M-DCC opened in September 1960. It is a two-year, state-supported community
college with six campuses and many outreach centers. M-DCC is recognized
nationally as one of the largest and best community colleges in the United
States. The college is governed by a seven-member District Board of Trustees
and a college president. The president at this time is Eduardo J. Padron; the
president during the initiation and building of the Teaching/Learning Project
described in this study was Robert McCabe. During 1995-1996, enrollments for
credit students at M-DCC was 74,060 and for noncredit students was 50,569.
M-DCC offers the Associate of Arts Degree, Associate of Science Degree, and
Vocational Credit Certificates in Business, Technical, Allied Health, and
Public Service occupational areas.
The average age of students is 26 with more than 67% of students attending on
a part-time basis. In terms of ethnic mix, 17% of students during 1995-1996
were white, non-Hispanic; 22% were black non-Hispanic; 59% were Hispanic, and
2% were other. Given this mix of students, M-DCC enrolls the most Hispanic
students and the second largest number of black students of any college or
university in the United States. M-DCC graduated 5,268 student in the academic
year 1995-1996 and has awarded a total of 154,523 degrees since it opened.
With this student base, M-DCC employed 2,292 part-time and 3,526 full-time
people in 1995-1996. The faculty is made up of 807 full-time and 1,305
part-time employees. In terms of education, 94% of the full-time faculty hold
advance degrees and 21% have earned doctorate degrees (M-DCC, 1996).
This case study focuses on one of the M-DCC campuses, the Kendall Campus,
which is located in the southern part of Dade County and a suburb of Miami. The
Kendall Campus enrolled a total of 52,912 credit and noncredit students in
1995-1996. Over the time of the Faculty, Staff, and Program Development
Initiative reported in this study, the campus has made the most concerted
effort at building and sustaining the initiative of all of the M-DCC
campuses.
Process Background
The Faculty, Staff, and Program Development Initiative described in this
study started in June 1986 when then M-DCC President, Robert McCabe, delivered
a concept paper entitled, "Organizing M-DCC To Emphasize Faculty/Student
Performance," to a group of 120 faculty and administrators. The paper provides
an outline for a multi-year, institution-wide project with a rationale that was
centered as follows, "If we were to improve teaching and learning overall and
to encourage faculty to take a leadership role in the process, we would have to
provide information and support, capture and share the expertise of excellent
veteran faculty, raise the status of teaching as a profession, and reward the
type of performance we say we value." By late Fall 1986, the Teaching/ Learning
Project had a project director and a 26-member steering committee. In January,
1987, four subcommittees had been put in place with a focus on institutional
values, the teaching/leaning environment, faculty excellence, and new faculty.
A total of 38 M-DCC personnel were directly involved in the project.
During 1987-1988, the project focused on raising awareness, expanding
involvement, and realizing initial outcomes. Information on the project was
shared in several formats inside the college, to the wider community, and
nationally. Two new subcommittees of the steering committee were formed with a
focus on classroom feedback and learning to learn and faculty advancement,
bringing nearly 60 college personnel directly into involvement with the
project. External consultants were brought in to help with the work of the
steering committee and subcommittees. Products of the year included a statement
of institutional teaching/learning values to be included in all college
publications, a new orientation process for new faculty, availability of two
new graduate courses on teaching and learning (effective teaching and learning,
research in the classroom), two videotapes for faculty on exploring classroom
feedback and cultural differences in learning styles, and secured funding for
24 endowed teaching chairs.
In the third year of the project, 1988-1989, the project turned to action on
its recommendations and further involvement of college personnel. Four new
subcommittees were formed with a focus on part-time faculty, role of
administrators, support for faculty, and nonclassroom faculty--the project now
directly involved just over 100 personnel. Major outcomes of the year were a
Statement of Faculty Excellence and the Faculty Advancement Policies and
Procedures. The Statement of Faculty Excellence served to "provide a common
understanding of what it means to perform in an excellent manner at Miami-Dade
Community College" (M-DCC, n.d., a). The statement would be used as a
foundation for assessment of potential new faculty, annual performance reviews
of existing faculty, as a guide in the development and review of portfolios for
faculty tenure and promotion decisions, and for faculty to judge their own
performance and make decisions about professional goals and development. The
Faculty Advancement Policies and Procedures put the standards and their use
into operating policy. There was extensive involvement of the faculty in
putting the Faculty Advancement Policies and Procedures together and they were
passed by faculty referendum in April 1989. By June 1989, 33 endowed chairs had
been funded.
