Foothill College: Create a Video Production PDL Project

This post is for faculty members at Community Colleges who are interested in applying for and successfully completing a sabbatical project that focuses on video production. The sabbatical system at Foothill college, where I work, is called a Professional Development Leave (PDL) and allows faculty members to apply for a 1-year sabbatical once every 7 years. The application process happens in year 6 and if approved, faculty members can take 3 quarters of sabbatical starting in year 7. This sabbatical can be taken all at once (3 quarters in one year) or broken into pieces across many years (eg. one quarter per year over three years). For more about this process, read the language of our employment contract published by the Foothill-DeAnza Faculty Association Union (focus on article 17).

This article is the first of a three part series. Below is an outline of each article in this series:

Article 1: Create a Video Production PDL- This article introduces more about the application process. In this article, I share all of my application resources that I used for my first PDL and discuss lesson that I learned as I applied.

Article 2: Execute Your Video PDL project- This article walks you through each step of the project to show how I managed the production process. I include all documents I created to execute my vision and produce what I promised in my proposal.

Article 3: Create your final report and get ready to finish your project- This article shows how you might create a final report to verify that you did what you promised and to communicate your work across campus (and to the state of CA if needed). I discuss lessons learned and share ideas to save you time (things I wish I would have done differently during the project process).

This blog post series is related to a larger goal of mine to create a robust network of support for Foothill Faculty who have an interest in creating educational videos for students and classroom use. Let’s get started by exploring the PDL application process and how you might create a video-based project.

Step 1: Think Ahead

The PDL application process takes time and happens in many steps. My first recommendation is to read all of Article 17 of the FHDA Faculty Employment Contract for the Professional Development Leave process as soon as possible. As is true for our entire employment contract, this is written in formal legal language and negotiated between our FA Union and the FHDA district. In other words, we have to do some work to interpret this language and make sense of it. In this case, Article 17.1 states that we are eligible to take PDL after 18 quarters of full-time service (which, at 3 quarter per year is once every six years).

When I applied for my first PDL, I started thinking about this process in the summer between year 4 and 5 of my career at Foothill College. That summer, I read through article 17 multiple times, highlighted important language that I wanted to return to, took notes on that article, created a detailed checklist for the steps I saw, and generated specific questions that I felt were relevant. I tried hard to do this at least one year before my application deadline. Specifically, as is outlined in Article 17.9: Application Process and Timeline, applications are due on October 15 of the year before I plan to take my first PDL quarter. Moreover, that same article 17.9 indicates that you need to speak with your division dean at least 5 days before you plan to submit my application to get their approval.

Thus, I wanted to get started on my thinking in the summer before year 5 of my career. This would give me an entire year to create my application plan, collect more information from Human Resources and senior colleagues, and get feedback on my work. Moreover, I could spend time over the summer before year 6 getting my application in finalized form. My goal was to submit my application by the end of week 2 of fall quarter, a solid 2 weeks before the official deadline.

This process of thinking ahead relates to a larger habit that I’ve built of tracking important deadlines or milestones many years in advance so that I can plan ahead and decrease my stress levels. For more about that process, take a look at the video below where I outline my planning processes (if you watch carefully, you’ll notice I’m already planning for my next PDL process which is about 3 years away at the time of this writing). If you like what you see, look in the description on that video for more resources and planning documents that might help decrease stress as you create your application.

Step 2: Do your research and learn from others

Once you’ve read Article 17 a few times and formulated some questions, I recommend that you reach out to a few different sources including each of the following:

1. Attend a PDL workshop led by FHDA Human Resources.
   
   These are usually advertised in spring quarter each year and sometimes during opening day ceremonies. For the timeline I kept for myself, my goal was to submit my PDL application two weeks before October 15, 2018 (eg. I made my deadline of 10/1/2018). To prepare for that deadline, I read Article 17 multiple times and generated questions during summer 2017. If I remember correctly, I attended my first PDL session in fall 2017. This session was led by the Vice Chancellor of Human Resources and Equal Opportunity. The workshop leader was also the person who chaired the PDL Application committee and had extensive experience reading PDL applications and evaluating final reports. For more information, see the FHDA Human Resources responsibility page.
   
