Featured Workshops
Thursday, February 11, 2010
The Academic Portfolio: A Successful New Way to Document Teaching, Research and Service
Presented by Peter Seldin
An important change is taking place in higher education. Faculty are being held accountable – as never before – for how well they do their jobs. The traditional approach to evaluating and developing their performance has been to focus on the “what,” but not on the “why.” Thoughtful reflection, significance, and context were not built into the system. But these failings limit the understanding of the full range of a professor's work in teaching, research/scholarship, and service. Evaluators and faculty developers might understand a professor's teaching philosophy and methodology if they did a teaching portfolio. But they wouldn't easily understand the nature of the professor's research, the significance of selected publications, the context of their work, or their most noteworthy accomplishments and goals.
And they likely wouldn't know how a professor's teaching, research, and service are integrated to form a cohesive whole or how they fit with the institutional or departmental mission.
The best way to get at the individuality and complexity of faculty work is the academic portfolio. It may prove to be the most innovative and promising faculty evaluation and development technique in years. What is it? The portfolio is a 16-18 page selective gathering of documents and materials highlighting a professor's performance and suggesting its scope and quality. It's based on deep reflection and provides context and significance. The portfolio template used is the result of extensive research by the presenter. More than 200 faculty members and department chairs from across disciplines and institutions provided specific suggestions and recommendations. The result is a comprehensive template that can easily be adapted to individual faculty and department needs.
The academic portfolio concept has gone well beyond the point of theoretical possibility. Today, it is being adopted or pilot-tested by an increasing number of institutions. Significantly, they are institutions of every size, shape, and mission. This highly interactive session will describe the what, why, and how to develop an academic portfolio. It will discuss the critical role played by department chairs as they assist individual faculty to develop their portfolios. It will provide proven advice for getting started, discuss red-flag dangers, and benchmarks for success.
About the Presenter
Peter Seldin is Distinguished Professor of Management Emeritus at Pace University, Pleasantville, New York. Formerly an academic dean, department chair, and professor of management, he is a specialist in the evaluation and development of faculty and administrative performance and has been a consultant on higher education issues to more than 350 colleges and universities throughout the United States and in 45 countries around the world.
COLLEGIALITY: Chairs’ Role in Fostering a Collegial Department
Presented by Bob Cipriano
This workshop will focus on the unique role of the chair in fostering a desired collegial and civil environment in their department. Strategies will be explored that also identify specific responsibilities the university has in reigning in an uncivil and vitriolic faculty member. Approaches will be examined that facilitate departments that invite free expression, exploration, and inquiry, and are enthusiastic, collaborative and exciting. In this interactive workshop, the attendees will actively participate in problem-solving activities regarding the topic of collegiality and civility within a department. The following questions will be explored using experiential case studies and scenarios: How do we operationally define collegiality? Can we develop guidelines to foster collegiality without discouraging productive dissent? Are there proven methods to assess collegial behavior in the interviewing and selection of new faculty members, as well as in the faculty evaluation process? What have the U.S. courts ruled concerning the role of collegiality in tenure, promotion, and termination decisions? What, exactly, is the chair’s role in fostering civility/collegiality in the department? Can ‘lack of civility/collegiality’ be used as a basis to terminate a full-time faculty member? What are the academic policy implications of what the courts have ruled regarding collegiality – in terms of selecting, hiring, training, and evaluating faculty? Are there implied delimitations that the typical chair faces in facilitating a more civil environment in their department? The workshop participants will develop a personal “Plan of Action” that they can use when they return to their campus after the conference.
About the Presenter:
Bob Cipriano received his Ed.D. degree from New York University in Therapeutic Recreation with an area of emphasis in College Teaching from New York University. He has written two textbooks, contributed chapters in three other textbooks, and has published 107 journal articles and manuscripts. Dr. Cipriano has received more than $9 million dollars in federal, state, and foundation grants, and has been invited to deliver more than 200 presentations in the United States and Asia. Dr. Cipriano has been invited to deliver presentations regarding collegiality and conflict management to department chairs and academic deans at many universities. He has conducted research and written extensively on the topics of collegiality/civility, chairs’ perceptions of important factors to be considered in personnel decisions regarding faculty, full-time faculty and department chair’s perceptions of shared governance, demographic characteristics of department chairs, and including individuals with disabilities in higher education. Dr. Cipriano has served as a department chair for 27 of his 35 years in higher education.
