Thanks to an IGNITE grant, the Teaching and Learning Collaborative created 10 short videos that will roll out over the next 10 weeks. Taught by accomplished teachers from all over campus, each is 7-10 minutes long and addresses a topic identified by colleagues as high-value in anyone’s teaching repertoire. This week we are pleased to debut Molly Hiro, English, who also serves as director of the Integrated Writing Center. She will discuss “How To Teaching Writing in ANY Discipline.”
09-16-2019
New Hire for Career Center: Seth Igarta
Seth Igarta has joined the Career Center in the new role of associate director, career education and academic integration. Seth brings a background in career and academic education from his roles in career services, students affairs, and higher education. Seth has experience and knowledge with curriculum, learning outcomes, standards and guidelines, and assessment and evaluation in higher education. Most recently Seth served as the interim director of student affairs assessment & research and the senior planning and assessment lead in Career Services at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.
For more information contact the Career Center at career@up.edu.
Become a Docent for The Saint John’s Bible
One of UP’s great treasures is our Heritage Edition of The Saint John’s Bible, the first hand calligraphed and illuminated bible text crafted in over 500 years. It serves as a tremendous resource for courses and prayer experiences on campus. If you would like to receive training in the proper handling of the texts, an overview of the whole manuscript and digital access to the 100-plus illuminations, you are welcome to attend one of two training sessions: Tuesday, October 1, at 4 p.m., or Monday, October 7, at 9:30 a.m. Both will be held in the Clark Library classroom, and the material in both sessions will be the same.
If you have any questions, please contact Karen Eifler (eifler@up.edu) in the Garaventa Center.
Theology Thursday, Sept. 19: “Sacramental Justice & The Mission of Holy Cross”
The next Theology Thursday lecture will feature David Turnbloom, theology, as he presents “Sacramental Justice and the Mission of Holy Cross” on Thursday, September 19, at 7:15 p.m., in Franz Hall room 120. Turnbloom will examine the relationship between sacraments and justice using the constitution of the Congregation of Holy Cross as a guide.
For more information or ADA accommodations contact theology at x7274 or mackinno@up.edu.
Participants Wanted: Annotate the Web With Your Students
The academic technology services & innovation office is seeking faculty participants to pilot digital annotation software for teaching and learning. ATSI will be partnering with Hypothesis, a non-profit and open-source tool allowing any webpage to be collaboratively annotated, commented on, and discussed. Initial research suggests that the social reading this technology allows can improve comprehension, foster deeper engagement, and encourage students to consider multiple perspectives. Ask your students to mark up a recent scientific article, comment on the latest news, or collaboratively a analyze a social media post – there are many interesting potential use-cases.
This brief video gives an introduction to the power of open digital annotation.
Participants in the pilots will be able to use Hypothesis within Moodle, so that private groups are automatically created for students in each course. Training, consultation, and instructional design resources from the experts are also available as part of the pilot program.
If you would like to learn more about participating in the pilot or about open annotation, please contact Ben Kahn at kahn@up.edu.
Explore Other Realities at Thirst Friday, Sept. 20
Get a taste of the future at the first Thirst Friday of the year! All staff and faculty are warmly welcomed to the Garaventa Center, Franz 330, on September 20 from 4-6 p.m. to mingle with campus neighbors and enjoy great food, conversation and libations…and to try an Oculus virtual reality headset, courtesy of unapologetic technerd Eric Anctil, education. Extra credit for bringing along someone new to UP: first dibs on the headsets!
For more information, contact Karen Eifler at eifler@up.edu.
Ignite Grants: Time to Apply
The Office of the Provost’s Ignite Grants support fresh approaches to curriculum and program development that make an impactful contribution to UP’s teaching and learning future. Ignite Grants, up to $5,000, are designed to encourage faculty to explore new ideas that have the potential to reshape the classroom experience and that tie curriculum to real-world experiences in both undergraduate and graduate programs. Proposals should complement the current strategic plan and support individual school strategies and priorities. Ideas are encouraged from all corners of campus.
The next request for proposals will open on September 16, 2019. Details about the process and requirements can be viewed at this link. The deadline for proposals is January 20, 2020. Grants will be awarded in early April, 2020. New for this year are two initiative tracts: 1) Faculty Innovation and 2) Instructional Technology.
If you’ve got an idea that might be a good fit for Ignite funding, please contact the Ignite team at ignite@up.edu to explore the possibilities.
Clark Library: History of University Athletics
The Clark Library has launched a new University Athletics digital collection to share the vibrant history of the University of Portland athletics teams, players, and events. Currently, the collection focuses on women’s basketball with an emphasis on players and conference championships. As the collection grows, it will cover all UP sports dating back to the days of the Columbia University (and Columbia Collosseum) era.
Please contact Philip Vue, digital services librarian, for more information.
Attention WordPress Users: Recurring Maintenance Window and New User Group
WordPress is a great way for UP community members to create sites. We use it for class blogs, event sites, professional pages, and so on. It’s also the most popular system for creating a website in the world. In fact, according to the latest estimates over 33% of all websites on the entire internet are running WordPress. This popularity also means WordPress is a prime target for hacking and malware. With that in mind, Academic Technology Services and Innovation has decided to rethink our efforts toward keeping WordPress sites up to date with the latest security and bug fixes.
Going forward, our plan is to reserve morning hours of the first and third Fridays of each month for maintenance. That means the next window is AM hours on Friday, September 20. While we will always do our best to keep downtime to a minimum, it’s possible that UP WordPress sites will be inaccessible for part of the maintenance periods.
It’s important to Academic Technology Services and Innovation that our plans for WordPress work for those of you who are blogging, publishing, reading, and creating. If you would like to give feedback, get notified when WordPress will be unavailable, or learn more about using WordPress, please join our new listserve group.
Thanks for your understanding as we work to keep our campus computing resources and data secure. Questions or concerns? Please contact atsi@up.edu.