Educational Administration and Supervision Commons^™

When It Comes Time Not To “Jump The Shark”: Stepping Down As Director, Nick Flynn

Honors in Practice Online Archive

I was the founding director of the honors program at Angelo State University. Our program started off in a small room in our library back in 2001 with seventeen students. Since then, the program has grown to approximately 150 students with a 2,000-square-foot lounge. Additionally, we received a $250,000 donation for programming and scholarships. After seven years as Director, in 2007 I began to contemplate the possibility of stepping down, and at the start of the fall 2008 semester I made the difficult decision so that I could devote more time to my scholarly endeavors. In retrospect, I wish that …

Editor’S Introduction, Ada Long

Honors in Practice Online Archive

The lead essay in this issue of Honors in Practice is one that most readers will want to keep close at hand. At the behest of the NCHC Publications Board, Emily C. Walshe of Long Island University, C. W. Post Campus, has contributed “Conducting Research in Honors,” a set of clear, detailed, step-by-step instructions on how to do research in honors. While some readers will be familiar with this material already and others will struggle to keep up, the majority will find in this essay an invaluable tool and resource for doing research in general and honors research in particular. …

Fertile Ground: Reflections On Collaborative Student-Faculty Research In The Arts, Mimi Killinger, Aya Mares

Honors in Practice Online Archive

This project grew out of mutual interests. In January of 2008, I briefly introduced myself to the students in my Honors 112 seminar, describing my most recent research on a women’s art collective that painted together in Houston, Texas, during the 1970s. That afternoon, I received an e-mail from Honors 112 student Aya Mares that was charged with enthusiasm for art as “fertile ground for change.”

Mimi had told our class that she was researching the Houston art collective, the Garden Artists, because her mother had been a member. She hoped to learn more about the workings of an art …

From The White House To Our House: The Story Of An Honors College Vegetable Garden, Michael Lund, Geoffrey Orth

Honors in Practice Online Archive

When Virginia Governor Timothy M. Kaine announced in December 2008 his “Renew Virginia” initiative for the Commonwealth, state agencies responded with their own programs “promoting renewable energy, creating green jobs, and encouraging preservation of the environment.” At Longwood University in Farmville, a state-assisted co-educational comprehensive institution, the Cormier Honors College for Citizen Scholars proposed a rooftop vegetable garden on its newly renovated honors residence hall to address these issues. The university’s signature “Citizen Leader” program would be enhanced by a working garden that demonstrates to those on campus and in the larger community the advantages of organic farming, composting, rain …

Teamwork For Nchc, Lydia Lyons

Honors in Practice Online Archive

Having had the opportunity to listen to NCHC presidential addresses since 1995, I find today’s opportunity a humbling one. Some of our presidents have used the conference themes as points of reference, but our first four conferences starting in 1966 had no themes. Ada Long and I share the experience of having chaired our NCHC conferences in San Antonio: she in 1994 with the theme “Crossing Borders” and I in 2008 with “Crossing Frontiers.” Theme or no theme, some presidents have grappled with defining honors or, even more challenging, the NCHC.

Intuitively, we know what honors is, yet we have …

About The Authors, Volume 28 (2010)

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

About the editors and authors of volume 28 (2010) of To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development.

Strategic Committee Involvement: A Guide For Faculty Developers, Phyllis Blumberg

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

Faculty developers should seek purposeful involvement in committee service because committees are essential to the functioning of higher education institutions. The unique expertise and perspectives that faculty developers bring to the table help committees execute their tasks and benefit faculty development efforts. Given the number of possible institutional committees and limitations on time, developers should decide carefully about their service. Offered here is a framework for making strategic decisions about committee membership on five criteria: committee characteristics, individual’s impact on the committee, personal characteristics, conditions that should discourage service, and pitfalls to consider before deciding to serve.

