Chief Academic Officer Blog
Fall 2020 Update: Guidelines & Practices
August 21, 2020
Dear Campus Teaching Community,
Thank you for your continued commitment to teaching excellence and student success during these challenging early days of the fall semester. In an effort to help you more easily access vital information about protecting yourself and the entire campus community, I offer the information below with links that provide more detailed information about each of these concerns. You will also find all of this information in the eCampus Community of Practice for reference.
Update on Fall 2020 Semester: Collaborative for Teaching Innovation and Faculty Forum
August 13, 2020
Dear Faculty and Staff of Academic Affairs,
Thank you to all those that participated in the Faculty “QuickStart Your Course Session” on Friday July 31st. It was great to see so many of you interacting and sharing your concerns and needs in preparation for the new academic year. My deepest thanks go to the Collaborative for Teaching Innovation leadership team (Dr. Carol Bunch-Davis, Dr. David Baca, Katie Slatton, and Laurissa Noack) and to Martha Lopez for a fantastic organization and engaging discussions. You input has helped identify areas of concern and interest that will guide our team in developing presentations/workshops that will be offered following the Faculty Forum (Aug 18, 9-11AM).
Update on Fall 2020 Semester Classes and Operations
June 30, 2020
Dear Students, Faculty and Staff:
We are looking forward to creating an environment that allows you to learn, teach, and work safely and successfully. Additional details were provided by Texas A&M University in College Station yesterday. Please review the information below carefully.
Fall Semester Preparations
June 18, 2020
Dear Faculty and Staff of Academic Affairs,
Another week has passed since my last communication and work continues in force to prepare for the fall semester. We are all indebted to the Action Team, co-lead by Dr. Antonietta Quigg and Dr. JoAnn DiGeorgio-Lutz, that is working on the planning and implementation of the return to class this coming fall. They have been unwavering in their effort and focused on providing as much clarity as possible in the soonest possible timeline. Please help me thank their selfless service (the full membership of the committee is listed at the end of this message), which they have kept going constantly for nearly two months and is reaching the level of detail that should provide the level of clarity we all are seeking.
Be An Ally
June 5, 2020
Dear Faculty,
As I was mulling over the much-needed update for immediate return to work and preparations for fall, my message and its relevance to everyone’s lives was suddenly gutted of meaning and purpose. Our President and our COO have both addressed our community repeatedly on how our community is wrenched by yet another senseless and brutal murder of an African American man. I align behind and support their message of unity, or commitment to our core values, and their call to make a difference in the lives of all members of our community. The latter part is where I want to start today. It is a question (how?) that needs to turn into action: “How”. I need to find ways to make a difference for black people who are impacted by systemic and institutional racism and who face challenges every day because of it.
Disruptive Methodologies in Academia – Take 2
April 16, 2018
In the previous installment, I discussed the potential benefits of moving from expert thinking to a design thinking model for curricular review and defining the learning outcomes we are aspiring to provide students with. At some level, the same benefits could be obtained from intentionally applying design thinking to research and creative processes in academia. Researchers and creative scholars should favor risk taking in developing innovation. In fact, I’ll argue that during the mid-20th Century that design thinking approach was formalized and institutionalized, but then lost somewhat in recent decades.
Disruptive Methodologies in Academia – Take 1
April 12, 2018
In my recent reads about influential trends that affect society and Higher Education in particular, design thinking and disruptive technology seem to take the lion’s share of discussions around how to plan systems of tomorrow, whether these are technological processes or social ones. Academia falls predominantly in the latter and in spite of seeing it’s fair amount of disruptive technologies in last decades, its evolution seems to have remained relatively linear, and may need a major rewrite in coming years to remain relevant to society’s needs. But before I explore the notion of circularity vs. linearity, let’s discuss disruptive technology.