From: Roger Davidson Date: November 11, 2011 4:32:03 PM PST To: John Thoo , Matthew Clark Subject: Preliminary feedback and information from AMATYC John and Matt, Please feel free to disseminate this note (or parts of it) to our other math faculty. The conference in Austin has been literally back-to-back sessions on course redesign.  It seems the push is on to find a magic bullet that will result in every student joyously passing our courses and being forever changed for the good of humankind.  The push also seems to be coming from all sides:  national government, state government, educational bodies at multiple levels, and non-profits.  Some schools are making changes on their own, some states are mandating it, and some schools have said simply "Do this."  The reason is obvious, we average a 50% pass rate in most of our courses, and this results in VERY few students who start in developmental math meeting their educational goals be it a degree, transfer or certificate.  We all seem to agree that improvement must be made. The consensus diverges quickly thereafter as to "How?"  From what I've seen there are a few main themes: 1)  More structure -- this is the cheapest option.  It requires departments and institutions to do some things that we've already done at YCCD (such as common finals) but goes much further.  How much further depends on the institution, the union status there, and other factors, but here is a list of the main items from the talks I've seen:     a)  common grading of the final (based on a rubric for each question)     b)  common course grading policy (e.g., 25% final, 50% exams, 10% hw, 10% quizzes/activities, 5% discretionary)     c)  common course syllabus including schedule     d)  common homework assignments        e)  common midterm exams     f)   and more, believe it or not. 2)  Placement test changes -- this includes "boot camps" before placement, counseling sessions before placement (e.g., "Go home and study before you take this test that determines your college path."), and even changing the order of the placement exams.  On that last note, there was a entry in the poster session today that showed a simple change in the order of the placement exams (from number sense (pass) --> algebra test, to algebra test (fail) --> number sense) resulted in greater overall success rates of 40% within the chain of courses.  3)  Course acceleration/Math immersion -- algebra courses are combined into one larger-credit, single-semester, course.  One college has it as 10 hours and then the students are asked to fill up the rest of their required # of units with a college success course (study habits, time management, test taking strategies, math anxiety management, etc.) so that the students do only math for that one semester to make them ready for transfer level courses.  I think one school even smushed in college algebra by the end. 4)  Emporium-model courses -- the algebra sequence is structured as a set of courses each containing parts of the Math50/52 curriculum.  Students then take each course in order requiring proof of mastery before moving on.  There is a lot of variation in this type of redesign, but one comes to mind.  At one college, the sequence was deconstructed into 9 components.  The various education goals (STEM, non-STEM transfer, AA, CTE, etc.) then determined which of the 9 were to be used as prerequisites for their programs.  This then provided a menu of the 9 algebra courses that each particular student must take (the list of combinations took most of a slide).  Then in their registration process, algebra is set up as a shell course for which each student pays for a given number of units (say 4, as an example), then the student works that semester to get through as many of the 9 modules as they need.  A great student needing 6 modules might get through all 6 in a semester and be done. A less adept student might pay for 4, get through 2 (technically failing the 4 unit course), but when they went to retake the course the next semester, they would start in module 3 versus back at square one.  There is a lot of room for innovation here, but the shortest time to implement that I saw was 3 years, and that was at a big school with LOTS of faculty, and if I recall, also had the force of a state (GA) mandate behind them.  Articulation for emporium-based college algebra was also a challenge with some programs. 5)  Finally, STATWAY & QUANTWAY, are the BMOC players here.  Both represent changes in curriculum, modality and process based on theory in neuroscience and education.  Both are 1 year pathways (2 academic semesters) that would replace 3 regular courses in our current system FOR non-STEM MAJORS.  A study of the top 5 math/critical thinking countries (based on student test scores) was compared to the US to determine why the US is not in the top 5.  Among the results:  we are great on explaining the concept, but we move too quickly to computation and procedure before allowing the students to experience an uncomfortable state called "productive struggle" which teaches them both critical thinking and persistence in problem solving.  I will bring a copy of an example module (both instructor and student versions) to the district math meeting.  I confess that I loved that module -- it is a deep, rich module that is heart-breakingly beautiful in its completeness and relevance.  To me, it really shows what can happen if you let enough really smart people collaborate and innovate.  Of course, it's the only module I've seen so the rest could be doo doo.  Also part of the program is a continuous feedback on course materials, innovations, collaboration across institutions, standardized assessments, instructor professional development, and on and on.  STATWAY (for us consider it Math 50 thru Stats 1) is being taught at about 2 dozen colleges in 5 states for the first time this semester. The debut of QUANTWAY (Math 50 thru college-level quantitative reasoning) is next year.  Good news: STATWAY is being used in CA so the articulation hurdles won't be so large for us.  Bad news:  YC must apply and be accepted before we would be allowed access to the program, and QUANTWAY is not being taught anywhere in our state so it will be years before the articulation of QUANTWAY would be addressed.    Both have huge support from non-profits including the Carnegie Foundation, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and 3 others whose names I've forgotten.  To apply, a college must send a letter of application that "evidences a culture of evidence" -- meaning we must show we are a data driven college.  Hmmm... I'll put that in the bad news column for now.  Two other good news bits tho:  the curriculum for both will become open source eventually, and the collaborative process of formal lesson plan development is something we could try with any of our courses at any time.  Also keep in mind that since both these paths are for non-STEM majors, we would still need a string of courses to support STEM fields. More on the collaboration for formal lesson plans.... In the session today, we were asked to review a lesson plan and offer feedback.  The process is: 1)  Group of faculty meet to develop a lesson plan with associated objectives, background, examples and activities. 2)  One faculty member teaches the lesson plan developed while ALL the others in the group observe and take notes on what worked, the level of student engagement, what questions were asked, etc. 3)  Each faculty member reflects on their experience/observation, and together they modify the original lesson plan as a group. 4)  A different faculty member from the previous one teaches the lesson plan while the others observe and take notes. 5)  Go to step 3 and repeat until lesson plan is deemed "ready". That is the process that STATWAY and QUANTWAY have been going thru for years.  It's very intense and a bit intimidating at first glance (if you are like I was).  But it was so COOL to see in action (they had video of one class working through an activity with mathematical modeling with exponential functions), and oh the results.  It was also telling that in our group and the table next to us (12+ educators from many colleges) today, no one had ever been thru a process like this, and many remarked that they wish they had or could. Sorry for the lengthy, typo-ridden report but I wanted to get this out while it was still somewhat fresh and more importantly before I get sidetracked into something else.  I'm happy to have been able to represent our college and district at the conference. Best regards, --R