2018-01-22 Carpentry Team Meeting
Present:
Stephen, Tommy, Tom, Gail, Donna
Past Instruction Debrief: Undergrad ARC Git Session
On Confluence: 2017-11-16 Introduction to Command-Line Git (ARC) - 2 Hour Deep Dive
From DW email sent to carpentry-instructors & KA on 11/7/2017:
We held a 2 hour workshop for undergraduates, as requested by the ARC (Academics and Research Committee) by Maggie via Kristin. Tom covered the basics of command-line local Git, and Tommy covered collaboration using Git and GitHub. Stephen and I participated as helpers during the class.
Overall the feedback was very positive, and some helpful critiques were also offered that we will incorporate into future class offerings. Details are on the Confluence page – please feel free to add comments or observations!
ARC managed registration for the event and asked us to not cap enrollment. They expected about 40 attendees, and had 34 registrations as of yesterday afternoon. However, only 14 registrants actually attended (with one person coming at the halfway point). This was likely due to number of factors – last-minute homework, etc. – but should be something we take into account when working with this group in the future. Logistically, though, it was actually the perfect number of attendees for us to work with to cover the material in the allotted time. I mentioned this to the ARC members who were there to consider in the future limiting the registration to ensure attendance. Their initial preference was to hold the session on a weekend, but given the timing of their request, the only weekend we had instructors available would have been this coming weekend, and ARC already had a leadership retreat planned so that date wouldn’t work.
Personally I think this event went very well. The undergraduate community here has been a particularly tough one to make inroads with (Lindsay has been doing excellent work as well), so the opportunity to work with them on an event like this is a great advancement, especially given the positive outcome.
Instruction Requests
Graduate Student Council (GSC) - Contact: Liz Holman (eholman@caltech.edu)
- Interested in 2-day R workshop for Spring Break, limit to 16-20 people
- Quoted $400 for 2-day workshop and that fee was accepted by GSC
- GSC will be covering lunch for participants (or else it will be BYO)
Status:
GSC sent out a poll for availability and interest in half-day R Notebook session (afternoon of Day 2)
- Top three choices were Fri-Sat, Thurs-Fri, Mon-Tues of the week of 3/26/18
- Unanimous interest in R Notebook session
Instructors: Donna & Gail, Helper: Stephen
- Decision: prefer Thurs-Fri slot (3/29 - 3/30), limit to 22 attendees, and hold in the MCR
Donna will communicate back to Liz and work on logistics (food, etc.)
Caltech Postdocs Association (CPA) - Contact: Sreeram (Ram) Balasubramanian (balasus@caltech.edu)
- Currently surveying members for topics of interest based on https://libguides.caltech.edu/instruction/carpentry
- Quoted $500 for a 2-day workshop, increased cost if 3 days
Status:
Interested in using other teaching spaces on campus that would accommodate >35 people
- While it would be good to have knowledge of, and experience teaching in, other rooms on campus, there are concerns:
* IT support
* Max size: too big of a class and not enough helpers would diminish the experience
* Tiered lecture halls are terrible for providing in-class support
The desire to have a bigger room is probably being driven by not wanting to pay for multiple smaller workshops. We can discuss this more once we have a better idea of the training they want.
At this point, timing would be mid- to late May, depending on topics chosen and subsequent instructor availability
Should we do surveys? Donna will ask for survey questions from Ram
Library-Hosted Instruction
Tom will pick dates for a Library-sponsored (open to all) Python-based workshop, probably late Spring Term or early summer
New Carpentry Instructor Training
Carpentry New Instructor Training - April 24-25, 2018
- MCR is reserved
- 4 out of 6 seats are claimed (Peter C., new DLD hire, Melissa Ray, student from Justin Bois' class), 1 JPL attendee pending
Other Training Classes & Resources
Upcoming training:
Donna & Gail are attending the RStudio Conference in San Diego 1/31-2/3/18, https://www.rstudio.com/conference/
Gail, Tom & Sebastian are teaching a week-long Author Carpentry class at FSCI 2018 in San Diego, 7/30-8/3/18, https://www.force11.org/fsci/2018
Gail has a proposal on Author Carpentry in for CarpentryCon in Dublin, 5/30-6/1/18, http://www.carpentrycon.org/
Journal / Book Club:
San Francisco Public Library has the full Safari package - all kinds of R, Python, etc. resources
- Donna & Gail have library cards - anyone else?
Packt currently has a sale on R and other programming books
Carpentry "One-Pager" Overview
The team should look this over, and SD & GC will take to department heads at some point before finalization. Will add KA to list of viewers when she's ready to have a look?
Idea to prevent no-shows: potentially blacklist for 6 months (if they don't have a good reason)?