Lecturing is one of the most common and oldest forms of instruction. In recent years, lecturing has also become one of the more controversial teaching strategies as well. Recently, my campus hosted my friend and co-author, Todd Zakrajsek, who spoke on his book, Dynamic Lecturing: Research-Based Strategies to Enhance Lecture Effectiveness. In today’s post, I want to share some of the highlights from the book and advice regarding planning dynamic and effective lectures.
Each opening on the U.S. Supreme Court leads to everyone questioning how a change in justices might impact the legal environment for higher education. Just as after Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s departure, Anthony Kennedy’s retirement means the swing vote on many key higher education cases will be leaving the Court. While the Supreme Court’s more recent history with ruling on affirmative action in the context of the two rounds of cases involving the University of Michigan are more familiar to most people in higher education today, the longer history often is less understood. In today’s post, I will share the legal history of affirmative action in higher education admissions before the Michigan cases.
Tenure has a P.R. problem. This is something we’ve known for a long time, but seems to be coming to a head with all of the internal and external pressures facing higher education institutions. The Chronicle of Higher Eduction has done a number of stories on tenure recently that highlight many of these concerns. Indeed, these concerns were part of what motivated me to write How to Get Tenure as I believe the current environment is as challenging as any in recent years for pre-tenure faculty. In today’s post, I want to share an article from the Chronicle that I provided some information for that I think does an excellent job highlighting these pressures.
The initial reaction to my new book, How to Get Tenure: Strategies for Successfully Navigating the Process, has been enthusiastic and I am excited for its publication. Several people have asked me about the purpose of the book and what all I discuss in it. The tenure process can be such a mysterious black box that there was a great deal of ground to cover with the book. For today’s post, I thought it would be helpful to share an excerpt from the Preface that gives some more details about the book and what I discuss in the various chapters.
The tenure process can vary dramatically based on the type of institution (i.e. a teaching or research university), the nature of the discipline, the culture of the academic department, and personal circumstances. I have written this book to be broadly applicable to faculty pursuing tenure in any college or university. Where differences may occur based on particular circumstances, I note these and provide some ideas for the reader to determine what is most appropriate in a particular case. The examples used throughout this book are drawn from research conducted in many different contexts, as well as from my own experiences. As the reader, you will be best able to apply the ideas in this book when considering your local context and the peculiarities of your own path to tenure.
While we often refer to the tenure process as if it is a single process that assistant professors undergo, the reality is the tenure process constitutes three interrelated streams that work both together and at cross purposes. The tenure process is comprised of a legal process, a peer review process, and a political process. This idea is foundational to understanding tenure and how I approach the subject in How to Get Tenure: Strategies for Successfully Navigating the Process. In this excerpt, I discuss the three processes and how they influence various aspects of the pre-tenure years.
