Brigham Young University
Faculty Center

Faculty Development Plan
Chemistry and Biochemistry [Professional]
Spring 2005

My goal in writing a faculty development plan is to assess my strengths and weaknesses in my role as assistant teaching professor, outline my professional goals for the next few years, and determine how my goals will fit in with the expectations and needs of my department. 

Self-assessment

I have many strengths and weaknesses as I begin my career in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

Some of my strengths include:  4 years experience teaching part-time for the department, teaching a variety of both general and organic chemistry courses, being approachable and accessible (especially to women students), love of the gospel, BYU, students, and chemistry, treating students fair and respectfully, teaching difficult concepts clearly (especially to students who are not science-minded), knowing how to ask for and listen to suggestions for improvement.  

My weaknesses are:  not always organizing my time, covering too much material in a single lecture, not including more relevant, everyday examples of chemistry in lecture, returning exams and regrades too slowly to students, and testing too hard sometimes, especially in freshman classes. 

Professional Goals

Teaching

In my role as an assistant teaching professor, my responsibilities in the department are to teach large undergraduate classes, assisting students from majors across campus obtain a rigorous background in chemistry.  My job also makes possible lighter teaching loads for chemistry professors with productive research labs.  My desire in teaching is to improve each time I teach a course.  Below are a list of some of my goals and expectations for the following few years.

  1. I will establish a test bank of general and organic chemistry questions before Fall 2005 semester begins.  These will not be multiple-choice questions, but rather short answer type questions on chemical structure, reactivity, mechanism, synthesis, and spectroscopy.  My intent for this project is to minimize the amount of time I spend writing new exams, because I feel like I spend too much of my time in this part of my responsibilities.  This will free up more time for me to organize my lectures, improve in-class demonstrations and examples, finish regrades quickly, and run weekly reviews.  This will be my course project for the Faculty Development Seminar.  
  2. I will have my lecture videotaped in Fall 2005.  I am especially interested in how fast or slow I speak and whether I enunciate.  Sometimes I am so animated in lecture that I think I move and speak too fast.    
  3. I will teach 5 courses a year (2:2:1) of both general and organic chemistry.  I understand that occasionally it will be necessary to teach 6 classes which I am prepared and happy to do.  I have two main concerns with regards to teaching more than 5 classes on a regular basis however.  One is that due to the large class sizes of 250 students, I will not be very accessible to students.  My second concern is that I will “burn out” juggling that many classes every year.
  4. I would like to teach Chem 351 and 352 in sequence whenever possible. 
  5. I would like to teach Chem 101 and 152 in sequence whenever possible. 
  6. I would like to have the opportunity to teach Chem 281.  While this would be a new prep for me, I would like the personal challenge of teaching biochemistry and increasing my chemistry background.  I also see the advantage in teaching classes in more than one subfield.  Although I am an organic chemist by training, I believe I teach organic chemistry better now because of my experience teaching general chemistry.  This would probably be even more true for biochemistry. 
  7. I will develop a GE course during Winter 2006 that is for students who do not require chemistry for their major.  This class will help students become intelligent citizens who understand chemistry in history and the modern world and hopefully find chemistry and its beauty in everything.  I will develop this course with other colleagues who are interested.  The first time this class is taught will be Fall 2006 or Winter 2007 whichever semester works best for the department. 
  8. I will develop an online course for Chem 101, which is a general chemistry course primarily for nursing majors.  This seems like a daunting task to me right now, but I believe there is a need for it as many women are interested in the nursing profession and may be juggling other facets of their life that make taking a course online crucial to their education goals.  I have the support for this goal from my department chair and CID.  My goal is to begin this project Spring 2006. 

Scholarship

While scholarship is not required in my professional teaching track, one of my long-term goals is to contribute in the field of Chemical Education.  Below are a few of my immediate goals. 

