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4th National PASS Forum
The 4th National PASS Forum took place across Monday, 29th and Tuesday, 30th September, 2008 at the University of Sydney with international guest speakers Dr. Deanna Martin and Dr. Robert Blanc. Other presenters included Jane Skalicky (University of Tasmania), Sanchia Draper (University of Melbourne) and the recipients of the inaugural Outstanding PASS Leader awards. An opening address was given by Professor Derrick Armstrong (University of Sydney), Acting Deputy Provost (Learning & Teaching) and Pro-Vice-Chancellor. The event was co-hosted by the University of Sydney and the PASS National Centre at the University of Wollongong.
The 4th National PASS Forum provided an excellent opportunity for both new and continuing PASS / SI supervisors as well as people interested in the program, to network and learn from other PASS practitioners. The Forum aimed to develop awareness of national and international developments in peer learning programs.
The National PASS Forum also, for the first time, held professional development activities for PASS Leaders. Leaders/Facilitators were given the opportunity to participate in workshops, discussion forums and attend presentations by their peers. These activities represented a terrific opportunity to both network with leaders from other institutions and further develop skills as Peer Leaders.
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For details and information on Staff / Supervisor Sessions please click here.
For details and information on Peer Leader / Facilitator Workshops please click here.
Guest Speakers
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Dr Deanna C. Martin is the founding director of the Center for Academic Development at the University of Missouri – Kansas City and the developer of Supplemental Instruction (SI, also known in Australia as PASS and PALS). A world authority on SI, Dr Martin remains active in her international roles as author, speaker and consultant. She continues to work closely with the Center’s current director and staff of the International Supplemental Instruction Program. Voted UMKC Alumni of the Year with husband Dr Robert Blanc in 2001, Dr Martin’s work on SI spans from its inception in the early 1970s to the present day. |
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Dr Robert Blanc currently serves as Vice Chair of the Academic Board overseeing the curriculum of St. George's University which includes, in addition to a School of Arts and Sciences, professional schools in business, medicine, veterinary medicine, nursing, and public health. He retired an Associate Professor of the School of Medicine, University of Missouri - Kansas City where Dr. Deanna Martin and he pioneered the development of Supplemental Instruction and Video-based Supplemental Instruction on the Kansas City campus, on distant sites in rural Missouri, and in urban centers as remote as Miami (Florida) and Chicago (Illinois). Dr Blanc’s theoretical contributions to SI include placing it within a developmental framework and differentiating it from traditional models of academic support. Prior to retirement from the University, Dr. Blanc developed effective programs of remediation for |
| medical students, practicing physicians, attorneys, and accountants who encountered difficulty in passing professional qualifying examinations. | |
Most recently Drs. Martin and Blanc have co-founded Worldwide Education, a not-for-profit organisation devoted to providing inexpensive and effective education to populations as diverse as Tibetan refugees in India, health professionals in Peru and unwed mothers in Grenada and in the islands of the Eastern Caribbean.
Selected publications:
Muhr, Carin and Deanna C. Martin. Team SI: A Resource for Integrating and Improving Learning (pp.85-93). (New Directions for Teaching and Learning, No. 106). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2006.
Martin, D. C., & Hurley, M. (2005). Supplemental Instruction. In M. L. Upcraft, J.N. Gardner, & B. O. Barefoot (Eds.), Challenging and supporting the first-year Students: A handbook for improving the first year of college(pp. 308-319). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Martin, Deanna C. and Robert Blanc. "Video-Based Supplemental Instruction (VSI)." Journal of Developmental Education 24(3) (2001): 12-19.
Martin, D. C., Blanc, R. A., & Arendale, D. (1996). Supplemental Instruction: Supporting the classroom experience. In J. N. Hankin (ED.), The Community college: Opportunity and access for America's first-year students (Monograph No. 19, pp. 123-133). Columbia, SC: National Resource Center for The Freshman Year Experience and Students in Transition. University of South Carolina.
Martin, D. C., & Wilcox, F. K. (1996). Supplemental Instruction: Helping students to help each other. In G. Wisker (Ed.,), Enabling student learning: Systems and strategies (pp. 97-101). London: Staff and Educational Development Association, Kogan Page.
Blanc, R. A., & Martin, D. C. (1994). Supplemental Instruction: Increasing student performance and persistence in difficult academic courses. Academic Medicine: Journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges, 69(6), 452-454.
Martin, Deanna C. and Robert Blanc. "Video-Based Supplemental Instruction (VSI): A Pathway to Mastery and Persistence." In Martin, Deanna C., and David R. Arenda1e. Supp1emental Instruction: Increasing Achievement and Retention (pp. 83-92). (New Directions for Teaching and Learning, No. 60). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1994.
Blanc, R. A., DeBuhr, L., & Martin, D. C. (1983). Breaking the attrition cycle: The effects of Supplemental Instruction on undergraduate performance and attrition. Journal of Higher Education, 54(1), 80-89.