Teaching @ ECU: The Essentials

In a blog post published in August 2023, I wrote about the “hidden rules” of working in academia and ended that post with some questions for how we might make the invisible rules of teaching at Emily Carr more visible to our new colleagues. As we welcome several new colleagues for the Spring semester, I thought it high time we try to answer at least one of them:

• What would change ... if we assumed, as a default, that most faculty don’t understand how this place works or why we do what we do?

In other words, what do we need to know to teach effectively here, and where can we find that information? Read on for this year’s version of Teaching @ ECU 101, and if there is important information we’ve missed, send us a note: tlc@ecuad.ca

Before the start of term:

Class information

The easiest place to find your class information—including location information, course delivery mode (in-person, online or hybrid), and class times—is through MyEC. From the home page, click on Faculty and Continuing Studies Instructors to see your active classes. Clicking into each course will allow you to see the class roster and waitlist: from the roster tab, you can also print or email your class list.

Every course at ECUAD is set up with a course website through our learning management system, Moodle. We encourage all faculty to include some basic information about your course on your Moodle site, such as:

• Course meeting information (room number for in-person; zoom link or other for online or hybrid)

• the course outline,

• your contact information, and

• when and how you will be available to meet with students outside of class time

Many instructors also include a “Frequently Asked Questions” forum at the top of their course and encourage students to check there before emailing you directly, which can significantly cut down your email.

For help getting started with Moodle, visit the Faculty Moodle Guide or email tlc@ecuad.ca. To see courses for an upcoming term in the Course Overview section of the Dashboard, you may need to select “Future” from the drop-down menu.

Course outlines

Course outlines provide your students with an overview of the work they can expect to do in your class, with specific information about how that work will be weighted in their final grade.

The official Procedures accompanying our Course Outline Policy clearly articulates what information needs to be included in a course outline, but ECUAD provides a course outline template through the Course Outline Manager that ensures you include all required information. A Help Guide for this system is provided by the Academic Office.

The course outlines uploaded through Course Outline Manager become the property of the University and are used to determine prerequisite equivalence, transfer credit, and for program review. They may also be provided to faculty teaching the course in future. For this reason, we encourage faculty concerned about protecting their intellectual property to include basic information about weekly course topics and course evaluation in the official course outline, but reserve detailed information about course activities and assignments for separate assignment sheets which remain the property of the instructor.

Policy 4.4 Course Outlines states that course outlines should be provided and explained to students at the first scheduled class of a given course. This allows students to make an informed decision about remaining in a given course before the Add/Drop date (the date before which students can withdraw from a class without financial penalty).

You can request previous versions of Course Outlines from the Academic Affairs office.

Connecting with Campus Resources

Many general questions about teaching at ECU can be answered by either the Academic Affairs office or the Teaching and Learning Centre. We are both a great place to start if you don’t know who to contact! Your Dean or Assistant/Associate Dean will be the best resource for program-specific information.

But the following areas offer specific services to support faculty in their course prep and planning. You can find more areas on this campus campus “cheat sheet” for faculty.

• CTS (Collaborative Technology Support) can help you with in-room presentation systems and video-conferencing systems (for online and hybrid classes).

• The Faculty Association provides resources for faculty about the Collective Agreement and the funds you have available to you as an instructor.

• The Library can help pull (or purchase) resources (books and media), schedule workshops, create class resources.

• Shop, Studio and Lab technicians can help you plan assignments, schedule shop/studio time, schedule workshops and demos.

• The Gallery can help you book exhibition and critique spaces outside your classroom.

• The Writing Centre can help with reading, research and writing assignment design, scheduling workshops, or supporting you with plagiarism cases.
  
  

Start of term:

The first class

There are not many hard and fast rules for what to do in your first class. The only University requirement is to record attendance at the first class for the purposes of managing waitlisted students. After the first class, you will need to manually email Academic Advising (aadvising@ecuad.ca) with the names of waitlisted students who attended your class.

You will also need to spend time in the first class explaining the course outline (as per Policy 4.4), which is a great opportunity to draw students’ attention to important dates and assignments as well as any course expectations.

The first class is also a good opportunity to assess student expectations and needs: having students complete an informal “what I hope to learn in this class” type of assignment can provide you with valuable information that you can use to plan subsequent classes.

Building in time for some icebreakers or other community-building activities is really helpful in the first few classes. These can sometimes feel like they take time away from more important course content, but research clearly demonstrates that strong in-class relationships result in better learning outcomes. One popular community-building exercise is the creation of a group agreement that governs how people agree to behave with one another in the class.

Finally, the first class is an opportunity to invite students with accommodation needs to contact you either after class or via email.

Managing challenging situations in your class

While we always hope each class will be smooth sailing, working with human beings always involves unpredictability and sometimes challenging behaviours. The information below is only a superficial overview of systems: you can always contact your Dean, your Assistant/Associate Dean or your colleagues in the Teaching and Learning Centre for more individual support.

Academic Check-ins

Students not showing up to class, not handing in work or not replying to your emails can benefit from an Academic Check-in message, which you can send via the Support Messaging System. Unlike email, support messages are monitored by a Student Resource Coordinator who may see patterns in a student’s behaviour that individual instructors can’t see (for example, not handing in work across several classes). Many faculty start with regular email communication but switch to the support messaging system if a concern persists or escalates.

Cheating, Plagiarism, or other academic misconduct

Instructors discovering cases of academic misconduct, including misuse of Generative AI in assignments, can use the following information to determine an appropriate response: https://www.ecuad.ca/on-campus/services-facilities/tlc/resources-for-teaching/cheating-plagiarism#further-resources

In a nutshell, minor cases of academic misconduct can be dealt with by the instructor alone, while more serious cases must be escalated to the Dean. In all cases, instructors should document their conversations with students and any next steps using an Academic Check-in message (see above). The Writing Centre is available as a resource for both faculty and students for consultations about academic misconduct: writingcentre@ecuad.ca.

Emotional Distress

Students exhibiting emotional distress, either in class or in private meetings/communications with you, can be sent a Request for Support message, also via the Support Messaging System (see above). A Student Resource Coordinator reaches out to every student who receives a request for support.

Bullying and Harassment

Bullying, harassment and discrimination are not tolerated at Emily Carr, including in the classroom. If you experience bullying from students or witness bullying between students, you can request support via the Coordinator, Student Rights, Responsibility + Safety, Justine Langille justinlangille@ecuad.ca

The following resource was developed for students https://www.ecuad.ca/on-campus/safety-security/incident-report but also provides useful information for faculty, including the academic policies governing violence and bullying prevention on campus.

Further Resources

This Guide to Campus Resources was developed to help faculty find the right people to answer their questions.

This Cheat Sheet for New Faculty was developed in response to questions from new faculty.