FSCJ has the best and brightest faculty who are committed to providing meaningful and rewarding educational experiences for our students.

As a way to continue the 2015-16 theme of “engagement,” Dr. Angela Browning will be highlighting the extraordinary work of a faculty member each month to share his/her teaching and engagement techniques, professional development, community service, and unique College contributions.

This month’s spotlight is Mark Barber, professor of IT at North Campus.

Engaging with and supporting students:

• Created the Financial Skills Academy (FSA) with Professor Harvey Slentz and Professor John Lyon
• The FSA offers several courses, including Basic Financial Skills, FOREX trading, and Investing.  Each course is four weeks long and free for all FSCJ employees and students
• Courses are offered in a variety of modalities: face-to-face, hybrid, and on-line
• Working to re-establish a Forex Trading Club at North Campus
• Uses Camtasia Studio to create short videos for his credit courses as well as his Forex Trading course

Reimagining assignments:

• Assigns students a culminating project in his programming class that requires students to produce code
• Students use a methodology developed by Mark that requires them to use a seven-step, problem-solving methodology
• The methodology, suitable for business-based word problems using a structured solution, is required of the students on several assignments. You can view an example of one such assignment here.

Engaging with the College and the Community:

• Volunteers at First Lego League Competitions
• Facilitated a First Lego League practice tournament at FSCJ’s North Campus with 130 Duval County middle school students participating
• Students were required to research a topic, make a presentation, demonstrate technical knowledge, and demonstrate a willingness to help others from other teams.