Professional Competencies

Caitlin Enz

My Professional Landscape and Goals

Higher Education

My long-term aspiration is to lead a learning design team within continuing education. My short-term goal is to move into a position that is more design focused on my current team.  

The skills have I built in this master's degree program stack nicely upon my experiences as an administrator and my knowledge of how a noncredit program within a university works. This combination will allow me to design in a holistic fashion, with an understanding of how what I am creating fits into the larger program and school. 

I have decided to specialize in adult, noncredit education because I enjoy the challenge of creating immediately useful content delivered under time constraints.  This field is very fast paced and provides the opportunity to work with a constantly changing cast of organizations, subject matter experts (SMEs), faculty and learners. I know that as a designer in this field I will be pushed to learn about new topics, use new technologies and identify new design, learning and teaching opportunities. This environment fits in nicely with what the Gallup Strengths Finder found my top strength to be- Learner. My ability to present myself as a learner  in the SME's domain and an expert in learning design allows SMEs to feel comfortable sharing their knowledge and letting me handle the process of shaping it into a learning experience.

I have worked almost entirely with online learning programs. And yet, none of these programs are particularly sophisticated in terms of learner engagement or use of technology. I see the field of adult education growing in the use of technology as a collaboration tool. Adults are frequently interacting with colleagues in another building, across the state or across the world, and yet online classes are still rather static places. My willingness to learn and try out new classroom technologies, my ability to listen to others and incorporate their ideas, and my experience in adult education all place me in a position where I can help make online classrooms more fun, effective and engaging.

Beer Education

My long-term goal is to run a beer education company and my short-term goal is to teach a workshop at a local brewery. Within this program I have built the design skills needed to teach across modes. I could comfortably lead a beer tasting online or in-person and develop asynchronous support materials for learners. My experience working with SMEs and on teams will enable me to create workshops that meet learner and brewery needs. For example, creating a workshop that brings in a more diverse group of beer drinkers, that gets learners excited about whatever new style of beer is on tap, or that builds their tasting skills so that they are able to communicate what they do or do not like about a specific beer. I live in a small city with over 40 breweries and yet there are almost no opportunities to learn about this amazing beverage. I think that beer education will play an important part in expanding the beer industry in Maine.

Inventory Rating Sheet

Evidence and Explanations

Below are each of the competencies in which I scored myself a seven or higher. For each of these competencies I have provided an example of my work and: 

• Why the work exemplifies the competency

• Why it merits the given rating  

The course in which a document was created is sometimes included in brackets. 

A Communicator

Proficient as a writer and as a presenter

All of the documents that I link to in this reflection can serve as examples of my proficiency as a writer. In almost every course I needed to create a course design artifact and then reflect on it within a written paper. This helped me develop course design as well as report writing skills. I created the first version of American India Pale Ales (AIPAs) vs New England India Pale Ales (NEIPAs) in the course Foundations of Learning Design. I shared the course site and supporting materials with my classmates through a course site video tour. I carefully scripted the tour before I recorded it, as a means to ensure that I covered the most important aspects, was succinct in my presentation and that I met all of the assignment requirements. After watching the video, an instructor would easily be able to open up the course site and prepare for welcoming learners into it.

Capacity to work within groups to listen well, speak well, and co-author

In the Blueprinting course my final project was to work with a classmate, Adrian, and a Subject Matter Expert (SME) to create a blueprint for a graduate level course on learning design. Adrian and I were given some basic course materials, including a module description, learning outcomes and a script that had been written as the instructor perspective. To create the module we needed to research our topic of multimedia principles and then interview the SME to fill in knowledge gaps and see how they would approach the topic area. Adrian and I worked together to create a blueprint that could be handed off to a course builder, who would be able to take what we had written and create the course in a Learning Management System, and to the SME, who would be able to read our script and record the updated instructor perspective for the course.  To work effectively together Adrian and I created a project schedule and split up the work. We regularly checked in with the SME to make sure we were creating a useful and effective product. We were able to meet our deadlines and create a high quality blueprint because we clearly communicated with each other, offered feedback and proofread our teammate's work.

Able to collaborate and communicate in a range of modalities (face-to-face and online)

Throughout this program I collaborated with classmates and professors online, the best example of something created through this process is the previously shared blueprint (Blueprinting). I created courses that were designed to be synchronous, asynchronous and a mix of in-person and asynchronous. To design in all of these modes I needed to be able to communicate with learners in different ways. In the asynchronous course Ales 101 (Technology Medium for Learning), I knew I would not be able to see learners and gauge their understanding through visual clues. To interact with them, communicate new ideas and practice skills I created a how-to tasting video, created online knowledge checks and had them submit video assignments. I also collected data on how they were using the site in order to see if aspects of the course site needed to be adjusted because they were too difficult to use, were not serving the purpose they were designed to serve or were not helping learners meet learning outcomes. The course American India Pale Ales (AIPAs) vs New England India Pale Ales (NEIPAs) (Advanced Practice of Learning Experience Design) was designed as an in-person course with additional online materials and an after class assignment that needs to be submitted asynchronously.  Most of the learning in this course takes place in person, so the course site plays a support role.

