porter continues to serve not just as a pillar of GSE, but also as a beacon in the field of education. 

I recently had a chance to catch up with the Dean to ask him about his time at GSE, the growth and future of the school, and some of his thoughts on the current state of education:


MTW: You are finishing up your sixth year as dean. How has GSE grown since you first came on board? 

AP: During my five and a half years as dean, we have seen the biggest growth in our Master’s student programs. The quantity, quality, and diversity of our Master’s student body have increased. In terms of numbers, the growth is roughly 50%. In terms of quality, one indicator is GREs, and the average GRE score of Master’s students at GSE is up by more than 100 points. In terms of diversity, GSE has always been strong, but today roughly a third of our students are international. Of our domestic students, roughly a third are persons of color.


MTW: What are the biggest changes in education you’ve seen during this time? 

AP: Tough question. One thing that comes immediately to mind is the increased emphasis on online learning at both the higher education and the K-12 levels. Another challenge is the growing focus on teacher accountability—in other words, making teachers accountable for their students’ achievement as measured on state tests. Yet a third area concerns the Common Core State Standards in Reading and Mathematics. Until now, each state has had its own content standards for K-12 education. Now, well over half of the states have signed on to the new standards. At the same time, the government has funded two multi-state consortia to build tests that are aligned to the standards. At least in theory, this should create much greater efficiencies and much better standards and tests. Of course, implementing the standards will be a huge challenge.


MTW: What are the strengths of GSE now, and what do you foresee as the strengths going forward?

AP: The greatest strength of GSE is that it has a great faculty and a fabulous student body. The students at GSE at all levels are bright, articulate, passionate, and deeply engaged in their studies. GSE is part of a truly world class university. Not only that, but the University of Pennsylvania values the practical, just as its founding father, Benjamin Franklin, did. Other adjectives that come to mind in thinking about GSE’s strengths are nimble, entrepreneurial, urban, and international.

We have moved up consistently in the U.S. News and World Report rankings of education graduate schools, a sign of the increasing strength of our programs. Generally, when you’re on your way up, rankings trail behind by a couple of years, so we hope to continue to our ascent.


MTW: GSE is helping to groom the educational leaders of tomorrow. What challenges do future educators and educational leaders face? 

AP: There’s always an under-supply of quality leaders. GSE strives to be the place that produces the leaders of leaders in education. At the same time, GSE strives to be the place that people around the world look to for innovative solutions to our most pressing educational problems.


MTW: A major current discussion in education is how open learning, with innovations like MOOCs, will affect education. What should future educators and educational leaders keep in mind as open learning continues to gain prominence? 

AP: Through the leadership of Provost Vince Price, Penn is rapidly positioning itself as the leader among institutions of higher education in open learning and distance education. Provost Price has asked GSE to play a leadership role in research and development to identify the characteristics of excellence in teaching of MOOCs. We have enthusiastically accepted that challenge.

***

Interview with Daphne Koller, Co-Founder of Coursera

On Friday, April 5th, Penn will host the Silfen University Forum, which will discuss "Open Learning and the Future of Higher Education."  An acclaimed group of panelists will discuss this important topic, as Penn President Amy Gutmann moderates.  One of the scheduled participants of this forum is one of the most well-known advocates of open learning: Coursera co-founder Daphne Koller.

Koller, the award-winning Rajeev Motwani Professor in the Computer Science Department at Stanford University, co-founded Coursera with Andrew Ng (Director of the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab and Associate Professor of Computer Science).  The massive open online course platform, of which Penn has partnered with, officially launched in April 2012 and has given learners across the world access to high quality college courses for free through the internet.  While some have proclaimed this to be the ultimate disruption of higher education, others claim that the classroom experience cannot be replicated or surpassed by a digital platform such as this one.  What are Koller's thoughts on the matter?

I had a chance to catch up with the Coursera co-founder in anticipation of the Silfen University Forum to get some of her thoughts on open learning and the future of higher (and to a further extent, general) education:


MTW: As open learning becomes more prominent in education, what role do you see future educators fulfilling in the classroom?

DK: I think most educators will move to a role in which they interact much more closely and directly with their students.  Rather than spending most of their time on content preparation & dissemination, and on grading of homework, they will be guides, tutors, coaches.  They will also curate content and contextualize it, and make it directly relevant to their students' needs.

MTW: What things should a professor who is thinking of teaching a MOOC for Coursera keep in mind about the thousands of potential learners that may take their course?

DK: That they come from very diverse backgrounds: geographical, socio-economic, educational, ethnic.  Therefore, one needs to teach in a way that is more inclusive, and very sensitive to students' different needs and expectations.
   
MTW: Where would you like to see Coursera and open learning in 5-10 years?

