Overview

We have a range of sessions that focus on efforts to create innovative and engaging hybrid and online classrooms, address racial and social justice issues in the classroom, techniques to encourage dialogue and discussion among students and highlight ways to engage with new teaching, research or service opportunities.

This year, the schedule will feature two session types: live sessions and on-demand sessions.

Live sessions will take place in Zoom on the afternoon of Thursday, October 22; attendees will be able to select live sessions to attend, and live interaction with attendees will be possible. During the conference, you will click on each time to locate the session you plan to attend and click on the 'join' link.

On-demand sessions are pre-recorded by presenters and are now available to watch on the website. Click on 'On-Demand Sessions' to access recordings.

Zoom Tips: We will be using the Zoom Meeting format throughout the conference. If you're unfamiliar with Zoom, review the Zoom FAQs.

Welcome and Featured Speaker

The conference is opened by Matt Acevedo, Director of Learning Innovation and Faculty Engagement, Academic Technologies, and our featured speaker Osamudia James, Associate Provost for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion with the topic, Maximizing Inclusion During a Time of Exclusion.

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Adapting Clinical Skills For Virtual Learning Through Telemedicine And Hybrid Simulated Patient Encounters

Samantha Syms, MS, CHSE, Director, Standardized Patient Program, and Saily Martinez Gutierrez, Standardized Patient Program, Miller School of Medicine, Gordon Center.

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Pre-COVID, medical students were frequently scheduled for in-person simulated encounters with standardized patients (SPs) to practice and assess their clinical and communication skills. Due to the shelter in place order, our clinical skills curriculum moved fully online in a matter of days. Furthermore, the USMLE decided to suspend the administration of the Step 2 Clinical Skills licensure exam until June 2021. With the exam suspended, the best measure of a student’s clinical competency is their performance on simulated patient exams, which had previously been utilized to gauge their performance on the Step 2 CS exam. By hosting formative telemedicine sessions, we provide valuable feedback to our students to refine their clinical skills while simultaneously becoming comfortable with this new normal. Through creativity and adaptation to constantly changing conditions, the Standardized Patient Program was able to successfully host a large-scale examination for 200 medical students in addition to many formative sessions. During our session, we will discuss how we incorporated remote simulated encounters into our curriculum, the progression to hybrid sessions, along with innovative approaches to maintain student engagement. Fostering communication and interpersonal skills among students using a facilitated debriefing model will also be discussed.

The Use Of An Online Software Platform to Enhance Student Engagement

Carmen Presti, Assistant Professor of Clinical, School of Nursing and Health Studies

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During the summer of the COVID-19 pandemic, educators worldwide had to quickly transform traditional face-to-face teaching to online distance education. When transitioning to online instruction, Microsoft Teams was used in a hybrid Seminar in Inter-professional Education course. Microsoft Teams is a platform that can be used as a hub for student and instructor online collaboration. This session will show examples of the use of Microsoft Teams in a course with 83 students working interactively in small and large groups. Students were divided into small groups and were able to work synchronously and asynchronously via the product. Students worked individually and also in a shared workspace which allowed collaborative editing of documents and chatting in organized channels that were directly related to group assignments. Teams also met as a whole with the instructor via the secure video conference feature to be able to engage with each other and the group in lively discussions based on case studies and other assignments. The use of the software helped students and instructors forced to isolate from one another during the crisis meet the course objectives and enhance teamwork and collaboration.

Inclusive Teaching Practices

Miriam Lipsky, Assistant Provost for Institutional Culture, Office of Institutional Culture and School of Education and Human Development

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This session will review research related to creating an inclusive classroom environment. Topics covered will include: stereotype threat, implicit bias, Universal Design for Learning/ accommodations for students with disabilities (SWD), Fixed and Growth Mindset, resources for reviewing syllabi for inclusive practices, and best practices for creating community agreements in the classroom.

