"given enough eyes, all bugs are shallow" -Linus' Law
Dying by Alex Grey
General Announcements
Undergraduate Research Symposium
Students welcome to meet with the client about evaluating proposals
Today, March 22nd 4:00 PM Bay 220
letter from LLS to professors of each SPB course:
Hello everyone,
The LLS Committee would like to meet with you on Monday, March 22nd at 4:00 pm in BAY 220. We expect to have some of the non-profit proposals for you at that time, although last minute proposals may not be ready until Tuesday morning.
We will have evaluation tools to share with you and your students to help your Boards in the grant evaluation process. These include evaluation templates made up for each of your classes based on the evaluation criteria stated in your NOFOs, as well as samples of evaluation rubrics developed by other classes.
If you want to bring a couple of students from your boards, please do so.
I need a secondary investigator
from Dr. Conner (3/19):
Here is more information that you can help me broadcast over the wiki:
On Monday I will be able to upload a few forms:
-1 example of a summary sheet and cover letter (with a ranking of all
proposals + narrative/rationale, and a table that puts # of scorers on
one axis and the proposals we reviewed on another axis).
-1 evaluation form (which I will upload once the committee finishes
the design) from each Board member
On April 7th we will finalize our decision, so that by noon on April
8th (Thursday) we can provide our results with the LLS client in time
for them to meet and carefully examine all 9 winners to make sure the
proposals are in compliance with all LSA strictures. On April 8th we
will provide our versions of these documents for the client!
Then, the following week, we will finalize our award letter/decline letters.
It's a writing party, from here on out!
Dr. Conner
earlier email from 3/19 from Dr. Conner:
Here is the tally of applications as of this morning:
11 total (for all 9 NOFOS).
2 have none.
4 have two--and we are one of them!
So, having 2 to review, at least we have a choice :)
I expect that we will see the bulk of the applications come in right
around the deadline at noon on Monday.
Advocates, time to get out there and write some proposals!
:)
email from yesterday (3/18) from Dr. Conner:
Hello Heather,
The LLS committee is meeting tomorrow morning. Charlie Justice is the
committee member in charge of fielding the proposals, and he hinted in
an email today that proposals are indeed coming in. The deadline is
Monday, so we are sure to see more. After tomorrow's meeting, I expect
to know how many have arrived thus far, overall, and in response to
SPB#9. I will post in the Board space or any other space on the wiki
that you would recommend. I can't wait to share the feedback Dr.
Gresham and I garnered at the conference, where we narrated the LSA
grant and SPBs from a programmatic perspective. Our mantra was
"documentation!" and I will share and elaborate on this refrain
Wednesday at the appropriate time. Our colleagues were very impressed
with our current activities, and gave a lot of great feedback.
Time to get our specific NOFO language into our evaluation scoring
sheet and set the protocols for evaluation! Crucially, this
documentation will go directly to Learn, Serve, America, so we must be
as precise as possible in our rubric. Time to start outlining and
mapping the contours of our final report (.pdf and hypertext
versions), which will harbor many varieties of documentation,
including documentation of the advocacy work. Interesting rhetorical
choices and lots of document design on the immediate horizon! In the
spirit of transparency and infinite/infinitessimal documentation,
Please post our transmissions to the wiki :)
looking forward to it all,
Dr. Conner
Help!
I am experiencing editing problems on my page it keeps telling me when I am editing I have "line overflow at line 0" HUH? Is anyone else experiencing this? - Jason
----
Hi, Dr. Conner! I had a question about the ethnography assignment -- I read through the guidelines on the course page (
http://enc42606421spring10.pbworks.com/18-January), but I'm still a little worried. I was thinking of emailing and/or calling the local Salvation Army, but I just wasn't sure how to talk to them. I wasn't in the class last semester and don't know quite what we're offering to possibly do for them, and I feel like I might falsely raise their hopes if I ask what they need and maybe can't provide it. Is this assignment formally due on Wednesday, or will there be time Wednesday to learn more about how to do it? I think it would help for me to learn how some of the more experienced members are going about their interviews. Thank you very much,
Heather Smith
Adv. Tech. Writing, Wed. 6-8:50
----------------------------
Heather,
Good questions, good anticipations. The first prompt is designed to
turn us into ethnographers as a way to tap OUR resources, and to
prepare us, as a class, for discussions that will set the parameters
of our rfp (NOFO). All you are doing is browsing for meaningful
nonprofit activity by asking a local nonprofit about their mission
what they do for the community. If you want to use the LLS grant as
exigence for your inquiry, you simply provide a brief explanation of
the pedagogical purpose of the philanthropy boards, and include a
thoughtful caveat, making it clear that you are a member of a
consensus-building process, and a community, and therefore have no
authority to make promises. Please start posting your work (thoughts,
notes, ideas, sources, stories, observations, interviews, connections
to the readings and other ethnographies in process, etc) now, and scan
the process work posted by your peers--if we do this, we will be able
to prepare adequately for Wednesday. We will check in on Wednesday to
discuss our research and talk about how to proceed.
Unhinge now from the idea that the 2009 class has more experience than
you do. You have their report. And, more importantly, you have your
own ideas and leading principles about the world--this assignment is a
chance to bring those into a dynamic with your coursework. Now is the
time to do so! Soon, we will be comparing our experiences (including
but not limited to the pilot board, our individual ethnographies and
what we learn/decide from/though them) in an effort to narrow our
focus so as to design our own rfp.
Heather, would you mind posting our conversation to the wiki, on the
Jan18 page? Others may (and probably should!) have similar questions,
or may want to participate in the conversation. Thank you!
___________
04 March 2010 - Question from April
Would a conflict of interest exist if advocates were involved in application review?
I am concerned that our evaluation process will not stand up to outside scrutiny if advocates are able to decide yay or nay on applications. This is a real grant with real money and we need to be as transparent and scrupulous as possible. What is everyone's opinion on the matter?
------
Good point -- maybe those who were in the class last semester could tell us if the advocates helped review the applications or not. -- Heather 3/3
I agree, that is a good point. I think Kimmi said the other day that they didn't have advocates last semester. It would be fine with me, as an advocate, if we didn't participate in the grading of applications. We should still have access to them and be able to try to persuade the voters. -Travis 3/5
That is correct; we didn't use any advocates in Dr. Gresham's board last semester. However, there was still a case of conflict of interest, due to one board member having a family connection to one of the applications. As such, because of that conflict, the member abstained from voting. The advocates having access to the applications does sound reasonable, and the advocates attempting to sway the board to their ideas also sounds reasonable. In fact, isn't acting in the interest of their chosen organization part of the advocate's duties anyway? -Kimmi 3/8
Yeah; I just had a though, though; even if everyone is grading the proposals, the votes of the advocates and documenters don't count, right? The board will get the final vote. So both documenters and advocates just have to advocate their points. Or does every vote count (i.e. we must have a 2/3 majority in the class, not just the board)? -- Heather 3/8
I believe only the board votes and I agree that advocates should have full access and should sway aggressively. - April 3/17
Yes, and one manner of aggressive sway would be to go into service learning mode, stanford style, and go out and help a nonprofit write a proposal. -ShareRiff 3/17
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