Christina Johnston-Eustace is a recipient of our first annual Outstanding Mentoring Award. (photo courtesy Christina Johnston-Eustace)

As a follow up to the FA's awards and recognition celebration held on January 28, I have interviewed each of our award recipients so people can learn more about their good work.

Below the interview is the official nomination that was made on behalf of Christina Johnston-Eustace, Robin Hill, Alexandra Belanich and Catherine Wynne as a group.

Editor’s Note: An exception was made by the FA awards committee this year for this category. The guidelines indicate that only one FA member may be nominated for one award per year. The following four women were nominated as a group, however, given their unusual work last spring and summer in mentoring hundreds of FA members who were scrambling to learn Blackboard and other technologies for remote teaching and working. The awards committee graciously made an exception given the circumstances of the pandemic.

Christina Johnston-Eustace

Q — Last year, when the shift to remote teaching and working was announced in early March, it must have felt like the sky was falling to our members in Information Technology Services (ITS) like you and your colleagues in the Center for Innovative Pedagogy (CIP) profiled below. What was that like?

A — As a relatively new mom, honestly, my first concern last spring was people’s health and safety, so I was relieved when our reporting obligations as far as being on campus were changed, when it was finally decided that we should work from home. It’s clear that, given the work we do with technology, we are capable of doing it from home, and it was so smart to have as few people on campus as possible last spring. And now we’ve been reporting to campus two days a week.

As part of IT operations, I help manage all of the help requests and support tickets. When people call x4357, you get Josephine, Paul or me, and we provide the help you need from there on. As the ITS trainer, I was able to quickly switch my workshops to MS Teams. I appreciated the fact that we could work remotely because I felt safer; we were actually well prepared by the college to work remotely so we could provide the support faculty and staff needed so badly.

Q — It seems to me that non-classroom FA members sometimes work in positions or roles that other members aren’t even really aware of. I mean, we all know what a professor does, right? But it’s not always so evident for our non-classroom members. What’s your work like in ITS?

A — The FA members in ITS generally field information technology desktop questions. When other FA members have a tech problem, we’re the people who solve them so they can continue with their job. We each have our own separate tasks that we are responsible for, but really any questions that involve Blackboard, Zoom and MS Teams go to me, I also handle most Excel questions, etc. When I used to work in CIP, I handled all of the Blackboard administrative support issues so when I shifted from CIP to ITS I took that responsibility with me which has kept me very busy as well. I don’t mind it, though; it makes sense given the years that I was in CIP doing faculty trainings and serving on the distance education committee. I love that through my position in ITS I can continue training and helping faculty, since as you know I got started as a PA in the Ammerman TLC.

Q — And how did your workload change last year with the pandemic forcing the college to shift to remote teaching and working?

A — There was a time when it felt like a lot of technology was coming our way and we were being told “we need this technology and we need it ASAP!” But other pieces need to be in place like training, expertise on the tech support side first, etc., which does tend to slow down the process of getting things into faculty hands. That sort of happened with Respondus, which was particularly challenging because we were handing out Chromebooks to students but Respondus didn’t work with it. We know that there was a real need to proctor exams but we were afraid that students were going to suffer because of the Chromebook issue. I’m glad the ACC labs in the libraries stepped up to provide laptops for students to check out so they can take their proctored exams.

Also, we know that faculty were clamoring for Zoom for the longest time, but we couldn’t provide it until SUNY did, then we in ITS had to scramble to get all of the tech support stuff done. We were well equipped and able to do it, don’t get me wrong, but it was crazy to have to handle the larger volume of calls. It was very time consuming and stressful for a while there. But we did it!

Q — I know it’s hard at times as a technology expert when faculty and staff really want certain tech solutions but the college is not always able to provide them. What else do you wish other FA members understood about your behind-the-scenes work?

