Happy Birthday, Jackie!
Everyone, Juan has placed in your mailbox a memo about grammar exit exams and another one about registration for continuing noncredit students, the latter with in-class registration schedules and other details.
Believe it or not, we are getting ready to plan course schedules for the fall 2010 semester. Please tell me in writing whether you are available to teach next fall ASAP. Thanks.
It's now time to talk up our new student recruitment in your class because our current students are our best word-of-mouth. Please encourage every one of your students to help recruit new students from among their friends and relatives.
All level 3 teachers, your students passing to ESL 34 will need to register online. If any student needs help with the registration procedure, please have them schedule an appointment with our ESL Student Specialist Marcela Gomez by calling the ESL Office at (760)744-1150 ext. 2272 or ext. 3264. They can also call Marcela direct at (760)744-1150 ext. 3947. In fact, any students who are not taking a credit class this semester but will take one next semester MUST reapply online to be credit students. Here are additional guidelines:
If you teach a credit class, please note that your continuing credit students may have already received a pink note card from the college telling them their online registration start time for spring. If they are anxious to register for next semester, you can tell them to go ahead and register for the next level up but warn them that if they don't get a passing grade from your class for this semester, they will need to drop their next-level-up class and add their current-level class in order to repeat it.
All current credit students can check their eServices account to find when their online registration start time is.
Teachers in the night program: Please announce that we will open a new computer class that meets in the library's lab Monday through Thursday from 6 to 6:50 next semester. This will be a noncredit, tuition-free class, but the space is limited to 30 students. Another consideration is the language requirement, so the class is not suitable for level 1 students unfortunately. Interested students can register for this class during their non-credit in-class registration or in A-17 starting 12/7. I believe this is good news for our night students whose computer access has been reduced due to the budget cuts.
If you have students in need of pronunciation help, please recommend that they consider taking one of these pronunciation classes in spring.
Our tentative teaching schedule for spring 10 is here for your information. There have been a couple room updates.
Carol wanted to pass on this information about an essay contest that Oxford Publishing is having. She thinks it would be great if we encouraged students to write and submit essays - $500 would probably come in handy for most of them.
At Friday's meeting, the Dept. approved a new sub policy and a new auditing policy. Please look for these new policies on our dept. web site, where they will be posted soon.
Each year, Educational Testing Service (ETS) hires qualified individuals to evaluate the essay portion of the Cal States' EAP English test. The scoring sessions are held in April and approved raters can earn $20.00 per hour. If you're interested in learning more about EAP and becoming involved in the testing process, participating in the evaluation of the EAP English essays can help to provide additional insights into the development and administration of the EAP English test. An ETS recruitment flier can be downloaded here. Interested individuals are encouraged to apply as soon as possible.
I've just posted a YouTube video that is an edited recording of a learning communities workshop given by a known LC guru on "fod," our dept.'s weblog. You can access the blog via the "Staff Only" section of our dept. web site at www.palomar.edu/esl/.
Because the latest on program activities, schedules, news, etc. are posted here, I hope you would feel that this "Message Center" is a part of your daily world and will want to bookmark this page and check it every day.
Thank you! Enjoy your your weekend!
Mark your calendar!