Teaching & Learning Centre Information for Chairs | The Teaching & Learning Centre | Seneca Polytechnic

_{Updated: Sept. 27, 2024}

Welcome to the Teaching & Learning Centre Information Hub for Chairs!

This page is curated with you in mind, serving as a central resource hub to assist you in planning and supporting your faculty members. Here, you will discover a spectrum of resources tailored to empower and enhance the teaching and learning experience for your faculty.

Navigate through the following key areas:

• A Focus on Assessment
• Support for Flexible Delivery
• Faculty Development Program Schedule and Deadlines
• Curriculum Integration in Fall 2024
• The Professional Development Plan for Non Full-time Faculty Members
• Teaching & Learning Centre Days
• Learn@Seneca Blackboard Ultra Webinars and Drop-ins
• Calls for Proposals

This hub is your ally in empowering your faculty and steering them towards success. For any questions or additional support, feel free to reach out to us at teaching@senecapolytechnic.ca.

A Focus on Assessment

Discover the assessment resources created by our Team: Assessment Resources (PDF).

This PDF highlights the webpages, nutshells, and videos we have that focus on assessment (in general), authentic assessment, academic integrity and artificial intelligence, and formative assessment.

Reminder: The Teaching & Learning Centre can offer a workshops for your School. We also offer one-on-one consultations for faculty and instructors. Email us at teaching@senecapolytechnic.ca.

Support for Flexible Delivery

Upcoming sections of our Fundamentals of Flexible Course Design and Delivery course:

• Nov. 11 to Dec. 1, 2024

If someon registered for a previous section, they still have full access to the course content and they can return to it at any time through BBTeach. They do not need to re-register for this course.

We are curating resources to support flexible delivery on our Flexible Teaching (HyFlex) webpage.

We recommend beginning here: our Flexible Course Delivery page, our Envisioning Your Course Through a Flexible Lens nutshell (a self-paced online module), and our Five Things I’ve Learned about Flexible Teaching from Conversations with Seneca Faculty Spark Plug article.

New: Seneca Flexible Classroom Instructional Video — this video shows how to set up and use the flexible classrooms on campus.

Faculty Development Program Schedule and Deadlines

FDP in Fall 2024

The First Bundle in the Faculty Development Program began on Sept. 10, 2024 and the Third Bundle in the Faculty Development Program began on Sept. 12, 2024.

Important deadline for you:

• If any of your faculty members currently in the Faculty Development Program will not be able to participate in the Faculty Development Program in winter 2025, please let us know before Oct. 15, 2024. Our staffing and scheduling for the Faculty Development Program bundles will be set up by then, making changes difficult.

Important deadlines for your faculty for the fall 2024 term:

• In fall 2024, the first bundle ends on Dec. 3, 2024 and the third bundle ends on Dec. 5, 2024; all participants should complete the deliverables by this date.
• If extra time is needed, the faculty member needs to let their facilitator know. The final deadline to complete the fall 2024 deliverables is Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024 — any faculty members who have not completed the deliverables for their fall 2024 bundle by Dec. 19 will not be eligible to participate in their next bundle in winter 2025.

FDP in Winter 2025

The Faculty Development Program schedule for winter 2025:

• First Bundle in the Faculty Development Program
  The live components will run on Tuesdays — in-person from Newnham Campus
  We would like all participants to be available all day on Tuesdays (from 9:50 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.) in case we need to offer two sections.
  The actual class time will take place over three consecutive periods.
• Second Bundle in the Faculty Development Program
  The live components will run on Wednesdays — hybrid mode from Newnham Campus
  We anticipate needing to run two sections in winter 2025; it would be helpful to us if all participants can be available all day on Wednesdays to participate (between 9:50 a.m. and 4:10 p.m.).
  The actual class time will take place over three consecutive periods.
• The Third Bundle is not running in winter 2025.

Faculty can apply to register now in MyPD.

Important deadline for you:

• If any of your faculty members currently in the Faculty Development Program will not be able to participate in the Faculty Development Program in summer 2025, please let us know before Feb. 15, 2025. Our staffing and scheduling for the Faculty Development Program bundles will be set up by then, making changes difficult.

Important deadlines for your faculty for the winter 2025 term:

• In winter 2025, the first bundle ends on Apr. 8, 2025 and the second bundle ends on Apr. 9, 2025; all participants should complete the deliverables by this date.
• If extra time is needed, the faculty member needs to let their facilitator know. The final deadline to complete the fall 2024 deliverables is Friday, Apr. 25, 2025 — any faculty members who have not completed the deliverables for their winter 2025 bundle by Apr. 25 will not be eligible to participate in their next bundle in summer 2025.

Standing Schedule of the Faculty Development Program

There is a standing schedule for the Faculty Development Program:

• The first bundle runs on Tuesdays.
• The second bundle runs on Wednesdays.
• The third bundle runs on Thursdays.

The only variables in our schedule are whether a particular bundle is offered during a given term and the exact timing of each bundle. If we have two sections of the same bundle running, or if that bundle runs in May/June, we ask for the participants to be available all day to participate in the bundle that they need.

Please note that the first bundle does not run in the summer term and if the second and third bundles are offered, they will run in May/June. We do not have Faculty Development Program bundles running in July/August.

