The Deep Dive

Park is among dozens of higher education institutions across the country actively exploring ways to reduce textbook costs for students while upholding the rights and responsibilities of academic departments/faculty to adopt the instructional materials best for their courses. Institutions are increasingly turning to Open Educational Resources (OER) and the collections within their own libraries to reduce cost, increase expedient access to instructional materials, and enhance learning outcomes.This conversation about reducing textbook costs through OER and library resources was presented by:

• Jon Ritterbush, Director of Library Services and Learning Commons
• Katelyn Handler, Assistant Professor and Reference Instruction Librarian
• Scott Curtis, Open Educational Resources Coordinator, UMKC Libraries

The purpose of this session provided practical information about how to plan a meeting, lead the meeting, take notes at the meeting, and follow-up from the meeting. This session was designed for those leading academic department meetings, school or college meetings, campus center meetings and committee meetings.

This presentation offered a view of writing as a highly varied language activity that could be strongly tied to goals for student learning, and, through examples and research, suggested ways that it could play a central role in every discipline.

If you attended or watched the event (MyPark login required), we invite you to complete this 3-question survey.

Find out how to help your students identify opportunities that are right for them and how to support students through the application processes. The presenters also discussed how to write letters of recommendation that will help your students win awards.

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Roundtable representatives included: Raed Alhathni, Robin Burger, Julie Creek, Kevin Vicker, Maureen Wambui, and Zephra Weber

Park University has a long tradition of diversity and inclusivity, and our dedication to international students is a matter of pride. However, as faculty, we often struggle with the challenges of teaching students who come from different cultural or linguistic backgrounds than ourselves. We are good enough teachers that we find strategies to help our students, but what are we not considering? In what ways could we better support our international students, both in the classroom and outside of it?

If you attended or watched the event, we invite you to complete this 3-question survey.

This session provided information on student demographics and student development theory and the resources that Park provides for underprepared students.

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This workshop provided an opportunity for participants to explore effective and efficient strategies for grading student work. Participants discussed the purposes of grading as well as ways to ensure that grades measure what students know. Various approaches to formative and summative assessment were introduced.

Visit KCPDC to view offerings. Kansas City Area Park University employees may register for KCPDC sessions by logging into Paycor and enrolling in the sessions of interest. For KCPDC questions, please email innovate@park.edu.

This session explores pedagogical approaches to preventing plagiarism rather than punishing it. Presenters shared resources for working on proper source use with students and demonstrated how students can use Turnitin through Canvas as a revising tool.

If you attended or watched the event, we invite you to complete this 3-question survey.

In response to feedback Stacey Kikendall and Glenn Lester received through their “Teaching the International Classroom” reading group and faculty survey, they gathered five international students representing different cultural backgrounds who spoke about their educational experiences in their home countries and how it might differ from their experiences at Park. The student panelists included: Anna Jaehn, Arber Dumani, Iroda Narzullaeva, Jinhong Li, and Leonard Lindweld.