Academic Affairs

Each year Forbes bestows a handful of “edu-preneurs” with the 30 Under 30 Award in Education (Under30), designating those individuals as the best hope for revolutionizing and reforming education. Boasting low recipient rates, Forbes elevates the manufactured expertise of awardees and the importance of their organizations and ventures. Further, Forbes employs the language and norms of neoliberalism to articulate a pro-market vision of education reform. This social network analytic (SNA) study seeks to untangle the edu-preneur network and critically examine the connections between awardees, their organizations, judges, and the larger education reform network. To this end, we utilized descriptive analyses and SNA. We find evidence that Under30 serves as a mechanism for promoting social closure and ideological homophily within education reform networks. Further, we consider the policy implications that such awards may have on public discourse and policy creation. 

The division of Academic Affairs is the heartbeat of institutional transformation.  These leaders are responsible for stewarding the university’s intellectual and operational core while simultaneously navigating a complex ecosystem at the confluence of teaching, research, and service.  They are not just administrators; they are stewards of knowledge, creators of culture, and architects of the institution’s future.  However, their dual responsibilities for ensuring academic excellence and fostering innovation can produce conflicting demands, requiring a nuanced approach to leadership.  This document offers a reflection on leadership, scholarship, and transformative practices and suggests a comprehensive approach to advancing the work of Academic Affairs through intentional scholarship, adaptive strategies, and reflective practices.  The premise is simple yet profound: for Academic Affairs to lead effectively, it must embody the best qualities of the scholar-practitioners on our faculties, becoming leaders who can bridge theory and practice to create systems that are responsive, equitable, and innovative.

Higher education, shaped by society’s aspirations and challenges, now faces unprecedented demands for agility, foresight, and courage. Pressures such as declining enrollments, unprepared students, heightened scrutiny on institutional value, demands for career-ready graduates, and funding uncertainties require leaders to rethink their approach. Unlike the stable maps of the past, today’s leaders must act as compasses, guiding their institutions through uncharted terrain. By setting clear direction, defining measurable outcomes, and fostering trust, leaders can navigate these challenges and empower their teams to achieve shared goals with purpose.

Academic Affairs occupies a unique position in higher education: it is the nexus where institutional vision meets execution. We are tasked with leading the university's intellectual and operational missions by translating strategy into action and fostering an environment where students, faculty, and staff can thrive. Although we know our work is essential and complex, our most persistent challenge rests in our inability to plan effectively. We possess the ambition, creativity, and vision necessary to perform our work effectively. Nevertheless, we lack discipline, specifically, the discipline to plan before acting, to differentiate strategy from tactics, and to execute tasks with accountability and precision. Planning failures have far-reaching consequences, from misallocated resources and fragmented priorities to diminished student success and institutional stagnation. This AXIOM represents a call to action. It is also a guide for transforming how we plan in Academic Affairs, bridging the gap between intention and action. Planning is not just a tool; it is leadership in action. When done well, it transforms challenges into opportunities and visions into realities.

"Teaching Across Cultural Strengths."  April: Interactive Theater & role play exercises with student group RAD (Reflection, Action, Dialogue) and Kaarin Johnston, CSB/SJU Theater Department. I. Curricular diversity Rationale:  Students of color want us to diversity the body of authors on the syllabus (April 4, 2016 "What CSB/SJU Students of Color Want Their Faculty to Know")-and they notice when they can't see themselves in the course materials. Student voices:  ASOC student from focus group: "They [CSB/SJU community as a whole] are glad there is diversity but there is nothing inside of it. We have to assimilate to the white culture more than they want to learn about our culture."  White student from focus group: "I think including different perspectives is something they [faculty] are trying to think about." Curricular Diversity, done well, is transformative:  The kinds of questions and concerns explored in the classroom become different because different voices are included.

In a time when higher education stands at the crossroads of tradition and transformation, the need for visionary, daring leaders is greater than ever. Leaders who embody the spirit of the "greater fool"-a concept popularized by The Newsroom-accept the challenges others avoid. This leader is willing to look past the comfort of convention, take bold risks, and embrace both uncertainty and failure in the pursuit of progress. The greater fool is not just idealistic; they are driven by a belief that higher education can be better, more responsive, and more impactful in meeting the needs of students and society.

