When Academic Leadership Comes with Baggage
The baggage we bring to work with us can take a variety of forms. It could occur because we applied for our positions as internal candidates and suddenly find ourselves as bosses of the very people who only a short time ago we regarded as close friends. It could occur...
Developing a New Faculty-Evaluation System
At Georgia College & State University, each academic unit was tasked in 2011 with developing a new faculty-evaluation system. We were instructed to create an instrument that had both qualitative and quantitative components. It took a year of discussion, compromise, and eventual consensus, but we finally moved forward with a...
Six Ways to Ensure a Smooth Chair Transition
Faculty members often become chairs under less-than-ideal circumstances or for the wrong reasons. An underprepared faculty member or one with an axe to grind can wreak havoc and lead to frequent department chair turnover. Recognizing this all-too-common cycle, Gian Pagnucci, chair of the English Department at Indiana University of Pennsylvania,...
Best Practices for Conducting a Faculty Search
“The success, stability, and morale of an academic department largely depend on its faculty.” This is according to Thomas Weidner, chairperson of the School of Physical Education, Sport, and Exercise Science, and Samuel Cotton, chairperson of the Department of Technology, of Ball State University. At the 32nd Annual Academic Chairpersons...
After Promotion and Tenure: Maintaining Faculty’s Upward Trajectory
While a necessary and worthy milestone, earning promotion and tenure is not an end goal of an academic career. During the pretenure years, a faculty member is gearing up for growth in the areas (e.g., teaching, research and teaching) defined by the institution to meet the mark for tenure. Ideally,...
Evaluating Online Teaching: Implementing Best Practices
More than a decade ago, Thomas Tobin, coauthor of the new book, Evaluating Online Teaching: Implementing Best Practices, was hired to teach a business English and communications class in a hybrid format. When the time came for evaluation, he received a very thorough evaluation based on the chair’s observation of...
Does Online Faculty Development Really Matter?
Laurence Boggess has had an interesting career path to his current position as the director of faculty development for the Penn State World Campus. After 25 years as a K-12 administrator, he earned his Ph.D. at Penn State and continued on to take a faculty position in the department of...
Making Faculty Development an Institutional Value and a Professional Practice
Sometimes faculty development programs are inherited by an academic leader, and other times they have to be built. In either case the academic leader needs to heed some wisdom from the Chinese classic the Tao Te Ching. Faculty development is a long journey wherever one starts; like a journey of...
Overcoming the Pipeline Myth: Department Chairs as Transformative Diversity Leaders
For at least three decades, the myth of a lack of diversity in the faculty pipeline has lingered in academic circles. And surprisingly, the role of the department chair in building a diverse faculty has received little attention in most chair handbooks and resources. Yet arguably, the department chair occupies...
Collegiality Incentivized
Traditionally a person in higher education is hired as an assistant professor. After an agreed-upon number of years, usually six, she or he is either tenured (aka, the Holy Grail of higher education) or terminated. At this time, the person also applies for promotion to the rank of associate professor....