DK: We believe in learning without limits.  I would love to be able to connect anyone, anywhere to the best education in any topic.

MTW: What is the biggest misconception you’ve seen or heard regarding Coursera and MOOCs?

DK: That they are non-interactive and non-social.

MTW: What is the most important thing that you hope everyone recognizes about the possibilities of open learning?

DK: That nothing empowers like knowledge, and that making education a basic human right can help move us closer to solving many other of the world's problems.

***

For more thoughts from Daphne Koller about open learning and the future of higher education in anticipation of her appearance at the Silfen University Forum, see her Ted Talk below from June 2012 (published August 2012):

*Although tickets are no longer available for the Silfen University Forum, you can still view the webcast of the event by going to this link on Friday, April 5th 2013 at 12pm: http://www.upenn.edu/silfenforum/webcast.html*

MOOCs: 2 Questions We Need to Consider

The biggest buzz-term in higher education right now is "MOOC."  A MOOC (massive open online course) has the potential to give thousands of students from all over the globe free access to high quality education from top professors completely through the internet.  Penn has thrown their hat in this ring, supporting one of the big platforms for MOOCs called Coursera (Penn Coursera courses are here) and there will be a forum at Penn on April 5th discussing open learning, the principal that sets the foundation for MOOCs.

The question that everyone is attempting to answer: Are MOOCs the future of higher education? Will they continue to disrupt higher education by granting widespread free access to knowledge that previous generations have paid thousands of dollars for?  Will they unite people all over the globe as these people pursue the quest for high level knowledge?  Will they level the playing field for citizens everywhere?

I do not have the answer, however, I am optimistic.  I am a big fan of open learning and utilizing technologies in innovative ways to maximize learning. In this case, MOOCs have the potential to be amazing fixtures in education.

Because I often look at learning environment design and the intricacies that create a space that maximizes learning for the learner, there are 2 design questions that I feel are important as we figure out the future of MOOCs:

First, how should we design MOOCs to keep the learner motivated?  The foundation of a MOOC relies heavily on the self-motivational capacity of the learner. There are a lot of articles that state that many people who start a MOOC do not finish.  I am not sure that we can interpret the MOOC stats correctly as of yet (remember, stats don't always tell the whole story).  So rather than focusing on that, I'd like to focus on motivation as a whole. How can we make sure that the learner stays motivated when there's no one forcing him or her to keep going?

Second, what is the best way to design a MOOC for maximum learning?  The main issue here is even if we can motivate the learner to keep participating in a MOOC through its design, he or she may not get the most out of the learning experience that they can. If they are motivated to finish a MOOC, but learn less than or even the same as what they would have learned in the classroom, isn't that a missed opportunity given how boundless a digital environment can be?

If we simply transfer the classroom experience to an online space (by say, turning the lectures into video lectures, and then tacking on a discussion forum), I do not think this will result in the maximum amount of learning that could occur from a MOOC.  Going back to my previous post that discussed why we must learn from learners, it is important that we get an understanding of how learning currently takes place in digital environments like virtual worlds, video games, and participatory media from the perspective of those who are actually learning in those environments.  An understanding of this will help as we design any digital environment for learning, including MOOCs.

These are just 2 of many, many thoughts I have about MOOCs and their future.  I believe it is a bright future and that right now educators and researchers are working out the kinks.  We have only begun to experience what a MOOC can do and what it can consist of.  Beyond the hype, this really is a very important development in higher education and perhaps one day, in all of education.

Why We Must Learn from the Learners

This is an interesting time to be in the field of education.  I follow the stories, the trends, and the developments, and it seems like there are nearly a million ideas about where we should take education.  From new technologies in the classroom, to the rise of MOOCS (massive open online courses), education is in an exciting, yet somewhat volatile place right now.  For everyone in support of one way of forming or reforming current education (whether PreK-12 or Higher Ed), there is another person or group that is in support of a completely opposite direction.

This is not new.  In our studies at GSE, we have learned that theories of education have always had opposition.  There never seems to be a time where there is one absolute truth.  Some may say that this is the beauty of education - that there is no absolute truth.  We're dealing with human beings, and because no two human beings are exactly alike, there's no way that a one-size-fits-all education can work.  Therefore, there has to be different theories and different approaches.  The major concern, however, is whether we as educators and administrators are so focused on the possible theories, angles, and perspectives of education, that we are not concentrating enough on the learner and the learning that takes place within education.