Professional Development Requirements for Newly-hired Full-time Faculty Members

As a reminder, The following are the professional development requirements through the Teaching & Learning Centre for newly-hired full-time faculty members:

• Participate in Micro-Teaching Sessions or the Teaching & Learning Summer Conference
• Attend New Faculty Orientation
• Complete the Faculty Development Program bundles of courses

The next Micro-teaching Sessions is on Oct. 23-24, 2024 and the next New Faculty Orientation is on Jan. 3, 2025.

Curriculum Integration in Fall 2024

Please note: We will not have a fall 2024 cohort of Curriculum Integration Champions for the pillars of TRC, SUS, and EDI.

There is a fall 2024 cohort for Human Skills. Here are the key dates for you:

• Sept. 4: Launch: Virtual Kick-off
• Oct. 28 - Nov. 1: Chair midpoint check-in
  Review initial work of the project deliverable, a Needs Analysis and Roadmap.
• Dec. 2-6: Chairs to discuss latest draft of the deliverable with Faculty Champions
  Discuss the progress on the Needs Analysis and Roadmap.
• Dec. 4: Sharing and Celebration Day
  This is the celebration and sharing event for this cohort of faculty champions.
• Dec. 6: Faculty Champions submit their deliverables
  Meet with your Faculty Champions to review and sign-off on the Needs Analysis and Roadmap. Discuss next steps for implementation.

The Professional Development Plan for Non Full-time Faculty Members

A professional development plan has been created for Seneca’s non full-time faculty members: PD Plan for Non Full-time Faculty. The hours of remuneration per course (at the meeting rate) are listed on the PD Plan webpage. Every course in the PD Plan is micro-credentialled and the micro-credential can be used as proof of completion if needed.

The fall 2024 courses are now open for registration in MyPD: Professional Development Plan for Non Full-time Faculty Fall 2024 Flyer (PDF) .

 Professional Development Plan for Non Full-time Faculty Summer 2024 Flyer (PDF) .

These courses are open to all faculty members and instructors.

Course(s) currently open for registration:

• Micro-teaching Sessions takes place Oct. 23 and 24, 2024 (during Study Week)
  two-day synchronous
  registration closes in MyPD at 1:00 p.m. Eastern on Tuesday, Oct. 22, 2024
• Effective Online Teaching begins Oct. 28, 2024
  four-week asynchronous
  registration closes in MyPD at 11:59 p.m. Eastern on Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024
• Sustainability in Our Classrooms begins Oct. 28, 2024
  four-week asynchronous
  registration closes in MyPD at 11:59 p.m. Eastern on Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024
• Foundations of Creating Accessible Content begins Nov. 4, 2024
  two-week asynchronous with one mandatory synchronous session on Nov. 11 at 1:00 p.m. Eastern
  registration closes in MyPD at 11:59 p.m. Eastern on Sunday, Nov. 3, 2024

Teaching & Learning Centre Days

Teaching & Learning Day Fall 2024 is on Tuesday, Oct. 22 at Newnham Campus. The theme is Human Skills in the Age of AI.

Human skills have long been a cornerstone of employability. The ability to communicate, collaborate, and think critically are essential competencies that every Seneca graduate should aspire towards. How will the rise of generative artificial intelligence impact human skills in the classroom and the workplace? Join us for a day of thoughtful discussion as we examine the intersection of human skills and AI. Come explore how we, as educators, can help our students leverage both their unique human skills and the power of AI to become career-ready in today’s workforce.

Our keynote speaker is Maria Vamvalis from the Critical Thinking Consortium.

Learn@Seneca Blackboard Ultra Support

Full details about our Learn@Seneca Blackboard Ultra webinars and drop-ins are available on the Blackboard Ultra Webinars and Drop-Ins webpage.

Our Blackboard Ultra website is where faculty can find all the resources they'll need to teach in Blackboard Ultra. With how-to articles, best practices, resources, and videos, this space hosts all of the Teaching & Learning Centre's Blackboard Ultra materials.

We recommend beginning with our Blackboard Ultra Crash Course. It walks through the main features of Blackboard Ultra. We have the Quick Tour, a short introduction video about Blackboard Ultra, and the Course Tour, showing what a course could look like in Blackboard Ultra.

The Crash Course also include four instructional videos that cover the vast majority of topics faculty need to know to successfully teach in Blackboard Ultra:

The First Look at Blackboard Ultra – explore the menu and content areas of Blackboard Ultra, then start creating content: documents, folders, and modules

Building Assessments – explore the details of assessments in Blackboard Ultra

Using the Gradebook – explore the Gradebook in Blackboard Ultra and see how all the same features are still available plus some quality-of-life improvements

Groups and Accommodations – explore how to create groups and add them to assignments, plus how to set up accommodations and exceptions

These are polished versions of our webinars that were recorded without audience questions.

Faculty may also be interested in our Blackboard Ultra Nutshells! Nutshells are a series of quick, self-paced, online learning modules for faculty. Our Blackboard Ultra series of Nutshells provide faculty with an overview of Blackboard Ultra in addition to tips, best practices, and resources.

Calls for Proposals

The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) call for proposals closed on Mar. 28, 2024.

The Open Educational Resources (OER) grant application closed on Nov. 15, 2023.

The Extended Reality in Teaching and Learning Call for Proposals closed on Nov. 3, 2023.

_{Header photo by Jess Bailey on Unsplash}