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Donnie Auvenshine, dean of the School of Christian Studies at Howard Payne University, in Texas, has been named vice president for academic affairs there. Meg Benke, interim provost at SUNY Empire State College, in New York, has been appointed provost and executive vice president for academic affairs there on a permanent basis. Chaudron Gille, interim provost and senior vice president for academic affairs at the University of North Georgia, has been named to the job on a permanent basis. Timothy J. Collins, chief government relations officer at Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory, in Maryland, has been selected as president of Walsh University, in Ohio. Lily S. Hsu, provost at Johnson & Wales University, in Rhode Island, has been appointed president of Labouré College, in Massachusetts. E. Joseph Lee II, interim president of Spring Hill College, in Alabama, has been named to the job on a permanent basis. Joanna Mott, dean and professor in the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics at California State University, Sacramento, has been chosen as provost and vice president for academic affairs at Oregon Institute of Technology. Saib Othman, vice provost for academic affairs at Marian University, in Indiana, has been named provost and vice president for academic affairs at National-Louis University, in Illinois. Vicki L. Walker, clinical nurse specialist at the University Medical Center of Southern Nevada, has been chosen as president of the Las Vegas campus of Chamberlain University, also in Nevada. Charles F. Zukoski, provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at the University at Buffalo, in New York, has been chosen as provost and senior vice president for academic affairs at the University of Southern California. Editorial Tags: College administrationNew presidentsIs this diversity newsletter?: Newsletter Order: 0Disable left side advertisement?: Is this Career Advice newsletter?: Magazine treatment: Trending: Display Promo Box: 

The City University of New York system is working to add new courses this spring in data analytics and cybersecurity. The system hopes to launch eight new courses and revise one older one under the guidance of companies that are part of Business Roundtable, a nonprofit association of CEOs. Four community colleges and three senior colleges, including Brooklyn College, Baruch College and York College, will be offering the courses. Angie Kamath, dean of continuing education and workforce development at CUNY, said the process started with focused conversations between faculty members and industry advisers from Business Roundtable companies, such as IBM and JP Morgan Chase. Professors who had ideas for new or revised curricula in data analytics and cybersecurity applied for grants from the system. Winning teams or individuals received a monetary grant (to defray the cost and time of course design) and advisement from a subject-matter expert from Business Roundtable partner companies. The monetary award was funded by CUNY and corporate sponsors. “We didn’t want this to be a partnership with industry that was just industry talking to faculty about what has to change,” Kamath said. “We really were having faculty define how they wanted to work with industry.” The collaboration will hopefully be long-term, she said, leading perhaps to industry partners coming in as guest speakers and getting to know students personally. Data analytics and cybersecurity were chosen as subject areas because company officials identified those as “pain points” in hiring, Kamath said. “It’s not that educational institutions are not keeping pace,” she said. “Advancements in the technology are changing so quickly that businesses wanted to work directly with universities to be able to have a really strong feedback loop and communication mechanism established.” At Brooklyn College, faculty members applied to create a course that will be an introduction to data analytics and data visualization in the social and behavioral sciences. At Baruch College, advisers from IBM are working with professors to revise a statistics course and incorporate tools more appropriate for data science, such as Python and R computing languages. “The work in the CUNY partnership was really about helping to find ways to drive course work that’s more relevant for current jobs,” said Kelli Jordan, director of careers and skills at IBM. “When we think about not only the skills crisis we have today with the thousands of open jobs and not enough graduates and people in the workforce to fill them, we’ve also got quite a volume of open jobs that are sitting right in the New York City area.” More and more companies are investing in higher education and attempting to influence course content to be more industry-aligned. Companies often assert that a “skills gap” -- between what graduates are proficient in and what employers want -- is the cause of thousands of unfilled jobs. The veracity of that assertion has been the subject of some debate. Skills gap skeptics, such as economist Paul Krugman, often say unfilled jobs are instead the result of stagnant wages and employers who decline to train new workers. A research paper by three economists that was published earlier this year suggested that when unemployment was high and workers were plentiful during the financial crisis, employers’ hiring requirements got more stringent. When unemployment fell, employers were more willing to hire candidates without certain skills or qualifications. Still, some surveys suggest that 90 percent of hiring managers find it difficult to find and hire tech talent. And though scores are up, less than half of New York City’s third through eighth graders passed the state math exam. That number aligns with the New York State average. What is not disputed is that tech jobs are growing in the city. The sector grew by 80 percent in NYC during the last decade, to over 142,000 jobs. Though the business, leisure, hospitality and health-care sectors are larger and added more jobs in those 10 years, many of those roles come with salaries below the city’s annual average of $89,800. For jobs in technology, the citywide average salary was over $152,000 in 2017. As the city has become wealthier, people who grew up in the five boroughs, like many CUNY students, have reported that they can’t afford to move back to their childhood neighborhoods. “It’s really important that we drove this from where there are growth jobs and growth sectors in New York,” Kamath said. (Note: A previous version of this article misstated which senior CUNY colleges will be offering these new and revised courses. Brooklyn College will be. Queens College will not be.)  Editorial Tags: Career/Tech EducationCurriculumJob trainingImage Source: Getty ImagesAd Keyword: OK4FidelityIs this diversity newsletter?: Newsletter Order: 0Disable left side advertisement?: Is this Career Advice newsletter?: Magazine treatment: Trending: College: CUNY Bernard M Baruch CollegeCUNY Brooklyn CollegeDisplay Promo Box: 

