Dear Dr. Potter:
Thanks for your continued encouragement and support for the Department of English First-Year Composition Program’s technology requirements. We appreciate your understanding of the writing program’s place in an educational context where learning is predicated to a large extent upon technology and delivery of multimedia content.
As supported below, we require approximately $36,000 to equip our instructors with the up-to-date computers necessary to be effective in our program. This dollar amount is based upon Hunt’s already-stated commitment as well as the $8,000 our program earned from this year’s textbook program.
Below is our analysis of how an up-to-date computer on each instructor’s desk will help ensure student success in the First-Year Composition classroom and, at the same time, help prepare students for success throughout their academic careers:
1. Research and theory support the importance of teaching multiple literacies to our students. Instructors must be proficient in the latest software and cloud-computing tools in order to teach these multiple literacies. With an up-to-date computer, instructors can access assigned, required multimodal texts, such as remediations and podcasts, developed by students using a computer.
2. Students are required to have Internet access for most USF classes, including First-Year Composition classes, and therefore instructors also should have access to an up-to-date office computer.
3. Instructors can create learning content through Blackboard tools and utilities, thus improving the students’ learning experience and ensuring the full utilization of USF’s investment in the Blackboard learning environment. Instructors with outdated, slow computers may be discouraged from using Blackboard’s tools, most of which are resource-heavy Java applications, and therefore student learning is marginalized.
4. The FYC program’s new online writing evaluation tool, SaMvaada, allows students to submit composition projects in electronic format for instructor review and grading. This method is convenient for the student as it permits document delivery by the due date without requiring physical delivery of the paper to the instructor. The instructor consequently must have an up-to-date computer in order to receive and evaluate papers.
5. Students also receive online feedback from instructors through the SaMvaada interface, and therefore may log on and see instructor’s comments online without waiting for graded papers to be returned during a class meeting. Immediate access to comments is particularly important on early drafts of student work (our program requires at least two drafts of each paper prior to the final submission). Instructors need access to an up-to-date computer in order to grade papers online in a timely fashion.
6. Instructors must have computers that can handle the multitasking that grading and commenting on that online student projects documents require. At any one point, an instructor may have a student’s document open, a sample document, an explorer window with database and adobe file open to check a source, and a rubric (java or document based) open, all at the same time.
7. Students receive instructor evaluations of their peer reviews, or detailed comments on fellow-student’s work, through the SaMvaada interface, thus improving students’ revising and editing skills.
8. Students can receive, for each submitted paper, instructor online audio comments and suggestions related to specific sections of the paper or the paper as a whole. Instructors must have access to an up-to-date computer to use Microsoft Word’s audio comment feature or Audacity. Audio comments not only save instructor grading time, but also provides students with a more complex understanding of their writing than possible through written comments alone.
9. Students can access screencasts created by their instructors using an up-to-date office computer and open-source online tools such as Jing or CamStudio. This provides students with a visual resource for understanding writing, research, and communications technology.
10. Instructors with access to an up-to-date computer can record grades directly to Blackboard or import grades to Blackboard from the SaMvaada interface. Students therefore have a better accounting of their work in class and more immediate access to grades.
11. Instructors with access to an up-to-date computer can make use of the USF library’s electronic resources to find material appropriate for in-class use, and can link to this material for student access, thus providing the student with a more diverse educational experience than conventional textbooks might allow.
12. Instructors can answer student questions or resolve issues quickly using email, chat, or Elluminate. Again, the student has more immediate feedback that would be possible arranging a face-to-face meeting with the instructor.
13. Enrollment and economic conditions all are trending towards the expansion of online instruction. While it is an immediate concern, for many of the graduate-assistants, the skill to design and control an entirely online course environment is a must. Powerful computers and software are essential to learning to work in that new electronic-only classroom.
As you can see, The First-Year Composition Program has a strong commitment to student success, both in traditional writing and multimedia literacies. To support that commitment we need to ensure that our instructors have access to an office computer capable of handling the demands of multimedia educational applications.
The attached spreadsheet details our current needs based upon an evaluation of our program’s academic responsibilities to both students and instructors.
Again, many thanks for your support as we attempt to meet the demands of the contemporary learning environment.
Sincerely,
Joe Moxley, Director, First-Year Composition
Michael L. Shuman, Assistant Director, First-Year Composition