Professional Development emphasizes the facilitation of professional growth related to the improvement of teaching effectiveness, the acquisition and enhancement of classroom skills, knowledge and techniques, and content-specific knowledge that may be discipline-based. Lecturers teach more than half of the courses at UHMC.

Studies on professional development for part-time faculty emphasize the need to include opportunities for integration and connectedness as well as pedagogy (Burnstad, 2003). Offerings must be flexible and varied to meet adjunct faculty schedules. Part-time instructors are critical to our success and their needs and preferences must be taken into account when planning professional development (Sandford, Dainty, Belcher, and Frisbee, 2011).

Professional Development focuses upon supervisory and management skills as well as leadership development. This includes professional growth, improvement in decision making, communication, planning, and measuring success of institutional outcomes.

Professional Development emphasizes the enhancement, improvement and upgrading of job skills. These include professional skills such as training to keep current in the technological tools to do their jobs, communication and career development as they desire to prepare for positions of increasing responsibility within the organization or beyond it.

Designed to improve pedagogical expertise, student learning, and assessment techniques

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

• New Faculty (NF) Orientation
• NF Peer Mentoring
• Learning communities on teaching styles and how students learn
• Classroom management, teaching methods, or learning styles
• Instructional development of curriculum
• Mid-semester classroom assessment
• Instructional technology support
• Survival skills for online teaching
• Student Mental Health and Behavior Management
• Copyright essentials
• Serving Veterans
• Communication and presentation skills
• Reading Across the Disciplines (RAD)
• Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC)

Designed to provide tools to improve the quality of work and life

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

• New job-specific strategies
• Communication skills
• Team building
• Help move the College towards culture of student success
• Excellence in customer services
• Stress management
• Problem solving
• Conflict management and resolution
• Time management
• Technology advancement with Microsoft Office (Access, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, Visio, Word)
• Technology advancement with Adobe
• Technology advancement with online and social media

Designed to build knowledge and skills within the academic discipline

Activities may include, but are not limited to:

• Supervisory skills
• Goal setting and measuring effectiveness
• Planning effective meetings
• Training for new administrators, department chairs and program coordinators
• Team building for your department
• Emotional intelligence
• Working with grants
• Budget management
• Effective presentations
• Ethics in the workplace

Designed to enhace organization-wide effectiveness and viability and skills to fulfill the mission of the College

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

• Title IX and conduct issues
• Compliance issues
• Understanding policies and procedures
• Succession planning for future position at UHMC
• New employee orientations and development
• Continuous quality improvement
• Mental First Aid
• Measuring effectiveness

Designed to build knowledge and skills within the academic discipline

Activities may include, but are not limited to:

• Present at and attend professional conferences, seminars or workshops
• Publish articles related to work area or scholarship of teaching
• Provide workshops or trainings for faculty, staff or students
• Present workshop and programs to civic organizations or groups in the community
• Participate in teleconferences, webinars or online trainings

Needs Assessment

The Professional Development Advisory Committee will conduct the needs assessments and analyze the results by end of fall so in spring the Committee can design programming for the following school year. The Professional Development Advisory Committee will then confer with leadership on campus to plan the annual calendar of professional development opportunities and events.

Following all planned activities on campus, participants fill out evaluation forms which solicit ideas for future training ideas.

Departmental / Program / Unit Goals and Needs Assessment

Annually, the head each department/program/unit will develop goals and priorities for that year, and also identify the professional development needs required to support these goals. This process should be a collaborative effort between the department/program/unit head and their respective faculty and staff.

Identified professional development needs should be submitted to the Professional Development Advisory Committee in the end of fall.

• The Professional Development Advisory Committee will use needs assessment findings to plan the annual calendar of professional development opportunities and events. The Committee will determine the best format to meet needs, facilitator, and timing.
• Employees may apply for funding to attend a professional conference relevant to the job description and professional responsibility of the employee.

Evaluation needs include:

• Value added
• Participant learning and skill acquisition
• Participant use of knowledge or skill (use in workplace, development of curriculum or program)
• Impact on student learning and student success
• Organizational enhancement
• Completion of department, program, and unit goals
• Follow-up and support