UHD Faculty Feedback on Supplemental Instruction Program (SI)
9. What did y=
ou find
the most frustrating about SI?
= 1. Not having enough time to best use my SI in and out of class.
= 2. Initially it was mildly frustrating that he was to shy to help the students during the class, but by mid semester this subsided.
= 3. I just did not have enough time to take advantage of the features of the SI…if we had the time to do more classroom activities, I could have u= sed the SI more effectively.
= 4. I did not find any of my SI leaders frustrating. They all conducted themselve= s as upperclassmen and were never condescending. However sometimes the students would frustrate one of them somewhat and this was his first semester being = an SI. At those times I would talk to him and may be show him a pointer or two= . By semester’s end he had become a “seasoned” tutor.
= 5. The SI leader should be someone who has a good background in Math; who has taken and performed well in higher level courses and who is current.
= 6. That it is not an hour attached to the course so that everyone would benefit from doing their homework in such a positive environment.
= 7. That students did not take advantage of this wonderful opportunity-especially si= nce she made herself available on Fridays.
= 8. His one flaw, perhaps, is that he can seem a stern task-maker. He is always the= re to help, but has a serious demeanor which may make students a bit fearful of asking for help. On the other hand, I have absolutely no proof of this-I can only compare him to my other SI in this respect. I imagine the evaluations = will be more help. This was not really a frustration; simply a concern of mine (= may have no foundation).
= 9. Sometimes it is difficult for the SI leaders to be available at the times all students can attend.
= 10. She is quiet. Her disability frequently kept her from attending class.
= 11. The students do not attend SI sessions. Even when I have offered “incentives” to attend like extra credit or extensions on paper deadlines, students just don’t make use of the SI outside of class.
= 12. Unfor= tunately, only a small percentage of the students in the class chose to take advantag= e of the SI assistance made available.
= 13. Occasionally, his handwriting. Very occasionally, not confident.
= 14. This semester one frustration was t= he loss of my initial SI and having to start over with a new SI about halfway through. Another was that not enough students sought the SI’s help. <= span style=3D'mso-spacerun:yes'>
= 15. In general, SI leaders are not trai= ned to tutor for English classes. An English SI leader should never write on or correct students’ papers for them. This has never happened with any of the SI leaders that I have been assigned because my SI leaders have either = been Writing/Reading Center (WRC) tutors or I have trained the SI to not do the = work for the student. As the director of the WRC, I have offered my services to = the LC program each semester and have offered to train the English SI leaders. = Once again, I will gladly volunteer my time to hold mini-training sessions for English SI leaders. In addition, I have heard through my tutors who also se= rve as SI leaders that there is an SI leader who speaks negatively about the WRC and repeatedly tells students not to come to the WRC. He claims that the tu= tors in the WRC do not know what they are doing. This is very unprofessional behavior and undercuts the overall mission of both the SI program and the W= RC.
= 16. Unfor= tunately, only a small percentage of the students in the class chose to take advantag= e o the SI assistance made available.
= 17. It is difficult to find a time when students and SI can meet because of conflicting schedules. An online venue might be helpful.
= 18. I regretted not being able to find a common time that would allow me to meet regularly with the SI leader to inc= lude his insights in curriculum development and to offer him closer guidance in = how he might more effectively support the students’ research and writing.=
= 19. Not a thing! I love it, as you may = know.
= 20. Every time I asked him for work, he completed/was successful with about half of the assignment.
= 21. Getting students to go see the SI o= utside of class is challenging. He was able to get a small of group of students to come regularly, but others who could have benefited never did go see him. <= /p>
= 22. That I could not ask the SI to help= me with grading. I would have wanted to do more in-class quizzes and I could h= ave done this with some help from somebody (SI or somebody else).
= 23. Getti= ng the students to take advantage of the extra times he was available outside of class.
= 24. I can’t ask the SI leader to help me with grading quizzes-knowing that = SI leaders should be very qualified to do the job.
= 25. His inexperience with the SI program and his cocky attitude at the beginning (coming late, wearing headphones, thinking that if he did anything during c= lass time he was doing my work). We had a discussion and he did change for the better. He really was helpful in that some students who passed would not ha= ve without working with him.
= 26. My SI= s are both wonderful and knowledgeable. I feel that I have trained them to be most helpful in my class and that is part of my responsibilities as an instructo= r in this program. It is difficult for them and frustrating when they are told by someone else to do even more! I, as an instructor, should have been consult= ed first!