CURRENT ARTICLE • January 23rd

Strategy Mapping: An Essential Tool for New Academic Faculty

Finding your path to tenure as a novice educator can be daunting and anxiety provoking. It is reported that challenges for junior faculty are most often related to decoding expectations of the academic organization and creating relationships with colleagues (Kahanov et al, 2012). Few tools exist to help new faculty navigate the complexity of the first years of academic life.

This article will introduce readers to a process called strategy mapping. The result of the process of strategy mapping is a tangible document called a strategy map. Though strategy mapping is a process that originated within the business world, its applicability within academic settings holds much promise. Within academic settings strategy maps can be used to prioritize teaching, research, and service expectations, particularly for novice educators who have little experience in the academic environment. This article will further demonstrate how the strategy mapping framework aligns with organizational expectations of academic life; how strategy maps can be used to optimize goal setting for new educators; and how strategy maps can be used as a tool to optimize structure and direction within formal mentorship relationships.

The Rhythms of the Semester: Implications for Practice, Persona

By: Linda Shadiow, PhD, and Maryellen Weimer, PhD

We begin each semester on a different note than we end on. The early weeks hold promise and high hopes, both often curtailed when the first assignments are graded. The final weeks find us somewhere between being reluctant or relieved to see a class move on. There is an inexplicable but evident interaction between our teaching persona and the persona a class develops throughout a semester. Some structural factors influence both: among them—the type and level of a course, the discipline, the time of day, and whether the students are a cohort or a unique collection of individuals.

January 18

A Growth Mindset: Essential for Student and Faculty Success

By: Shazia Ahmed, PhD, and Lisa Rosen, PhD

There is increasing awareness among K-12 educators on the importance of fostering a growth mindset. A recent survey by the Education Week Research Center (2016) indicated that 45 percent of K-12 educators were well acquainted with the concept of growth mindset, and almost all believed that nurturing a growth mindset in their students would improve learning outcomes. Although mindset is receiving a great deal of consideration in the K-12 classroom from teachers across disciplines, there has been less attention devoted to this concept on college campuses outside of departments such as psychology and education.

January 16

Seven Things to Consider Before Developing Your Online Course

By: Brian Udermann, PhD

As the number of online courses and degree programs in higher education continues to increase, more faculty are being asked to design and develop online courses. Sometimes this course design and development process is done somewhat reflexively, in a short time period, and with limited planning and preparation. This is not ideal as it can lead to a more stressful course development process for instructors and negatively impact the quality of online offerings. This article will explore seven things that instructors should consider prior to developing an online course.

January 14

Getting Students to Practice

By: Conred Maddox

I flunked out of college seven times. Yes, seven times. While there are many great tales associated with each failure—friends causing endless distractions, having to work late, one lame excuse after another—ultimately, I accepted that I am responsible for never acting like a student. Seven times I signed up, seven times I purchased books, seven times I went to class for a couple of weeks, and seven times I was off on another (ostensibly more important) adventure.

January 11

Seven Ways to Make Your Syllabus More Relevant

By: Christina Moore

Can a syllabus get students excited for your course? What will keep students coming back to it? These seven design elements can help students get the most out of your syllabus, prepare them for the course, and focus on the learning goals ahead. My Engaging Syllabus Design: Example illustrates all of these design elements.

January 9

Empathetic Syllabi Review Exercise

By: Laura L. Behling, PhD

“Do you know how much this exam is worth?”

“I can’t find any office hours listed for one of my classes—are there any?.”

“What if I get sick and miss a few classes—will my grade be hurt?”

My answer was the same for all three questions—“I don’t know.” Even though these were my first-year seminar students asking these questions, they were looking at syllabi from their other courses, part of a syllabus review exercise I do each fall with first-time students.

January 7

Engaging the Entire Learning Cycle to Ignite Enthusiasm and Learning

By: Deepani K. Tennakoon, PhD, Namrata G. R. Raut, and Shazia Ahmed, PhD

You can tell it’s exam week when you see countless students standing outside the exam room trying to take advantage of some last minute cramming. We wonder how much of this information they are about to regurgitate has contributed to their knowledge of the subject. Is what we’re “teaching” actually learned? Are we teaching in a way such that students can apply what is learned?

December 17, 2018

Assessment for Learning: It Just Makes Sense

By: Cathy Box, PhD

Assessment for Learning (AfL), sometimes referred to as “formative assessment” has become part of the educational landscape in the U.S. and is heralded to significantly raise student achievement, yet we are often uncertain what it is and what it looks like in practice in higher education. To clarify, AfL includes the formal and informal processes that faculty and students use during instruction to gather evidence for the purpose of improving learning. The aim of AfL is to improve students’ mastery of the content and to equip and empower them as self-regulated, life-long learners.

December 14, 2018

Contested Grades and the “You Earned It” Retort

By: Steve Snyder

A common rhetorical move we professors make when students object to a grade is to reframe the discussion. We’ll say, “Let’s be clear. I didn’t give you this grade. You earned it.” And if it were appropriate we might underscore our zinger with a smugly snapped Z. But stop and think about it. When we make the “you earned it” move, it’s simply an attempt to shift the debate away from the fairness or interpretation of our standard and onto students to justify their effort by our standard, which really wasn’t their complaint.

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