I was involved in staff and faculty development….(and) Pacific Crest and Dr. Dan Apple stand out as having had the most significant impact on the college of any of the consultants with whom I worked.
Empowering students to grow
On a professional level, Process Education has helped me to win teaching awards and the awe of my colleagues on how I can keep such high standards, teach what they consider the most difficult courses in the major and have the students accept ownership for their performance in the course.
On a personal level, Process Education has helped me to understand techniques that have allowed me to continually grow professionally and personally.
My whole way of thinking about teaching and learning changed that day...
My first contact with Pacific Crest's "Process Education" ideas was at a one-day workshop given by Dan Apple at Suffolk University in late August of 1994. My whole way of thinking about teaching and learning changed that day. Since that day, I have attended eight or nine Pacific Crest Institutes, every one of which has added tremendously to both my understanding of essential educational issues and to my "bag of tricks" for helping students to learn.I strongly urge any teacher interested in turning her or his students into self-growers to look into the offerings at Pacific Crest.
Pacific Crest has been a leader in developing training and publications in assessment. In my view it has developed the clearest most accessible and useful framework for assessment available anywhere. On too many campuses, to the consternation of accreditors, administrators, and faculty, assessment has contributed little to actual improvement of learning. This is an invaluable aid in developing empowered learning communities as faculty teams continue their work focused on assessment.
My relationship with Pacific Crest has been immensely valuable to the accomplishment of our primary mission to educate, train and inspire leaders of character for the Army and the nation.
The way I approach teaching and learning today is principally based on the understanding and skills provided by my association with Pacific Crest. One particular example has been the recognition of the primary role that assessment plays in the process of education. We never before considered the importance of real-time assessment in student learning, because we largely focused on faculty teaching. We often confused evaluation and assessment not only in student learning, but also in terms of faculty development. Even though we are engineers, we did not apply our extensive knowledge of design to the development of courses and curriculum until Dan Apple provided this and countless other insights into the education process.
There is a process underlying all human striving efforts--to achieve the desired result. What is sometimes is missing, especially in higher education, is the realization that an educational enterprise is no different. This realization is what attracted me to Process Education.
From this realization, my journey for continuous improvement and pursuit of quality was greatly enhanced. Process Education not only provided me with an integrated set of processes, based on proven best practices for education, but also provided me with a valuable tool for continuous improvement and growth, that being a unique conceptualization of assessment (separate from evaluation).
Since I can’t turn my back on striving for higher quality in all aspects of my life, my allegiance and involvement with Process Education is bound to grow.
My first introduction to process education convinced me that I had to learn more about it for the sake of doing what I should be doing for my student’s learning. Over the years process learning has kept me challenged and engaged with continuously improving my teaching practice.
The professional growth that has come from process learning institutes has been recognized by my home college in terms of promotion and tenure, merit pay, and respect from my colleagues. Above all, though, is the fact that I have seen my students coming to class prepared, thinking for themselves, and taking pride in their accomplishments. I still remember the day a student said “Your class makes my brain ache.” That’s why I’m a process educator.
Pacific Crest’s practices and content are strongly aligned with, or ahead of, the best practices that are articulated in the literature.
The products Pacific Crest has produced are at the leading edge of innovation in higher education across diverse disciplines.
I have been working with Dan Apple and Pacific Crest for over ten years. Our goal has been to produce curriculum materials and teaching strategies that help students develop key learning process skills and master course content in General Chemistry. This collaboration, along with the participation of others, led to the NSF-supported POGIL National Dissemination Project (Process-Oriented Guided-Inquiry Learning).
Pacific Crest and Dr. Apple have been the strongest change agent that I have had on campus for positive growth among faculty for the improvement of learning and teaching. I highly recommend Pacific Crest.
...a wonderful journey of growth and renewal...
My first exposure to Dr. Apple was at a chemistry conference where he presented for about two hours. Those two hours changed my life as to who I wanted to be as an educator. I returned to my college with the thought in my head that I was either going to make major changes in my teaching or take early retirement. I could not ignore what I had experienced if I wanted to have any integrity in my teaching and my life.
Process Education changed the classroom experience for my students and me in more ways than anything and everything else did in the first 28 years. My experiences with Process Education took me on a wonderful journey of growth and renewal for the later years of my teaching career. Years after retirement, I am still learning and growing as an educator.
While the impact of Process Education on my teaching has also been great (I credit Process Education with my recognition as an Outstanding Engineering Educator in the Pacific Northwest Section of ASEE--2000, the top teaching award at the University of Idaho—2001, and my success as a PI on multiple NSF grants—over $2M), the constant personal and professional renewal I’ve experienced as a member of the Process Education community is the primary reason I’ve stayed the course and assumed higher and higher levels of leadership in the Process Education community.
Unlike many of my colleagues, I see myself learning and growing almost as much as my students on a year-in and year-out basis.
After 20 years of teaching, attending three Pacific Crest teaching institutes has resulted in a significant improvement in my understanding of student learning, my skills for planning courses, and my ability to achieve desired outcomes. I now regularly assess my courses and activities and I have my students regularly assess their growth and the class. This process has provided me with insights about students that I never enjoyed before and it has provided me with a mechanism for continual improvement of my teaching.