An Account of Online Learning Experiences with First-Year Doctoral Students

by Sheena Ghanbari, Program Promotion Specialist at UC San Diego; Nahid Nariman, Director of Research at Transformative Inquiry Design for Schools and Systems and Karina M. Viaud, Director of Parent and Family Programs at UC San Diego

Higher Education is faced with multiple challenges such as tuition inflation, student retention, campus climate, and time to degree. Specifically, graduate school, namely Ed.D. and Ph.D. programs, continue to face challenges with student retention; approximately 50% of doctoral students leave the program before attaining the degree (Cassuto, 2013; Lovitts & Nelson, 2000; Reid, 2012) and most students discontinue the program at the ABD stage (All But Dissertation), a stage in which coursework is complete without successfully defending the dissertation (Barnett, 2008). Before reaching the dissertation phase of the doctoral program, many Ed.D. programs institute an end of the first year assignment - i.e., students must qualify for the subsequent year by writing a Qualifying Paper. This stage of the program is important in two ways. First, this stage signifies a critical junction in which the student demonstrates the ability to write a coherent literature review. Second, this stage signifies how well the Qualifying Paper Course prepared and supported the student to move forward in the doctoral program.

Researchers have begun analyzing data trails as means to obtain insight into various academic individualization, prediction, intervention, and adaptation. Analytics has captured meaningful attention in institutional research and business (MacNeill, 2012), and is a relatively new area of research in higher education (Barneveld, Arnold, & Campbell, 2012; Bichsel, 2012). It can also support innovative and meaningful ways of improving students’ performance and success (MacNeill, 2012). Learning analytics enables us to generate specific learning processes and images of students’ performance in a way that the two can be compared to the overall performance of a course (Gaviria, Glahn, Drachsler, Specht, & Gesa, 2011). Early investigation on academic analytics predict students’ academic difficulty in order to help faculty members generate individualized learning instructions tailored to the student’s learning needs (Campbell, DeBlois, & Oblinger, 2007). Broadly speaking, schools or other programs that use analytics evaluate data to help make decisions with information that can determine the best course of action to improve student learning (Hawkins, 2008; Long & Siemens, 2011; Norris, Baer, & Offerman, 2009), and improve teaching and learning (Campbell, 2007; Baepler & Murdoch, 2010).

In an effort to gain a different perspective of writing a Qualifying Paper in the student’s doctoral journey, we proposed that one class of the Qualifying Paper Preparation Course be conducted online to see how students engaged in dialogue about on-becoming a critical consumer of research. We analyzed data from this online activity to garner insight in information-giving while individual and collective learning developed among three groups of four to five doctoral students. We saw data related to students’ early understanding of the assignment develop in real-time. This digital footprint compiled evidence to consider creative ways of action in teaching and students’ learning development in this Qualifying Paper Preparation Course. We were interested in how online analytics can unveil the beginning stages of student learning and affect teaching strategies. We used Google Drive as the platform for the online shared-activity because it is a familiar technology. We collected data over a three-hour course that took place in the third week of the quarter. Participants were randomly assigned to three groups of four or five students. Each group navigated through four modules that explored different approaches to becoming a critical consumer of research. The following is a snapshot of the participants’ reflection on their experiences.

The first module asked participants to think back to assigned course readings and share what it meant to be a critical consumer of research. Building on this premise, the second module began with a video that outlined the process of writing a literature review followed by describing three strategies from the video they would be incorporating in their upcoming literature review for the Qualifying Paper milestone in the Ed.D. program. The third module asked if any new knowledge was gained during this activity and if the participant’s initial definition of a critical consumer of research has changed. After each module, participants also wrote a brief reflection. Finally, the fourth module was an overall reflection and opportunity to share general feedback about their online experience.

