THE PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM (PDP): A MODEL OF INNOVATION
Among the most significant contributions Rhetoric makes to the University and the profession is
our careful training and mentoring of graduate teaching assistants. Through their work with
Rhetoric faculty, GTAs develop teaching approaches that they carry with them to the job market.
Our approach to preparing teachers is unique, robust, and valuable. First time instructors enroll
in a practicum course that supports them in their first semester of teaching while introducing
them to research-supported pedagogical approaches, the Rhetoric curriculum, and the realities
of life as a classroom instructor. We further support their professional development by assigning
each graduate instructor a faculty teaching mentor in every semester during which they teach
within the Rhetoric Department, by offering them opportunities to develop new approaches to
multimodal instruction through IDEAL, by providing them opportunities to learn and practice
one-to-one instructional pedagogies in our Speaking and Writing Centers, and by recognizing
the most dedicated with internal awards and award nominations at the collegiate and university
levels. We have built upon our unique understanding of graduate students’ needs for
professional development through graduate-level course offerings such as Teaching in a Writing
Center, Writing in the Disciplines (now in its third semester with a regular waiting list for
enrollment), Topics in Teaching and Professional Development, and Innovative Teaching
Methods: Service Learning. In the spring of 2016, we will offer, for the first time, Public Speaking
for Academics.
The Boyer Commission Report (1998) cites the Rhetoric Department’s Professional
Development program as exemplary, calling it a “model of innovation.” Their report on
“Reinventing Undergraduate Education: a Blueprint for America’s Research Universities”
describes PDP as an example of what teaching apprenticeships for graduate students should
become. Though the Boyer report is now over fifteen years old, PDP maintains its innovative
leadership, serving as an emulation-worthy model for other pedagogy programs, departments,
and schools.
A Pedagogical Model:
Several dozen new instructors, most of whom have little or no prior teaching experience, gather
in the English-Philosophy Building in mid-August for an intensive workshop modeled on the
interactive environment we value in Rhetoric classes, involving active learning forums, feedback
sessions, mini-presentations, and instructional games that we play with our own students. The
Professional Development Program begins over the summer, when each new instructor has
one-on-one phone consultations with PDP faculty members concerned with understanding the
nuances of selecting required course material, articulating the mission of the course they will be
teaching, and raising any questions they might have about the Fall Semester and their roles as
instructors. New instructors are also contacted via email by PDP “co-leaders,” experienced
instructors who become teaching mentors. In August there is a three-day pre-semester PDP
orientation.
When participants in the PDP course finally meet in August, each new teacher begins
developing a plan for the semester, including detailed activities for the opening weeks, a
syllabus, and a course schedule for their first term. These plans are informed by the Rhetoric
curriculum and the provisions of the Rhetoric Handbook, which offer a combination of structure
and freedom, so that instructors can put their own stamp on their teaching without feeling too
much at sea and without straying from professional requirements and standards. Semester
plans in the PDP orientation sessions unfold in the context of exploring larger professional
issues, from rhetorical principles to pedagogical approaches, from the art of workshopping to
crafting assignments, as instructors learn to support undergraduates in undertaking more
rigorous and polished inquiry than they ever have before.
The pre-semester orientation launches a conversation about teaching that continues into the
semester with the required PDP Colloquium on Thursday afternoons throughout fall. Each
week, graduate instructors learn what will come next in the curriculum, and receive support in
course planning, grading strategies, conference practices, commenting on writing and oral
presentations, rubrics, class discussion, and the like. These issues emerge in the context of
their particular classroom environments and their particular instructional styles, yet also
consistently bring everyone back to shared, research-based practices and pedagogical theories.
What is Important about PDP in the Rhetoric Department’s Mission:
PDP is a primary site of both innovation and quality control in the Rhetoric department, and as
such is crucial in maintaining teaching excellence among both graduate instructors and full-time
faculty. In PDP we strive to sustain consistency across sections and work to and support quality
and truly inspiring instruction––the sort of teaching that augments the experience of
undergraduates and graduate students alike. Syllabi, assignments, lesson plans, and classroom
activities are rehearsed, pored over, dissected, revised and considered from the perspectives of
pedagogical theory and practice. Teaching PDP keeps faculty fresh and on-point in their own
teaching, up to date with research on pedagogy and writing and rhetoric, and introduces new
ideas to the department through graduate students’ own expertise and insight. I (Naomi) find
that my PDP cohort challenges me to teach rhetoric more intensively and compassionately and
creatively than I otherwise would, and I know many of my colleagues feel similarly. In short,
PDP maintains our graduate students’ teaching and also upholds our own, as it is a forum
where we engage in ongoing discussion, debate and consideration of classroom issues, writing
life, speaking practices and the like. More than most, the Rhetoric department is a collective of
mentor-practitioners as well as teacher-scholars.
One concern about PDP in recent years has been that, with decreasing numbers in graduate
programs and the increasing cost of supporting TAs, the university has hired more and more
people under the lecturer structure. As PDP has consequently shrunk in size, our department
has worked hard to sustain its teaching training and pedagogy missions. These missions keep
the teaching lives of all our faculty vital, thoughtful and responsive to rhetoric as a field,
contributing new expertise to the field of higher education and also maintaining the quality of our
undergraduate students’ learning. PDP and the ongoing presence of graduate instructors in
the Rhetoric department contribute to making our unit a vital, energized environment that is
responsive to current trends, as is appropriate at a research institution like Iowa.
In addition, the Rhetoric Department is a site where graduate instructors themselves frequently
learn the ins and outs of knowledge creation and inquiry. Many graduate students are only
vaguely familiar with information literacy, workshopping, revision, dissemination and project
management, never having had a chance to formally learn this repertoire of practices. Most
departments presume that their students have already honed these skills, and graduate
students are left scrambling, outside of the context of the classroom, to become autodidacts
around the process of inquiry. Graduate students regularly express that the experience of
teaching rhetoric greatly enhances their teaching and their own scholarship and public
engagement, given our public-facing curriculum.
PDP participants often also express that PDP offers them a foundation for pedagogy in the
disciplines. Because all fields engage in inquiry, PDP serves as a powerful source of
professional development for graduate students across the college and disciplines. As a
department housing a number of master teachers, Rhetoric serves as a well source of teaching
inspiration and support across CLAS. Indeed, PDP has been so successful in supporting
graduate students’ professional development that we are now offering an advanced version of
PDP for students interested in further pedagogical training and professional development, as
well as a streamlined version of our program designed for TAs in other departments.