STEP Working Groups: Building a Community of Practice Orientation for Working Group Facilitators Notes from three session combined Session Dates: September 24 th, September 25 th, October 03 rd, 2013 Tania Siemens, University of Oregon Dan Udovic, University of Oregon

Objectives and Topics: Introductions STEP Central Community of Practice (CoP) Working Groups CoP Facilitator work description Round Robin – Strategies for Working Group Facilitators to build the CoP – Identify Points of Collaboration – Building community of facilitators Promoting/marketing the project? Facilitation Best Practices Environment on STEPCentral.net

STEP Central Website: National & “Regional” Meetings: 3 Online Discussions Working groups Blogs Resource Libraries Member & Project Profiles News & Events Virtual Meetings & Webinars Special Topics Presentation by experts Small groups of geographically dispersed members Community Outreach STEP Central Opportunities for Sharing… Breakout Sessions Poster Sessions Mentorship Meetings Plenary Speakers

Working Groups on STEP Central -A Working Group is a like a mini Community of Practice. -Successful working groups need facilitators – you are the leaders! -The on-line Working Group on STEPCentral.net is a forum for facilitating your work. You can post comments, have a discussion, and post resources of interest to the group. - Let’s take a look. -It is also a mechanism for keeping the entire community informed, and inviting participation without exclusion.

STEP Facilitator Initiative: What are we hoping for? Needs Analysis and Resource Development: – Recruit and lead STEP Central Working Group members to 1) identify gaps or needs 2) identify an action, tool, or resource that could be developed, and 3) collaborate in the development of the product or resource. Engage working group members in sustained on-line discussions and contributions – Use on-line Working Groups for idea exchanges – Resources posted to the website Share with broader STEP community – STEP 2014 Meeting workshop and/or Webinar on STEP Central?

Round Robin (2-3 min each) What is the activity? How will you engage the members of your working group? How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? Time Line

Collecting, Organizing, and Making Use of Data Jorja Kimball and Rahman Tashakkori What is the activity? – Conduct a survey to find out the needs of different programs are in terms of data, and what different programs are collecting and for what purpose, and how they are collecting it. – What is the role of the program? Divide into 3-4 main groups – How as a working group can we help them improve their data collection? How will you engage the members of your working group? – It may be a challenge to get everyone engaged How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? – Report the data- but where do we go from there? – Maybe make recommendations on how to best share their data with deans/provosts etc. – Share on STEP Central and STEP 2014 meeting Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? – Evaluation working group is similar – Work together on the survey

Evaluators Network Kate McConnell and David Blair What is the activity? – Needs analysis – ask recent STEP PI about needs, desires, anxieties. – Information could be fed into other working groups. Are there tools we can help with? – Cheat sheet of questions to ask a prospective evaluator. – Develop a common language to talk to each other. This is important for people just starting. – FAQ sheet on evaluation. Continue to enhance the existing resources on STEP Central. – Perhaps create a template we can refer to when we write grants? All evaluators are very different, and a template may help create a standard. – NSF has a program evaluation guide from 2010 on their website – but perhaps it is overwhelming and scary. – A good list of evaluation instruments/measures would be really useful, but it can also be overwhelming. Perhaps create one that is more targeted. Group the tools thematically since many Pis have have other expertise. How will you engage the members of your working group? – Encourage evaluators to join the working group and contribute ideas as part of the needs analysis. – Survey? How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? – Series of Webinars to introduce people who are doing strong evaluation work or a construct that resonated in the STEM world. For example – a measure of motivation, could we consider it in an evaluation plan? – Introduce qualitative evaluation methodologies. – Plan a breakout session/workshop at the National Meeting. Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? – Assessment of the WG topics (eg Bridge Programs). – Collecting and Organizing Data – Main focus is more outward – to help other core topics/strategies.

Learning Communities David Grisé What is the activity? – See the different kinds of learning communities out there. How do they function? – How to integrate classroom material with the learning community – Come up with things to think about for institutions setting up a learning community. (Best Practices, FAQ’s, what works and what doesn't’t work) – Probably a survey How will you engage the members of your working group? – Work through STEP Central. How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? – Perhaps a Webinar and at the Grantees meeting. Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? – Project Management – Learning Communities are part of project portfolios. Time Line

Project Coordination and Management Karen Olmsted What is the activity? – Interested in projects with multiple components. – Nuts and bolts of project, especially for new PIs – Need for white papers on all the different strategies, and assessment approaches with your portfolio of strategies. – Looking for folks to volunteer to work on the white papers. How will you engage the members of your working group? – Using STEP Central. Look at and reach out the New Awardees – offer the nuts and bolts resources How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? – STEP 2014, webinar, get white papers out in journals. Support other authors. Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? – Easy to connect with a lot of other groups. Time Line

Undergraduate Research and Internships John Davis What is the activity? – Create linkage between STEP, PKAL, and CUR – Start information and collaboration exchange – the exact form is unsure – Serve as liaison between two groups. How will you engage the members of your working group? – Through STEP Central. Make members aware of PKAL and CUR – Feb – CUR dialog on fostering successful research for undergraduates How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? – Propose a session at STEP 2014, also at CUR dialog to talk about STEP to the CUR folks. Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? – Peer Mentor Group. Upper level undergraduate mentor freshman researchers. Time Line – Right away! Posting resources

