Keynote: Dealing with Dysfunction – Moving Forward When Others Are Moving Backwards |
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Richard T. Castallo Dr. Castallo will be talking with us about a topic we don’t often discuss – how to build strong cultures while dealing with resistant and challenging staff members. His presentation will be shared through the eyes of the main character of his book, a department chair that is faced with a number dysfunctional faculty members that are highly resistant to serving their students and institutions in a satisfactory manner. The role of the chair in relation to his dean and provost will be discussed. Some specific suggestions on what we can do institutionally, as well as individually will also be provided. |
Opening Plenary: Effective Academic Leadership in the Age of Uncertainty |
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Jon M. Garon Higher Education has just begun to experience a series of future shocks involving changing student demographics, financial stresses, adaptive courseware, online learning, personalized education, stackable credentials, artificial intelligence, new media platforms, regulatory upheaval, leadership turnover, and faculty uncertainty. Academic deans are expected to incorporate change while assuring stability, tranquility, and cohesion. This program will identify the key changes likely to have the greatest impact on educational organizations and explore the strategies available to meet institutional demands, improve learning outcomes, and increase the satisfaction for both students and institutional stakeholders. |
Special Plenary: Using Data and Collaboration to Transform Student Outcomes |
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Timothy M. Renick By implementing and scaling a series of student-centered and analytics-informed programs, Georgia State University has raised graduation rates by 23 percentage points and closed all achievement gaps based on the students’ race, ethnicity, and income level. It now awards more bachelor’s degrees to African Americans than any other college or university in the nation. Through a discussion of innovations ranging from chat bots and predictive analytics to meta-majors and completion grants, the session will cover lessons learned from Georgia State’s process of institutional transformation, including strategies for promoting cross-campus collaboration. |
Overcoming Obstacles When Implementing System-Level Gateway Course Redesign |
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Rachel Bates Across the country, institutions are embracing the significant gains in student success and course completion rates thanks to the research in gateway course reform efforts. In this session, participants will explore the state-system innovation intended to improve student outcomes in developmental education and gateway courses in colleges and universities in Oklahoma. This session will describe the complexities that innovation can entail in multi-stakeholder environments such as higher education. Lessons learned from numerous stakeholders perspectives will be at the center of this session. These perspectives created unique ethos based upon their own realities and pressures. |
Student Transformation—A Goal We Can All Embrace |
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Michael Gray Navigating the challenges facing institutions of higher learning requires leadership teams and faculty that focus on the right goal. “Meaningful change” in institutions must prioritize student transformation. Student transformation is most likely when students are embedded in a coordinated constellation of relationships, programs, challenges, and opportunities designed to deeply develop each student’s potential and character to prepare them to act as agents of transformative change in their workplace, cultures, and world. |
General Education as a Campus-Wide Collaborative Effort |
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Jacob M. Held The general education program at the University of Central Arkansas (The UCA Core) is an outcomes based general education program scaffolded throughout the student’s entire education from introductory level course work and a first year seminar to upper division course work. In this presentation, Dr. Held will discuss how assessment informs continuous improvement of the general education program at UCA by means of campus-wide conversations and collaborative efforts, from assignment design to faculty development and curriculum review and revision. |
From Change Agent to Game Changer: Cultivating Equity and Inclusion for Institutional Success |
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Kim Jackson Academic deans have a unique role in “minding the gap” between students, faculty and the administrative functions and responsibilities of their institution. This becomes increasing difficult as the persistence and resilience of student and faculty bodies evolve in an era where the presence or absence of “safe spaces” is polarized and politicized. How can academic deans leverage their spheres of influence to create and sustain equitable learning and work environments? Examining these challenges through an equity and inclusion lens, we will discuss the implications of those challenges on how we engage with one another and how that engagement correlates with success. This meditation on leadership will focus on best practices for increasing cultural competence and cultural humility in faculty so that the institution can thrive. |
Toto, I’ve a Feeling We’re not in Kansas Anymore: Going Beyond the “Lone Creator” Myth |
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Stephen J. Peters Creativity has been a focus of academic fields and leadership for decades. But it has become an urgent concern in today’s innovation-driven world. In virtually every creative endeavor, collaboration is the most vital force, yet it is also the least understood. This highly interactive session will introduce a constructive new view of the relationships that matter in creative collaboration. Participants will use role playing to explore the interpersonal dynamics that generate a creative process between participants in any group. |
Developing C5 for an Inclusive and Culturally-Responsive Leadership in Higher Education: Beyond the Language of Critique |
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Abdelilah Salim Sehlaoui Institutions of higher education are faced with the challenge of creating a representative and inclusive leadership style that is culturally-responsive to the needs of diverse students and faculty. The development of such style of leadership is based on how the concept of culture is used in education from a critical perspective. While there is need for systematic organizational learning to implement diversity culture change across campus, cross-cultural competence development among academic leaders is usually founded on traditional conceptualizations and hegemonic approaches. The presenter will share recommendations, hands-on activities, and strategies based on research and experience as a minority educator and academic leader, as well as his extensive experience working with other faculty and students who are culturally and linguistically-diverse. |
Managing Day-to-Day Operations While Keeping Focused on the Big Picture |
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Mark Wallenmeyer We all get bogged down with the day to day operations of education. This discussion will focus on methods of changing our way of thinking and of motivating your faculty and staff, along with ways that we as administrators need to keep our focus on the bigger picture of leading our institutions forward. |
Strategic Approaches to Institutional Diversity and Inclusion |
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Angela Webster Everyone has a story. Each person’s story interacts with the larger, complex American story. Understanding the juxtaposition of individual story to national history sheds light on ways campus leaders can design, implement, and shepherd strategies, systems, and structures that afford positive experiences for all. Strategies include collaborative leadership; data mining; academic, social, and professional student success; student financial support; recruitment and retention of underrepresented student, faculty, and staff communities; overall advancement of institutional diversity and inclusion. After all, everyone wants to be visible, valued, and validated. |
Panel Discussion: Working With Stakeholder Advisory Councils to Achieve Mutual Goals |
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Jimmy Ishee |
Jeff Robertson |
Terry Wright |
Nicole McZeal Walters |
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Moderated by Neil Hattlestad Learner and program outcomes can be enhanced when regional stakeholders are properly organized into advisory councils that meet periodically with academic personnel. This panel of college deans will focus on models of advisory council organization that have worked for them. Panelists will also discuss plans for advisory councils of the future as they adjust to the changing landscape in higher education. |
Panel Discussion: CAOs, Deans, and Chairs Working Together to Achieve Department, College, and University Goals |
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Penny Garcia |
Scott Newman |
Hal Strough |
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Moderated by Amy Hawkins The contributions of academic leaders at all levels are complex and numerous. This panel discussion explores the unique roles and responsibilities at each level in addition to examining the intersection between these roles in achieving the goals of the institution as a whole as well as those of its academic colleges and departments. |