During the fourth year of the project, focus was on revising and fine-tuning
the work of previous years based on the experience of the first year of
implementation. A Collegewide Student Feedback Questionnaire was pilot tested
to collect information based on the Statement of Faculty Excellence. The fifth
year of the project, 1990-1991, brought 48 additional college personnel into
the project with the forming of two new subcommittees of the steering committee
with a focus on support staff involvement and administrator advancement. These
were major milestones as they brought representation of all personnel
categories of the colleges directly into the Teaching/Learning Project. Another
milestone during this year was passage by the faculty and college executive
committee of the Faculty Advancement Procedures which put the Faculty
Advancement Policies and Procedures into operation--the professional
development program envisioned for the Teaching/Learning Project had been
institutionalized. Two other milestones of the year were the completion of the
appointment of Teaching/Learning Center Project Directors at all campuses and
much more extensive pilot testing of a Student Feedback Questionnaire. The
charge to the Teaching and Learning Centers was as follows:
- Develop a core program, consistent collegewide, designed to implement the
outcomes of the Teaching/Learning Project.
- Continue to provide the traditional, campus-specified, staff and program
development opportunities.
- Offer support for instructional design, including classroom research and
expanded application of technology. (M-DCC, n.d., a)
During the sixth year, 1991-1992, focus was on implementing and revising the
Faculty Advancement Policies and Procedures. For the first time, college
decisions on performance review and tenure and advancement were made on the
basis of the new procedures. Twenty-five endowed chairs were awarded to faculty
members who were judged to be excellent performers by their peers. M-DCC was
the first community college in the nation to use the idea of endowed chairs to
recognize faculty performance. Each chair represented a contribution of $45,000
from individuals, businesses, and civic groups and was matched by $30,000 from
the State of Florida. Faculty receiving an endowed chair hold them for three
years and get a $7,500 award annually for their use. Also during 1991-1992, the
Statement of Administrator Excellence, parallel to that for faculty, was
adopted by the M-DCC Board of Trustees (M-DCC, n.d., b).
The seventh and eighth years of the Teaching/Learning Project, 1992-1994,
continued to focus on assessing the implementation of staffing and staff
development policies and procedures and moving closer to full
institutionalization. Several of the project's subcommittees stayed in place to
play a significant role in the troubleshooting, assessment, and revision
process. Milestones during this year included (1) approval of the Statement of
Support Staff Excellence (making a full set for all categories of college
personnel); (2) testing of an Administrator Feedback Questionnaire, similar in
purpose to the student feedback questionnaire for faculty; and (3) soliciting
comments for improvement of the new Faculty Advancement Policies and
Procedures. By the end of the year, accomplishments also included the first
doctoral degree awards for the joint University of Miami-Miami-Dade Community
College's doctoral program, voluntary participation of 78% of full-time faculty
and 59% of part-time faculty in the collegewide student feedback program, and
the award of the seventy-fourth endowed chair. The college was also awarded the
first Theodore M. Hesburgh Award for faculty development to enhance
undergraduate teaching by a national panel of higher education practitioners,
for the accomplishments of the Teaching/Learning Project. At this point, with
many of its products a part of the M-DCC culture, plans were being made to
phase out the Teaching/Learning Project and continue institutionalization of
its purposes and activities in other ways (M-DCC, n.d., c).
The objectives of the Faculty, Staff, and Program Development Initiative at
M-DCC, began as the Teaching/Learning Project, were explicit from the
beginning. The three objectives were as follows:
- To improve teaching and learning with focus on the increasing numbers and
needs of nontraditional students to provide them with a high-quality
education.