At the onset of examining our data, we identified and used key adjectives linked to individual knowledge such as learn, explore, understand, find, and realize. We coded instances of collective learning and interactive conversations that showed collaboration. Responses that suggested individual or collective learning were closely reviewed for evidence of learning during the online activity. The first module focused on defining what it meant to be a critical consumer of research. Group-One had noticeably less interaction than the other groups. This group consistently shared resources and information, but gave less insight into where they were in their learning as a group. There was evidence of some contribution to learning with words like “additionally” and “also” after acknowledging an agreement. Group-Two illustrated greater collective understanding of shared learning experiences and challenges by providing interpretations of each other’s responses and using words like “agree” and “exactly.” Overall, there was a great deal of agreement and key words similar to “learning” were used sparingly in this module. Group-Three showed evidence of interaction and illustrated an awareness of changing current practice as they explored the definition of critical research consumption. This group conversation was deeper and showed a balance of individual and collective learning. For example, one of the exchanges in Group-Three exemplified a thoughtful interaction that included further questioning. Student-One described her interpretation of being a critical consumer of research and then Student-Two responded “I would agree with everything [name of student] said about critical consumption of research ...I would also add that just because it [article] does pertain, does not mean it should be included.” This point was affirmed by Student-One and then she followed with, “I would think that identifying why it [article] doesn’t fit can begin to expose the gaps. Is that your thinking?” The exchange continued and showed a confident display of understanding and deepening of thinking surrounding on-becoming a critical consumer.

The second module shared a video synopsis of how to construct a sound literature review. Group-One and Group-Two shared a level of discomfort with the scholarly process and moving forward with research. As one student in Group-One stated, “I am still questioning everything I write in my paper.” Other students agreed, “I have moments of uncertainty...it is helpful and a bit of validation that this is not an easy process.” Group-Two demonstrated a similar tone of empathy and appreciation for one another, but more acceptance toward the general challenges and ambiguities of the research process. Student-One in Group-Two described “Be comfortable in not being comfortable right now. I need to trust the process and realize that things will start to come together and make sense.” Group-Three showed a high level of interaction as well, and focused more on answering the prompt and sharing strategies with one another. For example, when one student shared a chart on how to organize literature, she received praise and appreciation from her peers.

The third module asked to share any shifts in thinking from their initial definition of becoming a critical consumer of research. Overall, Group-One’s definition of a critical consumer broadened or changed. As one student stated, “My new knowledge has come from the video and the dialogue between my team members.” Statements like this were heard repeatedly from Group-One and there was a particular emphasis in gaining knowledge from the video. Group-Two and Group-Three by-in-large expressed that their definition of a critical consumer of research did not change. Group-Three participants stated: “The discussions tonight helped solidify my existing understanding and allowed me the time to reflect on my own practices as a critical consumer of research.” Statements like this captured students experience in Group-Three. While Group-Two’s and Group-Three’s original definition remained unchanged, Group-Two also shared their preference for in-person (classroom) learning. This type of reflection did not surface in Group-Three where insight and comfort were the more prominent themes.

The final module was a reflection on the entire online activity and an opportunity to provide feedback on the experience. There was a high level of interaction among all three groups in this module and some variations on where they focused their reflections. Group-One delved deeply into practices of online platforms, strengths, weaknesses, and purposes. Group-Two emphasized their appreciation of being able to work remotely with constant reference to the value of time. Group-Three did not have many criticisms of the online platform. They seemed to have navigated through it with a level of ease not as apparent in Group-One and Group-Two. Group-Three saw value in this online activity earlier in their research journey.

Overall, the three groups demonstrated different characteristics to help us assess their understanding of and progress with the course assignment. Group-One constantly shared information and had moments of individual learning, but the collective interaction and knowledge-gaining attributes were less visible. There was a sense of community, but threads of dialogue were surficial at times. Group-Two had a higher level of comfort with their own skill set and showed an understanding of what it meant to be a critical consumer of research. Group-Three demonstrated a high level of competency with learning together and, much like Group-Two, their conversations pushed one another’s thinking. Group-Three also showed a healthy balance of individual and collective learning throughout the different modules. All of the groups conveyed instances of individual and collective learning, and their unique approaches have been enlightening as we learned about their needs as graduate students and emerging researchers.

In brief, this online activity was significant in that it made clear how the students defined their learning progress related to becoming a critical consumer of research and affirmed and supported each other’s success and struggles with the task of writing the Qualifying Paper. Many of the students felt overwhelmed and lost by the task of writing a 20-25 page Qualifying Paper which also meant undergoing critical examination of existing research; an intimidating academic undertaking. These uncertainties were masked before their participation in the online activity and we believe these uncertainties resembled syndromes of an impostor. The impostor syndrome is defined and redefined in a few ways since it was first presented in 1978 by psychologists Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes. The impostor syndrome includes characteristics of fraud, fear of discovery, and difficulty of internalizing actual successes (Craddock, Birnbaum, Rodriguez, Cobb, & Zeeh, 2011; Gravois, 2007). The students who may have felt like they were “faking their way through the course” no longer felt alone once they became vulnerable in the online open forum. Upon outing their vulnerability, they validated one another and provided words of support to help overcome fears or struggles.

