Category Archives: Faculty and Staff News

Are book clubs cool? Want to join one?

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I think the real question is– do we care if book clubs are cool?

No. No, we do not care because we’re beyond doing what other people think is “cool” and are more interested in doing things that bring us joy and help us explore ideas with openness and curiosity.

Plus sometimes there be dragons.

an AI-generated dragon wearing glasses, reading a book, and drinking a mug with steam coming from the top, sitting in a large cozy library
A book club dragon. Credit goes to Kyle Minton and the Midjourney AI image generator.

The Durham Tech Library is gathering data for faculty and staff reading groups. Take our survey and let us know what types of books and reading groups you’d be interested in joining and if you’d be interested in facilitating a session. Keep an eye out for more information about upcoming reading circles, too.

We’re interested in student feedback, too, though we won’t start any student reading groups until Fall 2023, depending on interest and staffing (so plan ahead!). Are you part of a student group that would like to do a book club or reading circle? Let us know!

Celebrating OER Week at Durham Tech

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March 6-10 is Open Education Week!

Open Educational Resources (OER) are high-quality educational materials that are available for free in the public domain and can be retained, reused, revised, remixed, and redistributed under Creative Commons licensing. These materials can be textbooks, research documents, or instructional tools, among other things.

Durham Tech has already awarded stipends for OER adoption to almost 20 instructors, and the OER Task Force is pleased to announce Spring 2023 stipends for instructors using open educational resources!

Many faculty members may already be using OER in the classroom without even realizing it, so check out the detailed guide to OER (Durham Tech OER LibGuide).

To be eligible to receive a stipend, you must be a Durham Tech instructor who is 1) already using OER in your classes this semester and 2) who did not receive a stipend for OER in Fall 2022. Only one stipend will be awarded per instructor.

The deadline to apply using the stipend application form is Friday, March 31st by 5pm. Once the deadline has passed, the task force will evaluate the applications using the 5 R’s of OER (Retain, Reuse, Revise, Remix, and Redistribute – see the link for a detailed guide to OER for more info on these Rs).

Keep reading to learn more about OER and faculty should look for more communication from the OER Taskforce in the coming weeks!

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