- To make teaching at the college a professionally rewarding career by
establishing high performance standards to challenge faculty and to enable them
to take pride in their accomplishments.
- To make teaching and learning the focal point of M-DCC's activities and
decisionmaking processes.
The key features of the initial phase of the M-DCC Faculty, Staff, and Program
Development Initiative, the Teaching/Learning Project, were (1) declaring
institutional values, (2) focusing on faculty excellence, (3) creating a
supportive teaching/learning environment, and (4) nurturing new faculty. While
several of the polices and procedures resulting from the Teaching/Learning
Project became collegewide operations, a new organizational entity, the
Teaching and Learning Center, was put in place on four of the campuses to
reflect the high priority of and to give special attention to faculty and staff
development. The center with the most intensive program of work emerged on the
Kendall Campus, the focus of this case study.
Teaching/Learning Project
The major features of the Teaching/Learning Project are described below.
Declaring Institutional Values
Early on a decision was made to ground the Teaching/Learning Project in a
set of institutional values focused on the importance of teaching and learning
to the college's success. The values that form this statement resulted from
extensive faculty and staff involvement and are as follows:
- Learning
- Change to meet educational needs and to improve learning
- Access while maintaining quality
- Diversity in order to broaden understanding and learning
- Individuals
- A systematic approach to decisionmaking
- The partnership with the community
Focusing on Faculty Excellence
The Statement on Faculty Excellence (M-DCC, 1990) serves as a base for the
features of the Faculty, Staff, and Program Development Initiative at M-DCC
focused on faculty. The Statement of Faculty Excellence defines the qualities
and characteristics of excellent faculty in four categories: (1) their own
motivation and their ability to motivate others, (2) their interpersonal
skills, (3) their knowledge base, and (4) their skill at applying that
knowledge. Two of the assumptions stated at the beginning of the statement make
it clear that definition of faculty excellence applies to all M-DCC faculty,
whether assigned primarily to classroom-based activities or nonclassroom
areas--they are all involved in teaching/learning and student success. The
qualities and characteristics noted under each of the four categories are as
follows:
Motivation
- Are dedicated to their profession in higher education and the community
college's philosophy as defined at M-DCC
- Are enthusiastic about their work
- Set challenging individual and collective performance goals for themselves
- Set challenging performance goals for students
- Are committed to education as a profession
- Project a positive attitude about the ability of students to learn
- Display behavior consistent with professional ethics
- Are concerned with many aspects of students as individuals, not just in their
role as learners
Interpersonal Skills
- Interact positively with students and with their colleagues
- Treat all individuals with respect
- Respect diverse talents
- Work collaboratively with colleagues
- Are available to students
- Listen attentively to what students say
- Are responsive to student needs
- Are fair in their evaluation of students
- Present ideas clearly
- Create a climate that is conducive to learning
Knowledge Base
- Have the intellectual skills requisite for superlative performance
- Are knowledgeable about their work areas and disciplines
- Are knowledgeable about how students learn
- Integrate current subject matter into their work
- Provide perspectives that include a respect for diverse views
- Do their work in a well-prepared and well-organized manner
Application of Knowledge Base
- Not only know their professional fields and established principles of
learning well, but they put these principles of learning into practice as they
carry out their responsibilities relating to the teaching and learning
process
- Provide students with alternative ways of learning
- Stimulate intellectual curiosity
- Encourage independent thinking
- Encourage students to be analytical listeners
- Provide cooperative learning opportunities for students
- Give constructive feedback to students promptly
- Give consideration to feedback from students and others
- Provide clear and substantial evidence that students have learned.
As noted above, the Statement of Faculty Excellence was put into operation
with the approval by faculty and administration of the Faculty Advancement
Policies and Procedures. The most recent edition of these policies and
procedures (M-DCC, 1994) states that they are "designed to encourage and
support the professional development of faculty members, to align the college's
reward system with professional performance as defined by the college's
Statement of Faculty Excellence, and to ensure consistency and equity in the
application of the policies and procedures" (p. i). The policies and procedures
address performance reviews; the performance portfolio; continuing contracts,
promotion, and endowed chairs; and a process to monitor and review the polices
and procedures. A set of philosophical concepts are set forth to provide
direction for developing policies and procedures relating to faculty
advancement. The guiding concepts are as follows:
- Polices and procedures will be geared toward support and development.