Simultaneously, the online interaction deepened our understanding of the students’ learning and progress with the Qualifying Paper. We gained insight in (1) areas in which to spend class time to review developing a literature review, (2) some of the students who had unique struggles in developing the literature review, and (3) students who were doing well with the assignment. Therefore, the online activity served as an intervention tool to learn students’ progress in the Qualifying Paper Preparation Course. In other words, the evidence from the online interaction required us to be flexible in and adaptive to the different levels of learning occurring among the students and respond to their unique needs.

The differences in individual and group learning made it clear that students don’t learn the same way and/or at the same rate, even though they are provided the same information in the same classroom. Although the online learning analytics were ephemeral, it is evident that data has provided information to have discussions about ways to be creative with learning, improve learning and possibly approach the entire course differently for subsequent cohorts.

References

Baepler, P., & Murdoch, C. J. (2010). Academic analytics and data mining in higher education. International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 4(2), Article 17. DOI= http://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/ij-sotl/vol4/iss2/17.

Barneveld, A. V., Arnold, K. L., & Campbell, J. P. (2012). Analytics in Higher Education: DOI= http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/MWR07085.pdf.

Barnett, D. L. (2008). Experiences influencing degree completion articulated by doctoral students in education administration (Doctoral dissertation).  Retrieved from http://ezproxy.csusm.edu/

Bichsel, J. (2012). Analytics in Higher Education: Benefits, Barriers, Progress, and Recommendations. Research Report. Louisville, CO: EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research. DOI=  http://www.educause.edu/ecar.

Campbell, J. P. (2007). The Grand Challenge: Using Analytics to Predict Student Success. Presentation at the 2007 EDUCAUSE Midwest Regional Conference (Oct. 2007). DOI= http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/MWR07085.pdf.

Campbell, J. P., DeBlois, P. B., & Oblinger, D. G. (2007). Academic analytics: A new tool for a new era. EDUCAUSE Review (July/August 2007), 41–57. DOI=  http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/erm0742.pdf.

Cassuto, L. (2013). Ph.D. Attrition: How Much Is Too Much? Chronicle of Higher Education. DOI= http://chronicle.com/article/PhD-Attrition-How-Much-Is/140045.

Craddock, S., Birnbaum, M., Rodriguez, K., & Zeeh, S. (2011). Ph.D. Doctoral students and the impostor phenomenon: Am I smart enough to be here? Journal of Student Affairs Research & Practice. 48, 4 (2011), 429-442.

Gaviria, F., Glahn , C., Drachsler, H. Specht, M., & Gesa, R. F. (2011). Activity-based learner-models for learner monitoring and recommendations in Moodle. In C. Delgado Kloos, D. Gillet, R. M. Crespo García, F. Wild, and M. Wolpers, M. (Eds.) Proceedings of the 6th European Conference on Technology-Enhanced Learning (EC-TEL 2011, Palermo, Italy, September 20-23, 2011). Heidelberg, Berlin: Springer-Verlag.

Gravois, J. (2007). You’re not fooling anyone. Chronicle of Higher Education. 54, 11, A1.

MacNeill, S. (2012). What is Changing and Why Does it Matter? A Briefing Paper. CETIS Analytics Series. 1, 1. DOI= http://publications.cetis.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Analytics-Vol1-No1-Briefing-Paper-online.pdf.

Long, P., & Siemens, G. (2011). Penetrating the fog: Analytics in learning and education. EDUCAUSE review, 46(5), 30-40

Lovitts, B. E., & Nelson, C. (2000). The hidden crisis in graduate school. Attrition from Ph.D. programs. Academe, 86, 6, 44-50.

Norris, D., Baer L., & Offerman, M. (2009). A National Agenda for Action Analytics. White Paper. Presented at the National Symposium on Action Analytics. (St. Paul, Minnesota, September 21-23, 2009). DOI= http://lindabaer.efoliomn.com/uploads/settinganationalagendaforactionanalytics101509.pdf

Reid, C. D. (2012). Joyful obligation: Listening to Black doctoral students in the academy. Doctoral Thesis. UMI Order Number: UMI Order No. 3493868., New York University.

