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Full-Time Teaching Faculty
Kerry Joyce is a 38-year-old assistant teaching professor in the McMaster School of Nursing. Kerry relocated to Hamilton from Calgary with her young family of four when she accepted her teaching-track faculty appointment shortly after completing her doctoral studies about a year ago. Kerry’s husband Todd, who is a bank manager, was luckily able to transfer into a similar position at a Toronto branch. Kerry and Todd have two active young boys, aged eight and six, respectively. Over the past year, Kerry’s family has settled into their new home and city.
Q1. What is MacID?
Your MacID is your unique identifier to access university systems and resources. The McMaster University Technology Services (UTS) offers guidelines on how to set up your MacID: https://uts.mcmaster.ca/services/accounts-and-passwords/macid/.
Q2. What is MOSAIC?
MOSAIC is McMaster's online system to access your pay stubs, tax forms, and for submitting expense reports. For more information, click here: https://uts.mcmaster.ca/services/administration-systems/mosaic/mosaic-employees-and-faculty/.
Q3. Where can I find the university policies and procedures such as student code of conduct?
The university secretariat has official policies, procedures and guidelines here. These include: student code of conduct, academic accommodations, research ethics, etc.
Q4. Does the university have an EOHSS (Environmental and Occupational Health Support Services) office?
Yes - you will be asked to complete some health and safety forms at the start of your employment with the university. See here for the EOHSS Office website: https://hr.mcmaster.ca/about-us/our-services/environmental-occupational-health-support-services/.
Q5. What social opportunities are there for new faculty?
Here are some helpful links from McMaster Human Resources:
Q6. Are there childcare services and other benefits available to faculty members?
Resources on childcare support:
Childcare allowance details here: https://hr.mcmaster.ca/employees/total-rewards/mufa/1.11a
Great article from HBR regarding creating a circle of support for working parents: https://hbr.org/2020/03/working-parents-need-a-parenting-posse
Kerry is currently working on her career review documents prior to meeting with the vice dean of nursing. Over the past year, she has taught three problem-based learning courses (PBL), two clinical lab courses, and one research course in the undergraduate nursing program. She is also a level 2 BScN lead and a co-primary investigator on a quality improvement research project in the School of Nursing.
Q7. What are the objectives of meeting with your chairperson or their designate?
Here is a sample overview of reviewing objectives. Important to note that you will be required to complete several career review documents prior to meeting with chair: https://www.feinberg.northwestern.edu/fao/for-faculty/performance-review/index.html
Q8. What types of research outputs do I list on my MacFacts CV?
Online helpful resources on MacFacts, McMaster's system for creating CV: https://www.csu.mcmaster.ca/macfacts/
Guidelines to create your Teaching Dossier and Clinical Activities Portfolio
Q9. What types of teaching activities “count” towards promotion? How are these activities entered into my CV?
Here is some information on maintaining an academic CV: https://fhs.mcmaster.ca/facultyrelations/documents/20140115LunchandLearnCVPresentation.pptx
Q10. What resources are available to support my research project and scholarly journey?
Here are some helpful resources:
MacPFD video: The 10 steps scholarly journey: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JPmObrqHTc
MacPFD video: picking projects for optimal productivity: https://www.macpfd.ca/pillars/scholarly-practice/schpra-picking-projects
HPER module 4-4: budgets, study schedules, and project management: https://www.macpfd.ca/hper-curriculum/hper-module4-4-budgets
MacPFD video: Building meaningful collaborations: https://www.macpfd.ca/home/event-day-in-faculty-development/macpfd13-baker-meaningfulresearchcollab
Given that her teaching effectiveness score (TES) average was 5.8/7, Kerry realizes that she needs to continue to develop her instructional skills, especially in PBL since this teaching approach is new to her. She admits that she was extremely stressed with the move and the initial demands of her first teaching position. Kerry also plans on pursuing educational research within the Faculty of Health Sciences and the McMaster Community, but she would like to first and foremost learn how to effectively balance her teaching, administration, and scholarly work.
Q11. What is the role of teaching evaluations?
Formative assessment of teaching skills: Learning Conversations: An Analysis of the Theoretical Roots and Their Manifestations of Feedback and Debriefing in Medical Education by Tavares et al Acad Med. 2020;95(7):1020–1025. doi:10.1097/ACM.0000000000002932: https://journals-lww-com.libaccess.lib.mcmaster.ca/academicmedicine/Fulltext/2020/07000/Learning_Conversations__An_Analysis_of_the.26.aspx
Self assessment of teaching: Know Thyself article: https://www-tandfonline-com.libaccess.lib.mcmaster.ca/doi/full/10.1080/0142159X.2021.1948518
Q12. What courses are available to me to improve my PBL tutor skills?
Review the following links:
PBL Tutorials:
https://www.macpfd.ca/pillars/inspired-teaching/inspt-problem-based-learning
PBL Bootcamp: https://www.macpfd.ca/pillars/inspired-teaching/inspt-pblbootcamp
Video on characteristics of an effective tutor: https://www.macvideo.ca/media/Module+1A+Characteristics+of+an+Effective+Tutor/0_k31fglpp
Peer observation of teaching:
Q13. If I plan to conduct educational research, what communities could I join to support my interests?
McPherson Institute
Teaching and learning scholarship (3.14) https://mi.mcmaster.ca/teaching-and-learning-scholarship/
Grants and awards https://mi.mcmaster.ca/grants-awards/
Join MERIT (Program for Education Research) – Community of practice membership: https://healthsci.mcmaster.ca/merit/about-us/membership
Other resources on community of practice:
Article on community of practice: Yarris LM, Chan TM, Gottlieb M, Juve AM. Finding your people in the digital age: virtual communities of practice to promote education scholarship. Journal of graduate medical education. 2019 Feb;11(1):1. https://doi.org/10.4300/JGME-D-18-01093.1
https://www.harvardmacy.org/index.php/hmi/educators-find-community-of-practice-pretty-tweet
What makes a community of practice work? https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5305036/
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