ACIFA 2014

With 12 Bow Valley College faculty members, I attended the 2014 ACIFA conference hosted by Norquest College. The scenery and mountain air alone literally engaged its participants to spring from one session to the next wearing a giant smile, but the main asset of the conference was the sharing of knowledge and inspiration that took place.  

Some of the highlights of my trip included attending:

1. Tapping into Writing Skills: Engaging Brewmaster Students with Blogs and Social Media and

Technology in the Classroom: Lessons Learned through the Olds College iPAD and Technology Initiative

Presented by Brooklin Schneider, Mark Fournier, and Philip Watland from Olds College.

In the past year, Olds College began a technological initiative that introduced mandatory iPADS into the college classroom. With the knowledge that employers are no longer reading over résumés and instead turned to “Googling” prospective employees, Olds College’s students communicate professionally through social media for grades.

In most classes students have to create a blog, write 8 blog posts, and create 2 videos in a 16 week class. During the process students can choose to keep their blog private or public. In some cases, before the end of the course, students were contacted by employers for interviews.

“Students need to grow up with their social media, and teachers need to model professional accounts.” – Brooklin Schneider

http://www.oldscollege.ca/programs/horticulture/brewmaster-brewery-operations-management/index

2. Creating Cultural Competence on Campus

Presented by Hana Taleb Imai and Diane Hardy from Bow Valley College

Our own Bow Valley College presented on the difference between a multicultural community which only tolerates the presence of other cultures and an intercultural community which genuinely wants to learn about the difference of others.  The session encouraged teachers to learn more about their students and give their students the opportunity to learn more about each other to avoid “the danger of a single story”.

http://youtu.be/D9Ihs241zeg

3. Giving Back to Our Community: Service Learning in Adapted Physical Education

Presented by Brandi Robinson at Red Deer College

Brandi Robinson teaches a Kinesiology class that gives back! Brandi models how to give back to the community with a free physical education class for children with disabilities. In the project, kinesiology students create and put into action lesson plans for the community children. After the model is completed, students are asked to find opportunities in their own community to help. The students must reach out to the community, find a need, create a project, and put it into action for grades.  A possible replica of this project in the CEFL could include asking our students to create lesson plans and tutor nearby elementary students.

http://rdc.ab.ca/about/research-innovation/scholarly-activity-award-recipients/2013-award-recipients/brandi-robinson-service-learning

4. Open Learning in the Cloud: Google Apps for Education

Presented by Lindsay Bonenfant from Bow Valley College

Lindsay presented on Google Apps for education and the benefits of storing all one’s information in the cloud for free: ) Some of the Apps discussed included gmail, YouTube, and Drive.

http://youtu.be/R4vkVHijdQk

I'd like to thank Keith and the Centre for Excellence in Foundational Learning for this amazing opportunity.