Transcending Macro to Micro: Lines of Research that can assist in Understanding the Manifestation of Neoliberalism in the Lives of Faculty

by Leslie D. Gonzales, Assistant Professor, College of Education, Michigan State University 

Background

             Scholars of higher education have developed a large body of scholarship that addresses faculty careers. Within this scholarship, there are consistent themes: the importance of disciplinary background in forming faculty views of the world and their work, how the type of college or university where one works bears down on the roles and expectations that a faculty member is expected to fulfill (and supported to fulfill). Higher education researchers have also illustrated how faculty careers are not immune to the bent of the wider political-economy, most often characterized as neoliberal, market-centered, commercialized, or austere (see Harvey, 2005 for history of neoliberalism). In fact, neoliberal critiques abound, not only in the U.S. but also throughout Australia, England, Canada, Mexico and many other countries (Apple, 2013; Torres & Schugurensky, 2002). Most of this research demonstrates how the professorial role has been unbundled, de-professionalized, and transformed (sometimes in the face of resistance) into a distinctive entrepreneurialism (Slaughter & Rhoades, 2004).

            Within the neoliberal critiques, studies show that faculty tend to work long hours in order to keep up with growing work load demands; that their work is increasingly understood for its fiscal or cultural resource generation; and that evaluation of faculty work is contingent on their ability and willingness to self-surveil and document what they do with their time (e.g., What was their percentage contribution to a manuscript; How many students did one graduate; How much revenue was generated via one’s course offerings?) (Gonzales & Núñez, 2014). As with most institutionalized patterns of valuation and resource allocation, the effects of the neoliberal turn are often disbursed unequally with female faculty members, individuals of racially or ethnically minoritized statuses, those working in disciplines further from the market, or faculty employed by institutions with fewer resources and limited infrastructure feeling the brunt of inequality. Indeed, Among those most effected are contingent faculty who teach a vast majority of undergraduate courses across American colleges and universities, and who are poorly paid, marginalized, and find themselves with limited or inconsistent access to teaching and learning professional development opportunities and materials from employing institution(s).

            To date, the field has learned a great deal from studies that use a neoliberal lens to explore faculty careers. However, as just suggested, this research has tended to document the ways in which faculty expectations and/or productivity/output patterns have changed, and how those changing expectations often reproduce inequities along the lines of discipline, institutional type, gender, and race (Misra, Lundquist, & Templer, 2012; Niehaus & O’Meara, 2015; Renzulli, Reynold, Kelly & Grant, 2013; Treviño, Gamez-Mejia, Balkin, & Mixon, 2015). Beneath or perhaps behind the pressures to publish and to demonstrate tangible outcomes are daily seemingly invisible or small micro level processes and experiences that the neoliberal moment also bears down on, but which are currently under-examined. To this point, Bastedo (2012) urged higher education researchers, and especially organizational theorists, to take a close look into “educational work” (p. 10) as it unfolds in a daily, perhaps even mundane, way. The goal of this post is to explore three ways of doing so, and I begin, drawing from the work of Anna Neumann, by asking if and how we might shift to studying faculty careers not only or primarily as a producing enterprise, but as a learning one.

Understanding the Faculty Career as a Learning Enterprise

            In her work, Anna Neumann (2009) encourages scholars and college and university leaders to remember that the work of faculty hinges on continual learning—an idea that is often muted in the desire to understand outputs, outcomes, and productivity. Although, the focus on output or productivity, in general is important and connected to an overarching concern with how the neoliberal bent positions colleges and universities, and in turn their faculty, as market competitors, there is also much work on the part of faculty that goes into “producing,” which the field knows little about. Specifically, the field knows little about how faculty members, embedded in (and producers of) the productivity culture, extend their scholarly learning: how they form and explore ideas, test out or articulate their thoughts as they grapple with old and new theories and developments. Given this gap in knowledge, there is merit in exploring such phenomena, broadly, and also in trying to understand how faculty learning efforts fall out differently among different groups of professors, such as those on and off the tenure-line, across gender lines, among faculty members who hold racially and ethnically minoritized status inside an institution constructed by and for White, wealthy males and for those who have come to know the world with Western-centric ideology and epistemology.

