Q2: JANUARY APRIL, 2018 ISSUE #147
CW’S MISSION The College of Westchester graduates individuals who have completed transformative and purposeful educational experiences that provide the foundation for successful, relevant professional careers. As an academically student-centered, culturally diverse college, CW is committed to providing the highest quality of education for all career and entrepreneurial-minded students through the delivery of a carefully constructed and focused curriculum, informed by regional employers. The College supports and encourages academic excellence, career advancement, professional integrity, financial responsibility, and good citizenship through a distinctive and highly personal campus environment.
Inside President’s Corners Page 1
Curiosity Can Make All the Difference in your Students' Ability to Excel and Thrive Page 5
The CW Way in Action: Recognizing Our Peers Page 7
Please join us in welcoming the following new employees to the CW Family Page 9
President’s Corner Mary Beth Del Balzo W
e have recently received the good news from the Middle States Commission on Higher Education informing us that they have re-affirmed our accreditation status. While this is the good news we expected, I am thrilled to have it official! Our next evaluation visit is scheduled for 2025-2026, which seems so far away, yet will be here before we know it. In the interim, starting in 2019, we are being asked to provide further evidence (via the Annual Institutional Update all MSCHE accredited colleges complete) of the use of assessment results for the improvement of educational effectiveness, and enrollment management planning linked to budget development. These requests are not a surprise as they were part of the team’s recommendations, and work is already underway to address and improve in above noted areas, as well as other areas the team had suggested. I can’t thank everyone enough for all the hard work that was, and continues, to be put forth to ensure that we are a quality institution providing students with the education they need to succeed. We received many glowing remarks from the team throughout the Self Study process and 1 | Q2 REVIEW
visit, which makes me very proud and thankful for your dedication to CW, so thank you. So as to give you a complete picture of what is expected of us from now till our next Accreditation Visit in 2025-2026, please refer to the following timeline: • August 27, 2018: MSCHE portal opens for submission of the Annual Institutional Update (AIU) and Closes on September 28, 2018: Some of you may be familiar with the Annual Institutional Profile, which has been revised and is now named the Annual Institutional Update (AIU). Completion of the AIU is a requirement of all Middle States’ accredited institutions. This annual update will require more data than the former report. Usually this report is done in the spring, but with all of Middle States’ updates to the report and their system, the report has been pushed off till late summer/early fall, for this year only. This report will resume its typical spring deadline in 2019. • April/May 2019: The AIU Portal will be open for data collection in April and May. In conjunction with the Annual Institutional Update, we will provide further evidence of (1) use of assessment results for the improvement of educational effectiveness (Standard V Educational Effectiveness Assessment), and (2) enrollment management planning linked to budget development (Standard VI Planning, Resources and Institutional Improvement). These are two areas in which we received recommendations.
• April/May 2020, and every Spring (April/May) thereafter an Annual Institutional Update must be submitted. Every update will include evidence that we are continuing to progress on the recommendations. • April/May 2021: Complete and submit AIU. • Fall (September/October) 2021: In addition to the Annual Institutional Update done in the spring of 2021, a Mid-Point Peer Review (MPPR) is due. An MPPR occurs four years before an institution’s next Self-Study. The MPPR is a peer review of the accumulated financial data, student achievement data and responses to Commission recommendations (if requested) submitted by institutions through a series of Annual Institutional Updates. It is not an on-site visit.
• Spring (April/May) 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025: Complete and submit AIUs. • Fall (October) 2025-2026: Next evaluation visit is scheduled. [**Approximately January 2023…begin work for the 2025-2026 Self Study!**]
Thanks again for your ongoing efforts and dedication to CW and our students. Together we are changing lives!