Faculty service expectations within higher education have increased to unsustainable levels, detracting from faculty members' core responsibilities for teaching and research. As these service expectations have grown, so has the need for strategic leadership to rebalance these obligations and ensure that institutional needs are met while allowing faculty to optimize all three aspects of their professional responsibilities. Utilizing a strategic framework based on the Pareto Principle and networked governance could allow institutions to address these imbalances and create a more equitable system that empowers faculty while improving institutional effectiveness. Why Leadership in Faculty Service Matters Leadership within academic affairs extends beyond administrative efficiency. Academic leaders must also focus on empowering faculty to engage deeply in teaching, research, and service. Overburdened faculty can become disengaged, which reduces their job satisfaction, research output, and the quality of their teaching. The key to addressing this challenge lies in rethinking traditional practices for service distribution. Effective leadership in this area fosters collaboration, enhances productivity, and promotes innovation by allowing faculty to redirect their focus to high-impact tasks.

In the evolving landscape of higher education, academic receivership represents a moment of profound transformation. When conventional governance structures fail, and academic units lose their way due to internal strife, financial instability, or leadership voids, receivership emerges as both a last resort and a catalyst for revitalization. Much like its origins in the business sector, academic receivership is a controlled intervention designed to realign, stabilize, and restore functionality to a failing department or program. It is not merely about managing failure but creating the conditions for a new paradigm of leadership that transforms dysfunction into resilience.

The first two volumes of How College Affects Students constitute the most-cited publications in higher education research. Since these volumes were published, the literature on college impact has expanded greatly, which is at least partially the result of the nearly 500 journals focusing on the scholarship of teaching and learning internationally. In addition to the increase in the quantity of college impact research, methodological advancements and the changing notion of the higher education enterprise have further shaped the rigor and tenor of the literature. We draw on our experience and lessons learned from conducting the most recent comprehensive synthesis of college impact literature to discuss 10 challenges and corresponding recommendations to advance future research of the effects of college on students.

The first two volumes of How College Affects Students constitute the most-cited publications in higher education research. Since these volumes were published, the literature on college impact has expanded greatly, which is at least partially the result of the nearly 500 journals focusing on the scholarship of teaching and learning internationally. In addition to the increase in the quantity of college impact research, methodological advancements and the changing notion of the higher education enterprise have further shaped the rigor and tenor of the literature. We draw on our experience and lessons learned from conducting the most recent comprehensive synthesis of college impact literature to discuss 10 challenges and corresponding recommendations to advance future research of the effects of college on students.

The first two volumes of How College Affects Students constitute the most-cited publications in higher education research. Since these volumes were published, the literature on college impact has expanded greatly, which is at least partially the result of the nearly 500 journals focusing on the scholarship of teaching and learning internationally. In addition to the increase in the quantity of college impact research, methodological advancements and the changing notion of the higher education enterprise have further shaped the rigor and tenor of the literature. We draw on our experience and lessons learned from conducting the most recent comprehensive synthesis of college impact literature to discuss 10 challenges and corresponding recommendations to advance future research of the effects of college on students.

The ESS was called to act during the fall of 2009. We faced a critical test: to stand beside the housekeepers at the hotel where we were supposed to hold the 2010 conference or to ignore their plight. I use the case study of breaking a contract with the Hyatt Hotel in order to locate the Hyatt layoffs in a broader context. This case is meant to illuminate two related issues. (1) The Hyatt Hotel used a traditional strategy of labor substitution in the context of a new global economy. During this ongoing economic crisis, housekeepers, who were promised good jobs and benefits, had worked hard on a steep climb toward fulfilling the American Dream. The resourcefulness of the unions, who saw the loss of these jobs as a threat to the entire industry, and articulate laid-off workers, who captured the media's attention, kept this newsworthy. (2) When faced with choices over ''whose side are we on,'' our strategies for how to act need to be different than academic posturing. I answer the question of how we should act when we become actors in these situations, which is what the ESS was confronted with over the Hyatt's housekeeper firing.