   I spent fall 2017 – winter 2018 generating ideas and creating resources to strengthen my application. Then, in spring 2018, I attended the same presentation again and asked follow up questions and shared ideas about my proposal. At the end of that workshop, I made an appointment to speak with the Vice Chancellor of HR in person for about 30 minutes to talk in detail about my application can get customized feedback on my work.
   
   
2. Speak with senior colleagues who have completed PDL projects that align with the one you want to do.
   
   I my case, I spoke with a senior Foothill math department colleague who had completed a video project for their PDL a few years before 2017. I asked this person to share their application with me so I could read and think about their work. I also asked a few questions to get advice and guidance.
   
   
3. Speak with a faculty member who has served at least a full year on the PDL committee.
   
   At Foothill, we have a PDL committee that reads PDL applications, sponsors PDL members through the process, and verifies completion on work. People who serve on this committee have special knowledge about the entire PDL workflow and can give you smart ideas for the entire PDL process (including applications, changes of plans, and final submission documents). Find someone on that committee by calling the Executive Assistant to the Vice Chalncellor of Human Resources and asking for committee member’s names. (Note: I hope to inspire HR to create a PDL committee website with the names of committee members that is updated each year. More on this later).
   
   When I applied, I spoke with a senior Math faculty named Marc Knobel who had serve on the PDL committee for many years. During our conversation, Marc gave me fantastic advice about how to fill out my application. He also admonished me to be sure to fill out Appendix P2: Request for Change Form for any departure on the PDL process. He told me about some horror stories of faculty members that changed their PDL project mid-stream and did not seek approval using the P2 appendix. Then, at the end of the PDL process, they submitted their final report and the work they created differed from their approved application. This resulted in a scenario where the faculty member had to repay 100% of their salary they received during PDL plus benefits cots. That is tens of thousands of dollars. Thus, Marc had me research appendix P2 and ask more about that process before I ever applied. I can say that was great advice because I ended up submitting two updates using Appendix P2 and got both approved. The fact that I got this advice months before I applied helped me feel confident in my ability to revise my work and decreased my stress about trying to get everything done in final form.

Step 3: Draft Your Application

At some point during your research process, you’ll be ready to start drafting your application. To do this, you’ll use Appendix P1. As part of my work at Foothill, I want to create robust support for faculty and staff who want to produce educational videos. With this goal in mind, below I share my entire PDL application that I created for my first PDL:

1. Jeff Anderson’s Appendix P1 PDL 1.1, 1.2, 1.3 Application (Submitted in October 2018)
   
   
2. Jeff Anderson’s Appendix P1 Revision (Revised based on committee feedback in Nov 2018)
   
   
3. Jeff Anderson’s Complete Filming Process Draft
   
   I wrote this draft after one quarter of producing videos. As of this writing (11/2/2022), the outline I provide here is out-of-date. I plan to write blog posts in the future that highlight my current systems and share how I produce a video. I’ll walk through my entire process from concept to posted video and show the steps in detail. However, for my application, I wanted to highlight my best guess and give the committee a detailed idea of what goes into this process.
   
   
4. Jeff Anderson’s Math 1C Supplementary Video List
   
   Prior to submitting my PDL application, I spent a full quarter producing videos for my Math 1C course. My goal was to get a sense of my workflow and to make sure I had all my systems in working order. In other words, I wanted to make sure that I could actually do the work I was proposing.
   
   Part of my goal for the work I’m doing with the STEM division recording studio is to make this process much easier for faculty members. I spent probably $10,000 out of pocket (using grant money and scholarship money that I earned during my time as a student) to get all my gear ready and worked hundreds of unpaid hours to learn how to make these videos. I plan to help our campus build systems to make this easier for others and to find funding to pay for equipment. I also want to provide training (paid or via PGA/PAA credit) to help faculty learn how to use recording technology. I’ll write much more about this in future posts.
   
   
5. Jeff Anderson’s Signed PDL Application submitted in October 2018