Amazon is Amazing: Help Support the College of Westchester Charitable Foundation Do you like to shop online? If so, chances are you’ve done shopping on www.amazon.com once or twice, or a hundred. Amazon really is amazing. Not only can you find virtually anything you are looking for on this site, but if you’re a Prime Member, you can also have your stuff on your doorstep in two days. Can’t beat it! Another amazing thing about Amazon is that through their AmazonSmile program, they will donate .05% of your purchase to the charity of your choice. This is a great way to donate to our very own College of Westchester Charitable Foundation. It’s very easy to do. To register your charity, go to www.smile.amazon.com, and you will be prompted to select the charitable organization from almost one million eligible organizations, and College of Westchester Charitable Foundation is one of those organizations. From then on, for all eligible purchases, AmazonSmile will donate .05% to the charity. AmazonSmile is a website operated by Amazon that lets customers enjoy the same wide selection of products, low prices, and convenient shopping features as on Amazon.com. Thanks in advance for your support of the CWCF Foundation!
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Recent Student Services Workshops By Prof. Jason Schoen and Megan Richardson n February, CW students had the opportunity to participate in two workshops on topics of significant need for college students and burgeoning professionals alike: note-taking (offered through the Learning Center) and time management (offered through the Counseling Center).
written, students can fill in those other two sections of the page with (1) summary comments about what they think that the notes mean, and (2) a place to write questions to ask of the professor at the next opportunity.
Student feedback following the event was quite positive, with most students noting the Although note-taking may seem like workshop’s topic as being a lost art in the current climate of valuable and applicable to their and multi-tooled presentations, work and a hope for future students still need a way to retain workshops on further developing that information. Absorbing new long-term memory. information is a skill that they will need to demonstrate in their careers More recently, the Counseling Center hosted a time management as well (especially for all those “meetings” they can look forward to workshop. This event continued a series intended to relieve stress and attending). Rather than trying to create a full transcript, students were boost confidence, starting with the encouraged to think of note-taking “Balancing Life” workshop in November. Time management is a as the act of moving information concept that many know what it is, from the short to the long term memory. We discussed the Cornell but frequently struggle to actually Note-Taking System, a format that is engage in. This workshop defined what time management is and fairly simple to apply. By creating explored why developing these three sections on a page for notes, students are encouraged to use only skills are so valuable, along with identifying barriers to effective time one zone for general note-taking management, such as during the period. The other two procrastination. Students also sections? They are left open for review and summary. By re-reading learned tips on how to get organized, prioritize and allocate and thinking about what was 3 | Q2 REVIEW
their time, the importance of creating a plan and writing things down, and how to begin to create positive boundaries to avoid becoming victim to procrastination and distraction. Student feedback following these events was also positive. Many reported that they felt like they learned skills that they could and would apply to their own lives. Although, feedback from students was positive, we hope to see larger attendance at future co-curricular workshops. It is imperative that we all encourage CW’s students to attend available workshops and seek out available resources to help them improved both academically and personally. The Counseling Center and Learning Center are planning more workshops in March and April to address test anxiety and effective communication practices with professors.
Survey of Modern Art & Design By Michael Ryan Associate Professor, Digital Media n years past, The College of Westchester has offered the GEN191 Art History course, which covered a broad overview of the history of art from prehistoric cave paintings to modern times. Due to curriculum changes, this course was removed to make room for other content. Now, GEN191 has made a return as an updated course entitled Survey of Modern Art & Design. This new class is a required course for Bachelor of Science in Interactive Digital Media & Marketing students, and available as an elective for students of other majors. Survey of Modern Art & Design has run for the first time during the winter 2018 semester and is being taught by Prof. Michael Ryan. In this new version of GEN191, students explore the rich history of modern art and design as well as its continuing influence on current media. Topics include the history of traditional artistic movements from the Hudson River School to Pop Art and beyond, as well as comic books, film, photography, television, animation, graphic design, and interactive media. This course has been designed to develop the students’ appreciation for and understanding of the visual arts. Student response and engagement for this new course has been outstanding.