Learning is a phenomenon that is exclusive of education.  Education is a social structure meant to foster and facilitate learning.  When we hear stories of students who are having trouble learning (or trouble proving that they've learned something), I believe we are too quick to think about the problems with education.  Perhaps the problem is not so much that we need, let's say, to turn a public school into a charter school, but rather that we have to reflect on whether our methods of connecting with the learners of today actually connects.  Are we doing our best to really understand how today's student (digital natives as they are labeled, since they have grown up using the technology that is prominent today) receives and interprets information and knowledge?  Are we talking to the digital natives to get an understanding of why they are so interested in that cell phone that we think is a distraction in the classroom?  The answer may be deeper and more complex than "Oh they just like to be on that silly Facebook."

More than ever, this is a time where we as educators and administrators need to get to know the students of today. All of the technology that has exploded onto the educational scene is fairly recent.   It is possible that the students of today "know" as much or even more about how that technology should be used to teach them than we do, even with our extensive research backgrounds and educational experience.  I believe it's important that, as we shape the world of education for the students of today and tomorrow, we consider these students almost like co-researchers and learn with them and from them about what works best to help them learn.   Paulo Freire wrote a chapter in his book, Pedagogy of Freedom, titled, "There is No Teaching Without Learning."  Are we spending enough time learning about - and from - our students of today so that we can put them in the best position to receive the knowledge we are trying to teach them?

Brendon Jobs Interview: How to be an Unofficial Teacher Leader

Last week in my Leadership in Educational Institutions course, we discussed teacher leaders and the roles they play in schools.  We looked at teacher leaders in the appointed sense, where a principal may assign a teacher to be in charge of training the other teachers in certain skills due to his or her expertise.  We learned that the implementation of the teacher leader concept is one that at times faces challenges due to the lack of clarity of the role.  This could lead to various levels of success or failure.  But what happens when someone assumes the responsibility of a teacher leader, without being appointed to a teacher leader position?  Can it be successful?  Are there challenges?

Enter Brendon Jobs, a Penn GSE Alum ('11), who teaches at the Philadelphia High School for Girls.  Assuming the teacher leader role without being officially assigned to the position, Jobs gave me a first-hand account of his success and challenges as he tries to "unofficially" lead his colleagues.


MTW: How did you become a teacher leader? 

BJ: You can either be selected or self-appointed.  I’m one of the self-appointed teacher leaders.  We came up with this organization called Revamp Girls High School, and it ended up being a voluntary [teacher-led] school improvement group.  We would kind of map out the vision of what a Girls High School girl is and should be, and also think about different functions within the school.  There were points where people could come to share ideas about what they wanted and expected from the school.  The environment we constructed through Revamp Girls High School made me feel like a teacher leader. 


Brendon goes on to describe some of his success in this unofficial teacher leader role:

BJ: I had a great administrator.  She let us publicize and get [Revamp] together. And slowly but surely I feel like people [at Girls High] were more open and candid in conversations.  I think Revamp made it so that there was a better sense of relational trust between the administration and the faculty, and the students as well. 

I also started giving periodical professional development sessions, and that’s not something that faculty members generally step up to do.  Teacher leaders operate within the school building.  You have to think of yourself as a member of the faculty, not just a teacher in a classroom.   

I try to bring some of the professional development stuff I've done in Philadelphia back to my department.   [For example], we don’t get professional development on issues of gender.  I was able to share the studies I did at Penn on that topic.  I don’t know how to measure whether or not it’s doing anything.  That can be something that’s difficult about teacher leadership.  But I think it definitely contributed to the school environment. 

MTW: What are some of the challenges you've encountered as a teacher leader?

BJ: The union fought [Revamp] really hard.  I feel like a lot of people, more of the senior faculty, were suspicious of the group.  There was a lot of push back and apathy.

There’s always going to be that resistance to change, unless that change is mandated from above.  I don’t think superintendents and school reform commissions really run what we do.  I feel like as an educator, as a professional, I have a say of how I conduct my classroom environment and school environment.  


MTW: Are there any interpersonal strategies you developed to overcome these challenges? 

BJ: In general when you’re respectful and thoughtful and engaging with faculty or children, they respond to that.  I was told by a friend of mine on the staff that sometimes I seem unapproachable.  I think I’m unapproachable to the right people.  If you’re going to come over here and complain, I’m not the one to talk to.  But if you want to develop yourself, or talk about awesome things that are happening with our girls, or in your class, then I love talking about that.   


MTW: What advice do you have for current education students who may want to be a teacher leader one day? 

Wherever you are, wherever you end up, get out of your classroom and use your summers to develop yourself and to greet people outside of your school building and district.  There are teachers all over the country that do amazing things.  Every summer I come back energized because I interact with people who are energizing and have amazing ideas.  Make sure you don’t stay in your box.  Try your best to not operate from a "place of protection." Your new and young, so experiment and have fun.

Brendon Jobs' official website: https://sites.google.com/site/brendonjobs/