Unification Grant

Saint Joseph College

 

PROJECT DESIGN

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The Unification Grant is designed to meet the following goals as established in the original proposal. Each faculty proposal must be developed in collaboration with education faculty members and address one or more of these goals.

 

MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS of the GRANT

  1. An integration of professional development coursework with the courses students take as part of their general education requirements for a liberal arts education.
  2. An infusion (or blending) of general and special education methods, materials and curricula, including literacy, numeracy, and classroom management.
  3. The application of research-based strategies in literacy and other cognitive-based strategies to the methods faculty use to teach and model instructional methods that meet the diverse learning needs of SJC students who wish to become teachers.
  4. Modeling, co-teaching, or team teaching between faculty who teach within general education and special education.
  5. Collaborative work within elementary, middle, or high schools.

 

The intent of the grant is to fund the inspirations of faculty rather than to impose what will be done to address these goals. A list of exemplars can be found in the Public Folder, Unification Grant.

Faculty proposals will be assessed against evaluation criteria that reflects the minimum requirements of the grant.

EVALUATION

Faculty whose applications are accepted will evaluate the extent to which their projects have met anticipated outcomes. Faculty will be required to gather college student feedback on the perceived value of the unification initiative. Applications submitted by teacher certification faculty will also be required to evaluate the impact of the specific initiative on college students' work, in addition to evaluation of students' perceptions of the initiatives.

IR TEAM and PHILOSOPHY

The Interdisciplinary Review Team (IR Team) will make the awards. It is comprised of the Co-Directors, the Project Manager and faculty advisors. Faculty advisors from the content areas (e.g., liberal arts) will be rotated on the team based on the nature of the proposal. Together, these individuals will evaluate the application, offer recommendations, and make awards.

The IR Team assumes that faculty who submit a proposal are in the best position to identify what assistance (e.g., funds, time, resources, policy changes) are most appropriate for the unification project they wish to develop. When necessary, college administrators, committee chairs, school practitioners, as well as college students, will be invited to sit on the IR Team and review faculty applications. In this way, the IR Team will invite individuals associated with the proposed collaborations to determine the costs, benefits, and rewards of the proposal.

RECOMMENDATIONS to SUSTAIN PROMISING PRACTICES

At the conclusion of the grant, the Co-Directors and Program Manager will review the evaluations and prepare a report for the IR Team. This group, together with the Co-Directors and Program Manager, will develop recommendations to sustain promising collaborations into the future. The recommendations will be given to college administrators and college faculty committees to institutionalize recommended changes.

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