            Indeed, history has shown that women, women of color and communities of color, more broadly, create and engage in productive learning outside of mainstream apparatus. Martinez Aléman (2000; 2010) illustrated how the learning experiences for young traditionally aged women and women of color differed (in terms of space and content) from that of young male students, and also from that of the other female group. Espino, Muñoz, and Marquez Kiyama (2010) shared how their friendship and bond has been central, indeed integral, to their intellectual development. With the power of these examples in mind, we need more studies that systematically focus on how faculty commit and recommit to learning over the course of their work lives, the ways in which community and friendship play a role in allowing academics to form ideas, to talk out loud about their work in ways that allow them to be vulnerable, and what such efforts look like across gender, race, familial composition/commitments; disciplinary affiliations; appointment types; and across different institutional types. Such work would not necessarily shed light on productivity, as it is typically defined in the current neoliberal moment, but it would remind researchers and leaders that meaningful productivity must be fed by scholars’ ability to extend their learning.

Deploying Intersectionality to Trace the Differential Effects of the

Neoliberalism on Faculty Mobility

            As already alluded to, cultures (e.g., disciplinary norms, normative dispositions toward work, professionalism) and structures (e.g., appointment types, hiring processes, tenure and promotion guidelines) do not operate in the same way for all faculty members. Faculty members enter academia as raced, gendered, classed, and otherwise marked bodies. However, beyond the personal and biographical markers that faculty carry, they also enter academia with particular forms of capital such as that attached to the type of institution where they completed their doctoral work, unearned capital attached to the cache of their major advisors, their methodological experiences/stances, and myriad other forms of privilege that are not well documented in current research regarding faculty hiring or mobility. In other words, like the hidden curriculum that many scholars have documented in the context of K-12 schooling, there are hidden and not well understood forms of capital that allow/constrain movement within academe (Margolis, 2001). It is notable that that women and racially and ethnically minoritized women and men, occupy the majority of non-tenure-track positions (Finkelstein, 2015); that racially and ethnically minoritized people are more likely to graduate from a non-Ivy League school, and more specifically, from a Historically Black College or University or a Hispanic Serving Institution as documented in emerging work by Dongbin Kim.

            When one holds these latter pieces of information in one hand, and then considers the fact that the majority of tenure-track hires are drawn from a tiny portion of doctoral-granting universities as noted here and here, it becomes evident that understanding faculty hiring, promotion, and mobility patterns demands an intersectional approach: one that accounts for personal identity markers; organizational/field markers or forms of capital; and also academic markers (e.g., research topics, methodological approaches) as each of these markers holds a certain value in this neoliberal context.

            By incorporating this three-dimensional approach to studying the composition of the academic labor force, higher education researchers might be able to investigate the manifestation of neoliberalism differently: perhaps as the layered reproduction of hierarchy, where scholars of color or otherwise minoritized (class, college generation) scholars, most likely to graduate from non-Ivy League institutions are fed into ranks of a labor market that are not promising pathways to mobility. While neoliberalism is currently understood for its de-professionalizing and unbundling effects on faculty roles, there is a need to understand how neoliberalism works in tandem with the deeply institutionalized logics of the field of higher education in ways that hamper access and mobility within the professoriate.

Emotions in Academia

            One final line of inquiry that might be developed within the broader neoliberal critique deals with emotion. At ASHE 2015, my colleague David Ayers and I put forward a new theoretical framework to explore the labor experiences and expectations of community college faculty in this neoliberal moment. We borrowed from an eclectic set of literatures, including institutional logics, nuanced discussions of neoliberalism, and emotional labor (Hocschild, 1983). In developing our argument, we recognized that one of the most powerful expectations for contemporary faculty, particularly those working in under-resourced colleges and universities and in the least secure of positions, especially contingent labor, is that of emotional labor. Our argument differs from recent writing that stresses the emotional toll and anxieties absorbed by non-tenure-track faculty (and faculty, writ large), and instead focuses on the idea that faculty members, especially those working in under-resourced settings, like community colleges, are expected to remedy structural inequities that stem from austerity politics and neoliberalism through their passion, commitment, and creativity. Adopting this vantage point, researchers might consider how calls for creativity and passion are actually attempts to draw on the emotional resources—particularly the passions—of those who attach a deep sense of purpose to their appointment as teachers, researchers, or academics, writ large.