On Being a New Chair: Past, Present and Future
Presented by Daniel Wheeler and Alan Seagren
The context/environment that chairs operate in today is much more complex and multidimensional than that of a few years ago. The information gathered from two research efforts provides a picture of the changes that have taken place over the past two decades. The issues chairs identified, as well as the strategies they suggested, will be presented. Special focus will be given to issues related to resources, technology and assessment.
About the Presenters
Daniel W. Wheeler is Professor Emeritus of Leadership Studies and head of the Department of Ag Leadership, Education and Communications at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Previously he was coordinator of the Office of Professional and Organizational Development at Nebraska. He has degrees from Antioch College, Cornell, and SUNYAB. Dr. Wheeler has made numerous contributions to faculty development, chairing departments and leadership. For example, he has co-authored The Academic Chairperson Handbook (1990), Enhancing Faculty Development: Strategies for Development and Renewal (1990), and he has contributed numerous book chapters and articles on faculty development and department chairs. Dr. Wheeler is a past president of the Professional and Organizational Development (POD) Network in Higher Education and recipient of the prestigious Spirit of POD Award. He is a member of the advisory boards of the Academic Chairpersons Conference, Department Chair Newsletter, Council of Independent Colleges and Effective Practices for Academic Leaders. Dr. Wheeler is a Senior Fulbright Scholar in higher education. At Nebraska, he teaches graduate and undergraduate leadership courses. He consults and leads workshops in all of these areas in the United States and internationally.
Alan T. Seagren is Professor Emeritus of Educational Administration and Vice President for Administration Emeritus at the University of Nebraska. He was an administrator at the University of Nebraska for 32 years, serving as a chair, dean, Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, and Vice President for Administration. For the past 15 years, he has been the coordinator of the online Graduate Program in Educational Leadership and Higher Education and professor teaching courses in the online ELHE program. Seagren has made numerous contributions to chairing departments, leadership education, and organizational development and has contributed numerous book chapters and articles on department chairs and leadership. He has co-authored The Academic Chairperson Handbook (1990), The Department Chair: New Roles, Responsibility, and Challenges (1993), and Academic Leadership in Community Colleges (1994). He is a member of the advisory board for the Chair Academy for Leadership Development, the International Business Studies Program King Willem I College of the Netherlands, and the Campus Ministry for ELCA. He consults and leads workshops in the areas of leadership and department chairs, and he has been a visiting professor at institutions in Australia, China, Japan, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.
What Department Chairs Want to Know Most
Presented by Kent Crookston
In a 2009 national survey, almost 3,000 chairs identified a small number of administrative tasks and abilities for which they most wanted help and information. Survey results will be shared and discussed – what do they tell us about the major needs of today’s American chairs? The workshop will then turn to an interactive discussion around at least the top two issues identified in the survey: “How to deal with problem faculty,” and “How to effectively guide department change.” Tips gathered from extensive research of current chair literature will be shared. If there is enough time for the number three issue, we will also discuss it – “How to effectively manage time.”
About the Presenter
R. Kent Crookston is Associate Director of the Faculty Center at Brigham Young University (BYU)with responsibility for academic administrative training and support. He has been in academic administration for over 20 years. He has served as Head of the Department of Agronomy and Plant Genetics at the University of Minnesota, and as Dean of the College of Biology and Agriculture at BYU. His current research focuses on effective decision making and on effective academic administration.
Chair – Dean Relations
Presented by Donald Chu
In the summer 2009 issue of The Department Chair, Mary Lou Higgerson and Barry McCauliff state the "The most effective strategies for an individual chair will be determined, in large part, by what decisions are delegated to chairs on the campus." Clearly for chairs to fulfill their leadership roles, they must be empowered by their deans. In this session, the relationship between deans and department chairs will be examined. What is the dean's world like? What can chairs do to convey the correct sense of a department and the capability of the chair to not only manage, but to also lead the department and its faculty? In this session, Don Chu will draw upon his experience as a dean and also his work The California State University Department Chair Survey to encourage a better understanding of this essential higher education dynamic, and to guide workshop participants in the development of a game plan for the best chair dean relations possible.