Using Padlet to Engage Students

Christine Delgado, Research Assistant Professor; Rebecca Shearer, Associate Professor; Jennifer Britton, Associate Professor, Psychology

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Padlet is a virtual bulletin board that provides a forum for students to share and interact with their classmates and the instructor. Padlet is visually appealing and easy to use for both instructors and students. Padlet posts can include images, videos, documents, and web links and they can be set to allow comments, ratings, and/or grades. This simple program can be used in a wide variety of ways to support in person, hybrid, and online instruction. Drs. Delgado, Shearer, and Britton will describe the various ways that they have incorporated Padlet into their courses this fall. Some examples include introductions, sharing information, posting assignments, peer feedback, and discussion.

Taking Harkness Dialogue Course Online

Ashmeet Oberoi, Assistant Professor of Professional Practice, and Ryan Schooley, PhD Student, Educational and Psychological Studies

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In this session, we will share with the participants some strategies to adapt a face-to-face Harkness course into an entirely online Harkness course. Participants will learn strategies to facilitate dialogue and discussions among students on controversial and challenging topics that help us to address critical questions of our time: How are my identity, values, and worldviews informed by my social identities? How do I dialogue with people who belong to social groups other than my own? How do I work together with people of different faith backgrounds or different worldviews to promote social justice? We will also share examples of how we adapted face-to-face learning activities (e.g. privilege walk, web of oppression) for the online (Zoom) format.

Race, Housing and Displacement in Miami: Using Digital Technologies to Make History Accessible to the Public

Robin Bachin, Charlton W. Tebeau Associate Professor of History and the Assistant Provost for Civic and Community Engagement

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The Race, Housing, and Displacement in Miami student project, funded by a Mellon CREATE Grant, examines the complicated and significant interconnections among race, housing, and displacement in Miami during the twentieth century. This project provides an in-depth and engaging approach to urban history by connecting students and community groups to visually chronicle the impact of racialized planning practices on people and neighborhoods. During the Spring 2020 semester, undergraduate students enrolled in my HIS 561/662 Cities in American History course engaged in research in Richter Library’s Special Collections, focusing on archival materials from grass-roots activist organizations. They also conducted oral history interviews with grass-roots activists to address the impact of planning, zoning, urban renewal, and gentrification on families and communities in Miami. The class (and project) moved fully virtual as a result of COVID-19, so students only had access to archival materials that had been digitized and had to conduct the oral histories via Zoom while still establishing rapport and trust with the community partners. The resulting digital project, an ArcGIS StoryMap, brings together historical narrative, archival documents, and oral histories in a way that engages a wide audience and demonstrates the power of digital platforms to tell complicated stories.

So You Want to Talk About Race: Using This Year's Common Read Text in Your Classroom

Meg Homer Assistant Director of the Center for Humanities; Ava Brillat, Librarian Associate Professor; Roxane Pickens, Director of the UM Learning Commons and Librarian Assistant Professor, University of Miami Libraries

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In this session, members of the One Book, One U Program coordinating committee will share strategies for incorporating this year's One Book, One U selection, So You Want to Talk About Race, into the classroom. Presenters will share resources including an instructors' guide, featuring a helpful break-down of chapters and prominent themes, as well as outcomes from a recent faculty reading group focused on the book.

The Next Blackboard: How We're Transitioning to the New Blackboard Learn Ultra LMS

Peter Martinez, Director of the Learning Platforms Team

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In this session, Peter Martinez, Director of the Learning Platforms Team, will discuss the University of Miami's upcoming transition to Blackboard Learn Ultra, the next generation learning management system available to faculty in summer 2021. Blackboard Ultra's new interface and feature set will be featured, giving UM faculty the opportunity to preview the new system's functionality and learn of opportunities to get involved in pilot testing.

Using Portfolios in Blackboard for Branding Development

Neri Garcia, Lecturer, Strategic Communication

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Adapting our course assignments to the online format comes with very different challenges. For classes where graphic design and the process of it are an integral part it proves particularly challenging. During Summer 2020 I taught an advanced graphic design class, where one of the projects was branding. This project has many factors, a strong research and brainstorming part, a conceptual part and then the consistent application of guidelines defined during the initial stages. The use of the portfolio tool in Blackboard proved invaluable for this project. I was able to experiment with it and create a custom-made portfolio template that met the project’s needs. This tool allowed me to guide students through the development of the brand identity, while also giving them a space to upload and add their different stages in a manner that was cohesive and consistent. It provided them with an overview of their project and gave me as an instructor, the necessary information to provide useful feedback. At the end of the semester the students had a way to showcase the complete process from the beginning stages to the final design of the brand, in a format they could share and add to their brand manual.