            There are other ways that emotional labor might be studied within academe while holding in mind broader political-economic contexts. For example, the personal identity markers—gender, race, class, sexuality and so on—discussed throughout this post often seep into the work that faculty do, how that work is perceived, and how they, in turn, strive to position that work (see Gutierrez y Muhs, Niemann, González, & Harris, 2012 for many examples). Scholars whom occupy one (or multiple) marginalized statuses and whose work is explicitly focused on critical questions concerning race, equity, power, inclusion, and Whiteness receive several warnings about the risks of such work: they will be perceived as overly political; as one-dimensional; as subjective or biased. Such critical work is imperative to understanding the inherently political production of knowledge, and how knowledge shifts and expands over time, but the field has yet to investigate how scholars engaged in this work negotiate, recoup, and thrive in spite of threats to or warnings offered about their intellectual viability. In other words, higher education researchers might consider exploring how scholars, who are engaged in critical— or less mainstream work (in any discipline)— move through and subvert the warnings they receive, but also what it takes to sustain such scholarly agendas. Such movement, it seems, would require a great deal of emotional energy, and as such, is deserving of close study as yet another way that neoliberalism collides with power and politics in the production and evaluation of knowledge.

Closing Thoughts

            Although the field has a well-established body of work concerning the academic profession, there are many questions and angles that remain unexplored. My hopes for this post were to motivate new ways of thinking about the study of faculty work and roles, such as what lays behind productivity (learning), how the opportunity to enter and be mobile within academe hinges on hidden curricula attached to historical and structural inequities, or perhaps what is expected or what it takes—emotionally—to move through academia today.

References

Apple, M. (2013). Audit cultures, labour, and conservative movements in the global university.

            Journal of Educational Administration and History, 45(4), 385-394.

Bastedo, M. (2012). Organizing higher education: A manifesto in M. Bastedo (Ed.). The organization of higher education—Managing colleges for a new era, pp. 3-18. Baltimore, ML: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Espino, M. M., Muñoz, S. M., & Kiyama, J. M. (2010). Transitioning from doctoral study to the academy: Theorizing trenzas of identity for Latina sister scholars. Qualitative Inquiry, 16(10), 804-818.

Finkelstein, Martin J. 2015. “Do I Still Want to Be a Professor and, If So, Can I? Entering the     

            American Academic Profession in the First Decade of the Twenty-First Century.” In Young 

            Faculty in the Twenty-First Century: International Perspectives, edited by Maria M. 

            

            Yudkevich, Phillip G. Altbach, and Laura E. Rumbley, 45–73. Albany: State University of   

            

            New York Press.

Gonzales, L. D., & Núñez, A. M. (2014). Ranking regimes and the production of knowledge in    

           

            academia: (Re)shaping faculty work. Education policy analysis archives, 22, 1-23.

Gutierrez y Muhs, G., Flores-Niemann, Y., González, C.G., & Harris, A. P. (2012). Presumed incompetent. The intersection of race and class for women in academia. Boulder, CO: Utah State University Press.

Harvey, D. (2005). A brief history of neoliberalism. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Hochschild, A. R. (1983). The managed heart. Berkeley, CA: University of California Pres.

Margolis, E. (2001). The hidden curriculum in higher education. New York, NY: Routledge.

Martínez Alemán, A. M. (2000). Race talks: Undergraduate women of color and female friendships. The Review of Higher Education, 23(2), 133-152.

Martínez Alemán, A. M. (2010). College women's female friendships: A longitudinal view. The Journal of Higher Education, 81(5), 553-582.

Misra, J., Lundquist, J. H., & Templer, A. (2012). Gender, work time, and care responsibilities among faculty. Sociological Forum, 27(2), 300-323.

Neumann, A. (2009). Professing to learn: Creating tenured lives and careers in the American research university. Baltimore, ML: John Hopkins University Press.

Niehaus, E., & O’Meara, K. (2015). Invisible but essential: The role of professional networks in promoting faculty agency in career advancement. Innovative Higher Education, 40(2), 159-171.

Renzulli, L. A., Reynolds, J., Kelly, K., & Grant, L. (2013). Pathways to gender inequality in faculty pay: The Impact of institution, academic division, and rank. Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, 34, 58-72.

