Los Angeles Unified School District Arts Education and Creative Cultural Network Plan

This paper describes the 2012-2017 plan for funding arts education in the Los Angeles Unified School District. This mission for this project is as follows: The Visual and Performing Arts are an integral part of the District's comprehensive curriculum and are essential for learning in the 21st century. All LAUSD students, from every culture and socioeconomic level, deserve quality arts learning in dance, music, theatre, and visual arts as part of the core curriculum

Competency Based Learning in Hospitality Education and Its Impact on Future Leadership Skills

In the past five years, hospitality educational programs have seen a distinct decline in enrollment from year to year (Oakley, 2016). Upon reflection of this decline, there could be many reasons, which caused a consecutive downward trajectory regarding enrollment. First, individuals are finding that a formal degree is not required for entry-level positions in the hospitality industry. Second, people are utilizing technology and videos to substitute for formal education and are finding success in the entry-level hiring process. Third, this generation does not see the value in formal education for entry-level employment. True as that might be, trends have shown that these individuals forego formal education completely and immediately enter into the workforce (Hersh, 2015). However, these individuals work for a short period of time and discover that promotion is not attainable since they lack the proper skill-set essential for leadership roles. Brownell and Chung (2001) argued that hospitality curriculum may not be offering the right knowledge and skills to individuals seeking future work and that a change must be made in higher education to address the issue. Perhaps the notion is that individuals need more than technical skills in order to succeed in their careers. If this statement is true, then putting forth changes to the curriculum in order to fill gaps in education is the first step to accomplishment. This paper examines whether competency based learning (CBL) in higher education is predictive of leadership outcomes in the hospitality industry. Within the higher education framework, competency based learning focuses on theory supported skill development and the application of concepts in scenario-based and problem-based assessments. More importantly, competency based learning emphasizes student advancement via demonstrated mastery of competencies that are specific, measureable and are learning objectives that empower students. In addition, the student learning outcomes stress competencies that include application and creation of knowledge along with the development of important skills and dispositions. Finally, CBL allows students to learn skills vital to leadership success in the hospitality industry

Assessing Learning Through the Arts

Within the past several decades, the emphasis in public education nationwide has steadily moved away from arts-rich and creativity based learning toward more standardized, test-based learning. In recent years, budget cuts and the "No Child Left Behind Act" have pushed the education climate even further toward high-stakes testing, narrowing curriculum. In line with this, Washington State has enacted the Washington Assessment of Student Learning standards, shifting local schools' priorities toward meeting test-based standards. At the same time, public education in Washington state faced significant budget cuts. By 2005, Washington ranked 42nd in the nation in public education spending.Public schools have had to cut many rich program offerings including in-school arts classes. In 2005, nearly 60 percent of Washington State principals reported one hour or less of music instruction per week in their schools. Worse yet, 60 percent of Seattle Public School elementary schools offered no visual arts program that same year.During this time, several existing organizations in King County and countless more practitioners were growing to meet a new demand for the arts gap through diverse, innovative programming both in and out of the school day. Seattle's nonprofit arts education organizations were natural advocates for more creative learning opportunities but remained somewhat disconnected from each other, lacking a cohesive, persuasive message to more effectively advocate for arts education. In response to these challenges, among others, seven of these regional nonprofit youth arts education organizations formed the Seattle Arts Education Consortium (Consortium), a collaborative, two-year project, in the summer of 2005.Reflecting on the work of the last two years, the Consortium offers several key findings and lessons learned related to both the process and the product. These findings may be an excellent resource to any group starting a similar process and especially for arts education programs hoping to elevate the rigor and public understanding of their programs' impacts. This report will also be useful to foundations interested in encouraging collaborations among their grantees.The sections that follow include descriptions of the process, outcomes and findings for each project activity including: Evaluation Planning & Implementation, Professional Development for Teaching Artists, Arts Education Communications & Messaging as well as What's Next for the Consortium

Faculty Members’ Perceptions Regarding The Role Of Assessment In Developmental Writing Courses