- The individual faculty member will be responsible for his or her own
advancement.
- Multiple sources of information will be relied on.
- Information will be obtained systematically.
- There will be consistent, equitable application of polices and procedures
from department to department and across campuses.
- Advancement will be based on performance, performance which has been judged
of value by the individuals who collectively make up the college.
- The decisionmaking process will be democratized.
- There will be checks and balances built into the system. (p. i)
Creating a Supportive Teaching/Learning Environment
Two of the major products of the Teaching/Learning Project seem to make
major contributions to creating a more supportive teaching and learning
environment at M-DCC. These are the approved statements of excellence for
support and administrative staff.
Statement of Support Staff Excellence
The introduction to the Statement of Support Staff Excellence (M-DCC, 1993)
notes,
No educational institution can hope to succeed in its mission to
provide high quality learning opportunities for its students without the total
commitment of all its personnel. . . . The critical role of faculty in the
teaching/learning relationship is obvious. Not nearly as obvious, perhaps, but
just as critical is the role played by support staff in the advancement of
student learning.
The assumptions listed as underlying the statement include the following:
- The intent of these statements is to encourage and enhance support staff
involvement in the teaching and learning process.
- The qualities and characteristics representative of excellence apply equally
to the four classifications of support staff (secretarial/clerical,
technical/paraprofessional, service/maintenance, and skilled craft).
- Excellent support staff at Miami-Dade Community College strive to improve the
quality of teaching and learning by recognizing students as the college's
priority and by responding in a positive manner to their needs.
The qualities and characteristics of excellent support staff are described in
five categories: (1) Motivation, (2) Professional Performance, (3)
Interpersonal Skills, (4) Knowledge Base, and (5) Leadership/Supervision. For
illustrative purposes only the statements relating to Knowledge Base are
presented here:
- Possess the knowledge and technical skill required for outstanding
performance
- Are knowledgeable about issues that impact teaching and learning
- Are knowledgeable about their work areas
- Are knowledgeable about college policies and procedures
Statement of Administrator and Professional Staff Excellence
The M-DCC Statement of Administrator and Professional Staff Excellence
(M-DCC, 1992) has a similar introduction and format to the statements for
support staff. The qualities and characteristics of excellent administrators
and professional staff are described in five categories: (1)
Leadership/Supervision Skills, (2) Professional Performance, (3) Interpersonal
Skills, (4) Motivation, and (5) Knowledge Base. For illustrative purposes, only
the statements relating to Leadership/Supervision Skills are presented here:
- Are leaders in their fields and are respected members of their administrative
units
- Recognize that the first constituency to be served is the M-DCC student and
make decisions accordingly
- Provide leadership for the development, implementation, and evaluation of the
teaching and learning process
- Actively seek the resources necessary to support institutional programs,
services, and goals
- Use power equitably and appropriately
- Accept responsibility for their own performance and, if they are supervisors,
also accept responsibility for the performance of their administrative units
- Exhibit positive behavior which they encourage in others
- Use leadership strategies that are appropriate for the situation
- Actively seek students and personnel who reflect the diversity of the
community and provide opportunities for their growth
- Respond to community needs and issues in ways that are consistent with
M-DCC's mission.
M-DCC is currently working on the feedback system for staff in supervisory
roles that will assist in improving the performance review process to help put
the statement of administrator and professional staff excellence into more
consistent and effective practice.
Nurturing New Faculty
The delivery of staff development for new faculty and staff takes the form
of orientation sessions and a mentoring program by veteran staff. Both full-
and part-time faculty are included in the program.
