Updates to my innovation plan
My innovation plan has been in a constant mode of revision and updating since it was conceived and implemented in the Fall 2016 semester.
The innovation plan began initially as an eportfolio initiative for students working at the University Press (UP) student newspaper to develop a repository of their published work for the purpose of job hunting and creating a professional identity.
As I progressed through the DLL program and its subsequent course, I have been able to get more and more feedback from my instructors and class mates on the viability of my project and its clarity of goals and purpose. I have found innumerable relevant sources not only for eportfolios, but also on the pedagogical frameworks and research to support it.
The implementation of the innovation plan for the UP went off without a hitch and has been successful in each semester it has been used. The innovation plan was shared to our department chair, Natalie Tindall, and she in turn shared the plan with our dean, Derina Holtzhausen.
I told Dr. Tindall about eportfolios being implemented to freshmen in Reaud Honors college and also shared what some other institutions and their communication and journalism programs were doing with their programs. Dr. Tindall asked about developing an eportfolio plan for students in the Communication department and I began to alter and include a wider vision in my innovation plan.
It became evident very quickly that Professional Learning (PL) would have to be added to my plan. My research was also broadened to address the needs and wants of faculty and students.
I think the biggest change or challenge to my innovation plan was the inclusion and expansion of Professional Learning (PL) for instructors and instruction and the need for instructional support. While not completely neglected or absent from the innovation plan, I had not set up a specific means of addressing how each instructor would learn to incorporate eportfolios.
There has been some resistance to the eportfolio initiative, about 50 percent of my colleagues were opposed to it. Their objections ranged from simply just not wanting to do an eportfolio, but also resistance to change in general. Our department is split along two philosophical lines: folks that are more interested in generating traditional communication theory application and those who focus on a more experiential and career-based instructional method. Patterson and Grenny’s Crucial Conversations (2002) has been one of my most important assets in developing my approach to dealing with both dissenters and advocates of the innovation plan.
Because our department is small, about 20 professors and adjuncts, my approach has always been to literally have conversations one-on-one or in small groups to convince my colleagues of the benefits of the plan and to hear their feedback about their concerns and reservations. I think a heightened since of urgency could’ve been applied to the department implementation. So often people have a fear of success as much as they do of failure.
Lessons to be learned over the course of my implementation is to engage underachieving students more assertively. I think this has been a factor of what I classify as the Harvey Hangover. This semester there has been a more profound frequency of students underachieving in the Practicum 3130 course which is the focal class the eportfolio initiative is built around.
My survey of current students won’t be complete until the end of the semester, but so far, I have gathered that several students were profoundly affected by the storm and have had issues of stable housing and employment. The lesson to be applied I think is patience and understanding and trying to find a way to keep students engaged and supported on their enrollment and degree plans.
