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Author: Ada Sharpe

Ada Sharpe, Ph.D. (English and Film Studies), has worked in faculty and support staff roles in the post-secondary sector for over a decade. She has taught and researched in literary studies and writing studies and co-led a university writing centre. Ada specializes in understanding how assessment shapes the teaching and learning experience for faculty and students.
March 31, 2025

Conestoga’s Evaluation of Student Learning Policy is changing: Here’s what you need to know

Reading Time: 6 minutesStarting September 1st, 2025, the updated Evaluation of Student Learning Policy will bring changes to how assessments are structured in courses. These updates aim to ensure that assessments are both meaningful and manageable for students and faculty.  The highlights: The intention of these changes is to provide time between assessments and promote effective assessment strategies during Conestoga’s 14-week semester.  This post describes a...
Categories Quality Assessment Comments: 0
February 26, 2025

Email Templates Responding to Suspected Student Use of AI 

Reading Time: 5 minutesIn this post, we will explore three scenarios in which you may need to contact students by email to express concern about suspected inappropriate AI use in an assignment. The email templates below chart a scaffolded approach, moving from 1) an expression of concern regarding the suspected use of AI, to 2) informing the student you will be filing an...
Categories Assessment & AI/Learning with GenAI Comments: 0
January 27, 2025

Evaluating Professionalism in College Courses

Reading Time: 4 minutesThis post was collaboratively written by Nancy Nelson and Joel Beaupré, and revised by Jesslyn Wilkinson, Marcia Chaudet, Nasreen Sultana, and Ada Sharpe Background  Many college educators aspire to teach, reinforce, and assess professionalism in their courses, though they may approach this objective in different ways, using different language. The grading category of ‘professionalism’ generally relates to skills and attitudes that are transferrable, non-technical, and essential to many workplaces. Separate from marks for content knowledge, professionalism marks...
Categories Assessment Design & Development/Grading & Grading Tools/Quality Assessment
November 26, 2024

From Anonymous to Acknowledged: The Benefits of Using Student Names in Teaching

Reading Time: 4 minutesEarly in my teaching career, a student told me that I was the only professor who had so far remembered her request to call her by her second name rather than her first. At the time, I was curious: What had prevented other educators from remembering her preferred name?  With experience, I have gained more perspective on the obstacles to...
Categories Accessible Teaching/Effective Teaching/Student Engagement & Communication Comments: 0
October 10, 2024

Is it Time to Refresh My Rubric? A Checklist When Your Rubric Needs a Tune-Up 

Reading Time: 3 minutesDo you have a rubric that you’ve been seeing a lot of lately? Perhaps there’s one rubric you’ve been using to grade multiple submissions this semester and noticed that it isn’t quite as smooth as you’d like.  Grading with a rubric oftentimes gives rise to observations about its limitations: you might notice, for example, that students are struggling in a...
Categories Grading & Grading Tools/Quality Assessment/Reflective Practice Comments: 0
August 29, 2024

Giving Student Feedback Using an Inquiry Approach

Reading Time: 4 minutesStudents rely on feedback – whether qualitative, quantitative, or both; from peers, from you, or both – to understand how they performed on an assessment task. Crafting quality feedback takes thought and care from the person providing it. In this post, we’ll explore strategies for providing feedback to students through an inquiry approach: non-directive and invitational, this approach positions you...
Categories Grading & Grading Tools/Inclusive Assessment/Quality Assessment Comments: 0
August 9, 2024

Getting Creative with Assessment Design

Reading Time: 3 minutesWhere you find yourself Are you building an assignment from the ground up while creating or revising a course outline? Or perhaps you’re looking to refresh an assignment you’ve taught before? In this Hub post, we’ll explore some options and considerations for creative and untraditional assessment design. Traditional assessments . . . and the “untraditional”? Midterms, exams, essays, and multiple-choice...
Categories Assessment Design & Development/Inclusive Assessment/Quality Assessment Comments: 0
June 24, 2024

Ready, Set, Teach! Navigating Pre-Class Jitters and Setup

Reading Time: 3 minutesYou’ve got your lesson planned, your water bottle filled, and your slides ready, but still, you’ve got butterflies in your stomach as you approach the classroom 10 minutes before the class start time. It’s pretty normal to feel a range of emotions in those minutes before starting to teach: nervousness, excitement, uncertainty, anxiety, anticipation . . . Getting your class...
Categories Effective Teaching/In-Person/Lesson & Course Planning/Reflective Practice Comments: 0
May 28, 2024

Heart Emoji, Crying Face Emoji: A Reflection on the Emotional Facets of Teaching

Reading Time: 5 minutesIn collaboration with Sara Kafashan  This past winter semester, I experienced a familiar feeling: I found myself getting frustrated with students repeatedly emailing me for assistance, but not following the instructions I had provided in multiple different contexts (in class, in video recordings of assignment instructions, in writing, in individual meetings etc.). Some of the emails bordered on rude. I...
Categories Effective Teaching/Reflective Practice/Student Engagement & Communication Comments: 0
April 8, 2024

In-Person Proctoring How-To’s

Reading Time: 4 minutesIn-class proctored tests and exams offer the opportunity to measure student learning in the moment, under observation. These types of assessments can also present you with challenges in upholding integrity and can cause uncertainty in responding in the moment if you suspect a student has cheated. In this Hub post, we will explore best practices for in-class proctoring of tests...
Categories Assessment Implementation/In-Person/Quality Assessment Comments: 0
April 1, 2024

Uses of Student Work: What You Can and Cannot Do

Reading Time: 2 minutesStudents have intellectual rights under Canadian copyright law to the work they create during their post-secondary education. They also have privacy rights that mean student work cannot be used or shared without their permission. You cannot submit student work to any internal or external technology without a student’s express permission. Likewise, you cannot use student work – excerpts or in...
Categories Assessment & AI/Assessment Implementation/Learning with GenAI/Quality Assessment Comments: 0
March 12, 2024

Leveraging Your Slide Deck, Part 2: Engaging Students in the Classroom 

Reading Time: 5 minutesA slide deck can be the focus point of a lesson, presenting key information related to the week’s learning outcomes. A slide deck, however, is not simply an overview of content to be presented to students: it is also a treasure trove of opportunities for  In this Hub post, part 2 of 2, we’ll look at strategies to integrate active...
Categories Effective Teaching/Lesson & Course Planning/Teaching for Learning Comments: 0
February 13, 2024

Leveraging Your Slide Deck, Part 1: Scaffolding Assessments for Student Success

Reading Time: 5 minutesA slide deck can be the focus point of a lesson, presenting key information related to the week’s learning outcomes. A slide deck, however, is not simply an overview of content to be presented to students. It is also a treasure trove of opportunities for: In this Hub post, part 1 of 2, we’ll look at strategies to introduce meaningful...
Categories Effective Teaching/Inclusive Assessment/Lesson & Course Planning Comments: 0
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