Teaching and Learning Centers
As a result of the Teaching/Learning Project, at one time four of the then
five campuses of M-DCC had an operating Center for Teaching and Learning with a
full-time director, an identifiable staff, and budget. However, by 1996-1997,
only two of the campuses had Centers for Teaching and Learning of this type in
place--Kendall and North. While a number of factors accounted for the
elimination of the centers on the other campuses, the primary cause was a state
cutback in fiscal resources. Campus administrators had to make hard decisions
on which programs and staff to cut on every campus. As will be apparent in the
following section on Future Directions, M-DCC is now moving to a collegewide
staff development strategy which will ensure more consistent service to each of
the campuses. The Teaching and Learning Center for the Kendall Campus, in
1996-1997 known as the Center for Faculty, Staff, and Program Development
(n.d., a), defined its mission as
a comprehensive resource for professional development and
performance excellence. The Center is a place where any employee with an idea
can receive support, guidance and access to a network of internal consultants
who can help the employee achieve campus goals and meet student needs. (p.
1)
The Center for Faculty, Staff, and Program Development
(n.d., b) on the Kendall Campus had the following goals for 1996-1997 as listed
in its 1996 Annual Report:
- To enhance the effectiveness of faculty, adjunct faculty, staff, and
administrators in dealing with students, faculty, and staff.
- To provide instructional design consultation and support for curriculum and
instructional development projects.
- To provide leadership resources and coordination for the campus's
comprehensive effort for faculty, staff, and program development.
- To promote new initiatives for program development.
- To provide leadership in the use of new delivery systems for instruction and
information (e.g., electronic forum, learning communities, distributed
learning, web pages, and service learning).
- To direct the services of the IBM Instructional Technology Center and the
Macintosh Multimedia Resources Center.
- To provide teacher effectiveness information, training, and support for
faculty.
- To coordinate the development of the Campus Master Plan for Integrating
Technology into the Curriculum.
- To identify and measure indicators of increased productivity in teacher
effectiveness as a result of using technology.
- To provide orientation experiences for new faculty, part-time faculty,
support staff, and administrators who are new to their roles.
- To provide training and support on identified areas of the faculty
advancement process for faculty, administrators, and committee members.
- To provide information, registration, and coordination for the University of
Miami course: Teaching, Learning, and Assessment in the Community College and
the Florida International University doctoral cohort.
- To prepare New Faculty Selection Committees to assume their role.
- To support the development and integration of instructional technology into
the curriculum by providing training, consultation, and support in the use of
computers, the Internet, videodisks, CD-ROMs, e-mail, and multimedia in the
teaching/leaning process.
- To provide process consultation/facilitation for campus/college groups.
To guide the planning and implementation of these goals, the Kendall Campus
Center had put in place a Center Advisory Committee which had the following
subcommittees:
- Academic Affairs Subcommittee
- Administrative Training Subcommittee
- Support Staff Training Subcommittee.
The center employed a staff of about 15 professional and support staff, of whom
five are full-time including the director. Some of the staffing was made up of
faculty who are on temporary or part-time leave from teaching positions to work
on projects in the center. The center had a budget of about $450,000 from
regular M-DCC funds and engaged in a wide variety of externally funded training
and development projects to enhance its size and funding.
The Kendall Campus Center described its services and resources in the
following categories:
- Workshops/Seminars
- Resource Information
- Travel
- Instructional Design and Development
- University of Miami and Florida International Courses/Programs
- Consultation
- Instructional Technology
Each of these categories of services and resources had a wide variety of
activities included.
The impact of the staff development program can be seen in the 1996 Annual
Report for the Center for Faculty, Staff, and Program Development on the
Kendall Campus. The report is organized by major "development goals." The goals
and illustrative accomplishments under each were as follows:
- To enhance the effectiveness of faculty, adjunct faculty, staff, and
administrators in dealing with students, faculty, and staff--211 workshops
conducted running the gamut from orientation for adjunct faculty, to team
building, to teaching and learning on-line, to basic first aid for security
officers; coordinating a Support Staff Day; planning 72 staff trips to
conferences, workshops, and seminars (41 out of the county); and producing a
Technology Resource Handbook.