A Creative Problem Solver

Develops and implements plans for addressing problems and effecting change

My Experiential Learning Plan: Involving Managers in Customized Programs (Leading Experiential Teaching and Learning) incorporates managers into the learning of their employees. Including the manager in the experience and providing them with tools to better support the employee aides in the transfer of new skills and knowledge from the classroom to the workplace. Within the plan I addressed the problem of skills not being transferred and provided the background information, stakeholder identification, measurable goals, timeline and needed resources to bring about change within the customized programs and to meet the program goals. Part of this project involved collecting feedback from my colleagues and reflecting on their suggestions. I'm confident that if I were to update the plan to include their suggested changes that I would be able to address the problem and effect change within the customized programs.

Is resilient in less-than-optimal circumstances

Last semester I was taking two courses and I also got COVID. I was able to meet all course deadlines and complete a group project because of resilience and planning. The Project Plan that I created with Adrian in the Blueprinting course is an example of how identifying deadlines at the beginning of a course and building in a time cushion allowed me to take some time to rest and not let my teammate down. There was a period of time where I was not able to meet synchronously, but this was okay because we both used the Collaboration Plan within our Project Plan to communicate with each other. When one of us started a section we marked it as "in progress." When a document was ready for review we tagged the other person in a comment. When the document was finalized we marked the status column as "completed" and changed the color to blue. This made it possible for us to finish our project despite my being sick and Adrian moving across the country. 

Culturally Responsive

Interest in, and capacity to perceive, multiple perspectives

In the course Introduction to Social Justice in Educational Settings I identified the lack of equality between genders within the beer industry and researched the issue in order to learn more. Through my research I explored the societal systems that have made drinking gendered and made breweries, beer festivals and bars spaces that are not welcoming to female drinkers. Looking at the issue through a societal lens, from the viewpoint of male and female identifying drinkers and male and female identifying professionals in the field, I was able to design the workshop Gender Equity and Beer. This workshop is designed for professionals in the beer industry and the learning outcomes are to: 

• Describe how gendered expectations negatively affect customers, breweries and brewery personnel

• Write a team values statement

• Develop three to four goals for making breweries/bars/festivals places of social justice that welcome all genders 

I was able to create this workshop by perceiving multiple perspectives and the workshop in turn helps professionals view the industry from multiple perspectives. 

Gender Equity and Beer: 

• Written Introduction 

• Video Overview of Plan

• Action Plan

Concentration Competencies

Create active, engaging, and accessible learning environments through images, words, videos, and animations 

Early in my program I created an infographic on tips for incorporating accessibility in learning (Education as an Advanced Field of Study). Many of these tips were new for me, such as the importance of writing descriptive link text, and I made a conscious effort to incorporate them in all of my following projects. 

In Technology as  a Medium for Learning I created my first entirely asynchronous course, Ales 101. 

A few ways that I made it engaging were by: 

• Using colorful and on-brand graphics

• Creating repeating sections that highlighted important information, were practice activities or were optional resources for a deeper dive

• Using different types of media such as videos and readings

• Having learners complete practice activities (written and video) to reinforce learning

• Providing different types of quizzes, such as multiple choice and re-arranging images so they are in the correct order

When it comes to beer education, part of the fun is connecting with other beer lovers. I think in future asynchronous courses I could do a better job of creating activities that allow learners to interact with each other and the wider beer community. Including optional activities on social media might be one way to do this.

Examples of engagement in the asynchronous course Ales 101:

Translate content requirements from stakeholders (e.g., SMEs) into effective learning designs

In Managing Collaborative Learning Design I wrote a plan for identifying, working with and evaluating SMEs within the Life Sciences Partner Programs, one of our newer programs.  This course provided the foundational skills for working with SMEs, but I did not work with an SME until Blueprinting. In the Blueprinting course my classmate Adrian and I were assigned a module that the SME had created a rough draft of. We were also given the requirements around mode, audience, length, and the course design elements that we needed to create.  We broke the blueprint down into sections and came up with a project plan and a rough idea of the direction we wanted to take the course before we met with the SME for the first time. We arrived at the first SME meeting with a list of questions for him, as well as a list of possible resources we would like to use while building the course. The SME answered our questions and offered feedback on what we had planned so far. The SME agreed with our ideas on how to start building the course and so we started creating our first deliverables. As we created deliverables, for example the module description and learning outcomes, we sent them to the SME for feedback. Incorporating SME feedback throughout the blueprint build ensured that we met content requirements from the SME and that we were building a module that fit nicely with the ones our classmates were designing to proceed and follow our module. 

Apply appropriate technologies effectively to support face-to-face, online/mobile, and blended learning environments 

An example of how I applied appropriate technologies depending on the course mode is shown through how I scaffolded learning in an asynchronous course and an in-person course with one asynchronous activity. 