Faculty are the heart of any institution of higher learning because they are the most important point of contact with students. Therefore, supporting faculty success is crucial to student learning, which is why institutions of higher learning exist.

This paper discusses the synthesised findings from two interdisciplinary, feminist studies conducted under the auspices of the non-corporate nexus, the Women's Academic Network at Bournemouth University, UK, of which the main author is a co-convenor and co-founder. These qualitative studies focus on academic women's experiences of managing careers in the work culture of corporate Institutions of Higher Education (HE) in a modern UK university. The background to this work draws from a body of international research into the slower career progression rates of women academics in comparison to male counterparts and the gendered barriers the former encounter. While there has been encouragement within Higher Education bodies across the EU to balance out the current gendered inequities within academia, our findings indicate that these are woven into the institutional fabric of enacted daily academic practices serving to disadvantage women scholars. Furthermore, although located at different starting and end positions on the career track, women academics, like male colleagues, are equally subject to the increasing expectations of the corporate HEI towards production line academic work which serves to decentralise and degrade the critical intellectualism and worth of academia in an attempt to reframe it as a masculinised, quantifiably driven, quasi-business exercise in knowledge 'output' and production-line teaching in the context of mass education. This isomorphic global trend is analysed in an illuminating book The Slow Professor by Berg and Seeber (2016). 'Slow' taken in the sense that Berg and Seeber (2016) intend is a term has been inspired by other 'slow' movements (for example 'slow food' versus 'fast food'). In this usage it means 'deliberate' or 'conscious' as well as 'in-depth'. This is posed as a challenge to corporatisation and the demands of an ever-increasing tempo in HE. In our paper, in line with feminist research methodologies, we take our inspiration from Berg and Seeber's analysis to further explore how women academics are situated and 'managed' in the gendered commodification of Higher Education in the UK, with clear applications to a wider international community of women scholars working in entrenched patriarchal HEI.

In Spring 2021, the librarian presenters partnered with Laura Bauer, a Nutrition faculty member, to teach students in introductory Nutrition classes information evaluation skills. The instructor\u27s assignment originally asked the class of non-science major students to find a recipe online that met a personal nutrition goal based on current recommendations. The assignment evolved for a class of pre-health science students into an evaluative assignment where students were asked to research a fad diet online and compare those findings with the scholarly literature, all while considering diet culture through a social justice lens. In this session we\u27ll discuss how the librarians and professor collaborated to create an assignment that incorporated the learning objectives of the course into a real-life scenario where students would be expected to critically evaluate information. Over our two-part library instruction session with the pre-health science majors, we introduced two evalua...

gender of globalization has been obscured by " neutral " analytical lenses that overlook the powerful incongruity between women's key roles in the global labor force and their social and economic marginalization, as well as their persistent efforts to navigate the processes that produce this incongruity. Our main concern in this volume is to understand, via the lenses of gender and cultural analysis, the ways in which women participate in, become drawn and incorporated into, are affected by, and negotiate their encounters with contemporary forms of global economic restructuring commonly referred to as globalization. We bring together ethnographic case studies from diverse locations in the global South and the global North, analyzing economic globalization as a gendered process. Our purpose is to move beyond the naturalization of gender in our analysis of globalization; 1 we illustrate how local and global constructions of gender are employed in the operations of transn...

The trend towards internationalization is becoming increasingly important in HEI (higher education institutions ) and universities in many countries. As HEIs become more international, they are increasingly recognized as contributing to the competitiveness of its graduates. Conceptually, internationalization has long been understood as a focus on the transnational movement of individual students and scholars rather than as a strategy to influence higher education institutions and systems. The importance of internationalization in HEIs and universities has increased over the past two decades of globalization .The Internet will continue to play a significant role, opening opportunities to reach a wider global audience. Online and other forms of e-learning approaches continue to play a significant role, especially in the postCOVID_19 era. This calls for adapting some of the higher education policies to new realities of future competitiveness in higher education deliver, and to ensure t...