A — While we mainly work with faculty and staff and not a lot of students directly, I don’t know that people realize how much we in ITS actually worry about students. When we give support to faculty ultimately we are thinking about the students. In sharing our tech support and advice, we try to help faculty understand the need to be as flexible as possible with students. I know from a technological point of view that issues do happen, so if a student comes to you and says they couldn’t submit their quiz on time because of a technology glitch, don’t assume that the student is making it up. These things do happen.

I have to say, though, that preparing for the fall as the first fully remote semester was kind of chaotic too. There’s always a big rush in the two weeks before the start of a fall semester, but last August was an extra stressful time for us. We were happy to see how much work faculty did over the summer so they were better prepared for the fall. We could see the difference in the kinds of technology questions faculty were asking.

Q — We FA officers greatly appreciate all of the advice and assistance you’ve given to us and to our members for all of these years, not just last year. What does it mean to you to receive the first annual FA award for outstanding mentoring?

A — I am very honored to have been nominated and selected because I’m a humble person and feel like I was honestly just doing my job. Requests come in, I do my job and handle them, and colleagues are happy. But this award did make me pause and think that maybe I do have something to offer that nobody else in the college can do in the same way. I love providing help to people, finding solutions, putting in that last piece of the puzzle. That’s what gives me satisfaction in my job. So to be seen and honored for that was really special for me.

	Robin Hill is a recipient of our first annual Outstanding Mentoring Award. (photo courtesy Robin Hill)

Robin Hill

Q — Last year, when the shift to remote teaching and working was announced in early March, it must have felt like the sky was falling to our members in the Center for Innovative Pedagogy (CIP). What was that like?

A — Well, I jumped right in offering three workshops a day which was not easy to do! They weren’t perfect, but I tried to be as efficient as I could in preparing and running those. Conducting trainings via live broadcast was new for us. Fortunately, I have great coworkers in Catherine and Alexandra. We work so well together. During workshops, one of us would present and whoever was cohosting was able to field questions in the chat, so we were able to keep people engaged and address all questions. In retrospect I know there are things we could have done better, but at the time it was a challenge, and we did the best we could do within a short timeframe. We spent a lot of time demonstrating the products in workshops and fielding a lot of emails.

Q — And that level of busyness continued into the summer, with the college and the distance ed committee deciding to offer the model of provisional and permanent DE certification since we knew the usual eLearning Academy wouldn’t be able to be offered on campus. What was that like, continuing all of the CIP workshops while also managing multiple sections of the Quality by Design (QbD) trainings?

A — Our role was primarily to facilitate those QbD sessions. We responded to faculty discussion postings, graded ADA work, and reviewed and gave feedback on faculty course maps. Lots of work went into responding to faculty course maps. Also, we continued running workshops, answering emails, learning new software and dealing with issues that arose from new programs like Respondus. We created a lot of customized instruction sheets and videos. It was a lot of pressure; it was all time sensitive.

It was nice working together because, for example when testing things, one of us would log in as instructor and the other would log in as a student to document the outcomes, so we could create better tutorials. The teamwork helped too because we would work together to develop answers and move forward. For example, when I received a YouTube question that I could not answer, I would go to Alexandra, but I’d email her and copy Catherine too, so we were all working with the same information. When necessary, we reached out to Christina Johnston-Eustace to address new procedures and Blackboard-related questions and tasks.

Q — What do you wish other FA members understood about your position in CIP?

A — I wish they knew that we know not everything we put out there is perfect. The work hasn’t really stopped for us, honestly. We would benefit from some down time to review and reflect and revise, but we haven’t had that luxury. New tools keep coming at us, like Hypothesis and Ally, etc., and we need to learn how to use these tools quickly, create tutorials and build workshops for each. We are constantly having to re-prioritize our workflow. We like to know things well before teaching others but unfortunately that is not always possible and that stresses us out.

Last fall still felt like the runaway train kept racing down the tracks. We continued conducting trainings, but we were also helping to develop QbD 2 for January. It was definitely better than the spring semester because faculty were better prepared. Having real-time online and combined online formats helped once faculty got used to Collaborate and Zoom. We were still working with faculty as a follow up to the summer QbD 1 workshop series with their required course maps until the middle of the fall semester.