- To provide instructional design consultation and support for curriculum and
institutional development projects--16 curriculum and instructional development
projects were supported addressing topics such as International Relations
Course Web Pages, Revision of Experiencing Art, Song Writing and Music
Composition (Interactive CAI), Historical Architectural Survey (CD-ROM), and a
Visual Plant Database (Interactive Videodisk).
- To provide leadership, resources, and coordination for the campus's
comprehensive effort for faculty, staff, and program development--leadership
was provided by accomplishments such as instituting new programs that promote
distance learning, promoting the expansion of departmental and faculty web
pages, and coordinating the Campus Future Search Conference, "2001: Kendall
Campus."
- To promote new initiatives for program development, ten technology practicums
were sponsored for a wide range of departments with descriptions such as
computerized conversion of course lecture notes; produced a video atlas and
video disc, using Course Builder software package to develop a tutorial;
developed interactive practice tests; and designed and developed a web site.
- To provide leadership in the use of new delivery systems for
instruction--emphasis during the year was on use of the Internet and web-based
learning.
- To direct the services of the IBM Instructional Technology Center and the
Macintosh Multimedia Resource Center--provided many beginning and intermediate
workshops on software such as WordPerfect, Excel, PowerPoint, and ToolBook;
increased use of open labs (total sign-ins numbered 519); provided
individualized help; set up student orientations; managed the campus web
server, and conducted training for area K-12 school staff.
- To provide teacher effectiveness information, training, and support for
faculty--provided wide variety of workshops for full- and part-time faculty on
topics such as active learning strategies, learning styles, diversity issues on
campus, and master teacher seminar.
- To provide support for the development of the Campus Master Plan for
Integrating Technology into the Curriculum--served on several of the committees
working on this plan.
- To identify and measure indicators of increased productivity in teaching
effectiveness as a result of using technology--gathered student feedback on
several of the learning projects making use of technology.
- To provide orientation experiences for new faculty, part-time faculty,
support staff, and administrators new to their roles--held orientation sessions
for groups such as adjunct faculty, new department chairs, and new student
assistants.
- To provide training and support on identified areas of the faculty
advancement process for faculty, administrators, and committee
members--training sessions were provided on topics such as portfolio
development for continuing contracts, promotion, and endowed chairs for those
preparing portfolios and those doing the reviews.
- To provide information, registration, and coordination for the University of
Miami course, Workshop in Education: Teaching and Learning in the Community
College and the Florida International University doctoral cohort--the UM course
was not offered because there were very few new faculty; a new FIU doctoral
cohort was started.
- To prepare selection committees to assume their roles--no new faculty were
hired and so no selection committees for faculty needed training; provided
training for an administrative selection committee.
- To support the integration of instructional technology into the curriculum by
providing training, consultation, and support in the use of computers,
videodisks, and multimedia in the teaching/learning process--in addition to
workshops already noted, provided individual help to nearly 150 individuals on
topics such as authoring and presentation, scanning, video editing, and web
authoring.
- To provide process consultation/facilitation for campus/college
groups--provided assistance to a wide variety of committees and groups.
- To schedule the use of the Conference Center by the campus and
college--scheduled a total of 614 events involving 13,344 people.
Major new directions have been set forth for the M-DCC Faculty, Staff, and
Program Development Initiative for implementation during 1997-1998. The new
directions were developed by a Human Resource Development Reengineering Team in
light of the profound impact on the college of dwindling resources, a changing
work environment, rapidly evolving technology, demands of external
stakeholders, and changing workforce needs. The work of the Reengineering Team
focusing on the human resources of the college, and described in a report
entitled "Recommendations for Training and Performance Management," included
assessing current practices relating to training, supervisory training, and
performance appraisal of professional and staff personnel; reviewing public and
private sector programs; Internet searches; and obtaining feedback from
one-to-one interview, town hall meetings, and focus groups of faculty, staff,
and administrators. The recommended future directions for training and
performance management at M-DCC are as follows:
Recommendations on Training
- Establish collegewide and campus training priorities annually
- Institute a formal training program for employees, full- and part-time,
driven by the college's mission, vision, values, and goals.
