Andrea I. Bakker
Mentor: Doug Krull, Northern Kentucky University
Even as a new teacher it is easy to become complacent in your teaching, becoming used to the academic level and type of student that exist at your university. Furthermore, as a new teacher it is easy to be defensive and to fear that you are seen as too inexperienced to be teaching. However, complacency and defensiveness do not better your teaching or improve the classroom atmosphere for the students.
Through the PFF program
I had the opportunity to team teach at Northern Kentucky University with a fellow PFF graduate student (Marie Weakland),
where I discovered that I was guilty of both complacency and defensiveness. Fortunately, PFF also helped
me to become more comfortable as a teacher and to overcome these shortcomings. Student ability and expectations
at NKU were very different from what I had become used to at Miami. This discrepancy required Marie and I
to have to moderately alter our original guidelines for the class, a difficult step for us as it almost seemed
that by changing our guidelines we were somehow admitting to being "wrong." However, the students
were significantly more satisfied with the class set-up after we revised the syllabus. This experience has
helped me to realize that being willing to adjust the class guidelines does not necessarily mean that I was "wrong"
or incompetent, and that flexibility in the classroom and being attuned to students' needs is imperative for creating
a positive class experience.
Zachary Birchmeier
Mentors: Beth Uhler, Miami University - Middletown campus and
Jim Bodle, College of Mount Saint Joseph
My PFF experiences have been greatly beneficial to my professional development. This semester, alone, I have:
Besides these recent tangible accomplishments, contact with partner faculty and visits to partner campuses have broadened my conceptions of undergraduate education, including an increased awareness of the benefits and drawbacks of being a faculty member at institutions smaller than Miami-Ox (i.e. sans graduate program). I will also take advantage of the opportunity to experience more diverse student learning styles by teaching at the College of Mount St. Joseph this summer. Finally, attending and presenting at the Ohio Learning Networks and the Lilly conferences, respectively, has exposed me to many valuable ideas that I will continue to integrate into my teaching. The bottom line: I feel significantly more comfortable with the process of becoming a faculty member in psychology, and have experienced increased levels of commitment to that goal. I look forward to my continued participation in PFF this fall at the university level.
Mentor: Jim Bodle, College of Mount Saint Joseph
Participation in the American Psychological Association Preparing Future Faculty program has been a wonderful opportunity and experience. As a graduate student in a clinical psychology program I have gained extensive experience in clinical work and also have had many research opportunities and experiences. However, training in areas specifically related to being a faculty member and working in academia has been sparse. As an APA/PFF scholar, I have been exposed to relevant issues in higher education, pedagogical perspectives and effective teaching strategies as well as other responsibilities and/or interests of college faculty members. Overall, I have had a very positive experience as a scholar in the APA/PFF program. Although I do not have a strong interest in becoming a full time faculty member, I do have interests in becoming either an adjunct or visiting faculty member. My participation in the APA/PFF program has provided me an invaluable experience and has been a foreshadowing of my future role as an adjunct or visiting faculty member.
In my two years of participation in PFF, I have gained a lot of valuable experience with, and knowledge of, all that being a college professor entails. I have taught and been involved at two local colleges, and have thus been afforded the opportunity to see what being a faculty member is like in a variety of settings, and just how much faculty life can differ by institution. I feel I am better prepared for the job search and how to best match my interests and qualifications; I know what I want in a job and feel better prepared to get it. Many of the things I have learned through PFF-related activities I had never even thought to consider before; they were things I didn’t realize that I didn't know. I would recommend PFF for anyone even considering an academic career. The flexibility in type and level of involvement allows one to tailor the program to his/her own goals and interests, whether that be simply exploration of faculty life for those who are unsure about whether they want to teach, or even more experience and knowledge for those who are certain they want to teach.
Sandra L. Neumann
Mentor: Nelson Bingham & Beth Harrick, Earlham College
Since PFF is more than “teaching” program, I decided to try something new this year. Instead of having the more traditional teaching placement on one of our partner campuses, I focused the service aspect of the faculty role. I engaged in a variety of activities on three of our five campuses, as well as here in our own department. In addition to serving as the Assistant (to the) Chief Departmental Advisor and sitting on the PFF Steering Committee here at Miami-Oxford, I spent a considerable amount of time shadowing two Earlham faculty throughout the year and guest lecturing on our branch campuses for Beth Uhler and Shannon Maxwell. The highlight of my PFF experience this year was in January as I traveled to Washington D.C. to represent our Miami Cluster at the annual conference for the Association of American of Colleges and Universities (the funding organization for PFF). I spent an incredible five days and four nights in meeting with other PFFers from around the country as well as a whole host of academicians who truly care about higher education. This was easily the most exciting conference I have ever been to!
My two years as a Preparing Future Faculty scholar at Miami have been exciting and extremely beneficial. I highly recommend the continuation of this program and encourage graduate students to become an active part of its implementation.
Amberly R. Panepinto
Mentor: Jim Bodle, College of Mount Saint Joseph
I have had many exciting experiences as a PFF scholar, but I would say that the most beneficial was team
teaching at the Mount with a full-time faculty member there. This gave me the opportunity to teach at a small
college with students who are different from Miami students in many ways. The added benefit of team teaching
was that there was guidance and feedback from a more experienced teacher who knew what worked but also
gave me room to experiment and find what was comfortable for me. I also had the opportunity to visit three
of the partner campuses for various activities including guest lecturing on topics that were of interest to me.
Finally, through seminars, I learned about the various roles of faculty members and administrators.
As a whole, the year has provided me with teaching experiences and knowledge about life at smaller
institutions as well as Miami.
Cecilia Shore
This year I have again been struck by how everyone wins in PFF programs. Students benefit by learning about faculty roles on partner campuses; partner undergraduates benefit from participating in our Tri-State Symposium; our department has benefited in terms of placement and recruitment of grad students. Our second year as has been marked by our efforts to institutionalize PFF. First, we have worked toward establishing PFF activities as a part of the department's graduate curriculum. Second, we are working toward establishing a PFF learning community open to doctoral students from all over Miami University, and working out a complementary balance between departmental and university programs. We are grateful for the enthusiastic participation of our grad students; for the willingness of partner faculty to mentor our students; and for the support from APA and our administrators, which have made this progress possible.
Marie Weakland
As a PFF scholar I have had the opportunity to teach, learn, and observe. One of the goals of the PFF program is to offer future faculty the opportunity to learn what it is like to teach in other types of college environments. I feel that my teaching experience at Northern Kentucky University has challenged me in a number of ways. I had to become more adaptive and sensitive to a diverse level of ability in this setting. Furthermore, because my background is more in line with that of a typical Miami University student than students from Kentucky, I became aware of little adjustments that I needed to take into account in order to be an effective teacher. For instance, something as small as the example that I gave to illustrate a concept needed to be altered to better serve as a reference for some students.
In addition to gaining knowledge about what it is like to teach in other environments first hand, I also benefited greatly from the other opportunities offered by the PFF program. For example, I was able to incorporate some of the teaching suggestions that I encountered at the MACTOP conference into my own repertoire. At a computer-oriented discussion offered at Mount Saint Joseph’s College I was given a small glimpse into what it might be like to teach in an environment that stresses technology. However, the program offers more than teaching suggestions and teaching opportunities; it also offers psychological support to its scholars every step of the way. By having a mentor at NKU, we did not have to experience everything alone, but rather we had the ability to discuss our experiences with someone who had insight and wisdom to offer us in an unfamiliar environment.