Kimberly Rombach’s Reflective Statement
February
12, 2010
I have just completed 5 ˝ years as an assistant professor in
the Department of Childhood/Early Childhood Education at SUNY Cortland and
continue to find this job to be one of the most intellectually rewarding and
yet challenging endeavors of my lifetime. This reflective statement and
accompanying portfolio are intended to serve as my application for continuing
appointment; the contents correspond to the necessary continuing appointment
criteria outlined in the Childhood/Early Childhood Education Department Bylaws
and in SUNY Cortland’s Handbook and are referenced in the information that
follows.
Throughout my past years at Cortland, I have taught seven
different courses in three different programs in our department. The courses
have varied widely in topics and because of that, it has taken a considerable
amount of planning time because resources can’t always be used for multiple
course preparations and assignments needed to be created specific to course
objectives and goals. As the semesters have passed, I have continued to strive
to find new ways to increase my courses’ rigorous design; Students regularly
report that my courses are difficult to complete but well worth the effort. For
example, some recent students commented saying that, “I have never been so
encouraged to work so hard for another professor” and “I feel that Kim wants
all of her students to succeed and does everything in her power to ensure that
this happens. She also expects the best from all, which truly prepared us to
become great educators”. I am a current 2009-2010 nominee for SUNY Cortland’s Excellence
in Teaching award.
Evidence of growth over time
I have been a teacher for over
twenty years. That’s more than half of my lifetime! One of the greatest joys
about teaching is that it is a job that’s never complete. Our students are
always changing, growing and improving and so it should be with exemplary
teachers. I love studying the art of being an exemplary teacher. I always
strive to maximize all students’ learning and continually reflect during and
after my teaching to consider ways to improve my instruction. One of the ways
that I have grown most over time is with the clarity of my course preparations.
When I started my college teaching career, I don’t recall focusing on course
goals and objectives as intently and deliberately as I do now. I find that am
now able to quickly develop meaningful course activities, assignments and
assessments that well correspond to the course goals so I can efficiently work
toward planning meaningful in-class experiences for all students.
I have participated in
professional development activities that have included thinking about ways that
social justice education, inclusive education practices, brain-friendly
learning, and cooperative learning experiences can be implemented into college
courses and have redesigned course assignments to reflect those understandings.
I have worked to create innovative course activities including experiences with
school-aged children, outdoor activities, technology infusion, and
cross-curricular experiences to maximize students’ outcomes. As I strive to
continue to plan for continuing to improve my teaching in the future, my focus
for improvement has now moved to online instruction. I have occasionally taught
online courses and find that they are the most challenging for me to plan and
teach. Last year I participated in a
pilot study which served as a professional development opportunity to learn
about multi-media technology that can enhance online instruction. I created
video stream files of myself teaching content to my online students. I also
taught students how to create their own multimedia video stream files in my
on-campus courses; all students repeatedly emphasized its ease of use and
effectiveness for teaching in online environments. I recently presented
information about this innovative teaching application at New York State’s
Association for Teacher Educators. Studying effective online teaching tools will
help me to continue to strive toward excellence in online instruction.
Course
teaching evaluations
My course teaching evaluations
have consistently been high throughout my time as a professor at SUNY Cortland.
My ratings have been in the 4.5 – 5.0 range on Course Teaching Evaluation (CTE)
items. My most recent CTEs have an overall mean of 4.81. Quantitative results
of all of my CTEs are in the evaluation section of my portfolio for further
reference.
Student
Comments
Each semester, I am eager to learn
what students think about my teaching and course design. I am continually
pleased with their comments. Some students’ comments from my most recent
evaluations included: “Kim has been the most effective professor I ever had at
SUNY Cortland.” “You are my role model.” “One of my favorite professors.” “Best
class I had.” “Great class and great content.” “The workload was intense at
times, but worthwhile.” “Loved this class to death.” All of my students’
comments are referenced in the evaluation section of my portfolio under the
qualitative comments links.
Syllabi
and other artifacts
I have had so many varied teaching
assignments during the time that I have been at SUNY Cortland and because of
that, I have created many different course syllabi and related course
materials. Courses that I typically teach have included: EDU 510: Inquiry into
Teaching, Technology and Research, EDU 379: Inquiry into Curriculum, Technology
and Teaching and EDU 514 Teaching Elementary Social Studies. A relatively new
course, EDU 378: The Academic and Social Curriculum I, is part of my current
teaching schedule. Samples of my syllabi and a sample collection of teaching
artifacts for all courses that I have taught have been included in my portfolio
for reference.
Advising
duties
I am an advisor for nearly
seventy-five MST students who are currently enrolled in our MST Program in
Childhood Education. In the past, I have served as an advisor for undergraduate
students as well. I invite my advisees to meet with me throughout the semester
and enjoy assisting them with their future plans and help to clear the path for
employment as a teacher. I find that one of the most important roles that I
have in that capacity is to write letters of recommendation. I often have
unsolicited feedback from students thanking me for the contributions that I’ve
made to help them begin their careers.
