Creating Career Connections

Tech and Tips Tuesday

Creating Career Connections – Building your online PLN

It’s fine to have social media that connects us with old friends, but we need tools that help us discover new people as well. – Ethan Zuckerman

                                       

 

A few weeks ago, we discussed the importance of Creating  a Social Resume and maintaining our social media profiles on Facebook, Google+, Twitter, and LinkedIn. So, today, we take our social media presence one step further as we use it to build our Professional Learning Network, or PLN. This is an exercise in appreciation of faculty and scholarly efforts everywhere. 

Through online network connections we can commune with colleagues around the globe or in our home institution, celebrate victories, share discoveries and best practices, say happy birthday or congratulations, ask questions, and provide insight. Professional online groups can be found in each of the popular social media sites above. However, one of the most significant and powerful sites is LinkedIn, the largest professional networking site on the web. 

Here are three resources to get you started with groups on LinkedIn:  

Finding and Joining a Group via the LinkedIn Help Center

These are step-by-step instructions to set up communities for yourself. So easy!

Groups – Getting Started via the LinkedIn Help Center

This is a list of Help Center posts that assist with everything from setting up your own group to learning how to post comments to a group conversation. Useful stuff! 

25 LinkedIn Groups for Teachers via Fractus Learning

While this extensive list of groups was compiled in 2013, it will give you a great jumping-off point to finding connections that fit with your ideas, disciplines, and research areas. Start here! 

Now that you know how to connect, you are ready to tie into the groups sponsored by your school or popular in your field, as well as those associated with the professional organizations you decided to join. Your PLN is picking up steam! Be brave, say hello, and join the conversation. 

Please lend your voice to our February Survey and tell us what you love most about your work! :)

Also, join me tomorrow for Historic Hump-Day as we review how higher education professionals have historically been motivated and recognized as compared to contemporary practices.

See you then, 

Melynda

@Melynda_Conner

#TCBHigherEd

3 Reasons to Join Professional Associations

Make-It Monday

3 Reasons to Join Professional Associations

Appreciation is a wonderful thing; it makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well. -- Voltaire

         

This week we explore appreciation within and among higher education faculty and administration. As we do so, I encourage you to make a list of the professional organizations of which you are currently a member, as well as three you would like to join. On the list, make notations of the primary research foci of each group, in addition to conference event and submission dates. Using a calendar, plan which conferences you will attend, submit to, and when you will join at least one of the three new organizations you explored. 

According to Kelly Cherwin, Communication Director at HigherEd Jobs, the benefits to joining a professional association are three-fold: 

Professional Support

Through conferences, committees, events, and online chat forums members connect, share ideas, encourage “best practices,” discuss new developments in the field, highlight key influencers, and learn together. The research, publishing, and presenting opportunities the organizations supply, as well as chances to serve help build your portfolio. 

Career Growth

Many associations provide members with job boards and career services such as tips on resumes and cover letters. Training and certification classes often are offered online through the association websites. Listing your membership and professional activities on your resume improves your status as an active professional.

Get Smarter

As a member of a professional organization, you will have access to online publications and journals full of current resource information in your field. In addition, many times associations provide awards for those achieving excellence as scholars. 

So, to get you started, here are three higher education associations to consider:

American Association of Community Colleges (AACC), www.aaccnche.edu

 

Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U), www.aacu.org

 

The Professional and Organizational Development (POD) Network in Higher Education, www.podnetwork.org

 

Don’t stop there! Search for the associations that are specific to your discipline and to your region of the country. Find the best fits for you and join in!

Also, meet me here tomorrow for Tech and Tips Tuesday when we discuss professional online chat forums and other ways to share appreciation with fellow faculty and administrators online.

See you then, 

Melynda

@Melynda_Conner

#TCBHigherEd 

Reference:

Cherwin, K. A. (2012). Why join a professional association? Higher Ed Jobs. Retrieved from http://www.higheredjobs.com/articles/articledisplay.cfm?ID=157

Online Adjunct Survey Results

Online Adjunct Survey Results

While January’s survey only elicited a dozen responses, I want to thank those of you who were able to participate. 

Here are the long-awaited results! 

Q1. How long have you been an online adjunct or part-time online faculty in higher education?

90% of respondents were seasoned educators who have been adjuncts for more than 2 years.  

Q2. How many higher education institutions employ you as an online adjunct or part-time online faculty member each year (January to December)?

67% of respondents teach online for only one school.

Q3. How many higher education institutions employ you each year (January to December) as an adjunct or part-time faculty for location-bound blended courses with both online and in-class elements?

Likewise, 67% of respondents who teach in the blended modality only service one school. 

Q4. What length are the courses you teach at colleges and universities in the online and blended modalities? (Choose answers closest to your term lengths and choose as many answers as apply.)

The term lengths really vary for our adjunct respondents with a 5-week term being the most popular.

 

Q5. On average, how often does your employing university contact you with available faculty development opportunities?

While a couple of respondents never receive faculty development opportunity notifications, most are engaged by their schools at least 2 to 3 times per year, and many are invited monthly. 

 

Q6. On average, how often have you been able to participate in the faculty development training offered by your employing institution?

Our respondents seem to find the time to participate in faculty development programs at least once or twice in a three-year period, with most attending more than twice a year. 

 

Q7. In what area of your work as an online adjunct or part-time faculty member would you like more training or better guidance? In other words, in your opinion, what is missing?

• More pedagogical applications of Learning Management Systems with useful strategies
• How to incorporate interactive, engaging technology into the classroom
• Specifics on grading writing assignments and how to correct APA without putting red all over the paper
• Embedding videos
• More involvement in curriculum development
• More opportunities to improve facilitation skills

Q8. What is the highest degree you have attained?

The majority of adjunct respondents hold a Masters Degree.

 

Q9. In what discipline or field do you teach online or blended courses? (Feel free to share course names or multiple disciplines.)

• Communication
• Education
• Computer Science
• IT Management
• Business
• Counseling/psychology
• Humanities
• General Studies
• Economics
• History
• Political Science
• Urban Studies
• Patient records and basic health

Q10. What is the highest number of courses you have taught online at the same time, or had running simultaneously? (even if it was just for a few days of overlap...)

Wow! Nine classes at once is the largest load recorded through this survey, with 27% of respondents having covered six at their busiest. However, the majority of adjuncts here have maxed-out with teaching two classes at once. 

Thanks again to those who fit the survey profile and took the time to lend their voices!

We had a wide variety of term lengths and disciplines represented. The adjunct faculty respondents held at least a Master's Degree, have predominantly taught within higher education for more than two years, and teach in both the online and blended learning modalities. We learned that the majority of institutions are offering faculty development opportunities to adjunct instructors and many are participating three or more times a year. Those of us who design enrichment workshops can use the list of "wants" as a guide for future offerings.

Please take the time to complete our shorter 5-question February Survey about why you teach. We will reveal those results on March 6th in the Weekly Wrap-Up. 

Join me next week as we explore APPRECIATION and how it is expressed within the ranks of higher education faculty and administration. On Make-It Monday we will begin development of our online Professional Learning Network (PLN) by reviewing how to become a member of interest groups and professional organizations. 

See you then, 

Melynda

@Melynda_Conner

#TCBHigherEd