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Volume II, Issue 4 March 2006 |
Quinsigamond
Community College |
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Staff
Development Staff Members: Erica Merrill
Office
Hours: Room 267A
Upcoming
Events:
In accordance with the college's strategic initiative to optimize the use of technology for improved and cost-effective communication, this newsletter is being distributed via email as the best means for information-sharing with faculty and staff. |
Editor: Erica Merrill "Rubrics and Staff Development" by Julie Bakerlis "Yankee Dental Congress" by Joyce Cooney
“I’d like to thank the Academy….” I
was talking to a friend the other day when I suddenly remembered that her
birthday is coming up soon, but I couldn’t remember the exact date …
so I asked. Frowning slightly
and scrunching her forehead, she reluctantly answered, “March 3rd.”
Puzzled by her reaction, I asked, “Why the hesitation and the
frown? It’s not like I
asked you to solve all the problems of the universe.”
She explained, “No, it’s not that.
It’s just that I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it.
Two years ago, my birthday was also the day of your mom’s funeral
so….” At
that moment, I realized: My turn to frown…. But
I didn’t. I just smiled
reassuringly and told her she shouldn’t feel like she still has to
tiptoe around me. “It’s
been two years, I’m fine,” I answered and plastered “the smile”
back on my face. I then asked
her what she wants for her birthday and started ticking off ideas on my
fingers … “a knickknack, or a stuffed animal for your bed, or a new
purse, oh you’d love this necklace I saw last week in Filene’s, and
oooh, how about a little catnip toy for your new cat, too? How is Scooter doing? Is
she still hissing? Is she
crawling into your lap or at least letting you pet her yet?” I
could tell my friend was scrutinizing me carefully, but after another
moment’s hesitation, it seemed she decided that I had tactfully changed
the subject for a good reason, and so she didn’t push it (or me). Although
I was not able to fool one of my best lifelong friends, I still consider
myself to be a great actress whose performance is worthy of an Oscar.
For the most part, when people ask me how I am, or how I’ve been
feeling, or how well I’m coping, I just slap on my million-dollar smile
and say, “I’m fine. How
are you?” Some days, I’ll
even go so far as to answer, “I’m great!” I’m lying! I’m lying through my almost pearly-whites that took a year and a half to straighten. I’ve been lying at least 20 times a day, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year, for two years now. If I’ve done my math correctly, that means I’ve lied about 14,560 times. You’d think I would have started to believe my own lie by now, but … no. It’s just the opposite, actually. The more I say it, the less I believe it. And I’m sure I’m not alone. I know I can’t speak for every QCC employee who has lost a loved one – whether two days or 20 years ago – but I wouldn’t be surprised to discover that for the sake of non-confrontation (or perhaps for the sake of denial or self-preservation), they lie and put on that trademark smile as much as I do. Maybe someday, 20 years from now, we’ll finally start to believe our own lies, but until then, we just keep on “keeping-on.” It’s what our lost loved ones would want us to do. It’s
what Mom would want me to do, too,
I always tell myself, letting it repeat like a mantra in my head. Maybe someday, I’ll finally believe it.
Rubrics
and Staff Development Workshops and seminars for the NAEYC 2005 Annual Conference were held at the Washington Convention Center, Grand Hyatt, and Renaissance Washington Hotel. I attended several workshops over the course of four days in December 2005. I participated in a seminar called “Rubrics and Staff Development: What Are Rubrics, How Are They Used, and How Can They Lead To Effective Staff Development?” In order to offer effective staff development and not “prepackaged” training, it is important to figure out what level each staff member is at. Looking at their past experiences, skills acquired, and value systems will help you guide and mentor your staff. It is crucial to provide feedback and self-reflection on a consistent basis. Rubrics are a performance-based assessment tool and can be tailored for specific tasks and purposes. An assessor can use them relatively quickly to determine performance levels, and the details can be easily organized. Levels of attainment can be listed in order and individualized to guide my student teachers in changing their behavior or routines. I have also learned how to motivate my student teachers to move to the next level to ensure success. Job-embedded staff development has three components: relevance, feedback, and transfer. Training and development of student teachers is most efficient when it takes place in the regular workplace (i.e. as part of the normal teaching day). Relevance begins with a thorough understanding of one’s own capabilities, values, and beliefs. Therefore, it is crucial to work individually with each student teacher to allow them to find their “comfort zone” and give them opportunities to succeed; when frustrated, the mentor can easily move in. Providing continuous feedback in the classroom through mentoring, peer coaching, self-reflection, and dialogue will encourage the student teachers to seek new techniques, methods, and experiences to improve their teaching and care-giving. Having daily short meetings with their peers and a mentor will reinforce their learning. Lastly, when learning takes place on the job, the transfer of skills into daily practice is also embedded in the process. However, in order for skills to be learned, one must admit that there is practice that needs to be modified or a skill that must be learned. The environment must be one of trust that places value on improved performance.
Yankee
Dental Congress I
attended the Yankee Dental Congress in Boston.
Along with hosting an Alumni reception for our Dental Hygiene
Alumni, on the night of Friday, January 27th I attended a
course on Non-Surgical Protocols for periodontal disease.
I also helped to coordinate the Student Table Clinic Competition on
Saturday, January 28th. The
course was presented by a periodontist who also had a doctorate in dental
research; therefore, the content was based on the current research
outcomes of the different modalities of non-surgical treatment for
periodontal disease. It
included treatment protocols of scaling, root planning, plaque control
methods, and chemotherapeutics with local delivery modes and systemic
delivery modes. The course
was very well delivered and very informative.
The information was the most current standards of non-surgical
treatment of periodontal disease, and I will incorporate these standards
into my course content. At
the Student Table Clinic Competition, four second-year dental hygiene
students represented QCC: Dawn Hicks, Jessica Sindoni, Evelyn Romero, and
Theresa Martinez. Ms. Hicks
and Ms. Sindoni presented “The Missing Link: Periodontal Disease and the
Impact on General Overall Health,” and Ms. Romero and Ms. Martinez
presented “Anchors Away and Innovative Orthodontic Protocol.”
Both table clinics were excellent, and “Anchors Away” won
first-place in the competition. It was imperative that I attended all of these events, and I thank the college for their support. © Staff Development, Quinsigamond Community College 2006. |