Good morning, class of 2022, Johnnies, Bennies, Students of SOT, members of our monastic community, guests, staff and fellow faculty: Today is a very special day: it marks the beginning of a new school year and what is more exciting, it marks the entrance of class of 2022 into this great community. Saint John's University, founded in 1857, is grounded in the Benedictine tradition, which dates back to the 6 th century. Based on the Rule of Benedict, a Benedictine education aims to transform the human mind and heart through cultivation of values such as: listening, hospitality, taking counsel, reverence of all persons, and pursuit of the common good.

This paper discusses the synthesised findings from two interdisciplinary, feminist studies conducted under the auspices of the non-corporate nexus, the Women's Academic Network at Bournemouth University, UK, of which the main author is a co-convenor and co-founder. These qualitative studies focus on academic women's experiences of managing careers in the work culture of corporate Institutions of Higher Education (HE) in a modern UK university. The background to this work draws from a body of international research into the slower career progression rates of women academics in comparison to male counterparts and the gendered barriers the former encounter. While there has been encouragement within Higher Education bodies across the EU to balance out the current gendered inequities within academia, our findings indicate that these are woven into the institutional fabric of enacted daily academic practices serving to disadvantage women scholars. Furthermore, although located at different starting and end positions on the career track, women academics, like male colleagues, are equally subject to the increasing expectations of the corporate HEI towards production line academic work which serves to decentralise and degrade the critical intellectualism and worth of academia in an attempt to reframe it as a masculinised, quantifiably driven, quasi-business exercise in knowledge 'output' and production-line teaching in the context of mass education. This isomorphic global trend is analysed in an illuminating book The Slow Professor by Berg and Seeber (2016). 'Slow' taken in the sense that Berg and Seeber (2016) intend is a term has been inspired by other 'slow' movements (for example 'slow food' versus 'fast food'). In this usage it means 'deliberate' or 'conscious' as well as 'in-depth'. This is posed as a challenge to corporatisation and the demands of an ever-increasing tempo in HE. In our paper, in line with feminist research methodologies, we take our inspiration from Berg and Seeber's analysis to further explore how women academics are situated and 'managed' in the gendered commodification of Higher Education in the UK, with clear applications to a wider international community of women scholars working in entrenched patriarchal HEI.

I dedicate this dissertation to my mother, Clara, who is one of the strongest and most resilient people I have ever met. She taught me to work hard, be humble, overcome adversity, and to never stop being grateful. My mother never attended college, and likely does fully comprehend what a dissertation is, but her love, guidance, and support helped make this dissertation (and defense) possible. Ma, I love you and hope this makes you proud. I dedicate this dissertation to my best friend, Sonia, who is my rock, my morale compass, and a true example of taking life's lemons and making something resembling lemonade. You remind me to make the most out of every day and to live life to its fullest. I dedicate this dissertation to my sister Kassandra, brother Andre, uncle Balmir, and grandma Clara. Your love, support, and encouragement helped me complete this journey. "I'm done with school." I never expected that seven years later, I would complete a doctoral degree. This would not have been possible without the love, support, and

Discussing difficult issues in the classroom is necessary preparation for engaged citizenship. A number of pedagogical practices used by the authors have produced open and constructive conversation. These practices, combined with modeling and encouragement by the professor and trust among classmates, give students opportunities to practice effective interpersonal conflict management, civility, and expand their understanding of the topic at hand.

"Teaching Across Cultural Strengths."  April: Interactive Theater & role play exercises with student group RAD (Reflection, Action, Dialogue) and Kaarin Johnston, CSB/SJU Theater Department. I. Curricular diversity Rationale:  Students of color want us to diversity the body of authors on the syllabus (April 4, 2016 "What CSB/SJU Students of Color Want Their Faculty to Know")-and they notice when they can't see themselves in the course materials. Student voices:  ASOC student from focus group: "They [CSB/SJU community as a whole] are glad there is diversity but there is nothing inside of it. We have to assimilate to the white culture more than they want to learn about our culture."  White student from focus group: "I think including different perspectives is something they [faculty] are trying to think about." Curricular Diversity, done well, is transformative:  The kinds of questions and concerns explored in the classroom become different because different voices are included.