The purpose of this study was to explore teaching faculty members’ perceptions regarding how they design and implement writing assessments to evaluate Student Learning Outcomes in developmental English/writing courses. The study identified teaching faculty members’ pedagogical beliefs about the purposes of writing assessment and instructors’ attention to Student Learning Outcomes when designing assessment plans in developmental English/writing courses at a California community college. Using Moustakas’ (1994) phenomenological approach, the study drew data from interviews with full-time faculty members at a Central Valley community college in California. Focusing on the participants’ experiences and perceptions about the purposes of assessment in developmental English/writing courses, the analysis of data suggested that frequent writing assessments and integrated assessment were vital for evaluating Student Learning Outcomes. Even though the participants noted that their academic department did not enforce an integrated approach to writing assessment, they recognized its importance in evaluating Student Learning Outcomes. The participants believed that their institutional placement exam’s lack of customization to developmental English/writing courses’ Student Learning Outcomes caused students to be misplaced in courses. Faculty in one community college English department strove to provide productive assessment for students in developmental English/writing courses

Chichester College of Arts, Science and Technology (FEFC inspection report; 72/95 and 43/99)

Comprises two Further Education Funding Council (FEFC) inspection reports for the periods 1994-95 (72/95), and 1998-99 (43/99). The FEFC has a legal duty to make sure further education in England is properly assessed. Inspections and reports on each college of further education are conducted according to a four-year cycle. Chichester College of Arts, Science and Technology is a general further education college in West Sussex

Teaching and Assessing Soft Skills

[excerpt from article] It is our job as legal educators to put our law graduates in the best position to succeed as new lawyers.1 And to succeed, law graduates must possess certain qualities or character traits that will enable them to thrive within legal organizations.2 Despite many calls for reform in legal education to include more practice-related skills, including professionalism, many law professors teaching doctrinal courses are reluctant to incorporate teaching professional competencies and behaviors.3 They are unwilling to do so even though they have long decried students’ lack of professional skills.4 Professors complain that students show up late for classes and are unwilling to work hard. They criticize students for failing to persevere when faced with challenges or critiques, respond to professors’ emails, engage in teaching exercises, listen to their classmates, closely read assignments, or follow directions. Professors note that students’ attention spans are too short and they are addicted to their phones. It follows that the same student behaviors we see in the classroom transfer to practice. If these behaviors impair our students’ performance as attorneys, we should take steps to remedy the problem by teaching and assessing the qualities and character traits necessary to succeed throughout the law school curriculum, including in the first-year and other doctrinal classes

A study of effective evaluation models and practices for technology supported physical learning spaces (JELS)

The aim of the JELS project was to identify and review the tools, methods and frameworks used to evaluate technology supported or enhanced physical learning spaces. A key objective was to develop the sector knowledgebase on innovation and emerging practice in the evaluation of learning spaces, identifying innovative methods and approaches beyond traditional post-occupancy evaluations and surveys that have dominated this area to date. The intention was that the frameworks and guidelines discovered or developed from this study could inform all stages of the process of implementing a technology supported physical learning space. The study was primarily targeted at the UK HE sector and the FE sector where appropriate, and ran from September 2008 to March 2009

Developing Measurable Cross-Departmental Learning Objectives for Requirements Elicitation in an Information Systems Curriculum

The ability to elicit information systems requirements is a necessary learning objective for students in a contemporary information systems curriculum, and is a skill vital to their careers. Common challenges in teaching this skill include both the lack of structure and guidance in information systems textbooks as well as the view that a student’s education consists of a disparate set of unrelated courses. These challenges are exacerbated by faculty who focus only on their taught courses and by textbooks that often promote an isolated, passing glance at both the importance of and the idea behind requirements elicitation. In this paper, we describe a multi-year, faculty-led effort to create and refine learning activities that are aligned to requirements elicitation learning objectives both within and scaffolded across courses in a modern information systems curriculum. To achieve success in developing this marketable skill within information systems students, learning activities were integrated across the entire information systems major in a process we call Bloomification, where learning objectives, aligned learning activities, and courses are related and connected across the curriculum. This cross-departmental process is presented and lessons learned by the faculty are discussed