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Curiosity Can Make All the Difference in your Students'Ability to Excel and Thrive. By Kelly Walsh, CIO
ne of the most inspiring “edtech” moments I've had so far this year was the interview I conducted with Ramsay Musallam for the Winter 2018 Edition of “Flipped Learning TODAY”. Musallam is a high school science teacher, a TED Talk alumnus, and recent author of Spark Learning: 3 Keys to Embracing the Power of Student Curiosity. I have just started reading Spark Learning and look forward to sharing more about it on EmergingEdTech.com in the coming weeks, but if it plays out like his TED Talk on the same subject, I have no doubt he will make a convincing case for the vital importance of working to raise student curiosity as a For example, if you simply hide part pre-cursor to delivery of learning of something someone is looking at content. As he stated in our interview, (a projection on a screen perhaps), you trigger an innate desire to “When they are motivated to the task and when their interest is piqued, when know, “what's behind there?” Or ask, “what would happen if we there is tension between what they ________?” (Even the simple act of know and what they don’t know, and more importantly, when they are aware reading these ideas as I write them seems to trigger a familiar, curious of that tension, then things like video response in my brain.) Of course, it can work really well. The real ‘flip' in takes effort to figure out how to flipped learning is flipping when the lecture happens, not where it happens apply these ideas within the context … delaying direct instruction, waiting of how we teach. for a time when students have laid down enough pathways that say, ‘I don’t know this, I need information.”
Certainly, motivating students to want to learn is an overarching goal of education, and I think many teachers struggle with this (and many who don't have sadly lost the desire to try). Musallam provides ideas that we can all use – it’s not as hard to trigger curiosity as we might think. 5 | Q2 REVIEW
• Curiosity Is a Unique Marker of Academic Success (from The Atlantic) “In the school context, conceptualized as a “character strength,” curiosity has also received heightened research attention. Having a “hungry mind” has been shown to be a core determinant of academic achievement, rivaling the prediction power of IQ.”
• 5 Strategies to Inspire Curiosity in Students (from Connections Excited and reflecting on this, I was Academy) “Consider the format FQR: Fact, compelled to do a quick Google Question, Response. When presenting a search around the subject. I new fact, expand with a question. For searched “motivating students to learn by raising curiosity” and similar example, “Beethoven kept composing as his hearing was getting worse. I phrases and found some good wonder how he felt about that?” A resources I'd like to share with student’s response might be, “I’d be readers interested in exploring this scared and angry.” With you as a model, further. I provide a linked title and students will learn to frame their own an excerpt from each article. questions and even go on to question the answers.
• How to Stimulate Curiosity (from Time Magazine) “Prime the pump. In his 1994 paper, George Loewenstein noted that curiosity requires some initial knowledge. We’re not curious about something we know absolutely nothing about. But as soon as we know even a little bit, our curiosity is piqued and we want to learn more … to get this process started, Loewenstein suggests, “prime the pump” with some intriguing but incomplete information.” • Curiosity: The Force Within a Hungry Mind (from Edutopia) “Teach students to be skeptics. The term skeptic is derived from the Greek skeptikos, meaning “to inquire” or “to look around.” A skeptic requires additional evidence before accepting someone's claims as true. He or she is willing to challenge the status quo with open-minded, deep questioning. Galileo was a skeptic. So was Steve Jobs.”
• Six ways to build greater curiosity in students from ASCD Edge “Focus learning around essential, driving questions. ‘If the textbook has the answers, then what were the questions?' The development of essential questions as the starting points for units, and the development of driving questions as the starting points for projects, are both good ways to encourage students to see questions as the starting points for learning.” It is far too easy as an educator to take the default position of simply being the purveyor of knowledge,
and being satisfied to leave it to students to decide if they are motivated to learn. This is a real travesty. Not only does the struggling student stand to suffer greatly from this uncaring perspective, but the advanced student may also be de-motivated by this sad state of affairs. Is it not a part of our job as educators to inspire learning? I believe it is, and I know I am not alone in that thought.
Need to change your tax withholdings? By Jessica Muller, Manager of Business Operations common question we are asked right after tax time is “where can I get the form(s) to change my tax withholdings?” If you’ve found you had to pay more in taxes than you were anticipating, or better yet, if you found you got more back in taxes than you had thought you would, you may be considering changing your withholding amounts. Should you wish to do so, you can now do this easily online through ADP’s iPay system. See the
January 2018 issue of the CW Review for instructions on accessing that system, or the iPay instructions posted on the HR Page on Campus Cruiser!