Scaffolding in the asynchronous Ales 101 course (this course is in Argos and so harder to share, see the above images for examples): 

• Introduce a topic through a video or reading and provide guiding questions

• Practice activity 

• Quick quiz to test understanding, with feedback (multiple choice, matching, putting items in order)

• "Graded" activity (activity that needs to be submitted)

• Summary of what was learned

• Optional resources for a deeper dive into the topic area

Scaffolding in the in-person course, AIPAs vs NEIPAs (see the section "What the session will include" in the AIPAs vs NEIPAs final plan): 

• Present content on how to use a tasting mat

• Demonstrate tasting techniques using a tasting mat

• Practice as a group

• Pair practice

• Debrief and feedback

• Blind tasting in pairs

• Reflection

• Asynchronous beer recommendation for a given persona

Both courses cover beer related topics and yet the manner in which scaffolding is provided to learners is quite different, because of the different course modes. 

Demonstrate expertise in recognizing and including the perspectives of participants and/or stakeholders in the design process (e.g., subject matter experts, educators, learning scientists, media designers, and technologists), in order to forge respectful and constructive working relationships

In Leading Experiential Teaching and Learning I designed an experiential learning plan for including managers in learning experiences. I created this plan with a design thinking approach. This required that I engage a range of stakeholders from the very beginning.  In fact, one the first artifacts I created was a document outlining how I would gather stakeholder perspectives. The purpose of including stakeholders from an early stage is to ensure that the program change meets their needs.  Creating frequent opportunities for them to share feedback throughout the process  allows for changes to be made in real time. On this project I also worked closely with my classmates, who acted as subject matter experts and gave feedback on my artifact. I collected this feedback and added it as notes into my stakeholder perspectives document. This feedback informed the first draft of my experiential learning plan. Once my plan was drafted I again collected feedback from my classmates, and also shared the learning plan with some of my colleagues. I took their feedback, summarized it and included it in the feedback and reflection portions of my experiential learning plan. This was the only course where I was required to get feedback from colleagues, and it was invigorating! Hearing their ideas and incorporating their viewpoints was challenging and time consuming, but their feedback was thoughtful and constructive and I know that incorporating it will make my plan much stronger. My direct team at work is very small and I often find myself working in a bubble. This exercise was a reminder that I need to make an effort to reach out to colleagues outside of that bubble, as their work is related to mine and they have valuable ideas to share.

Additional Competencies from Your Own Research

Develop design assets with online technologies (eLearnings, self-guided job aids, manager guides, and live, virtual training sessions, facilitator guides, participant workbooks, podcasts, animated videos)

The course AIPAs vs NEIPAs is an in-person course for which I created several design assets with online technologies. The materials that I created are: 

• Course site with downloadable materials, details on in-class activities and where the after class assignment is submitted.

• Lead Beer Appreciator Guide: breaks down tasks that need to be completed before the workshop.  It starts four months out and goes until 10 minutes before class starts. 

• Materials Guide: provides details and links to the materials needed to run the online and in-person portions of the Hops & Brains workshop, AIPAs vs NEIPAs. Includes participant worksheets.

• Design Plan:  introduces the workshop, situates it within a performance, learning and cultural context, as well as outlines the instructional treatment, implementation and evaluation plans. The lesson plan is in the appendix of this document.

These guides and plans make it very simple for someone with background beer knowledge to prepare for and teach a course on AIPAs vs NEIPAs in a way that is engaging, fun and cohesive with the Hops & Brains brand.

Conclusion

For this project I rated my competencies before I reviewed the ratings I gave myself at the beginning of the program. I did not want previous answers to change how I view my competencies now. The progress that I have made was clear when I compared the two sets of professional competency model ratings.  

I did not make as much progress in the competencies that I pulled from job advertisements (see Additional Competencies on the Competency Inventory). The competencies include "provide graphical art/media direction through storyboarding" and "create inclusive educational experiences with emerging technologies." I was not able to take a class on storyboarding and so that is something that I will pursue independently. While I did practice creating inclusive educational experiences, I do not think that I have done a thorough enough job of relating this skill to emerging technologies. That is something that I will continue to improve in this capstone course. 

The majority of the courses that I design and launch have always been online and are created on very tight timelines. This led to my lack of confidence at the beginning of my degree in using appropriate technologies for different learning environments. In this program I had opportunities to try out new tools and to form opinions on when they should be used within my courses. I also gained experience designing in different modalities and now feel comfortable working across them. 

Revisiting projects from the beginning of my program was inspiring. There were a few projects, like the infographic on accessibility, that I had forgotten about, despite the fact that the knowledge I gained while creating it has informed much of my recent work.  While revisiting I also took notes on aspects of each deliverable that I would like to pull into  my capstone project and into my daily work. I realized that even though some of the courses seemed less useful than others, that there is something that I can take from each of them to build upon and mold so that it fits into my current needs. 

At work I am finally working on a team instead of by myself and when I have a new project I frequently go back to my portfolio to get some ideas on how I might approach it. I then mock up my idea and run it by the rest of the team for feedback. In this manner I have already incorporated many templates, ideas and skills that I built during this degree program. I expect that this trend will continue!