We have reached the penultimate moment in our work together this semester. Over the next ten days you have the time and space to build out your project sites. We hope that you enjoy the process. As Cole encouraged us to remember last week, “Building things is fun.”
In addition to building we will be sharing—most immediately, sharing our work with members of the greater COPLAC community. Sharing your course blogs, and this NAPLA course blog, will foreground the power of teaching and learning in the open: That is, your research process and our collaboration on a public storytelling project will demonstrate to others the potential of narrative to capture and convey the experience of the public liberal arts. Your course blogs are beautiful chronicles of your research process—the Recent Posts list exemplifying an arc of accomplishment.
Your work in the next few weeks is to make the most of this penultimate moment. Here is how you should be spending your time:
- As Mark explained in class this week, during the next ten days you would do well to undertake a self assessment and review. Make sure that you have 9 Research Reflections so that we are able to give you full credit for your work on the course blog. Then, before class next week, open the NAPLA category archive “Weekly Updates,” and read each of the updates from the bottom, starting with the September 19th Create Manage License. Each of the posts includes the steps you have taken (or need to take!), most often in the form of a bullet list of tasks. Together the weekly updates function as a general rubric to assess your own progress and help you fill in any missing parts. In addition, reading over these updates will remind you that what you have learned about digital tools you are using on your course blogs is transferable to the work you are now doing on your project sites.
- The Schedule page on this site has been updated and meeting deadlines is imperative as we move into the third and final phase of the course. The updated schedule, outlined below, will help you make the most of your time before the holiday as well as make sufficient progress in preparation for the final weeks of the term:
Tuesday November 15: Project team meetings: 2:00-2:30 Casey and Julia(UNC Asheville); 2:30-3:00 Emily and John(SUNY Geneseo); 3:00-3:30(Keene State College)
Thursday November 17 Preview Institutional Project Sites. Each team will have twenty minutes to showcase the Project Site
Tuesday November 22: Cole and Mark will conference with project teams: 2:00 Casey and Julia 2:30-3:00 and 3:00-3:30 Abby. Emily and John TBA
The due date for the Project Sites is Tuesday November 29th. Please enjoy your holiday break. But please give yourself time and space between November 22 and November 29th to complete the Project Sites. Mark and Cole will be available by email should you need assistance.
- Public presentations of projects will take place during the last two weeks of classes. The presentations may be “attended” by faculty and administrators from other COPLAC institutions. OnTuesday November 29th, when we return from the holiday break the Final Projects are due. We will then follow the schedule: OnThursday December 1 Casey and Julia (UNC Asheville) will present. OnTuesday December 6 Abby (Keene State College) will present. And on Thursday December 8 Emily and John (SUNY Geneseo) will present. We are happy to reconsider this schedule based on other commitments. If you would like to suggest a change, please let us know as soon as possible.
We are looking forward to our project team conversations next Tuesday. Your job is to get as much done as possible between now and then so that we can best use our time together.