Throughout the time that I have been at SUNY Cortland, I
have worked to create a specific and cohesive scholarly agenda, which involves researching,
studying and disseminating information about effective elementary inclusive
education practices. I am currently a co-PI for a grant that supports the
Mid-state Regional Taskforce on Quality Inclusive Schooling. In that role, I
work to bring together professors, researchers, teachers, support staff and
others interested from institutions, schools, NYSED staff, and other regional
support office staff in the Mid-New York State region to discuss and plan ways
to (1) enhance preservice teacher preparation programs to have teachers be
better prepared to teach in inclusive classrooms and (2) to facilitate
inclusive education knowledge acquisition for inservice teachers and support
personnel. I am also currently serving as a co-director of a SUNY Cortland
Professional Development School project titled, The Unified Teaching and
Learning Initiative (UTLI) with a goal of facilitating preservice and inservice
teachers’ knowledge, understanding and use of collaborative, elementary
inclusive practices. Both of these roles have helped me to develop a
professional network of others who share goals similar to my own; our collegial
conversations and projects have helped solidify my scholarly agenda. As a
result of my scholarly work, I am a recipient of a SUNY Cortland Excellence in
Research, Scholarship and Outreach award.
Recognized
contributions to the field
I have had three peer reviewed papers published with
an additional paper currently in review. I am currently completing a book
proposal for Brookes Publishing and have recently been invited to be a
co-author of a book chapter. The following list includes one published
manuscript, one in review and one in preparation specific to my scholarly
agenda. Other manuscripts (published, in review and in prep) are listed in the
publications section of my portfolio.
Rombach, K. (in press). Clarifying
Research Synthesis on Inclusion. Electronic Journal for Inclusive
Education.
Rombach, K. (in
review). Learning from Parents of Students with Disabilities. XXX.
Rombach, K. (in prep).
Touchstones for Success: Using Research on Inclusion to Inform Evidence
Based Practices. Targeted publisher: Brookes Publishing.
Throughout my years
leading up to this tenure application, I have presented my work at fifteen
International, National and Regional conferences. The following list includes a
sample of presentations specific to my scholarly agenda. Other presentations
are highlighted in the presentations section of my portfolio.
Rombach, K., Smukler,
D., & Swanson, K. (03/10). Implementing the Unified Teaching and
Learning Initiative (UTLI): Initial Findings, Inherent Strengths and Potential
Challenges. The National Professional Development School (NAPDS) Annual
Meeting: Orlando, FL.
Rombach, K., Smukler, D. (10/08). The
Unified Teaching and Learning Initiative (UTLI): A Professional Development
School (PDS) Model. New York State Association of Teacher Educators (ATE),
Albany, NY.
Rombach, K. (04/08). Preparing Teachers for Inclusive Settings: Parents
Suggest Teacher Preparation Gap. New York State Association for Teacher
Educators, Saratoga Springs, NY.
Rombach, K. (04/07). Investigating Preservice Teachers’ Dispositions about
Elementary Students’ Diversity to Inform Teacher Preparation Programs.
Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association. Chicago, IL.
I have been awarded ten internal grants and one
external grant currently in its third year of renewal. Grants specific to my
scholarly agenda are included in the following list. Other grant awards are
listed in the grants section of my portfolio.
New York
State Higher Education Support Center for Systems Change grant: New York
Higher Education Support Center for Systems Change Research Grant. This
external grant proposal was initially awarded in September 2007 and is in its
third year of renewal [$24,000].
SUNY Cortland Professional
Development School (PDS) grant: The Unified Teaching and Learning Initiative
(UTLI). This internal grant awarded in April 2008 and continues for five
years [$30,000/5 yrs.]
Nuala McGann Drescher
Award, titled: IMPACT2: Inclusive Models: Promoting Aligned Collaboration
through Technology. This internal grant was awarded in March 2009.
Service
Volunteering is extremely important to me because I've come to realize
that it is through service work that I can help to form collaborative,
cooperative communities. I have found that I enjoy taking leadership roles when
serving on committees and have assumed on-campus leadership roles including
chairing our department's social studies search committee, co-facilitating campus-wide workshops on electronic
professional portfolio development, being a presenter for our Office of
Research and Sponsored Programs to talk about my scholarly agenda and internal
grant writing success, and serving as the coordinator of my department’s
Master of Science in Teaching (MST) in Childhood Education program.
Off
campus leadership roles include serving as a co-liaison for the Mid-state
Regional Taskforce on Quality Inclusive Schooling, co-facilitating a
semester-long series of five professional development workshops on inclusive
education offered through the Cortland County Teaching Center and serving as an external manuscript and small grants reviewer
for numerous professional organizations and publishers.
The
following information provides a sample of my service activity with different
levels of involvement. Other service information is listed in the service
section of my portfolio.
Local, on-campus service
MST in Childhood Education Program coordinator, Spring 2006 – present
College Scholarship Committee, Spring 2005 - present
Faculty Development Committee, Summer 2005 – Spring 2009
Long Range Planning Committee, Spring 2007 – Spring 2009
Service to my professional, scholarly community
Annual Summer Symposim on Inclusive Schooling co-planner, 2008 – present
Manuscript reviewer, Allyn & Bacon, Pearson, and various professional
organizations, Fall 2006 – present
Cortland County Teacher Center Professional Development Series co-presenter, fall 2009
My
work as a professor at SUNY Cortland continues to be a very professionally rewarding
time of my life. I continue to be very proud to be part of the SUNY Cortland
faculty and am hopeful that my portfolio will provide the reviewers with
evidence of my teaching, scholarship and service that supports a decision for
continuing appointment as an assistant professor in the Department of
Childhood/Early Childhood Education.
Thank you in advance for your careful review of my work.
Sincerely,
Kimberly Rombach