Learning with the Lowe: Encouraging Dialogue and Discussion Among Students Using Art Objects

Matthew R. Deroo, Assistant Professor of Digital Literacies for Multilingual Students, Teaching and Learning, and Jodi Sypher, Curator of Education, Lowe Art Museum

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This session draws on CREATE grant funded work between a professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning and the curator of education at the Lowe Art Museum. In this session, we will model how we have fostered dialogue and discussion among university students in support of interdisciplinary, content area learning through two approaches: Visual Thinking Strategies and Object-based Learning. This interactive session will guide attendees through the process of discussion and dialogue based on art objects from the Lowe’s collection: After modeling this approach, hear video feedback from the students in the course demonstrating their success in making connections between art objects and their content areas: music, psychology, English, science, and film studies. Session attendees will receive digital resources and lesson plan suggestions for using Object-based, and Visual Thinking Strategies approaches to support dialogue and discussion in their own classes. The session will close with a time for questions and answers.

Introduction to Medical Profession: Social Determinants of Health

Jeff Brosco, Professor of Clinical Pediatrics; Kim Reynolds, Assistant Professor of Clinical; Laura Chamorro Dauer, Assistant Professor of Clinical; Sabrina Taldone, Assistant Professor of Clinical; Roderick King, Senior Associate Dean of Diversity, Inclusion, and Community Engagement, Director of the MD/MPH Program, and Associate Professor, University of Miami Miller School of Medicine

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Social determinants of health are the social conditions that adversely influence health and well being of populations. In the first two weeks of medical school at the University of Miami Miller School of medicine, 200 first-year medical students are immersed in a robust curriculum that addresses themes including social determinants of health, which in turn lays the foundation for racial and social justice discussions. In this academic year, in the midst of the COVID pandemic, educational objectives were achieved virtually (i.e. Zoom) through lectures, small group discussions, panels of community members, and independent learning activities. Educators across disciplines, from Medicine to History, provided the depth and breadth of content to reinforce and interleave key learning points. Theoretical frameworks were applied to our local Miami community, facilitating student engagement among our students and a sense of belonging. Student evaluations reflected high levels of satisfaction. This introductory curriculum plays a key role in achieving our medical school curriculum mission: Empower to transform lives and inspire to serve our global community. Despite the challenges to live learning, we successfully delivered this critical introductory component to our curriculum through these virtual and hybrid sessions.

Gameful Learning Techniques to Address Hybrid Classroom Challenges

Courtney Dumont, Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering

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Gameful learning allows students to engage with course content and have choice in their assessment opportunities within the framework designed by the instructor. The overall goal is for students to accumulate points throughout the semester in the manner that suits their learning style and accessibility in a hybrid course format. This strategy puts students in control of their grade and allows them to plan their activities to achieve a particular grade through accumulation rather than feeling they lose points in the traditional grading models. Using a gameful learning lens, the Regenerative Medicine course offered through the Department of Biomedical Engineering has been reimagined to address concerns with hybrid teaching and to allow students to explore areas within the field that are of interest to them. Senior undergraduate and early graduate students are the target audience, as foundational knowledge and self-accountability are required for student success. Clear assignment details, rubrics, point accumulation options, and both online and in-person discussion platforms are essential for this class. The primary pitfall of this course format is low student assessment submission rates, which can be addressed by more concrete deadlines identified in future offerings of the course.

Using VoiceThread to Engage Students in Online Courses

Ashley Falcon, Assistant Professor of Clinical, School of Nursing and Health Studies

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VoiceThread (VT) is a versatile tool that faculty can use to engage students. Whether you're looking to move beyond discussion boards, reimagine assignments for online teaching, or reclaim in-class time for other course activities, VT is a lesser-known resource that you never knew you needed and is already available to you on Blackboard! Come see demonstrations of real-world applications of VT at work: humanize course introductions, encourage student reflection of assignments, present lecture content for a flipped classroom experience, promote peer discussion, or migrate student presentations online. Then, spend time brainstorming how you'd like to incorporate VoiceThread into one or more of your classes.

