Welcome to your e-Portfolio

What is the purpose of this e-Portfolio?

When we think of a portfolio we generally think of a large album developed by artists, models, actors, architects and similar professionals to show their work. They use portfolios to collect and show samples of the variety and quality of their projects or accomplishments. It is a collection of what they have done and how well they have done it. Portfolios are a collection of work samples.

This portfolio, however, is a collection of learning samples. We are interested in what you have learned from what you have done - not merely the fact that you have done or accomplished something. In the teaching profession what we are about in Sudent Life programs is called "experiential education." This type of learning from active involvement in meaningful projects results in a new way of understanding an issue or requires you to development new skills because you see the need for the growth to complete the task effectively. This type of experiential learning asks you to develop your understandings and definitions rather than memorizing them from a book. It can also ask you to compare your experience with others.  

The "work samples" in this portfolio should point to your learning not your activities. The activities are the means to or the process for the learning. The verifiers if the activity (brochures, speech drafts, proposals, fllyers for events) are "learning artifacts" that provide proof that you did an activity. The learning, however, comes from some type of reflection on the experience and the learning that occurred rather than simply listing activities and positions as you might do in a resume.

An example of how this e-Portfolio is to work comes from leadership literature. It is stated many times that "leadership is action not position." So, being president of a student organization is a position and in this e-portfolio it is a work sample, an artifact, a verification of an experience. It is not the learning.  It is the way you learn.  The position is your "textbook." 

What you do with that position, what you come to understand by being in that position and working to address the goals and responsibilities of the position is what you have learned or begun to learn.   Reflection on your choices as president should develop new personal understandings and point to the need for new skills. Developing these understandings and skills, and having them verified, is the type of learning outcomes we are looking for in your e-Portfolio.

How Does It Work

There are three components to the e-Portfolio.

*You need a place to keep your ""artifacts" and reflections.

*You need to be able to easily share these documents with others.

*Finally, you need to have your learning affirmed so you can include it, as appropriate, in resumes, applications and interviews.

All portfolio participants are asked to open a free account at www.inbox.com/register/email.aspx. This application provides you with an email address, an email account and 5 gigs of storage space. Using this application you can share your work with your advisor, get feedback from colleagues and have a place for storing letters of recommendation from campus and community members. Using one application will assist the college with its spam firewall and easily allow emails from this service access to college email boxes.  Please use your name for the inbox account since a professional account is important for the agencies and college offices to see as the email address.

For an example of Inbox, its use and a student e-portfolio follow this link.  https://www.inbox.com/login.aspx

User ID is     tpsseportfolio                        The password is student

Once you have developed your portfolio and verified your learning - your advisor will forward your e-Portfolio to the Director of Student Life for review. At the completion of that review a letter will be drafted, in consultation with you, for signature by the Vice-Pesident, Provost of the Takoma Park / Silver Spring campus for your use.

Resources

Some ideas for learning outcomes of your participation in Student Life Programs ----- learning outcomes link

This document should be loaded to your inbox account for use with your counselor ---  academic plan.doc 

(Save to your desktop and upload to Inbox)

This is an interesting approach to help you get started.  It was developed as part of the work of the Carnegie Foundation. They are questions to get you thinking about how you can direct your own learning in Student Life Programs.  This is different than going to class and taking notes.  This is you learning to direct and verifiy your learning.  One approach would be to have a word document in your develop folder headed by each question.  Write your reflections when you begin and update each as new information, understandings or questions arise.  These can by synthesized into your learning outcomes.  Try these:

e-Doc 1 - What is the focus of your investigation?  What are you trying to understand differently?  (For my work I want to develop a clear outcomes approach for students to use to capture their learning) 

e-Doc 2 - What are your expectations?  What do you already know?

e-Doc 3 - What is/was your approach and/or what evidence have you gathered?

e-Doc 4 - What references/resources have you found helpful?

e-Doc 5 - What results have emerged?  What have you discovered or are thinking about differently?

e-Doc 6 - Post samples of your work (Learning Articacts) - This is the place to put copies of meeting minutes, brochures, pictures, videos that are the process of/or the result of your work.