Catalog of Synchronous Workshops

This workshop will introduce you to the Baruch WordPress network Blogs@Baruch and help you figure out how to contribute to our Seminar site as an Author. We will also cover the new Block Editor, so even if you have used Blogs@Baruch in the past, this will be a chance to preview the changes that are coming to the new WordPress interface.

Led by Joanna Thompson, Blogs@Baruch Educational Technologist.

This workshop will introduce you to the Baruch WordPress network Blogs@Baruch and help you figure out how to contribute to our Seminar site as an Author. We will also cover the new Block Editor, so even if you have used Blogs@Baruch in the past, this will be a chance to preview the changes that are coming to the new WordPress interface.

Led by Shiraz Biggie, Blogs@Baruch Educational Technologist.

This workshop will serve as a beginner’s guide to Vocat, a free multimedia hosting and annotation platform developed at Baruch. Learn how to get a course added to Vocat, then set up assignments where students submit their own content, provide feedback on peer content, or respond to instructor-created content or external materials. We will also discuss designing or adapting assignments that use Vocat to foster student engagement.

Led by Craig Stone, CTL Project Manager for Educational Technology.

This workshop will introduce you to the Baruch WordPress network Blogs@Baruch and help you figure out how to contribute to our Seminar site as an Author. We will also cover the new Block Editor, so even if you have used Blogs@Baruch in the past, this will be a chance to preview the changes that are coming to the new WordPress interface.

Led by Christopher Silsby, Blogs@Baruch Project Manager.

Learn more about how you can engage students on Zoom. The CTL’s Catherine Kawalek will lead two workshops on this topic, and a workshop focusing on break-out rooms (see below).

Led by Catherine Kawalek, CTL Zoom Pedagogy Specialist.

This workshop will serve as a beginner’s guide to Vocat, a free multimedia hosting and annotation platform developed at Baruch. Learn how to get a course added to Vocat, then set up assignments where students submit their own content, provide feedback on peer content, or respond to instructor-created content or external materials. We will also discuss designing or adapting assignments that use Vocat to foster student engagement.

Led by Craig Stone, CTL Project Manager for Educational Technology.

Learn more about how you can engage students on Zoom. The CTL’s Catherine Kawalek will lead two workshops on this topic, and a workshop focusing on break-out rooms (see below).

Led by Catherine Kawalek, CTL Zoom Pedagogy Specialist.

Learn more about how you can engage students on Zoom. The CTL’s Catherine Kawalek will lead two workshops on this topic, and a workshop focusing on break-out rooms (see below).

Led by Catherine Kawalek, CTL Zoom Pedagogy Specialist.

A course syllabus is often your first line of communication with students. For many students, the syllabus is not only an introduction to what they can expect from the course, but also a reference guide on what they need to do to get through the semester. Two common beliefs about the syllabus permeate academia: syllabuses must contain everything one needs to know about the course, and that students don’t read the syllabus. In this workshop, we will rethink the syllabus as a site for student engagement by: looking at different types of syllabuses, considering language, tone, and context, examining traditional policies, and adding humanizing content. We will also consider various ways of designing the syllabus to appeal to different kinds of learners.

Led by Hamad Sindhi & Katherine Tsan, CTL Digital Pedagogy Specialists.

Discuss your ideas and challenges for building engagement into online synchronous class meetings

Led by Cathy Kawalek, CTL Zoom Pedagogy Specialist

​In this hands-on workshop you will learn to create icebreakers and build community in your class with StoryMap JS. Baruch faculty from a range of disciplines have been successfully experimenting with this storytelling tool which works for any narrative with a geographical component. We invite you to this stand-alone session where you will learn what a StoryMap is, see some examples and practice using StoryMap JS to create a personal introduction of the kind you can use to build a sense of classroom community.

Led by Pamela Thielman, CTL OER Coordinator, and Katherine Tsan, Digital Pedagogy Specialist.

Discuss your ideas and challenges for building engagement into online synchronous class meetings

Led by Cathy Kawalek, CTL Zoom Pedagogy Specialist

Remote learning challenged us to rethink the ways our course content builds and culminates in assignments. This workshop will consider ways to integrate synchronous and asynchronous student engagement into assignment designs (such as low-stakes engagement opportunities, interrelated materials, staggered deadlines, and/or content remediation) and assessments (such as rubrics and guided peer review) and invite participants to share their own experiences and insights.

Led by Christopher Campbell & Seth Graves, CTL Digital Pedagogy Specialists.

In this workshop, we’ll explore methods of utilizing students’ most available technology, the cell phone, as an asset in class instead of a distraction—and consider other ways that we might (1) take common course policies and remix them to foster active learning and student presence, and (2) encourage students to bring the mediums and media they already interact with into the class.

Led by Seth Graves, CTL Digital Pedagogy Specialist.

Research in educational psychology prominently highlights the importance of students taking a more ‘active’ and ‘agentic’ role in the learning process, rather than merely being passive recipients of course content and lecture-based information. When they can ‘own’ it, they’ll be more likely to learn it and use it! Rooted in social-constructivist theory, this workshop will aim to help you develop ideas for how to get your students more engaged by increasing their ‘activity’ and ‘agency’ in your course and their ‘ownership’ over the learning process.

Led by Ron Whiteman, CTL Digital Pedagogy Specialist.

The 20th Anniversary CUNY IT Conference will take place virtually on December 2 and 3, 2021. This year’s conference theme is Technologies for Teaching, Learning and Working at the Future CUNY – Utopias and Dystopias. In considering this year’s conference theme, we ask ourselves these questions:

1. Artificial intelligence is here (again). What can it do for workflows in our offices? What can it do for our students? For teaching and learning? What do you fear it may do to all concerned?
2. HyFlex gives students the flexibility to attend class how they see fit. Can this model foster more equity – and how?
3. Students and educators are increasingly turning to the internet for services such as access to supplemental materials, online tutoring and entire courses and degrees. What does that trend portend for higher education and for CUNY?
4. What does the ideal cyberspace look like for CUNY?

Thirty-eight faculty teaching across Baruch’s three schools participated in the CTL’s inaugural Fostering Student Engagement Seminar over the summer of 2021. This fully online Seminar provided an opportunity for faculty teaching in fully online, hybrid, and in-person modes of instruction to connect with one another and consider student engagement in their courses. This showcase highlights some of the innovative methods and approaches to increasing student engagement from the Summer 2021 cohort.

Throughout their first two years of undergraduate study, Macaulay honors students take four required seminars that introduce them to the academic disciplines. The seminars feature creative inquiry and hands-on exploration of the city’s resources to understand the cultural, natural, social, and economic forces that shape the contemporary urban landscape.

At this session sponsored by the Baruch CTL, faculty members teaching the Macaulay Seminars will share how undergraduate research, experiential learning, and collaborative projects build students’ professional profiles; foster their awareness of New York City’s communities and history; inspire their imaginative engagement with the city; and develop their sense of belonging as students, creators, and citizens. 

The interdisciplinary, creative, and hands-on inquiry featured in the seminars can be transferred to classes across the curriculum to engage students at all levels of their undergraduate careers. 

Moderated by Allison Lehr Samuels and Jody Clark Vaisman.