Blog

Adapting in Times of Crisis: Navigating Tenure Clock Stoppage

by Lauren Scungio

clock and succulent on wood tableThe coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has drastically altered the day-to-day operations of higher education institutions across the nation and globally. As quickly as the world is changing, leaders must adapt their institutions’ policies and practices to suit these unprecedented times. In an effort to draw upon the power of collective problem-solving, we have compiled an incomplete yet growing collection of policies that academic and faculty affairs administrators across the nation are adopting. In the first of what we hope will be a series of articles, we address navitaging tenure clock stoppage. 

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Guidance for Remaining Faculty Job Satisfaction Survey Communications (March 23–April 10, 2020)

by Todd Benson

Hands holding a phoneThis post serves to offer some communications guidance for the COACHE partners with three weeks remaining in the Faculty Job Satisfaction Survey period. We understand that many other priorities are in play right now: these points are offered strictly to reduce your cognitive load, not to add to it. As mentioned in Kiernan’s update last week, you do not have to do any more work.

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Considering Part-time Faculty in COVID-19 Response Planning

by Todd Benson

man giving presentationWith the sudden escalation in both public concern and genuine risk associated with COVID-19, COACHE’s team has been discussing the implications for faculty. As we discussed the issue, an important question that arose was, “Who might we be forgetting?” For us, the answer to that question was part-time faculty. As administrators grapple how to handle their institutions’ response to this global pandemic, here are some thoughts about why part-time faculty are an important consideration in these discussions and some questions that institutions might consider in their planning.... Read more about Considering Part-time Faculty in COVID-19 Response Planning

AAC&U 2020 Annual Meeting: Four Faculty-Focused Tracks Through the Agenda

group convened for panel presentationCOACHE research on the professoriate is shaping the future of higher education leadership, so we are eager to attend next week’s annual meeting of the Association of American Colleges & Universities, “Shaping the Future of Higher Education: An Invitation to Lead.” While the program is characteristically overflowing with opportunities to learn and to network, we have identified four tracks through the January 22-25 schedule where we expect to find most of our partners:... Read more about AAC&U 2020 Annual Meeting: Four Faculty-Focused Tracks Through the Agenda

A Changing Faculty Requires Change Leadership: Implications of The Gig Academy for Provosts and Deans

by Adrianna Kezar, PhD. Dean's Professor of Leadership, University of Southern California; Co-director, Pullias Center; Director, Delphi Project

A classroom chalkboard and stack of booksFor this guest blog post, we asked Prof. Adrianna Kezar to apply her research and experience to cite, critique and extend two recent Change Magazine articles on cultivating faculty leadership and indicators of institutional resilience. Kezar considers implications of her latest work, The Gig Academy, and the new edition of How Colleges Change, for leadership of and by the faculty.... Read more about A Changing Faculty Requires Change Leadership: Implications of The Gig Academy for Provosts and Deans

Where the Faculty Affairs Things Are (Now): Conferences and Convenings Updated

by Kiernan Mathews

 

People listening to a conference presentationSeveral years ago, I observed here that the assistant, associate, and vice provosts and deans with institution-wide responsibility for faculty success (I call them “chief faculty affairs officers” or CFAOs) often find themselves alone on their campuses. Without a community of practice in academic personnel and faculty development, people in these roles “set sail to distant places” to find the professional advice and emotional support that fundraisers, admissions officers, and student affairs administrators (for example) find closer to home. At the time, there was no magnetic pole for faculty affairs professionals, so I offered links to several conferences and associations where they could piece together a peer network and learning agenda.

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Leading at Your Growing Edge: Reflecting on the 2019 Seminar on Leadership of the Faculty

by Kiernan Mathews

Jerlando Jackson leads a session during the SeminarWhat leadership is required to help faculty do their very best work for our institutions?

That was the organizing question when, earlier this month, I served as Educational Chair to a second cohort of academic leaders in the Seminar on Leadership of the Faculty. The Seminar is a COACHE program I run with the Harvard Institutes for Higher Education, with my disciplinary colleagues who are leading scholars of the professoriate, and with other outside-the-box thinkers. I started this institute because data I collect suggests that academic leaders struggle to be inventive, despite their training as faculty to be just that. One goal of the Seminar is to reconnect provosts and deans with that quality of inventiveness.

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Growing Our Own: Cultivating Faculty Leadership

by Kiernan Mathews

This article was originally published in Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning

A professor teaching

“What do the faculty think?” It's a question that governing boards and presidents ask routinely—or don't ask at their peril. It's also the question that, for nearly 15 years, has prompted nearly 300 colleges and universities to participate in the survey research project I direct to understand and assess the faculty experience.

But here's the problem: it's the wrong question. The seasoned college leader appreciates that there is no such thing as “a” faculty (“encamped just north of Armageddon,” according to Robert Zemsky) followed by a verb in the third-person singular. Rather, there are many faculties. Since Change's founding, the increasing diversity in the roles, demographics, and institutional homes of faculty is the most consequential factor bedeviling the leadership of the faculty enterprise and, therefore, any transformation of the academy.

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2018 Year in Review: COACHE Reflects on Accomplishments and Findings

A page with data points from the 2018 Faculty Job Satisfaction Survey2018 here at the Collaborative brought with it growth far surpassing our faculty surveys. We collaborated with the Harvard Institutes for Higher Education (HIHE) to launch the first ever Seminar on Leadership of the Faculty, a three-day workshop for academic leadership. An introduction between Harvard Club of New York, HIHE, and COACHE partners at the CUNY system led to a $100,000 grant for CUNY to invest in developing diverse faculty leadership. Data from the Faculty Job Satisfaction Survey yielded an exploration of mid-career faculty, an going pursuit to prevent mid-career malaise and provide support. The Faculty Retention and Exit Survey revealed the risk that a “counteroffer culture” poses to faculties’ home institutions during salary negotiations. Finally, an overhaul of our data dissemination process has made it easier for researchers to access our data in order to implement institutional changes.

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Building Policies through a Collaborative Forum at Skidmore College

The title page from the Skidmore case study documentSkidmore College, a liberal arts college in upstate New York, wanted to understand climate and leadership challenges within their academic departments. As faculty groups rarely had the opportunity to collaborate, it became increasingly difficult for faculty and administrators to address shared challenges in a unified manner and arrive at meaningful, campus-wide solutions. In an absence of a common group that could bridge this gap, Skidmore College partnered with the COACHE to conduct the Faculty Job Satisfaction Survey on their campus.

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