Slaughter, S., & Rhoades, G. (2004). Academic capitalism and the new economy: Markets, state, and higher education. Baltimore, ML: John Hopkins University Press.

Torres, C. A., & Schugurensky, D. (2002). The political economy of higher education in the era of

            neoliberal globalization: Latin America in comparative perspective. Higher Education, 43(4),

            429-455.

Trevino, L. J., Gomez-Mejia, L. R., Balkin, D. B., & Mixon, F. G. (2015). Meritocracies or masculinities? The differential allocation of named professorships by gender in the academy. Journal of Management, doi:10.1177/0149206315599216

The Under-Realized Potential of Higher Education as a Field of Study Within and Beyond the U.S.

by Sydney Freeman, Jr., Associate Professor at the University of Idaho, Dept. of Leadership & Counseling 

Anna Mountford-Zimdars, Senior Lecturer in Higher Education at King’s College London, UK

The Great Recession that began in 2008 has had a profound influence on higher education sector, particularly in the western world. College and University tuition continues to rise as more students continue to seek access to the middle class through the attainment of higher education. Much of the US research that is influencing policy discussions centers around providing access to postsecondary education and students apart of historically marginalized groups. This is also happening at the same time that countries such as the United States is providing less financial support to the college and university sector. However, in other parts of the world, developing countries are increasing their investment in higher education.  For example, Jordan views higher education as the one strategic investment the country can make into ‘human capital’: surrounded by neighbors rich in natural resources like oil, education is the one resource this country can provide for its own citizens and also for those from neighboring countries.  Some of the non-western countries over the last 50 years have begun to develop higher education programs, centers, and institutes that prepare leaders for service in this sector (Rumbley, Altbach, Stanfield, Shimmi, de Gayardon, & Chan, 2014). Also these same entities develop research to inform higher education policy in their local context. What is interesting is that much of the growth of over the last five decades have been on the continents of Africa and South America, and in large countries such as China and Australia. Great growth in this sector is the product of these regions understanding that there are individual and societal benefits to developing a robust tertiary sector. As in North America, a strong higher education system is still seen as a stable route to upward mobility. China is expected to have more students in higher education than the United States by 2020. 

Higher education as a field of study was founded in the United States. Over the 120 years since its inception more than 200 higher education graduate degree programs, institutes, and research centers have been established. However, there is a concern that while the largest programs, which are characterized by having more than eight full-time faculty continue growing, smaller less supported programs are shrinking and disappearing. On many campuses, the sentiments exist that higher education graduate program faculty expertise does not inform the decisions happening on campus. Some academic leaders are critical and even hostile towards such programs. Questions related to the relevance of the field and programs have gained traction. 

A failure to communicate the value and relevance of our work to the current challenges facing our campuses has not been good for the field as a whole.  Higher education experts and researchers can ‘undersell’ their skills and expertise by not highlighting what they can contribute or engaging in research that is too removed from practice to be relevant to practitioners. There have been cases where universities have hired outside firms and experts to help solve problems that higher education faculty on that same campus have the expertise to address. With all the conversation that has been bantered about regarding “translation” of research from scholars to policymakers. Too little of our work effects institutional, state, or national education policy.  In many cases, expertise is sought from disciplinary experts in other fields. Although, we highly respect other disciplines and fields and believe they can provide a wealth of knowledge in solving higher education problems. We believe that it is important for higher education scholars to move from the margins of conversations that inform our work and take leadership in areas that intersect with our scholarship. Our teaching and scholarship should be practical, relevant and be able to be applied to challenges confronting the postsecondary sector. We should be viewed as social scientists who inform the study of the field of higher education. 

This issue does not only apply to how are scholarship is viewed. This also informs our preparation of the next generation of scholar-practitioners. Graduates of our programs should be highly sought after for positions in such areas as mid to senior level administration and education policy advisors. We should be preparing our students to communicate not only within our scholarly associations and periodicals, but with policymakers and general public. Although, we are proponents of generating knowledge for knowledge sake we also understand the necessity and the imperative that we provide our graduates with the knowledge, experiences and transferable skills that can help them secure employment beyond the professoriate and provide the skills for undertaking action research for the good of whatever graduates choose to do with their lives. Critical thinking and professional ethics should be at the center of our instruction. Teaching our students how to review and conduct academic research without undergirding it without modelling and displaying those traits will put our graduates at a disadvantage.   

