The Jose Way: a navigation style to enhance the learning experience

By Jose Lepervanche, MS, NE
IT & eBusiness Faculty

The Jose Way is my particular navigation guide to conduct all my courses. As a faculty member my objective is to guide my students and prepare them academically, professionally and personally to be leaders in their fields. Teaching is not a job. Teaching is an adventure where I can transform the lives of my students. I guide them with passion in a dynamic environment because I want to share with them, the talents and knowledge that I have the privilege to receive. Now is my time to keep the flow and help to educate the next generation. I motivate and inspire my students to take care of the helm of their own ships.

My navigation guide is organized in four stages: Getting underway, Cruising, Storms, and Getting into port.

Getting underway. It is the stage where I set the sails. I establish the rules of engagement, expectations and know each other. I set up the technical and business role playing scenarios we will use during the course. The learning experience of my students should be positive, challenging, dynamic and integral. It includes, not only the content of the particular course, but also strategies and ideas to use this knowledge for better problem solving and decision making.

Cruising. Once the rules are clear, we are ready to sail. I use different dynamic classroom techniques such as lecturing, demonstrations, working together, humor, and a continuous evaluation process to check their classwork. I continuously evaluate their work to assess their learning progress.

Storms. During the course, I focus in the student learning process, especially when clouds appear in the horizon. They have to be able to handle any technical or e-business situation by assessing problems and suggesting or implementing solutions. Individual and team projects, team role playing and simulations and used. This stage includes team dynamics, conflict resolution and project presentations. All these topics are based in the current needs of the industry where the students are going to be challenged with many storms.

Getting into port. Last Day of the journey. This stage includes project presentations, performance evaluations, final exams and my closing remarks. I make emphasis in the importance of practice to reinforce knowledge and I relate the course to following courses, graduate work, or next jobs or businesses. This journey is one small step in their continuous learning journey. I leave the door open to check their future progress during their programs and after graduation. It is rewarding to receive messages from alumni reporting their professional and personal success.

Every course is a new journey to share our knowledge with our students and to enhance their learning experience. I give to them the best of my technical, business, and persona experience in Information Technology and other fields. The more I give, the more I receive. At the same time, I motivate and inspire them to integrate these knowledge and skills to others disciplines such as spiritual, financial and cultural topics to have an integral knowledge and be in a leadership position to influence their workplaces, families, and communities. This is my teaching philosophy: The Jose Way.