Emporium and Faculty

Many colleges have implemented the Emporium model (or a related redesign), and others are getting ready to do so.  This post is not about whether those colleges should have done this method, nor about the validity of the methodology itself.  This post is about the faculty who find themselves in this situation — either working in the redesign themselves or being part of a department where the model is used.

Faculty concerns about these models relate to workload, college priorities, and professionalism.  Since a deliberate goal of these redesigns is often reduction in costs, faculty workload often shifts; instead of faculty having a class with 25 to 35 students, we find ourselves providing individual assistance (often in a computer lab) … sometimes for additional hours compared to the class. We may or may not be providing instructor-led learning opportunities (most often not), and we often work alongside tutors.  We usually have different professional responsibilities in these redesign models, and may have less opportunity to apply our judgment on assessments.

On those workload issues, I would remind faculty that these changes are in a larger context.  One of those larger factors is a trend to look at faculty in different ways within higher education; sometimes, this is a ‘faculty are the problem’ approach (a continuation of that them in K-12 education) … other times, people are listening to the ‘faculty of the future’ conversations will people envision vastly different responsibilities for faculty.  Those factors are parts of the forces that have led institutions and systems to adapt these particular redesigns; the question will be — are these models of redesign a viable structure for a new role of faculty?  In practice, fundamental changes like this are not a continuous function; an initial solution (Emporium or other redesign) does not provide sufficient benefits, so the solution is modified or replaced by an alternative model.  Due to other forces on developmental mathematics, I think it is very likely that the initial redesigns like Emporium will be replaced by a different model after a trial period (in most situations).

The college priorities that lead to this type of redesign place the highest value on efficiency and savings; for faculty, this produces some reasonable concerns.  How far ‘up the curriculum’ will these methods be used?  This set of values is also part of a larger context, one which will become even more evident in the next few years: ‘making college affordable’ in the political jargon.  We need to recognize that there is some validity to the view that higher education has become too expensive — less so in community colleges, but still true there.  Given that the median income is stagnant or slightly declining, any increase in cost for higher education is relatively ‘out of syn’; our colleges will have increased difficulty in adding revenue.  In some states, there is a path prescribed which would enable increased revenue — performance based funding, where increases are assigned based upon achieving more benchmarks (such as ‘completing’ developmental education).  These larger factors will be a problem for us, which means that we need to see them as an opportunity — how can we envision developmental mathematics so that we provide mathematically sound courses in a faculty-based system while reducing costs?

The faculty concerns about professionalism take different forms.  Faculty have told me that they are concerned for their job security when their college implements an Emporium (or similar model) and the faculty member is definite in their judgment that these are not appropriate models.  Faculty have told me that the move to a cost-saving redesign raises questions about being respected as professionals.   Faculty have also wondered whether the Emporium or related models reflect standards of the profession.    The fact that faculty in these models find themselves primarily providing individual help can create some cognitive dissonance about what ‘professional’ means for math faculty in developmental mathematics.

These concerns about professionalism have validity.  The larger context here deals with the history of our profession, both community college mathematics education in general and developmental mathematics in particular.  In general, we have not anchored community college mathematics education in our professional association (AMATYC).   AMATYC works hard through the efforts of incredibly dedicated colleagues; however, too few of us are active members … and few colleges change their mathematics curriculum based on AMATYC standards.  One factor here is that AMATYC is young, being about 40 years old — the process is slow; perhaps we will ‘get there’ in the next few years.

I need to address the professionalism for developmental mathematics in particular.  Because of the history of the field, we often see our courses as ‘improved high school courses’ and frequently hire current or former high school teachers to work (either full time or adjunct).  This is not a criticism of the individual teachers involved … however, this creates weaknesses in our profession, because we have not had our unique ‘voice’ for what developmental mathematics should be.  Our only ‘model’ has been “like high school”.  Essentially, we lack a professional ‘voice’.  Within the emerging models (New Life, Carnege Pathways, Dana Center Mathways), a common theme is the building up of the profession by emphasizing unique features and goals.  These emerging models provide a “this is not high school” message, and provide a framework for the profession; in these models, math faculty provide benefits and strive for goals with students that can not be reduced to doing lots of homework.

If you are one of the faculty either happy with doing an Emporium (or similar) redesign OR not-so-happy with being on such a project, I encourage you to do your best for the sake of our students.  Since there are larger forces involved, I believe that these redesigns will tend to naturally migrate to one of the emerging models over time.  If this change does not happen, we can hope that this is because the particular implementation is well designed to meet student needs.

Your best activity for the long term is involvement with your professional association — AMATYC for those of us in community college mathematics.

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