- Establish core training curricula to address required performance
standards.
- Retain autonomy for individual campuses in addressing their unique training
needs.
- Ensure collegewide access, consistency, equity, and quality of training for
full-time, part-time, and District personnel of all six campuses.
- Initiate a required training program in effective supervision for all
supervisors through the level of executive management.
- Allocate funds equitably to support training programs.
- Evaluate the effectiveness of training based on trainee's ability to transfer
the learning to the workplace.
Recommendations on Performance Management
- Adopt a standard process for managing the performance of support staff and
professionals. The process will have three phases: (1) setting performance
expectations, (2) coaching throughout the year, and (3) performance
appraisal.
- Institute a consistent, prescribed performance appraisal process for support
staff.
- Institute a consistent, prescribed performance appraisal process for
professional staff.
The recommendations about training address major concerns regarding best use of
the state mandated two percent of budget that must be spent on staff and
program development (about $1.8 million for M-DCC in 1996-1997), substantial
current variation in training and development efforts among the campuses, and
needs for a systematic process to access training needs at an institutional
level and match training with college priorities. As regards performance
management, the recommendations address the concerns about formation and
consistency in the performance management process for support and professional
staff.
Some important implications can be gleaned from the M-DCC staff development
program journey for designing, staffing, and staff development. Based on this
case study and a prior study of the M-DCC staff development initiative
(Loumos-Kennedy, 1996), the following implications are evident:
- Administrative Backing: There is no substitute for support from top
administration of a TYI for staff development initiatives. They play a key role
in securing adequate resources and encouraging participation.
- Focus on Learning: The staff development initiative cannot, in the
end, be grounded in or operated for the self-serving benefits of staff. The
staff development initiative must have its impetus and continued justification
and accountability in effects on learning.
- Support Individual Development: The staff development initiative must
be responsive and in tune with the individual development needs and plans of
each and every staff member. The learning expectations, process, and
organization must fit the specific context and situation of the individual
staff member.
- Include All Staff: The staff development initiative must include
attention and focus to all of the staff who affect a particular topical area
related to student learning. The initiative, to be effective, will need to
consider attention to faculty (full- and part-time), support staff, and
administrators.
- Align with Organizational Goals: The staff development initiative must
be directly responsive and productive in terms of the institution's needs and
goals, both short- and long-term. With a shortage of resources, all initiatives
will and should stand the test of relative contribution to organizational
mission and plans.
- Build a System: The staff development initiative must be thought about
and designed in a comprehensive fashion so the components can be mutually
reinforcing. That is, the initiative must align with organizational goals,
address clear and accepted standards of good performance, respond to
individuals needs, be reinforced by performance review, and be compensated for
in reward systems.
- Support with Resources: The staff development effort must have
adequate resources to deliver what is planned and promised. Staff development,
as with student learning, takes resources on a regular and dependable budgeting
cycle.
- Use Participative Decisionmaking: The benefits of directly involving
those who will be the target and beneficiaries of staff development in all
components of the staff development system cannot be underestimated. Most staff
development initiatives are voluntary, and even if they are not, learning is an
individual matter; for staff development initiatives to have the desired
effects, the participants must be supportive, which comes, in part, with
participation in deciding what and how staff development will occur.
- Account for Results: The staff development effort must develop a
deserved reputation for quality through careful planning, continuously
monitoring impact, and quickly making needed changes.
- Make Long-Term Commitment: Improving an institution through staff
development does not occur quickly. Rather, it requires a commitment of many
years to put effective systems into place, remove disincentives, reach a
critical mass of staff, and support programmatic change.
Study Director
George Copa, Professor, Department of Work, Community, and Family Education,
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University of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN, (612) 624-9284
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Site Contacts
Marty Jenrette, District Director of College Training and Development and Project
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Implementation, Miami-Dade Community College, (305) 237-3775
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Marie Nock, Director of College Training and Development, Miami-Dade Community
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College, (305) 237-2258
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