FEU faculty gears up for new school year with C.R.A.F.T.

With another transformative school year ahead, FEU faculty members prepared for full face-to-face classes through a 4-day in-campus training on August 2-5, 2022. The training covered a set of refresher topics for the nearly 800 FEU Higher Education faculty. FEU CRAFT (Course Refresher in Assessing and Facilitating Teaching-Learning) drew on the practices and modalities from the past two years and used them as the starting point of discussions and implications to the now normal education. Critical discussions on student-centered teaching and learning (SCTL) and assessment were also addressed as part of the workshops.

Competence in content delivery, pedagogy and full integration with technology stretched the university in the past two years. Thus, the program was designed to provide varied experiences through the thirty facilitators and five lead facilitators who handled the breakout Sessions at the new student-centered classrooms of the FEUture Center.

There were four plenary lectures in the week-long training. Maria Teresa Tinio (FEU Senior Vice President) made faculty members reflect on what an FEU Educator is and engaged them into a panel discussion. Attendees uncovered what SCTL is at the conceptual and instructional levels through speakers Aisa P. Arlos (Director–Accreditation and Quality Assurance) and Percival S. Paras (Chair–Institute of Education, Undergraduate Studies Department). Harold John D. Culala (Dean–IE) and Joseph Jintalan (Director–General Education) streamlined everyone’s understanding of assessment with the standards set by FEU. As culmination, attendees exhibited the lectures’ discussion points into practice through their Course Information Booklet.

Faculty from Edustria High School (Lipa, Batangas) were guest attendees, and it is hoped that more future training will be extended to other campuses. Faculty members recommended more specialized training and workshops.

The training was co-organized by three offices, the Institute of Education-Center for Teaching and Learning, Academic Affairs and Academic Development, assisted by other FEU offices.