The Value Of The Narrative Teaching Observation To Document Teaching Behaviors, Niki Young

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

A central mission of teaching and learning centers is to help faculty members improve their teaching. The teaching observation is an established tool to support this effort. Although educational developers have created general guides and forms for conducting teaching observations, the literature contains few examples of observation narratives. This chapter offers detailed examples of these narratives, deconstructing the process and demonstrating the value of narrative to document teaching behaviors. This chapter extends and develops the literature, showing how—and making explicit why—we do what we do, in the interest of making our work transparent and replicable.

Dysfunctional Illusions Of Rigor: Lessons From The Scholarship Of Teaching And Learning, Craig E. Nelson

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

My initial teaching practices were based on nine “dysfunctional illusions of rigor.” Overcoming them required revision of my ideas on the value of “hard” courses, the effectiveness of traditional methods, grade inflation, what students should be able to do initially, the fairness of traditional approaches, the importance of fixed deadlines, the importance of content coverage, the accessibility of critical thinking, and the appropriate bases for revising courses and curricula. I present the initial illusions and some more realistic views. These more realistic views are framed in terms of key research findings and some readily accessible models for improved practices.

Rx For Academic Medicine: Building A Comprehensive Faculty Development Program, Megan M. Palmer, Mary E. Dankoski, Randy R. Brutkiewicz, Lia S. Logio, Stephen P. Bogdewic

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

Faculty in academic medical centers are under tremendous stress and report low satisfaction. The need for faculty development in medical schools is great, yet it remains largely unmet across the United States. To ensure ongoing success in academic medicine, medical schools must institute comprehensive faculty development programs. In this chapter, we describe the development of an office for faculty affairs and professional development at the Indiana University School of Medicine, including key collaborations, budget trends and infrastructure development, strategic planning, ongoing assessment planning, goal setting, and early patterns of participation.

The Case For Excellence In Diversity: Lessons From An Assessment Of An Early Career Faculty Program, Dorothe J. Bach, Mary Deane Sorcinelli

To Improve the Academy: A Journal of Educational Development

Many colleges and universities have come to understand the added educational value of having a more diverse faculty, and some have created specific programs to enhance recruitment, development, and retention of underrepresented faculty. How do these programs help underrepresented faculty start a successful career? How can they help a diverse faculty build thriving, long-term careers in academia? This chapter addresses these questions by sharing the findings and lessons learned from an internal and external assessment of the Excellence in Diversity Fellows Program at the University of Virginia.

It's Not The Bicycle, It's The Ride: Eight Ncpea Living Legends Respond, Theodore Creighton, Marilyn Grady, Louis Wildman, Robert Beach, Rosemary Papa, Martha Mccarthy, Charles Achilles, Texas A&M University

Department of Educational Administration: Faculty Publications

My 2009 Living Legend presentation highlighted the fact that the National Council of Professors of Educational Administration (NCPEA) is currently experiencing "lightening speed" issues that Ilced to be addressed sooner rather than later in the scheme of things, Using the metaphor in the title, I suggested that we really can't wait until the "bicycle is finished," but we need to get on and "build the bicycle as we go," Further, I borrowed a phrase from Roger Martin (2007) who in discussing the innovative Amtrak Acela Railcar stated, "The salient issue is the ride, not the railcar" (p.83). I used another …

The Balkanization Of University Support Systems: Ferpa’S Chilling Effect On Campuses And How Honors Administrators Can Break The Ice, Amy Beth Cyphert, Keith Garbutt

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

One of the outcomes of the way FERPA has frequently been interpreted was the Balkanization of student support services that exist on a university campus, particularly at large universities. As the cabinet members noted in the Report to the President on the Virginia Tech tragedy, “information silos” at universities “impede appropriate information sharing” and “are heightened by confusion about the laws that govern the sharing of information” (Leavitt, Spellings, and Gonzales, 7). At our institution, by the first day of classes a first-year student will have signed up to five separate FERPA forms, each one pertaining to a particular aspect …

A Preliminary Study: Body Dysmorphic Disorder In Division I Women’S Collegiate Soccer Players, Tammy D. Jones

Department of Educational Administration: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The prevalence of Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD) among collegiate athletes has not been clearly determined. The purpose of this study was to determine if there are symptoms of body dysmorphic disorder found in Division I women’s soccer players. The researcher hypothesized that there would be some symptoms found within the participants of sport and that there was a need to research this area further.

