Student/Faculty Interaction

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Student/Faculty Interaction

• Presenter
• Dr. Steady Moono
• Dean of Student Success
• Montgomery County Community College

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• Seven Principles of Good Practice
• in Undergraduate Education
• Encourage contact between students and faculty
• Develop reciprocity and cooperation among
  students
• Encourage active learning
• Give prompt feedback
• Emphasize time on task
• Communicate high expectations

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Seven Principles (Contd)

• Respect Diverse talents and ways of knowing
• ___________________________________Chickering
  Gamson (1987)

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A Case for Student/Faculty Interaction

• Frequent student-faculty interaction can
• Enhance students motivation, involvement, and
  intellectual commitment
• Encourage them to think about their own values
  and future plans
• Caution
• It is the quality of the contact not the
• quantity that matters

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• Cross argues that when faculty show an
  interest in students, get to know them through
  informal as well as formal channels, engage in
  conversations with them, (and) show interest in
  their intellectual development, then students
  respond with enthusiasm and engagement

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What Do Students Think?

• 35.6 of entering first-year students
• estimated chances were very good that they
• would communicate regularly with
• professors
• __________________________________
• Sax and others (2002)

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What is Students greatest fear when interacting
with Professors?

• Students fear appearing unintelligent when
  interacting with their professors

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• What do students hope to get out of a new
  course?
• Details vary, but the most common hope students
  express is that each class, by its end will help
  them become a slightly different person in some
  way.
• This hope transcends the subject matter of a
  class, or a students background, or even whether
  the student is a wise old senior or an incoming
  freshman.

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The Most Memorable Class

• Anne Clark in her research asked
• undergraduate students about their most
  memorable class
• -Almost each one of them described a
  class in which their professor got to know them.
  

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Student-Faculty Interaction

• Building relationships (know students by name,
  seek informal contact with them)
• Discussing career plans
• Joint project work or committee
• Discussing ideas outside of class

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Student-Faculty Interaction (cont.)

• Event Activity Spectatorship Participation
• Student Organization Project Advising
• Community Service
• Intramural Athletics

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• Effective Academic Advising
• Good advising may be the single most
  underestimated characteristic of a successful
  college experience
• Good advising ranks as 1 challenge that both
  faculty and students identify (R. Light, 2000).

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• The Obvious Idea
• A great college experience depends upon human
  relationships
• One set of such relationships, should, ideally,
  develop between each student and one or several
  faculty members

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Good Mentoring

• Informal
• Personal
• Cross Divisional
• Instructs on life lessons
• Is usually non-academic

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Faculty Who Make a Difference

• Connecting Academic Ideas with Students Lives
• Engaging Students (even in large classes)
• Teaching students to think like professionals
• Encouraging Students to Disagree with the
  professor

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Faculty Who Make a Difference (cont.)

• Teaching the use of Evidence
• Not being predictable (Students honor
  predictability in faculty members standards, but
  not dilemmas or controversies)
• Integrating Ideas from other disciplines