I also hope faculty know that we are proud of them because they’ve really extended themselves and gone above and beyond the norm to make their classes as engaging and effective as possible. We can see when we’re in their courses helping them that they are very dedicated to their students. You can tell they just want to do it right. It’s amazing to watch.

Our faculty being successful means our students are more likely to be successful. Technology is a bigger challenge for some faculty more than others. We are both patient: faculty keep returning to workshops and asking questions, and we keep helping. In the end their success leads to student success.

Q — What does it mean to you to receive the first annual FA award for outstanding mentoring?

A — I am truly honored and humbled that we were selected. I think this award shows how the FA has evolved in really good ways. There have been lots of retirements, and we have new voices being heard. Our community and environment have changed. I think it’s great, it’s progress. I’m honored to be in the first class of award winners and so happy to be a member of the FA. I see the FA going out of its way to be progressive in good ways to support the college community and the communities around us. 

	Alexandra Belanich is a recipient of our first annual Outstanding Mentoring Award. (photo courtesy Alexandra Belanich)

Alexandra Belanich

Q — Last year, when the shift to remote teaching and working was announced in early March, it must have felt like the sky was falling to our members in the Center for Innovative Pedagogy (CIP). What was that like?

A — Once the pandemic struck, our number one priority was getting as many faculty on Blackboard as we could with the little time that we had. It was very stressful, fielding so many questions with little time to really prepare. We ran so many Blackboard workshops: Blackboard Basics I and II, the grade center, discussion board, assignments, advanced tools, Collaborate, Zoom, Respondus, etc. I don’t know how but Robin did three a day, and Catherine and I did three a week over the course of a couple months. We would set it up so we would cohost, so one person handled the questions in the chat while the other was presenting and at times we’d have over 100 people in a single workshop. It was a lot because some of the faculty had never once used Blackboard.

Q — And that level of busyness continued into the summer and fall, with the college and the distance ed committee deciding to offer the model of provisional and permanent DE certification since we knew the usual eLearning Academy wouldn’t be able to be offered on campus. What was that like, continuing all of the CIP workshops while also managing multiple sections of the Quality by Design (QbD) trainings?

A — Over the summer we had to shift focus to facilitating QbD with those different sections and we were also simultaneously doing workshops during that same timeframe. It was really a lot of work. For example, Catherine took the lead with Respondus workshops, which involves video, so that was very tricky.

I put together the section in MySCCC for Suffolk Online Faculty Resources but we all contributed the content for that. I organized it. It was sort of one space where we could have a repository for faculty and just show them how to get there. It was actually useful for helping us stay organized too.

Then there was a big push toward the start of the fall semester with lots of workshops to help faculty get geared up. We added on new workshops, like on accessibility, how to make accessible Word docs, how to use Annotate, Ally and others. Then we started working on QbD 2 so it’d be ready for the January launch. Once QbD 2 started, faculty from QbD 1 were still needing our assistance because they were creating their course maps and we had to guide them through that. I was making personal tutorial videos for faculty to help them because we had some faculty take five or six revisions to get where they need to be.

Q — What do you really wish other FA members understood about your position in CIP?

A — You definitely see a range of abilities between faculty who need just a little bit of help and faculty who need an awful lot of help. It was very gratifying to see how many faculty really came a long way, from knowing not very much to becoming really fairly proficient. Sure, some faculty would call us for things that they could have looked up on their own, but we know it’s so important to stay patient with faculty who have greater needs for our assistance or who haven’t really kept up with technology changes.
I hope faculty know that it helps our stress levels when we hear from faculty that they were able to be better teachers in part from something they learned from us. That’s why we’re here: we help the faculty, and they help their students. Sometimes they even pass on student compliments to us and that is very gratifying. Overall, though, I feel like faculty have been appreciative of our efforts.

They should know that we will always do our best to help them. 