Bridge Programs Donald Allan What is the activity? – Survey all NSF grants about the various types of Bridge projects and their efforts toward sustainability. – Classify project types - how is the bridge made? – Attitudes and Successes – How they plan to sustain themselves once the grants are gone. How will you engage the members of your working group? – Ask about what questions to ask. Perhaps divide into specialty of question types. – Give preliminary findings of results, but also ask about survey questions. – Input of new and correction of old question types. Basically, we will have enough good-will to get a generous response How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? – Report out at the annual meeting. – Publish in a Journal Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? – Collaborate on a survey – But the survey may be too long, or each group might get fewer questions. – Look for natural connections between groups that make sense to collaborate. – Sustainability (Maureen Scharburg)

Project Sustainability and Institutionalization Maureen Scharburg What is the activity? – Needs analysis and identify gaps for project sustainability and institutionalization. – Define what project sustainability is For example just within campus or outside campus How will you engage the members of your working group? – On Line discussions How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? – Resource Guide around case studies – Show the pipeline of project sustainability – needs to be sustained from when they enter- transfer to the degree – Share at STEP 2014 meeting Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? – Definitely with the 2-4y since so many students are transfer students – Evaluation – to convince administrators that it needs to be sustained. – Connect with Karen Olmstead in Project Management and Coordination. Time Table – Write resource guide based on what comes out of the STEP Meeting – Call for workshop proposals will be late Oct, early Nov. – Proposals can clarify that the project is in process

Recruiting, Retaining Women and/or Minority Students Veronica Arreola, Pat Marsteller, Patricia Hogan, Javier Kypuros What is the activity? – Create annotated bibliographies on this issue. – Each has own niche to focus on – Needing more culturally appropriate materials for practitioners to use. – White papers that document best practices and how they work. – Working across different levels – different parts of the pipeline for each white paper. – Ultimately it can be put together into a WIKI or Blog. It can be on STEP Central. – Looking as best practices, what needs be adapted to be considered when trying to recruit women and minorities, How will you engage the members of your working group? – Utilize STEP Central to get feedback on white papers. – Link to blog on the website, so people can react to the white papers. How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? – Get additional feedback from entire community Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? – Partner with 2y-4y group, many minorities and woman are starting at the 2y schools. Time Line

2year-4year Partnerships Dean Livelybrooks, Pamela Leggett-Robinson, Eric Triplett What is the activity? – Reach out to community through STEP Central to ask for success stories for 2y-4y partnerships. How are they formed? What has worked, and what HASN’T worked. – Ask for FAQ for starters then engage conversation around the answers – Procure resources to post on the site. – Write articles/white paper in parallel with the FAQ. – Identify where would we look for publications on student tracking. – Have a webinar that address FAQs For example – tracking students as the go from one institutions. Role of academic advising (proactive/collaborative/intrusive) Transfer shock and tracking of the students How will you engage the members of your working group? – Develop seed FAQs. Push that out to people using STEP Central. Using a survey instrument. – people to tell them to go to the site, and sign up for the working group? How will you communicate the results of your project to the larger STEP community? – Get a group together at the March meeting to discuss the issues and solutions. – After the meeting identify solutions and publish. – Publish is the best form of dissemination. Do you see points of collaboration and cooperation with other working groups? – Research opportunities for CC students – Sustainability relates strongly to addressing 2y-4y transfer issues. – Minority recruitment and retention Time Line – Success and Failures by March, publish solutions by 1 ½ yr from now.

Engaging the STEP Community How can we approach them in a unified way? Not overwhelm people? How can we get the most participation? Brand and market the initiative - “STEP gets to WORK”? Recommend one comprehensive survey. Perhaps this could be a service of the evaluator working group could help organize. Scheduling will be important to not correspond with STEP 2014 solicitations. A single survey may be too long, or each group might get fewer questions. Perhaps one survey/working group might be less overwhelming to the STEP Community Segment a large survey to have people skip to the part that pertain to their project. Collaborate on a survey –Look for natural connections between groups that make sense to collaborate. If they are focused and target you will get a better response.

Building Community for Facilitators Working Group for Facilitators Hold regular webinar/meetings? Cooperate on some projects (combine surveys?)

Strategies for Working Group Facilitators to build the CoP and develop a project Survey the WG community? Survey the entire STEP community? Post resources and questions to the Working Group – ask for feedback How can the WG community engage the broader STEP Community? – Sponsor a Blog – Hold a webinar – Share results and further engage at the STEP 2014 meeting

Best Practices for on-line Facilitation -Asking Questions -Thoughtful, provocative, stimulates thinking -Responding to Questions -Quick, respectful, and keeps the conversation going -Maintaining a Conversation -Solicit new ideas, ask for follow up, and bring in related questions or ideas. -Encourage working group members to contribute resources and take leadership on initiatives.

Orientation to STEPCentral.net Working Groups -Core Working Groups vs. Community Working Groups -Adding Resources, Editing Resources -You must be the owner of a resource to edit it and add more.