Serendipity35

I am doing a presentation today on measuring faculty buy-in to instructional iechnology at the NJEDge Best Practices Faculty Showcase. It covers the assessments that we have done for the 5-year grant that I have been directing at Passaic County Community College. In October 2007, PCCC was awarded a $2.5 million grant through the Department of Education’s Strengthening Hispanic Serving Institutions Program (Title V) aimed at increasing achievement and program completion rates of Hispanic and other students by integrating critical thinking, information literacy and technology into college-level writing.

In our annual review, the Dept. of Education asks us: “What were any unintended consequences (positive & negative) of the program?” It is an interesting question to ask about any initiative or course we teach, and it became the idea for my presentation.

Some people question the idea of phrases like “faculty resistance,” or a “lack of faculty buy-in.” One article I read claims that they are "empty and lead nowhere; they are phatic, having a social purpose (bonding among technology advocates) but they contain no useful information." That's not my own feeling, because I do find there are reasons for and against faculty buying into using any piece of or approach to technology.

I have found a number of articles that list ways to get faculty to accept technology. Typical advice includes: 1) Start with champions - a few faculty who are willing to use the tech and who will then serve as models. 2) Don’t “require” the technology - a good approach, unless you're working on a project that requires the technology (like introducing a new LMS)  3) Make the tech the reward - typical of a "carrot and stick" approach. Use iPads in your class, get an iPad. If you want the new LMS, go through the training.  4) Use multi-faceted training - 1:1, group, peer-to-peer, self-paced, online, face to face etc.).

Though in our grant initiative we have touched on all of those, using multi-faceted training is the one that we have focused on.

Here are some of our lessons learned that I'll address in today's session.

If at all possible, have faculty involved in the planning stages of your project. You shouldn't expect buy-in to something that was decided for you rather than by you.

On the plus side, we found buy-in for some technologies. Faculty liked using LibGuides to create websites to supplement their courses. The tool allowed them to do something that is not easy otherwise at the college - create "official" webpages and have collaborators (other faculty, librarians, staff) contribute. The technology filled an already perceived need. We intended those LibGuides to be created for the 25 courses we were focused on, but over 200 guides have been created for a varirty of purposes well beyond the scope of the grant.

Faculty did not see a need for e-portfolios that were a part of the initiative. We saw a need for them as a tool to assess student writing. We saw them as a tool that could help students reflect on their writing and monitor their own improvement. But, unfortunately, OUR needs or the possible positive aspects for students was not enough to get faculty to use the tool. Not that the effort was a total failure. 70% of the students in our initiative cohort did use the portfolios. But that average comes from classes where there was 100% use and classes where there was 0% use - and that zero percent was in classes where the instructor simply did not even try to use the portfolio or made it a total option to do so.

Oddly enough, we did have buy-in from faculty on the overall writing goals. 80% of faculty responded that they were using elements of the initiative in course sections that did not require using them. That is buy-in.

We were disappointed that faculty resisted using technology in general. Some faculty commented that they saw the tech as getting in the way of the writing. Some of that perception was also seen on the student side. We use an online software package to allow students to make appointments in the writing center at any time, but students often preferred to come in person to make appointments.

One aspect that is decidedly low-tech that was widely accepted was creating reusable learning objects (RLO) like templates and rubrics and making them available in an online repository.   Need + Ease (of use).

We also made a push for faculty to create their own streaming video (using ECHO360). Creating media had limited buy-in, probably because of the steeper learning curve and time commitment. And we also encouraged using commercial streaming services like Intelecom and FMG which we purchased rights to use. Those services had almost no use at all, but free services like YouTube and TED had wider acceptance.

As far as training, going 1:1 with a faculty member was definitely the best method. Unfortunately, in many cases that is just not feasible.

What is "buy-in" anyway? In management and decision making, buy-in (as a verb or noun) signifies the commitment of interested or affected parties to a decision (often called stakeholders) to buy in to the decision, that is, to agree to give it support, often by having been involved in its formulation. As an investment, would you be willing to put your own money into a venture?

My concluding Big Ideas that I take away from our experiences are:
- Just because you build it, doesn't mean they will come and play on your "field of dreams."
- You have to be willing to let things go when they don't work.
- Faculty will use a new technology (or pedagogy) when they see how it will help THEM - not just because it will help students.
- Be careful about offering solutions to problems that are not seen as problems by faculty. ("I'm fine with the old version of the software. Why do I have to upgrade?")
- Cultivate relationships with faculty - especially 1:1.
- And, whether or not you are on a grant, plan early on how you will sustain and institutionalize your initiative after the funding and the initial energy starts to fade.