About the Presenter
Dr. Don Chu is Professor and Dean of the College of Professional Studies. He earned his undergraduate and graduate degrees from Oberlin College and Stanford University. Prior to coming to UWF in 2005 he worked two years as a special education teacher in New York, taught at Skidmore College for nine years, and was at California State University, Chico for seventeen years as professor and chair of the Department of Kinesiology teaching courses in the sociology of education, anthropology of education, the sociology of sport, and graduate research methods. From 1999-2000 Dr. Chu served as California State University Executive Fellow working from the Office of the Chancellor. While there he completed the “California State University Department Chair Survey” on which his most recent book The Department Chair Primer (Jossey Bass, 2005) was based. In addition he has written two other books, and served as senior editor or co-editor on three other books. His current grant funded projects include serving as primary investigator on “Hometown Heroes Teach” (funded $275,000 annually through Workforce Escarosa), and co-PI on “Hometown Heroes Reachout “ (funded $330,000 annually through USDOL). Dr. Chu serves on the board of Alzheimer’s Family Services and is an NCATE Examiner. While a devoted family man, he embraces his new status as “empty nester” living in blessed peace with only his wife Janine and himself at home.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Effective Stress Management for Chairs During Uncertain Times
Presented by Tim Hatfield
Stress is a fact of life for department chairs, who typically are not prepared adequately for the range and intensity of stresses they face daily – and that is in the best of times. Of late, with a floundering economy, diminished resources, and additional uncertainty about what will happen next, there is even more stress facing the persons serving as chairs. This workshop will provide participants with useful concepts and hands-on materials to highlight not only what stresses they face, but also a variety of ways to deal with these stresses effectively. This material also can be adapted to give away to your department colleagues, who are subject to their own stresses and uncertainties. The workshop is designed for the active involvement of participants, with opportunities for small group discussion to reflect on the ideas and on practical applications of them to alleviate the inevitable stresses at work.
Topics will include:
- Personal assessment of key job stressors;
- A practical model of stress management skills;
- Sills for professional and personal stress management;
- Attributes of a stress-resistant personality;
- Engaging your colleagues about their own and the department’s well-being;
- Action planning for lowered stress-reactivity in the role of chair.
About the presenter
Tim Hatfield, Ph.D., is professor of Counselor Education at Winona State (MN) University, where he has chaired his department for 22 of the past 27 years.
A frequent presenter at this conference, his work has included the creation of a major stress management website that reflects the integration of many of the major concepts that he has introduced to his students, colleagues, and workshop participants over the years. He is married to Susan Rickey Hatfield, Ph.D., also presenting at this conference, and they have four children aged 16 to 29.
A Chairperson's Guide to Program Level Assessment - What To Do & What To Avoid
Presented by Susan Hatfield
Often, the job of implementing a program level assessment plan falls on the department chair. While some chairs are lucky enough to inherit well developed, functioning assessment plans, most chairs wind up starting from scratch. Regardless of whether or not your assessment plan is fully developed or just being conceptualized, this workshop will help you move from identifying student learning outcomes to closing the assessment loop.
About the Presenter
Susan Hatfield is a Professor of Communication Studies at Winona State University, where she has taught since 1981. During that time she served for nine years as chairperson in that department and for 12 years as the Assessment Coordinator. In addition to her university responsibilities, she is a Visiting Scholar with the Higher Learning Commission and serves as a peer evaluator for that organization. In 2001 she was appointed by the United States Secretary of the Navy to the Marine Corps University Board of Visitors, a position she still holds. She has been on the board of the Academic Chairpersons Conference since 20 Susan has presented numerous workshops on assessment and accreditation at state, regional, and national conferences, and has consulted with individual departments and universities on related issues.