Strengthening Academy Leadership: Bylaws Update

The Academy Board periodically reviews and updates its Bylaws to strengthen its operation. The Board is recommending changing the Bylaws to strengthen the leadership structures of the Academy, and to reinforce member participation in the election of the Executive Board and engagement in Academy work.

All current members of the Academy are requested to vote on these changes.  Electronic voting will run from April 26 to June 25, 2019. These changes will be ratified only if at least 30% of current members vote, and 2/3 of voters approve the changes. If passed, the changes apply immediately and will be in effect for elections during the Business Meeting at the 2019 conference.

VIEW Details of the proposed changes
VISIT the forum for discussion of the changes
VOTE: Cast your ballot

Thanks for participating in the continuous improvement of the Academy!

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Summary of Proposed Changes to the Bylaws

1.  Extend the terms of the President and President-Elect to two years. Recent Academy Presidents, and the current President-Elect, believe that a two-year term as President will allow the President greater ability to carry out their vision for the Academy. The Academy's 3-year strategic planning cycle can be more effectively achieved with the longer term for the President. This change extends the commitment of a President of the Academy to 5 years: 2 years as president-elect, 2 years as President, and one year as Immediate Past President. (The current incoming president has agreed to serve for a two-year term, if these amendments are ratified by the Academy membership. Current candidates for President-Elect have agreed to the five-year commitment to the Academy Board in this series of roles.)

2. Clarify election procedures. The current Bylaws have ambiguity about whether ballots may be cast by members not present in person at the Business Meeting during the Annual Conference. The Board believes that all current Academy Members should have the opportunity to elect their officers during that meeting. The proposed changes to the Bylaws clarify that all members present during the Business Meeting, whether in-person or online, may vote in elections of the Executive Board.

3.  Add additional Appointed Officers. The Executive Board has created and filled several new appointed positions that create increased opportunities for ongoing involvement by more members, and to support the agenda and mission of the Academy. These roles, and their job descriptions, are recommended for addition to the bylaws.

4.  Minor changes to balance the election process and clarify language. The election years of some Board members are shifted so that about half of the Board is elected each year, and the Academy Board is differentiated from the Executive Board. 

Academy members are encouraged to "Create posters that represent a key innovation in universal design to share with conference participants”. The Poster Sessions at the Process Education Conference are a venue for sharing specific innovations that apply certain principles of Process Education.

— Each poster session presenter will interact with the conference attendees for 45 minutes to discuss their innovation/idea.

— All proposals must be submitted through the conference submission portal. 

See the website for additional information and submission details.

A 90-minute workshop scheduled for May 7^th, 6 pm EDT will help prepare facilitators for the PE Conference/CoTL 2019. This includes facilitators of panels, symposiums, practitioner workshops, and research workshops. 

Topics to be included are:

* expectations of facilitators of workshops, panels and symposiums
* role of recorders during each session 
* creating effective facilitation plans that will engage participants
* effective use of the moodle site for posting materials/resources/notes
* tips on collecting and synthesizing assessment feedback
* identify 15 best PE practices that will be emphasized in multiple sessions 

From the Editorial Board

Welcome to the tenth volume of the International Journal of Process Education. In this issue, we present an exciting collection of collaborative research efforts of many Process Educators. Student learning is the main focus of this volume. From implementing a Learning to Learn camp to a revised version of the Classification of Learning skills, promoting, measuring and documenting student learning will be explored in this issue.

Our first two articles relate to Learning to Learn camps. Wenner, Soman, Stevenson and Apple discuss the implementation, infrastructure and support necessary to begin a learning to learn camp at an institution by discussing their experiences at Grand Valley State University in Building Institutional Support for a Recovery Course for Academically Dismissed Students. The authors discuss, in detail, a recovery course developed from the Learning to Learn model that has been established at the institution to shed light on how an institute could be incorporated at other institutions. The last article, Student Perceptions of Skill Acquisition in a Process Education Learning to Learn Camp, Murray looks at the impact of a Learning to Learn camp on students’ perceived skill acquisition. Nursing students who were in jeopardy of being academically dismissed from their program were invited to participate in a Learning to Learn camp to gain readmission. Successful students who gained readmission were interviewed about the skills they developed during the camp. Results indicated that the skills the students obtained are effective in empowering students to be independent, self-directed learners.

In our third article, Employing a Rubric to Assess Learner Performance in Calculus and Differential Equations, Kaplan examines student growth in learning across fourteen characteristics. He creates a baseline with a student self-evaluation across these characteristics at the beginning of the semester and compares the scores with a self-evaluation at the end of the semester in two types of mathematics courses.

Analyzing student learning growth is also the focus of the collaborative research paper, Self-Growth Paper – An Assessment and Research Tool to Analyze Growth Outcomes. Ellis, Apple, Leasure, Perkins and Watts analyze students’ self-growth papers and generalize their usage for different stakeholders. Additionally the authors describe how to incorporate the self-growth paper into the curriculum, how to generate and use evidence of growth indicated in the paper.

Our last article, Classifying Learning Skills for Educational Enrichment, is the product of the work of multiple Process Educators. The authors revisited and refined the 2007 version of the Classification of Learning Skills (CLS). The 2019 CLS identifies new processes and clusters as well as skills missing from the previous version. In addition to these refinements of the Affective, Cognitive and Social Domains, the new version includes skills for the Assessment and Evaluation of Quality. The authors also provide an example of using the 2019 CLS to design facilitation plans for a course.

It is our hope that you will enjoy reading the contributions to our newest issue as much as we enjoyed working with the authors to bring the research to fruition. We look forward to receiving your feedback as well as your future research contributions.

Sincerely,

Kathleen Burke, Chief Editor, International Journal of Process Education