What Makes an Effective Orientation Program?
What type of orientation do new instructors receive at your school? What components do you believe are crucial to an effective orientation program or process?
Our new instructors have a 30 minute session with me to explain basic attendance procedures and I get them started on our Fast Track program that begins with observing an other instructor for at least 30 minutes and completing an observation form. They must meet with their program chair for extensive policies and classroom procedures. Time - I believe is crucial a new instructor. A new instructor can not digest all that is required in one session. The orientation should be done in several face to face meetings.
Suzanne,
You make good points here. There is so much to learn when one first joins an established faculty.
We developed an online faculty orientation course to help new instructors understand our history and culture and learn the policies under which our academic team operates.
I meet with each adjunct for a considerable amount of time one-on-one. I go through a Faculty Orientation Checklist that contains nearly 40 topics. This is when I give the new hire a copy of the College Catalog, the Faculty Handbook, and I show them how to access our intranet to obtain a copy of the Personnel Manual. We review several items in the manual such as dress code, academic freedom policy, etc. In addition to this orientation, our college also has them complete an online orientation. This is an approximately three hour training session that covers philosophies of our school and other pertintent information. The online orientation is preferably completed before they start teaching, but not later than two weeks into the start of the quarter.
Crucial components of an effective orientation program would include:
1. An understanding of the history, mission, culture of the organization and how they fit in.
2. Understanding the organizational structure.
3. Using technology in the classroom. How to access our intranet, the faculty portal, and using power point.
4. The academic side. Classroom structure, syllabi, addendums, grading procedures, breaks, active learning, mid-term and final grades, core questions, etc.
5. Meeting other faculty and build on mentoring.
Dave,
This sounds like a pretty thorough plan for faculty orientation. Is there an area that seems to be the toughest to cover or that needs to be added to the process?
Jeff - I agree with Suzanne in that I think the toughest part is the amount of material a new hire has to digest. There's just so much. I have had several problems with the technology side of things. Getting them able to access their email off campus, using the faculty portal to enter attendance and issue grades, and accessing our intranet.
Our new instructors participate in several orientation sessions. Our most formal session ideally we like to invite all of our new hires to a New faculty orientation. This all depends on the timing of the hires. We had a very successful session last fall when I hired 8 instructors. I invite several key people on our campus to speak briefly and welcome the group, Executive Director, Associate Dean, Dept. Chair, faculty mentors, and other campus managers. We provide a lunch for new instructors. Prior to the orientation our new instructors meet with our Admin Assistant to complete all hire paperwork.
After the introductions, we discuss all faculty related issues then later in the day, we break off into sessions with dept. chairs to discuss issues unique to their disciplines. My Associate Dean is assigned the task of introducing faculty to GradeKeeper, CV, and other technological issues and the discussion of faculty related forms. At this meeting I also invite faculty mentors. New faculty get an opportunity to spend sometime during lunch to ask more detailed questions to their faculty mentor. After instructors begin work their orientations continues. It is very important to me that new instructors not feel overwhelmed and feel that they have many, many resources at hand. Because I have such a full day, I have to continually introduce my new faculty to other capable people in our organization because I never want them to feel that they have to wait to seek an answer to something if I am unavailable. Throughout the quarter, faculty mentors and the new instructors journal about their experiences and this information is provided to me at the end of the quarter. All new instructors full-time or adjunct are invited to all campus activites as a way to begin assimilating them more into the campus community. This topic is very applicable to my dissertation research. My research focuses on using virtual communities of practices as a tool for new faculty orientations (particularly adjunct and distance education faculty) who are not always capable of being at the campus or not at the campus due to day work responsiblities. It is critical that these faculty members feel connected to the campus community.
Thank you Tammy for your enthusiastic participation in this course. You have really provided a lot of good information in your many discussion forum posts.
It sounds like you have many intentional strategies for helping new faculty members to assimilate to your campus and culture.
Thanks, Dave!
You might want to consider having selected faculty members serve as mentors for new instructors. Those mentors may be able to help address the technology issues. For example, they could go to the campus library to be taught how to log in from home.
Our orientations are all done virtually. We begin with an orientation to our learning management system. The Administrative Assistant for Faculty Relations and our Faculty Training Coordinator provide an Adobe Connect webinar on completing the required paperwork. All Instructors are given access to a comprehensive manual and other resources on our HarrisonShare site for Online Instructors. This site is entitled, Faculty Cafe, and is available only to Online Instructors (and a few select individuals). Each new Instructor is mentored for the first six weeks then is monitored on a regular basis for the rest of the quarter and periodically after that. Department Chairs are available to answer questions by email or by phone as questions arise.
I believe that all of the components mentioned above are crucial to an effective orientation to Online.
Orientation of new faculty: The College has several steps that initiate the faculty to the orgaization. The on line courses they take about the College are very helpful. Our Administrative staff make sure the correct papers are filled out. At the department level checklist of topics that need to be covered. A packet of information is also printed and given to the applicant. A mentor is assigned to make sure there is someone for questions. I try to meet with staff weekly, offer time to sit in the classroom with other staff. I still think there is plenty of opportunity for us to improve on this topic. Areas of weakness: Use of technology; giving feedback to faculty appropriately; sharing the core values of the program effectively. Continuing to update these and other issues is always on going.
Thanks, Donna!
I appreciate the effort you have put in on this course. It sounds like you have an effective plan for your online faculty members.
To add to what everyone else has stated the one thing we do before the instructor starts working is we schedule them time to take the teaching at IBC modules. This really helps in getting them to complete the modules.
Our Associate Dean manages most of the orientation and we've worked steadily to improve the process. Dave mentioned our technology challenges. We have some great Program Coordinators who really are the life lines to our instructors. They check on our new adjuncts to make certain they have what they need, answer questions and make certain the first few weeks are on track. It literally takes a group of people to launch one or two individuals. Orientation is easier when you have plenty of time with a hire. Consequently we're working at creating bench strenght so that continuous interviewing is part of what happens all quarter, each quarter. After multiple conversations, info sharing, a face to face structured interview and a test teach, we're better equipped to know that they will fit into our system. Generally the prospective hire also learns a great deal about us in the longer process as well.
Thanks, Cissi!
What type of feedback have you received from faculty members regarding the online orientation course?
Thank you, Annette. Mentor programs are usually effective as long as the mentor shares the values of the institution and receives guidance as to the goals of the mentor relationship.
What most of them say about the online orientation course is that it really helps them know more about our company and what is expected of them. They seems to feel that the modules help them in learning more about the adult learner and how to handle them in different situations. The feedback is all ways positive except for the lenght of the courses. But overall they feel that the courses help them in determining what style of teaching they will have to utilize.
Giving the orientation to them before they actually start helps to ease the pressure of them getting the modules done before the next term. It has really worked out for the good in our situation.
Susan,
Thank you for the fine contributions you have made to the discussion forums throughout the this course. Others will definitely benefit from your posts. Building a bench is a lot of work, but that work can really pay off.
Cissi,
Thank you for your effort while in this course. Your posts have been quite good and should help others who take this course.
We have them come in and fill out the employment packets. We pretty much go in order. We make sure they get their syllabi, a course catalog, and a Harrison pen. These oreintations are done by the program coordinators. By the end of the orientation the instructors look like they can't make it home. We have to do something to make the process more enjoyable.