Title of Document: ACADEMIC AFFAIRS AND STUDENT AFFAIRS PARTNERSHIPS PROMOTING DIVERSITY INITIATIVES ON CAMPUS: A GROUNDED THEORY Lucy Anne LePeau, Doctor of Philosophy, 2012 Directed By: Professor Susan R. Komives Department of Counseling, Higher Education, and Special Education Higher education research suggests student affairs and academic affairs partner to address challenges on campus, such as building inclusive environments for diverse students and staff, but evidence about how partnerships form is lacking in the literature. The purpose of this constructivist grounded theory was to understand how the process of forming academic affairs and student affairs partnerships about diversity initiatives developed with educators involved in a national Project launched by the Association of American Colleges and Universities in the 1990s. The American Commitments Project was designed to encourage educators to center tenets related to diversity in the curriculum and co-curriculum. Resear...

There is an increasing concern about the absence of women in senior positions in academia and administration within institutions (Johnson, 2016). There is limited research to compare the journeys of women leaders in academics and administration. This study is an examination of women’s experiences of perceived barriers to leadership roles in faculty and administration. Using comprehensive interviews, this study explores personal accounts to emphasize apparent barriers to career advancement. The goal of the study is to explore women in senior positions in academia and administrative paths to leadership. The male dominated society has made it challenging for women to grow their careers in higher education. Bonawitz (2009) assessed factors including demographics, gender norms, education, employee relations, family, and unwritten rules. Additionally, researchers have evaluated policies and procedures to work on increasing the number of women in educational leadership (Bonawitz, 2009) His...

The U.S. labor movement is in deep trouble. Many assume that union decline is irreversible—the result of changes in the nature of work and unions' inability to adapt. However, American laws and corporate resistance are also responsible. New union tactics and militancy point toward a possible revival of a workers' movement.

Institutions of higher education often use the term “at-risk” to label undergraduate students who have a higher likelihood of not persisting. However, it is not clear how the use of this label impacts the perspectives of the higher education professionals who serve and support these students. Our qualitative study explores the descriptions and understandings of higher education professionals who serve and support at-risk students. We use thematic analysis (Braun & Clark, 2006) to interpret our data and develop our themes. These themes include conflicting views of the “at-risk” definition, attempts to normalize atrisk, fostering relationships, and “at-promise.”

We would like to express our gratitude to the LFHE for funding this work and, in particular, Robin Middlehurst and Helen Goreham for their support and guidance. We would also like to acknowledge the contribution of our colleagues Michelle Ryan, Kim Peters and Alex Haslam in the University of Exeter School of Psychology, as well as Jonathan Wyatt of the Oxford Learning Institute who helped arrange the listening posts. We are very grateful to the participants in our study, whose thoughtful contributions and generosity with their time is much appreciated.

Robin Middlehurst and Helen Goreham for their support and guidance. We would also like to acknowledge the contribution of our colleagues Michelle Ryan, Kim Peters and Alex Haslam in the University of Exeter School of Psychology, as well as Jonathan Wyatt of the Oxford Learning Institute who helped arrange the listening posts. We are very grateful to the participants in our study, whose thoughtful contributions and generosity with their time is much appreciated.

For many years, the dissemination of academic research has been controlled by commercial publishers. However, in light of the continuing inflation of subscription prices for scholarly journals, many academics are investigating open access publishing over the Internet. Although most advanced in the natural sciences, given its essentially political character, open access publishing should also be carefully considered by political scientists (and associated disciplines). This article explores open access publishing and suggests the reputational pay-off of 'normal' publishing can easily be maintained in the open access realm.

Í umsögn gagnrýnenda kemur meðal annars eftirfarandi fram: "Vafalaust er túlkun höfundar á því efni sem fram kemur í langri bók talin umdeilanleg af einhverjum. Það er eðlilegt þar sem sjónarmið einstaklinga og sýn þeirra á menn og málefni eru mismunandi. Engu að síður er ritun bókarinnar "Íslenskir kommúnistar 1918-1998" að mínu mati verðmaett innlegg í íslenska stjórnmálasögu sem varpar nýju ljósi á margt sem áður var hulið einföldum áhugamanni um íslensk stjórnmál."