The study consisted of four participants who participated in semi-structured interviews. The subjects were asked a series of questions from the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale Modified for Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD-YBOCS) to determine if they indicated …

Improving Academic Achievement Of Students With Problematic Attendance By Implementing A Multisystemic School-Based Model, James Edward Kay

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

This study addressed the problem of poor attendance adversely affecting grades and learning. Current school policies do not address problematic attendance for all school-aged children, perpetuating trends of academic failure. The research objective was to determine if unexcused absences had a greater negative impact on a high-stakes test compared to excused absences and then develop a manual of best attendance policies to better serve all school-aged children. This study sampled 10,403 students in a southern United States county. Bivariate regression and ANOVA analyses examined the scores students earned on their first attempt at the Social Studies Georgia High School Graduation …

Leadership To Sustain Professional Learning Communities, Kelly P. Gillespie

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) have shown promise as a means to meet the challenge of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. A problem that has surfaced is the inabilty of schools to sustain PLCs. This project study examined leadership characteristics of elementary school principals in selected school districts to determine how these characteristics shape organizational culture and provide support for sustaining professional learning communities. At the center of this initiative have been the school principals and their leadership skills. The theoretical underpinnings of this study were based on the work of DuFour and DuFour, which places leadership of …

The Effect Of Learning Styles Strategies On Benchmark Eighth Grade Middle School Mathematics Achievement, Jean Ferrara

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Low standardized mathematics scores resulted in a suburban middle school not reaching adequate yearly progress (AYP) for the 2 previous years. There were many possible factors contributing to this problem, among them the design of instruction. The purpose of this study was to identify learning styles of students and implement differentiated instructional strategies that address the learners' needs. The study was based on the Silver and Hanson's theory of learning style instruction and Gardner's multiple intelligences as a model for differentiating instruction. This sequential mixed methods quasi-experimental causal comparative design study investigated the effect of classroom intervention based on learning …

The Perceptions Of Developmental Therapists About The Influence Of Inner-City Home Environments On Service Delivery, Tywanda Jiles

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Act required that early intervention services for young children from birth to age 3 take place in their natural environment. However, limited research has been conducted on the impact of this requirement on the actual service providers who work within the home environments. Lewin's field theory on behavior, individual person, and the environment formed the theoretical framework for this descriptive case study, which examined the perceptions of developmental therapists on how their service is influenced by the inner-city home environment. Ten developmental therapists in a midwestern metropolitan city were interviewed about their beliefs …

The Relationship Between Psychological Well-Being And Perceived Wellness In Graduate-Level Counseling Students, Michel Renee Harris

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

It is imperative that those who provide personal therapy to others be well-adjusted in their personal and professional lives and possess a keen and accurate perception of wellness. Yet, persons drawn to careers in counseling often have unresolved psychological issues. Counselor education programs should have a systematic way to evaluate and improve wellness in their students. Studies addressing the well-being of counselors-in-training, their perception of wellness, and their need for self-care are lacking in the professional literature. This study, therefore, examined the relationship between psychological well-being and perceived wellness in a sample (N = 97) of graduate students in a …

Arts Integration Professional Development: Teacher Perspective And Transfer To Instructional Practice, Jo Ann Garrett

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Limited data connect teacher training in arts integration (AI) to evidence that students benefit from arts integrated instruction. As teachers are challenged to facilitate instruction for a wide continuum of learning needs, and students are challenged to demonstrate learning through high-stakes testing, more data are needed on how teachers learn and transfer AI strategies to classroom practice. Teachers (N = 38) from five elementary schools learned multi-modal AI strategies via the Intensive Development through the Arts (IDEA) model. Interview data in this concurrent mixed methods study illustrated the IDEA experience as a positive influence on (a) the learning environment, (b) …