If you need advice on what your new withholdings should be, you should consult with your personal tax advisor.
Alternatively, if you are more of a paper person, both the Federal (W-4) and New York State (IT-2104) tax forms can be also still be found on the HR page on Campus Cruiser, under the Payroll tab. Once completed, your updated forms should be submitted to my attention. Q2 REVIEW | 6
The CW Way in Action: Recognizing Our Peers ach quarter we receive so many thoughtful Certificate of Recognition nominations of which we are only able to share a few during our Quarterly Meeting. So we thought we’d take this opportunity to share a few highlights from the nominations we received that truly exemplify the CW Way in action!
About Katie Dorelian: “Katie always has a friendly greeting to all who pass her desk whether they are just passing by or have business in the Career Services office."
About Craig Vincent: “Craig has been a major help to my classes since he started here, but in recent months, he was instrumental in helping me to find needed resources for a couple of significant projects… The workshop was definitely richer for his contributions. He actions that I am part of a team, one that is mutually supportive, working toward the goal of enriching the student experience at CW.”
About Alyssa McDermott, Esperanza Cruz & Jennifer Mitchell: “…for going above and beyond in the transition of our newly renovated student services center and our new concierge’s desk. The feedback from our students has been nothing but great…They consistently display the CW Way and just to prove it, here are a few comments that came directly from our students through a recent survey: - “I admire the support that the staff at CW provides to my peers and I. At CW, the staff drives the students to obtain the highest level of excellence. Thank you!” - “The people that work in the office of student services are great, they are nice and very helpful.” It’s so inspiring to read stories about others who are truly exemplifying The CW Way and so rewarding to receive acknowledgement, especially from your colleagues! If you have a story to share about how you, or a CW colleague, has exemplified the CW Way and made a student, visitor or fellow employee feel important and cared about, we’d like to hear it! Please send your stories, or story ideas, to Jessica Muller for inclusion in an upcoming CW Way Corner article!
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By: Erica Schacht Associate Chairperson, General Education arch is Women’s History Month and it serves as a reminder that many of the freedoms that women have today were not always a given. They were fought hard for and won by courageous women who risked ridicule, and even imprisonment, by confronting society's acceptance of gender inequality. By 1920, women had earned the right to vote as stated in the 19th Amendment. Decades later, the 1960s and 1970s, women began to fight for equal pay and status amongst both sexes. They drew inspiration from the Civil Rights movement, which fought for equal rights amongst races. The women’s movement was brought on mainly by women who felt underappreciated and bored being simple suburban housewives. Women themselves took measures to improve their situations. Currently, the number of women registered to vote exceeds the number of registered men by 8.3 million. In addition, women can not only expect to receive unbiased consideration by university admissions offices, but they are the majority gender of enrolled students. They can even earn their own income and not have to turn it over to their husbands. As strange as this sounds now, it was not always the case.
Recent movements like #metoo and #timesup have pervaded our nation and remind us how important it is to speak up and fight for what we believe in while seeking justice for those who abuse their power. In Hollywood, actors and actresses are using their positions as a platform for these injustices. These movements bring to light not only the gender pay gap, but the sexual harassment many women face in the workplace, and elsewhere. In 2018, there are still stumbling blocks such as equal pay and achieving the presidency which remains to be conquered; however, women are in a good position to do so now more than ever before. This month, Sisters United is hosting a Women’s History Month event that will showcase women in our area who have broken the glass ceiling and serve in roles such as owners and CEOS of companies. The idea to focus on women who have broken barriers was inspired by women such as Sandra Day O’Connor, Susan B. Anthony, Katherine Johnson, and Hillary Clinton, who have, in their own way shattered the glass ceiling or at the very least put a dent in it.
