RECAST | O-Week Resources and Reminders
From: Academic Deans <deans@evergreen.edu>
Sent: Thursday, September 17, 2020 3:15 PM
Dear Colleagues,
Welcome to the remarkable 2020-21 academic year! We miss seeing your faces, and we are so grateful for your huge work this summer in a range of institutes, including several aimed at moving along the New Academic Directions model. Thank you, thank you! It’s been wonderful seeing so many of you remotely through this work, and nice to see you in the Academic Retreat. Time to dig in to fall! Please read this set of reminders with care.
COMMUNICATIONS
Coordinated Communication. We are aware that you’ve been receiving numerous communications including COVID updates, the Learning and Teaching Commons Newsletter, NAD updates, and more. All of these communications are important and are meant to be helpful. This communication, which we call Resources and Reminders—or the R&R—is a “missive” from the Deans’ Area to faculty on academic matters. We do cross-reference important notices from the LTC and work closely with them and others on communications. We try to coordinate both content and timing of communications, so it doesn’t seem like an avalanche. We try to be as thoughtful and helpful as we can with information sharing. With that, please enjoy your 0-Week R&R.
The Communication Ecosystem. Students look to faculty as their first and best source of information about the College, especially for how we are supporting them through COVID-19. There are many ways you can stay up-to-date and provide your students with accurate information: attend staff/faculty forums such as the September 24th Health and Safety Briefing, 11-noon; watch past briefings, check for regular updates, and find other resources at https://sites.evergreen.edu/covid19/; read weekly updates sent via email; and ask when you have questions. Keep in mind: students are mostly studying remotely, and it is not possible for them to run into their favorite former faculty member or staff advisor on Red Square to ask questions. You are their primary point of contact with the College.
Learning and Teaching Commons Please keep your eyes out for the tremendous ongoing flow of resources from the Learning and Teaching Commons (LTC). This amazing Center offers their own regular newsletter and helps to highlight important communications from across the college through their Recast series.
LAUNCHING FALL
Syllabi and Canvas support tools. As you wrap up your syllabi and Canvas site, please use the wonderful guidelines gathered in the document, Welcoming Students to Inclusive Learning Spaces. Here you will find guidelines for inclusive approaches to names and pronouns, ways to welcome and support students with a range of access needs, credit policy guidelines and so much more. This is a tremendous set of guidelines for building a welcoming and inclusive framework for your program or course offering. Additionally, the Canvas template has received a remarkable overhaul that can help build a clear platform for your class and offer some continuity of student experience across campus. Bridget Irish has offered direct support on: Canvas (+ Zoom, Microsoft 365, Hypothesis); new curricular template for Canvas; WordPress; student portfolios using WordPress; communicating with students; creating community online. Reach out to Bridget directly or through https://help.evergreen.edu.
Holidays for Reasons of Faith and Conscience. College policy on Holidays for Reasons of Faith and Conscience responds to state law https://apps.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=28B.137.010 and requires that you publicize the policy in your syllabus.
Start date and other relevant dates. The first day of remote classes is Tuesday, September 29th. Please remember to put your synchronous start times in Schedule Evergreen and post your Zoom room on your canvas site for your class. If your program has any in-person components, they will start in Week 2 and there will not be any in-person meetings after Thanksgiving break.
Registration Tracking Forms: Be sure to return your Week 1 tracking forms (accessible from the Faculty section of my.evergreen.edu under “Class Lists and Evaluations”) to the Registrar’s office by the end of week one. Knowing which students listed are not attending your program or course is very important for those students’ future interactions with Registration and Financial Aid. An oversight at this early stage might mean entering a [false] “no credit” for those students later, which can have major consequences for them.
Adding/dropping. If students are adding your program or course be sure they have completed the necessary paperwork through the Registrar’s Office. The deadline for adding or dropping a program or adjusting credits is October 2nd for a 100% refund; October 9th is last date to drop without it counting toward attempted credits for Financial Aid; October 27th is last date to drop with 50% refund. Please be sure to help students with their settling in and communicate clearly with Registration and Records about who lands where, and whether students are in or out of your programs (including anyone you are not sure about!).
Submitting Syllabi and Community Agreements: The deadline for submitting your Fall quarter syllabus and agreement is October 12th. If you have not done so already, please send your fall syllabus and covenant to us using the convenient Submit Syllabus and Community Agreement link from the Faculty section of your my.evergreen.edu page. Turning in your syllabus will help us support students, meet our accreditation standards, and better understand the overall state of syllabi and covenants across the college.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
The CARE Team: The CARE Team looks to colleagues across the college–and especially faculty–to orient students to the resources available at Evergreen. They encourage you to be familiar with services and make direct referrals to students for whom you are concerned. Making a referral online to the CARE Team will ensure that any additional actions offered by the CARE Team will occur. Those working most closely with students are often best positioned to refer them to resources. The CARE Team can guide you in making those referrals.
New Human Subjects Review protocols. We have a new process for Human Subjects Review at Evergreen. Please review the new guidelines. We now offer training through CITI, the Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative. Whether your students’ projects require a full HSR review or not, this is a wonderful educational resource, and we encourage you to build this online training into your programs to help students learn about ethical research. As part of the Academic Retreat, on Monday, September 21, from 3:45-5:00, we will offer a workshop to help walk through the new HSR process. We invite you to join us at that time to be guided through the process and ask questions. Please note that the IRB (Institutional Review Board) will meet twice a quarter (applications are due Monday 5:00 of week 3 or week 6) deadlines). Thanks and acknowledgement to Sue Feldman, Mike Craw and Amadou Ba, who helped with this transition to a much-improved system!
SURF Celebration: This year’s SURF celebration will again coincide with the annual Return to Evergreen event, and will be virtual. SURF students are busily recording presentations right now to share at this October 17, 2020 event. We hope you will visit this virtual event to learn more about what student and faculty teams have worked on this summer (links to be provided in upcoming communications).
Faculty Grants: This year, we will be offering Sponsored Research Grants only. Sponsored Research Grant Applications are due October 26, 2020 by 5:00pm (No late applications accepted).
Academic Statements: Fall is the season when full-time programs include at least 6 hours of in-program work on the Academic Statement.Half-time programs should include at least three hours during the quarter. Consider a weekly shared reflection on the learning and/or using the academic statement as an occasion for one-on-one conversations about students’ needs, hopes, and academic direction. Resources for in-program work are on the Academic Statement Canvas page.
Expressive Events. The college has a team of people who aim to prepare for and respond to free expression events (such as teach-ins) on campus. If you know of an event coming up, please let folks in the Deans’ Area know (deans@evergreen.edu) so we can best support our students and other members of our campus community.
Thanks for attending to these reminders! Please let us know how we can support you. And thanks again for your tremendous work!
The Academic Deans | 360.867.6810
Karen Gaul | Elizabeth Williamson | Marcia Tate-Arunga | Larry Geri | Kathleen Eamon | Greg Mullins
