Northern California
Commissioner's College

Instructor Guidance

Structure

Your course will be taught by a team of one to six instructors. One will be designated as the lead instructor. Your course is scheduled as part of a track (typically courses that are related and taught in one room). Your track is guided by an Assistant Dean (AD), typically a Council Commissioner. If you do not know who your AD is, check with your Council Commissioner. If you have questions, check with your AD first. If they can not answer your questions, check with the Dean. If the Dean does not know, he will find out (or make up a plausible answer...)

Materials

Your course will have a course number, title, and description. All courses are listed under “Classes - Descriptions” on the left. You are expected to teach a course which meets the objectives of the title and description. If it is a national curriculum course you need to cover the material in the national outline. You are free to structure the course as you see fit. You may use existing materials, modify existing materials, or create your own.

Nor Cal Specific Courses BCS200 and up, MCS 420 and up, DCS 620 and up
These courses were designed to met a need, identified by the Commissioners in our service area, which was not met by the standard courses listed in the “Continuing Education for Commissioners” guide. They are intended to be equal in quality to the nationally identified courses and count equally toward degrees.

Some courses have existing materials, including slides or AV aids, that you are free to use. These materials are on the Norcal Commissioner's website (http://www.norcalcommissioner.org/trainingMaterials.php)

  1. Basic Training
  2. Bachelors's Courses (BCS)
  3. Master's Courses (MCS)
  4. Doctoral Courses (DCS)

Traditional Courses BCS 101-114, MCS 301-408, DCS 601-612
These courses are the courses listed in the current, or previous, versions of the “Continuing Education for Commissioners” guide. With minor variations, these courses form the curriculum of Commissioner's Colleges all across the country.

All the national curriculum courses have outlines in the “Continuing Education for Commissioners”. There may be slides or AV aids available on the Norcal Commissioner's website, see above.

Presentation

Course Length - The standard session at the college is scheduled in a one hour time slot. It is important to realize that the time you have for a presentation is considerably shorter than that. Some of your students will not arrive until five or more minutes after the nominal starting time. By the same token, to enable your students to reach their next activity on time, it is good to release your students five minutes early. This gives you an effective presentation time of about 50 minutes. Depending on the style and content of your presentation, you need to plan to allow some time for questions and answers. For a typical course, experienced instructors plan on about 40 minutes of delivered material.

Audience Expectations - Most audiences today expect a presentation to be supported by AV materials. Usually this means PowerPoint or similar. For many of our courses, previous presenters have graciously shared their materials (see above). We would like that to be “all courses” but this depends on our current presenters. If possible, we would like you to share any materials you alter or prepare to extend our library. A convenient way to do this is to stop by the Registrar's Office and give a copy of your presentation(s) to the staff. Submissions may also be done electronically, see the training materials submissions page on the Norcal Commissioner's website (http://www.norcalcommissioner.org/trainingMaterialsSub.php)

Technical Support - The college moves to various venues with different levels of AV support. We attempt to provide a video projector in each room. You should not assume that the provided projector is “state of the art”. It may be fairly low resolution. When preparing your materials, plan accordingly. We also try to have a laptop in each room. We recommend, based on too many strange experiences, that you try to bring your own laptop and cable. You are welcome to use your own projector and laptop if you are so equipped. We also recommend that you bring a copy of your presentation on a CD and/or a thumb drive. Experienced presenters are aware that if there is a mismatch between your laptop display and the projector resolution Windows will resynchronize to the lowest resolution device (the projector) and rearrange your desk top in the process. Just be aware...