Hands-on Teaching in a Hands-Off Environment

Elsa Drevyn, Clinical Assistant Professor and Director of Clinical Education and Vice Chair for Clinical Education; Sabine Gempel, Assistant Professor and Clinical Education Coordinator, Miller School of Medicine, Physical Therapy

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Clinical Skills is a foundational class in the Doctor of Physical Therapy curriculum, requiring hands on teaching and skill assessment. We have restrictions of social distancing, PPEs, time constraints, limited space. Strategies included: 

• Pre-recorded lectures. Labs are divided into four groups of 15 students per room, each room having 5 groups of 3 students. Students only work within these groups while wearing PPE. On lab days two groups come into two rooms connected via Zoom. 
• Virtual lab sessions utilizing ‘dummies’ 
• Virtual check offs and hands on exam 
• Skill assessments are now being done in groups of 3’s with one student being the evaluator, providing ‘peer’ feedback. 
• Some of the previously independent ‘paper’ case activities are being done during zoom meetings in small groups to facilitate group discussions. 
• Live Integrated Clinical Experiences were replaced by 3 videos of PT interventions being performed in three different settings followed by a reflection paper comparing the three settings.

The major benefit we have observed is that we increased the number of TAs and students are getting more individual attention and feedback than previous years. They are also getting comfortable in assessing each other’s performance and providing feedback.

Open Access & Open Educational Resources: UML Supporting Equitable Teaching & Learning

Dr. Cameron Riopelle, Head of Data Services at UM Libraries; Prof. Joy M. Doan, Head of Austin Weeks Music Library & Librarian Associate Professor;  Ava Brillat, Librarian Associate Professor, UM Libraries

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• The theme of International Open Access (OA) week is Taking Action to Build Structural Equity and Inclusion, which focuses on, "structural racism, discrimination, and exclusion are present and persistent in places where openness is a core value." Cameron Riopelle will provide an overview of UMiami activities during OA week, October 19 - 26. 
• What does OA mean? What are our preconceived notions of OA? How has OA broadened? The field of OA goes beyond the sciences to the humanities and social sciences. It's more than predatory journals. Joy M. Doan will discuss how OA has changed to be more inclusive and involves diversity of thought and disciplines. 
• How is UML, and by extension UMiami, implementing practical applications of OA? Who are the people involved (e.g, campus IT, Academic Technologies), and how do we bring these resources to students and faculty for classroom engagement. During the pandemic, we have developed practical applications that are pedagogically equitable (i.e., OA, OER). Ava Brillat will provide a holistic view of the application of OA/OER in the classroom to support teaching and learning.

GeoMuseUM: Geolocative App of Campus Public Sculptures used to Sculpt Innovative Curriculum and Music

Lien Tran, Assistant Professor of Interactive Media; Diana Ter-Ghazaryan, GIS Research Associate at FIU; Melvin Butler, Associate Professor at Frost School of Music; Brent Swanson Lecturer at Frost School of Music; Christina Larson, Andrew W. Mellon Academic Engagement Fellow at the Lowe Art Museum; Mark Osterman, Manager of Museum Digital Experience at the Lowe Art Museum

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Attendees will learn about GeoMuseUM and ways in which it can be used for innovative curriculum. Funded by a Mellon CREATE Grant, Dr. Diana Ter-Ghazaryan and Professor Lien Tran worked with a team of students to collect highly accurate GPS coordinates of the Coral Gables campus’s public sculptures and prototyped interactive map and app solutions to make finding and learning about these sculptures easier for the UM community and campus visitors. This exploration led to the launch of GeoMuseUM, a geolocative web app and sculpture guide created in coordination with the Lowe Art Museum. Visitors to this online resource can connect to the Gables campus via physical places/spaces and art, learn about sculptural art and artists, and even be inspired to create. Dr. Melvin Butler and Dr. Brent Swanson will share their experience using GeoMuseUM as part of an assignment in MCY 140 Experiencing Music. Students selected, visited, and studied a sculpture in-person or virtually, then “sculpted” (composed or improvised) a short piece of “music” that connected to the selected piece of visual art. The Lowe plans to use GeoMuseUM to engage the residential student population through art-related, stress-reducing activities that provide healthy outlets for anxiety and feelings of isolation. The GeoMuseUM app is available at geomuse.as.miami.edu.