In the United Kingdom, a more positive story for higher education research is emerging.  There is a vibrant community of higher education researchers and there has been a rise in employment opportunities within higher education for scholars interested in teaching and learning. Some Higher Education Departments are located in traditional Departments of Education and often work along linguists and those supporting teacher training in primary and secondary schools. Others are located in the growing central Learning and Teaching units - the main remit of these units is to support academic faculty and graduate students who teach to professionalise their practice. There has been a shift in consciousness among academics from viewing such units as a necessary evil and a ‘conscript attitude’ to participating in teaching development because such programmes are often tied to probation requirements, to a more curious and enhancement focused culture in approaching opportunities to develop teaching practices.  Slowly, academics from a range of discipline appreciate that the idea of evidence-base and deep understanding are meaningful in learning and teaching and not only in their home disciplines, let it be physics, medicine, or modern languages. 

In the UK, the increasing importance of teaching, even in leading research institutions, and the introduction of teaching-based promotions across the sector have helped to increase the salience of the teaching agenda.  However, just as in the United States, the ability of these researchers to research, enhance and influence institutional practices can vary.  In the most constructive and positive collaborations, academics collaborate with professional service staff and students as partners in the academic development processes to enhance the evidence-base and sharing for best practice and interventions. Academics in central learning and teaching units might collaborate with academic faculty in specific disciplines to undertake particular action research projects - there are also some national evaluations, often funded by central national bodies such as the Higher Education Academy or the Higher Education Research Councils. 

Perhaps because of the smaller size of the United Kingdom, there are also ample opportunities for academics in the field to exchange and share their practices. Again, the best scenario here is a diffusion effect of academic practice that enhances the student experience and supports meaningful and inclusive higher education curricula. This ideal is not always met, but there are pockets of excellence and good practice that show that such constructive partnerships and collaborations between academics of different fields, professional service staff, and students are possible.  

International comparisons help those with a strong legacy of institutions of higher education look at challenges with a fresh pair of eyes. We will see that scholarship can be the interconnective issue that can help us advance leadership and policy development internationally.  However, a comparison with our European, or Australian neighbors is not where international work should stop. As our programs continue to grow around the world, we cannot afford for our scholarship to continue to Western-centric and need to engage with wider international discourses and developments.  

For example, in western scholarship certain subjects such as governance and leadership  may be close to saturation , but in developing countries there is a huge need for additional context specific knowledge developed in that area. Cross pollination in scholarship could help to shed light on ways to solve problems.  In turn, US scholars can learn from other models of higher education where education is free – this is the case for Germany and Denmark. And Scandinavian countries pay their students to go to college. Also fundamental questions around institutional stratification become stranger when looked at through the lens of an outsider – indeed, there is nothing inevitable about the Anglo-Saxon model of hierarchical university system divided by prestige and alternative models exist.   Furthermore, should we accept that prestige should be determined by how many students are excluded from participating in the higher education context, the competitiveness of entry and yield rates?  Or should prestige be based around inclusion, how many previously under-served students higher education succeeds in reaching, and the added value or learning gains in higher education?  Such alternative conceptualizations of prestige might turn some traditional university hierarchies upside down.  

We believe that the field of higher education and those associated with its’ programs are well positioned to advance leadership and policy development internationally. However, the research that we conduct must remain relevant and able to inform higher education policy and practice. We need to prepare students with the knowledge, skills, and competencies that will help them solve complex challenges that may have international implications. We need to engage with international agendas and share practices and experiences with a view to enhance the public benefits of higher education as a field of study.  Within our institutions and national contexts,  we must be fearless in asserting our expertise in our local campus context and to the broader public and collaborate with university management and higher education sector body to be part of initiatives that can meaningful change and enhance higher education.   

References 

Rumbley, L. E., Altbach, P. G., Stanfield, D. A., Shimmi, Y., de Gayardon, A., & Chan, R.Y. (Eds).(2014). Higher education: A worldwide inventory—Research centers, academic programs, and   journals and publications (3rd ed.). Science Management series. Boston and Bonn, Germany:   Center for International Higher Education, Boston College and Lemmens Media.