Q — What does it mean to you to receive the first annual FA award for outstanding mentoring?

A — It’s nice to be recognized for the hard work we’ve done because it has been a very unexpected period in college history. It’s nice to know the FA recognizes that our department really was pivotal in helping the college get through last spring and summer and to get up and running for the fall semester. The first few weeks of lockdown were critical because we were getting hundreds of faculty each in our workshops, then we had hundreds of faculty in the summer QbD workshops. It was a lot, but we are happy that we were able to help so many colleagues. We three really work well together and balance each other well. Catherine and Robin and Christina are incredibly hard workers.

	Catherine Wynne is a recipient of our first annual Outstanding Mentoring Award. (photo courtesy Catherine Wynne)

Catherine Wynne

Q — Last year, when the shift to remote teaching and working was announced in early March, it must have felt like the sky was falling to our members in the Center for Innovative Pedagogy (CIP). But especially for you, since you’re the one who is relatively new to that area. What was that like?

A — I remember the moment when we were told that spring recess was extended and the college was going remote. I knew it was going to be a daunting task, but I was encouraged knowing that I worked with such a talented team. At that point, I had been at CIP long enough to appreciate the depth and breadth of knowledge my colleagues had on all things ed tech related, and there was a genuine culture of kindness among them too. I knew that I was going to be okay and that the college was in good hands.

The pace of the workshop presentations last spring was dizzying. I took the lead on a few workshops later that summer, but at the time I was happy to be their wingman in the chatroom. What a time it was. Who even knew what Zoom was a year ago? Yes, we felt pressure, but we knew our faculty felt pressure too and we didn’t want to let them down.

Q — And that level of busyness continued into the summer and fall, with the college and the distance ed committee deciding to offer the model of provisional and permanent DE certification since we knew the usual eLearning Academy wouldn’t be able to be offered on campus. What was that like, continuing all of the CIP workshops while also managing multiple sections of the Quality by Design (QbD) trainings?

A — That’s right! Between summer workshops and facilitating QbD sessions, we were kept busy. As I’m sure you’ve heard from Robin and Alexandra, the three of us really put in amazing hours; we wanted everything to be user friendly. Respondus, Ally, Collaborate and Zoom were all new software acquisitions. Time was in short supply, but we did the best we could.

Q — What do you wish other FA members understood about your position in CIP?

A — You know, I think our faculty really "got it." They knew we were facing a challenge. And they knew that we really care. Likewise, I hope they knew that we were rooting for each and every one of them because we know that they really care.

Q — What does it mean to you to receive the first annual FA award for outstanding mentoring?

A — To be recognized by your peers—I don’t think there is any higher honor. And to share it in the company of these six outstanding colleagues truly humbles me. SCCC is a special place. People choose to work here. They believe in its mission. It fosters and inspires student success. It did, for me, many years ago when I was a student here, and it remains a source of inspiration to me every day I work here.

I have many reasons to be thankful to the FA, so thank you for this award and thank you for all that you do for us.

Nomination for Christina Johnston-Eustace, Robin Hill, Alexandra Belanich and Catherine Wynne, Outstanding Mentoring

When the college first announced a shift to remote teaching in March, I was in touch immediately with Camille Karlson in CIP about support for our faculty, and there was some very loosely coordinated efforts across the campuses to help as many faculty as possible in as little time as possible, e.g., through the campus TLCs. It was an all hands on deck situation, and it put a sudden and unexpected burden on Christina, Alexandra, Robin and Catherine, given their regular and ongoing roles in teaching faculty how to use Blackboard and how to design and develop their courses through the eLearning Academy (Alexandra, Catherine, and Robin) as well as providing the critical technological support that faculty require to make their teaching possible (Christina). (As you may know, Christina used to be in CIP as a Bb trainer/support person and served on the distance education committee for years until recently her reporting line changed, but she is the backbone of Blackboard at the college.)