Supporting Teaching and Learning with Primary Sources

Christina Larson, Andrew W. Mellon Academic Engagement Fellow, Shatha Baydoun, Library Assistant Professor, Roxane Pickens, Director of the UM Learning Commons and Librarian Assistant Professor, University of Miami Libraries

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During the fall 2019 semester, we interviewed 15 humanities and social sciences instructors from the University of Miami (UM) who teach with primary sources. Sponsored by UM Libraries, this local study joins a suite of 25 parallel studies across the United States and United Kingdom, coordinated by Ithaka S+R, a nonprofit research and consulting organization that will publish a capstone report in fall 2020. Our presentation will highlight the innovative ways that faculty have collaborated with colleagues at Special Collections, the Cuban Heritage Collection, and the Lowe Art Museum to engage students in object based learning. Interviewees described how archival materials give voice to marginalized groups while others commented on the pedagogical power of primary sources in encouraging critical thinking and analytical skills. Faculty reported primary sources as catalysts for discovery and discussion while technology played a major role in student engagement with objects. The world has changed vastly since the fall 2019 semester when these interviews took place. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, faculty, UM Libraries, and the Lowe Art Museum have pivoted toward virtual experiences. We will present on best practices and share our recommendations for teaching and learning with physical and digital primary sources.

Executive Summary
Slide Deck

Strategies for Student Engagement 

Sarah Cash, Lecturer, English

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The proposed presentation will showcase several teaching innovations for the fully online and hybrid class. These are strategies that I currently use in my classes, and they have been effective in increasing dialogue and engagement. Given new challenges with student interaction and attention in virtual and hybrid classes, these innovations encourage student engagement both synchronously and asynchronously, allowing for more interactive class time. The proposed modes of engagement will include: 1. Pre-recorded mini lectures with visual presentation, including interactive, embedded activities ranging from true and false/multiple choice questions, short discursive responses, and links to outside sources and other learning material. 2. Pre-recorded introductions of assigned readings with annotations, allowing faculty to approach annotating pdfs of readings for the students. 3. Interactive quiz games in class to promote student engagement and discussion, providing a way for students to “test” their understanding of readings and content and allowing the professor a mode to assess comprehension and identify problem areas. 4. In-class small group work and presentation discussions using Slide Decks, promoting full engagement in small groups and the full class setting. Slides also add a visual component to discussion which promotes understanding, particularly for L2 learners.

International Virtual Rounds: Global Observership Program through Virtual Training and Education

Eduardo de Marchena, Associate Dean for International Medicine, Professor of Medicine and Surgery

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The International Medicine Institute (IMI) mission is to promote the Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine internationally as a global leader in education and training of the next generation of medical healthcare professionals, in the advancement of medicine, innovation and technology as a premier academic medical center and a true medical destination that offers quality healthcare services. In June, Dr. Eduardo de Marchena, Associate Dean for International Medicine developed and piloted the first virtual rounds program. The International Medicine Institute is now offering virtual education and training in a growing number of clinical specialties to medical professionals around the world. The Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) has precluded the in- person participation of international observers due to travel lock-down and local social distancing guidelines to prevent the spread of the virus and promote well-being. Our mission is to continue our commitment to education and training by establishing new alternates through “virtual rounds.” Through a single sign-on platform that is HIPAA compliant, users have access to an interactive live e-learning experience, which simulates the in-presence observer experience. Through these virtual rounds, observers are able to:

• Participate in 4-weeks virtual clinical rotations
• Transmit the rounds to multiple participants
• Provide real time case management discussions with medical team
• Review medical history, procedures and results
• Transmit high-resolution images and videos
• Offer participants the opportunity to ask questions and offer opinions virtually
• Participants will also be able to have access to our weekly conference schedule via zoom.