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Please join us in welcoming the following new employees to the CW Family: Megan Richardson, Amanda Nugent and Christina Rivera Megan Richardson has joined CW as our full time Counselor in the Academic Center. Prior to joining CW, she worked as an in-home Functional Family Therapist in Putnam County. Functional Family therapy is an evidence based and solution focused therapy model, which helps to address and reduce negative behaviors and increase positive behaviors and relationships. Within this role she also worked with children and their families who were at risk of being placed outside of their home (ie: residential placement/foster care) and was involved with the Department of Social Services and/or probation. Megan attended The University of Massachusetts-Amherst for her bachelor’s degree and received her Master’s in mental health counseling with a concentration in couples and family therapy from The Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology (MSPP) now known as William James College. Megan grew up in Pelham and now resides in Somers, NY. She lives with her husband, two daughters and their dog, “Fonzy.” Megan and her family enjoy the warm weather, so they can have BBQs and bonfires with friends and family. She also enjoys baking, particularly cookies. When we asked Megan about her experience so far at the college she said, “It has been such a great transition from the beginning to work here at CW. Everyone has been so warm and welcoming, which has been the best part for me to begin to build relationships with my co-workers.”
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Amanda Nugent has joined CW as an Adjunct in the General Education Department. Along with being an instructor, she is currently a part-time consultant/ambassador for the National Board Certified Teachers of New York. However, Amanda considers her full-time job is staying home with her three children. Before her second child, she worked as a fourth grade teacher for eight years in Manhattan. Amanda received her Bachelor’s degree from the University of North Carolina in Charlotte, Master’s Degree in Special Education from Kaplan University and her Ph.D. in Educational Curriculum and Instruction from Capella University. She also has a certification from the National Board in Middle Childhood (ages 6-12). Amanda is originally from West Milford, NJ and is currently living in Stamford, CT. Amanda has been married for 5 ½ years and has three children, all boys, their ages are 4, 2 and 11 months. She enjoys traveling and spending time with her family. Amanda and her husband try to travel to one new state and one new country a year. Some of Amanda’s interest are writing children’s books, which she has self-published three books (two fantasy and one realistic fiction) for children in grades 2-5. She also has a yoga teacher certification for ages 3-12, which she enjoys helping her friend teach a few classes over the summers. When we asked Amanda about her experience so far at the college she said, “I really enjoy working at CW so far. I really like teaching at the college level. The students are wonderful and work really hard to successfully learn the material. The staff is very nice and friendly and I always feel comfortable coming to work or asking other staff members questions.”
Christina Rivera has joined CW as an Admission’s Counselor. Prior to joining CW, she worked at Blink Fitness for five years as the training Manager for all of NYC. She was responsible for exceeding quotas at her location while managing and assisting other managers. She also worked for a non-profit organization managing and developing a client base for individuals in need. Both jobs led her to her passion of helping others as well as a passion in sales and developing. Christina received her Bachelors in Business from Baruch College. She is originally from Puerto Rico but grew up in the Bronx. She currently resides in the Bronx, just a few blocks from Pelham Bay Park. She has a small family but they are very close. Some of Christina’s interests are trying out new brunch spots, skiing, and having game night.
When we asked Christina about her experience so far at the college she said “I genuinely love working at CW. The environment is warm, the staff/faculty are all kind and hardworking. As an Admissions Counselor, the competitive environment has a great twist to it because we are helping so many HS seniors and young adults every day. It’s the perfect mix for someone like me who has a passion in both building up a business but also helping others.”
Please also welcome • • • • • • • •
Janina Charles Sabrina McGowan Emeka Mmuo Bryanna Paoli Samantha Smith Bria Warner John Zelaya O’Brien Andrea Zhinin
• • • • • • • •
Jona Caparas Joseph Gonzalez Alicia Henriques Jessica Gonzalez Helene Quezada Lombekiso Stuart Joseph Thomas Dr. Gary Xavier
And stay tuned for our next edition featuring the following new employees: • • •
Mary Ann Grillo Tandrie Jones Denisse Cordal-Menyu
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Q2 Highlights Warriors Pep Rally Be My Valentine Club Love
Black History Month Adult College Appreciation Night Women’s History Month