By the summer, however, these women had worked with Camille as well as with the distance ed committee to develop a series of robust and extensive professional development opportunities for faculty throughout the summer so that faculty could be as prepared as possible for our first fully remote semester in the fall. I don't think it's overly hyperbolic to say that this was life changing for some faculty. I personally spent my two-week spring break in March sitting with faculty in the Orient Building every day, 9 to 3, teaching them the very basics of Blackboard. These are faculty who struggle to attach a file to their email; their technological proficiency is definitely beginner level.

After receiving support from Christina, Alexandra, Catherine and Robin, however, they managed to get the basics down in a way that enabled them to actually be prepared for the fall term. Again, some of these were faculty who had never once logged in to Blackboard. The growth of their knowledge set was remarkable, and it would not have happened without the group and one-on-one mentoring and support that they received from these four nominees.

The summer virtual trainings were a big part of this. These are the people who designed, created, developed and delivered workshops like Bb Tools Basics Part I, Bb Tools Basics Part II, Bb Grade Center, Bb Exams, Respondus, Bb Collaborate Ultra... and any number of individualized lessons that they had to come up with on the fly as faculty were reaching out to them constantly.

At the same time as these women were managing these virtual trainings, they were also tasked with moderating the two Open SUNY Quality by Design (QbD) sessions that contained nearly 400 faculty throughout the course of the summer, full time and adjunct, and all coming from a wide variety of skills, abilities and technological proficiencies. Anyone who's played any kind of tech support role (even informally with family and friends) knows that this can be very trying at times, but they took their mentoring roles seriously and handled it with grace under enormous pressure.

Suffice it to say that this was not their normal summer work routine. At the same time as the virtual trainings, QbD moderation and untold numbers of emails and phone calls were flooding in, there was all the other work that needed to be done, such as Christina setting up additional technologies needed by faculty, such as Hypothesis, or responding to the numerous issues that regularly fill the Suffolk Help area for Blackboard. I can personally attest to how deeply Christina has mentored me over the years on a variety of Blackboard and technology topics. Whenever I have any technological question, Christina is my first contact. I know who will have the answers I need, and I go straight to the expert.

I've learned a great deal under Christina's mentorship during my tenure at the college. I've long been the FA officer who fields members' distance ed questions, and Christina has mentored me through issues such as the technology that enables chair and peer observations, bumping (how to remove faculty names), running course reports, setting up Blackboard community spaces, etc. Nearly all of this is work she and I have connected on this summer too—despite all of the extra, unexpected work dumped on Christina's shoulders. She's so modest and unassuming and so content to work behind the scenes, I don't think many faculty at SCCC even realize what this hidden genius actually does for us.

At the same time they were managing virtual trainings, moderating the QbD courses and fielding all manner of other inquiries, they also collaborated on and developed the Suffolk Online Faculty Resources area of MySCCC. This area did not exist prior to the summer. The work that went into this section of the portal is outstanding. There are tutorials on Blackboard, Zoom, Respondus, accessibility; recordings of previous training sessions; and a list of upcoming workshops and training sessions. In addition, I know that these nominees are simultaneously hard at work at developing the QbD 2 program that will be offered in January and late next spring.

When we think of mentoring situations, most people picture traditional one-on-one types of mentoring, typically with a more senior faculty member offering information, guidance or just a willing ear for a junior faculty member. But mentoring takes place in groups too, and I don't know that any other group of FA members has had a greater, more pivotal impact on their fellow FA members than these four nominees have done since last spring and summer.

Finally, lest anyone think "well, this is their job; this is what they are paid to do," I can assure you that I know the work that these four women regularly do given their job titles and scope of work. The pandemic asked everyone at the college to go above and beyond, but all four of these nominees—Christina, Robin, Alexandra and Catherine—went into the stratosphere. They were tireless this summer, they have had and continue to have a profound impact on hundreds of colleagues and they deserve to be recognized for their outstanding leadership in helping faculty gain greater proficiency in Blackboard and putting professional development structures in place to continue encouraging that growth.