Representing Art: Beyond the Museum

Zevensuy Rodriguez, Lecturer, Department of Interactive Media

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Re-Presenting Art is an interactive holographic installation that allows the user to experience and digitally view 3D scanned masks from the Lowe Art Museum’s Art of Africa Gallery. The installation allows users to manipulate the digital artifacts, not only through the touchscreen interface, but through hand gestures as well. Re-Presenting Art gives the Lowe a new didactic canvas to inform, experience, and highlight items in its collection. The original scope of this project is to create a physical installation, but like all of us Covid and the recent marches provided an opportunity to think of different ways to engage with our content. In this presentation, I would like to present how we are using the web and web-based technologies to create experiences that can reach audiences beyond the physical location of the Lowe Art Museum. Beyond the technology aspects of the project, The presentation will also highlight how we have started working on the process of creating middle school and high school curriculum for students to engage with content. During the presentation, we will highlight how we intend to incorporate both of these parts of the project.

Miller Medical School 2020 NEXTGENMD Faculty Development Series: A 360 (Degree) Approach

Joan St. Onge, MD, David Lewis, PhD, Mary Ann Benites Kaplan, EdD, Edwin Merced, EdD, Educational Development Office

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Eight faculty development sessions were taught via Zoom over the summer as faculty prepared for our new curriculum, the NextGenMD program. Sessions ranged from the role of the Subject Matter Expert, Assessment, 21st Century learners, Active Learning, Implicit Bias and Microaggressions, Blackboard, and Zoom. The faculty concluded this series with a zoom session that attempted to facilitate active learning at distance.

Diverse Genomic Studies Enrich Genetic Education

Daniel Wang, Senior Lecturer, Biology

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The Human Genome Project and genome-wide association studies have laid the foundation for investigations into the biology of complex diseases. The coverage of such studies has always been the central theme in all genetics courses. However, among all participants in these studies, over 80% were European, less than 5% were African, Hispanic, Pacific Islanders, and Native Americans. The under-representation of ethnically diverse populations has impeded our ability to fully understand the genetic architecture of diseases. The lack of ethnic diversity would make our effort in translating genetic research into clinical practice or public health policy dangerously incomplete, or even, incorrect. Considering the differential genetic architecture that is known to exist between populations, bias in research representation can exacerbate existing disease and healthcare disparities. In this talk, I will present exemplary research and analysis in diverse populations, including racial and ethnic minorities in treating human diseases. I will discuss causes of bias in human genomic research and introduce promising projects and efforts to fix the diversity problem in genomic analyses. With the inclusion of diverse genomic studies in the genetics course, students will develop fuller and more comprehensive understanding in human genetics and become motivated to promote racial and ethnic diversity in approaches to study humans. Diversity matters in genomics; diversity strengthens genetic education.

Defying Gender Expectations through Discussions of Art and Literature

Dr. Elizabeth Oldman, Hope Torrents and Jodi Sypher, Department of English and Lowe Art Museum

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This session will demonstrate the use of Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS), an open-ended discussion-based methodology, which allows students to discover the connections between art and literature. Participants will learn how students of Dr. Elizabeth Oldman’s ENG 210/GSS 350: War and the Fashioning of Gender partner with the Lowe Art Museum to connect works of art to foremost literary themes of this class. By comparing Shakespeare’s late tragedy Coriolanus to a painting of the same time period in the Lowe’s permanent collection, we consider the extent to which women have opportunities to participate in war-like action during the patriarchally-centered Renaissance. VTS discussions are a student-centered learning process which motivate students to pursue writing and research projects based on their genuine interests. In these conversations, students bring their life experiences and background knowledge to engage in a dialogue about the meaning of the work of art. Since spring 2020, this collaboration has successfully transitioned from in-person museum experiences to virtual learning environments. After an introduction about the process of collaboration between Dr. Oldman and the Lowe, attendees will participate in a VTS conversation, and learn strategies to develop richer and more complex course content.