Hi Lex,
Thanks for starting this thread - my frustration with this problem back
in 2008-10 was part of why I left academia to re-start Software
Carpentry [1], and it's great to hear about other people's experiences
and thinking.
I haven't run a regular classroom course in eight years, so I don't
think I have a lot to contribute to your first question. Regarding your
second, I think you've set an impossible problem: if learners are
extrinsically motivated (doing it because they have to), then we've lost
before we start playing [2]. In my experience, Carpentry workshops work
because people already have the problems we're showing them how to
solve; if they don't, then we're in the same unhappy boat as first-year
linear algebra courses. Putting things like plotting (which they can
immediately use in other courses) at the start of a Carpentry course
might help with this, and having them build and program lab hardware
using Arduinos and the like might as well, but that's speculation.
As for quality of instruction and instructor motivation, I think the
fundamental problem is that teaching isn't respected or rewarded as much
as most of us feel it should be. That's not specific to Carpentry, so I
don't think we can or should try to solve it on our own. Instead, I
think Carpentry should become a gateway to participation in groups like
NABT [3], AAPT [4], or CEEA [5], through which the people we train will
become part of a larger movement to modernize teaching practices in
higher education. Achieving that will be the work of a lifetime, but
believing that things are going to get better, and working with peers to
make it happen, is a great motivator. Since there isn't a CarpentryCon
in 2019, maybe some of us would like to plan to attend one of these
organizations' conferences as a group and see if we can make new friends?
Cheers,
Greg
[1] https://f1000research.com/articles/3-62/v2 (which really, really
needs an update if anyone's willing to take a crack at it...)
[2]
https://www.amazon.com/Enhancing-Adult-Motivation-Learn-Comprehensive/dp/1119077990/
[3] https://nabt.org/
[4] http://www.aapt.org/
[5] https://ceea.ca/
On 2018-10-03 3:55 a.m., Lex Nederbragt wrote:
Hi community,
At the University of Oslo (UiO), we have an ongoing process that will result in
a Masterplan for IT at the university. I am part of the task force responsible
for writing this plan, and have been tasked to contribute to a section on
skills training. We have a large Carpentries effort at UiO, regularly teaching
one-day workshops with one lesson of the Software Carpentry stack each
(including make and testing/continuous integration), very popular two-day R
(tidyverse), and occasionally Data or Library Carpentry lessons or full two-day
workshops. Many at UiO are now seeing the need to offer this kind of skills
training more widely and organized as formal course offerings, potentially with
students earning credit.
I am very happy with this development as it is a recognition of the skill gap
that exists amongst researchers, and a testament to the success of The
Carpentries and our local effort in filling it. However, I also worry that we
may lose something in the process of scaling up offering these workshops.
By making Carpentry workshops a core offering across departments, with students
able to earn credit from them, my fear is that the spirit of the volunteer
effort gets lost or may become reduced. Making our workshops into required
courses may change (reduce) the motivation for learners and instructors.
So here are my questions to you:
⁃ Have other universities made the same move, or are they planning this, and
if so, how are they organizing this effort?
⁃ How to keep learners motivated if they feel they are required to take a
Carpentries workshops?
⁃ How to keep the quality of instruction, and instructor motivation, high,
if workshops become organized like regular courses?
I’d appreciate any suggestions that will help us become succesful scaling up
our Carpentries skills training!
Regards,
Lex Nederbragt
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