Eportfolios as Opportunities for Professional Development - Lauri dietz

I think e-Portfolios are a particularly powerful tool for professional development because they give students an opportunity to document all the different types of experiences and skills that they're developing and not only are they documenting it in really detailed ways so that they can really look back and say, "Wow, I didn't realize I had accomplished so much in that position," but then they also are put in the position to reflect on those experiences and it's through reflection that research tells us that we gain the most insights into why something matters and how it's really transferring and connecting to other parts of our lives. So that combination of documentation of experiences plus reflection I think positions students really well so that when they are looking ahead to graduate school or to jobs that they can really articulate in specific ways what they accomplished in their student employment positions, and how those experiences will transfer to their... their new goals. At the University Center for Writing-based Learning (UCWbL) all... peer writing tutors ar required to maintain a professional development e-Portfolios through Digication. We use those uh... e-Portfolios as a way to both gauge people's progress so that we can get them feedback as tutors, and it really helps us with our mentoring process. When we need to make rehiring decisions we refer to those portfolios, and then when people graduate we use us portfolios as a way to maintain ongoing mentorship and write letters of recommendation for people. The people who work at the University Center for Writing-based Learning begin their experience by taking it required training class and in that class we really spend a lot of time to make sure people trained on both the technical side of Digication as well as the rhetorical side in terms of the decision making that comes with designing an e-Portfolio. So during the ten weeks of the training course they're getting a lot of experience and a lot of feedback on developing and designing their own e-Portfolios. We also make sure that we give them feedback throughout the year, not just in the class as they're developing their portfolios so that they're getting their questions answered that they're really clear about the decisions they're making and what they should be prioritizing and focusing on. All of this works together because the writing center is the heart of support for Digication and e-Portfolios on campus. Any student should feel confident that if they make an appointment at the writing center, that tutor will be able to help them with both their rhetorical choices as well as some of the technical aspects of Digication.