  1. I will develop ChemCAT, a computer adaptive test of general chemistry, in collaboration with Dr. XXX.  This exam has the potential of impacting general chemistry students on a national level.  We have some funds on campus that will allow us to work on this project Summer 2005.  We also have the support of the ACS Examination Institute who will help us disseminate the final project.  I gained good experience Fall 2004 in grant writing for ChemCAT and had the opportunity to collaborate with professors and professionals across campus.  This will be my scholarship project for the Faculty Development Seminar. 
  2. I will regularly attend department seminars to stay more current in my discipline.  I will also become familiar with the research of my colleagues.  This will allow me to actively participate in faculty meetings and in decisions about new hires or rank and status. 
  3. I will read J. Chem. Ed. and JOC for 3 hours a week.  This will be an important component in becoming more active in the chemical education and organic chemistry fields. 
  4. I will attend at least one professional conference each year.  I attended the American Chemical Society (ACS) conference last March in San Diego, chaperoning 10 undergraduates who were presenting in the poster sessions.  I am also attending a Gordon Conference on Chemical Education at the end of June. 

Citizenship

I believe being a good citizen in my department means being willing to serve on committees, being respectful of colleagues, and participating in discussions on departmental goals.  A few of my short-term goals are listed. 

  1. I will chair a committee to coordinate the curriculum for the Chem 101/152/281 series.  These classes are primarily geared for nursing majors.  Our department does not currently have standards for the concepts and for the level of difficulty that must be taught in these courses.  Because this series teaches general, organic, and biochemistry, we have also struggled finding a textbook that is satisfactory to all professors involved in teaching these courses.   This will be my citizenship project for the Faculty Development Seminar.  
  2. I will continue coordinating the tutorial labs for general and organic chemistry.  This was one of my responsibilities this year.  I was slow in putting together the lab schedules Fall 2004, but improved Winter 2005.  My goal is to have the schedules ready by the beginning of the second week of classes each semester or term and to keep instructors current of all the tutorial details that impact their classes.  Also I will ask for feedback from tutorial assistants and instructors two times during each semester and once in each term to better improve the tutorial labs. 
  3. I will volunteer to perform demonstrations at local elementary schools.  Currently I am involved in this outreach program and I thoroughly enjoy it, even though it is hard sometimes to fit it into my schedule. 
  4. I will participate in the Central Utah Section of ACS.  I have participated as the secretary-treasurer for the last year, will continue this year in the same role, and will in the near future contribute as chair.  Our section is involved in such annual events as National Chemistry Week, Chemistry Olympiad and Awards Night for local high school students, and the Utah Award Banquet, honoring an accomplished chemist in the state.
  5. I will continue participating on the department curriculum committee.  In the past year, we worked on teaching practices, general and organic chemistry lab problems, and updating requirements for chemistry majors. 

Resources needed

I feel I receive wonderful support from colleagues and department chairs.  The following would also help me in my goals. 

  1. I am in need of a new computer.  My current laptop has broken speakers and frequently crashes. 
  2. I would like to hire a former teaching assistant for 5-10 hours a week Summer 2005 to help me with my test bank project. 
  3. I would like to have a few colleagues attend my lectures Fall 2005 and make constructive comments on how to improve.
  4. If possible I would like to only teach 5 large undergraduate classes per year. 
  5. I would like to hire a former teaching assistant for 5-10 hours a week Spring 2006 to help me with the online Chem 101 course development.   

Department expectations

I believe my department expects me to contribute the most in meeting their teaching goals, however I am also expected to actively participate in faculty decisions on matters outside of teaching.  Below are some of the ways in which I am expected to contribute. 

  1. I will be flexible enough to teach a variety of courses and the mix of classes will vary every year depending on the assignments of other faculty members. 
  2. I will receive teaching evaluations that are at least as good as the average teaching ratings and preferably better. 
  3. I will strive to improve my teaching each year. 
  4. I will attend faculty meetings and be engaged in discussions. 
  5. I will serve on 2 or 3 committees each year.