Most Ph.D.s go on to teach in some way, even if they don’t want or land teaching positions: they find jobs that require them to communicate their work to the public, for example, or to colleagues within an organization. And of course many Ph.D.s do still want, and snag, part- or full-time professorships across a variety of institution types. Yet graduate education has historically treated this fact a kind of inconvenient truth, overlooking or flat out ignoring students’ need for pedagogical training. That’s explicit pedagogical training, not the sink-or-swim method adopted by so many programs that throw their graduate student instructors into teaching undergraduates with no real preparation. Scholar Cathy Davidson -- and, evidently, scores of individual programs and groups -- want to change that. Davidson, distinguished professor of English at the City University of New York’s Graduate Center, recently asked her Twitter followers to share names of doctoral programs that actually require students to learn how to teach. The effort took off, with Davidson and colleagues creating a Google document to inform future discussions about this topic. What models are out there? Who isn't doing anything. The document includes dozens of programs thus far, and the ongoing Twitter conservation names scores more. Davidson says the next big step is to all ask programs that aren't on the list why not.  “We were crowdsourcing an inventory of what graduate departments do to prepare the students who are often teaching their own undergraduates,” Davidson said Thursday. “It seems irresponsible not to require some form of pedagogical training, whether a course or some other intensive training, for your own graduate students who are teaching your own undergraduates.” Davidson’s list is humanities-heavy -- probably unsurprising given her own field and the fact that the particularly poor faculty job market in the humanities has led some graduate programs to rethink how they approach graduate training altogether. It’s also far from comprehensive or official. But both it and yet-to-be-added social media comments include some programs in the natural sciences and other fields. Doctoral students in the School of Physical Education, Performance and Sport Leadership at Springfield College, for example, take a Preparing Future Faculty series that consists of three semester-long classes: a seminar in contemporary issues related to higher education, physical education and sport; a course in instructional effectiveness, evidence-based practices, course design, curriculum development and reflective teaching; and a seminar about faculty roles. The program says that a fourth course, on scholarly writing and publication, also will be required starting next year.  Georgia Institute Technology requires all students with teaching assistantships to complete the university's Tech to Teaching certificate.  The program includes two courses, in teaching fundamentals and course design, and a teaching capstone of teaching or co-teaching a course. (Such certificate programs exist on other campuses for students who want to become professors but aren't necessarily required.)  The University of California at Berkeley’s Academic Senate Graduate Council Policy on Appointments and Mentoring of Graduate Student Instructors even requires that all graduate instructors -- regardless of program -- attend a day-long teaching conference at the campus GSI Teaching and Resource Center and complete an online course on ethics in teaching. Most significantly, they must all enroll in a pedagogy course for first-time graduate instructors within their departments. Making Teaching a Priority The Council of Graduate Schools doesn’t have specific information on which graduate programs require training in pedagogy. But it has long promoted the idea that graduate programs should provide students the tools they need to be teachers in various capacities -- including at different institution types -- through the Preparing Future Faculty initiative (of which Springfield College is part). The Association of American Colleges and Universities originally partnered with the council on Preparing Future Faculty. Terrel Rhodes, vice president of quality, curriculum and assessment at the association, said that many of the program’s elements -- think student learning outcomes, pedagogy and assignment design -- "have been inserted into graduate programs in many, many places,” typically as one course. Yet that's insufficient for the many graduate students who secure faculty jobs, especially teaching-intensive positions, he said.  Rhodes’s organization therefore strongly encourages departments and institutions to offer students multiple opportunities to build teaching expertise within their programs. Disciplinary associations “also need to make this a priority for graduate-level institutions to make it happen,” he said. Accreditation standards could also apply pressure, as could institutions by incorporating evidence of teaching into hiring standards. The “disincentive,” however, Rhodes said, is that research expertise brings in money for the institutions and disciplines "in ways good teaching does not.” And while many institutions known for research do pay attention to teaching, he add, faculty reward and recognition systems don’t necessarily reflect that. Professional organizations have weighed in here. The American Historical Association, through its Career Diversity initiative, for example, has pushed graduate programs to adopt a more student-centered approach to training historians, to prepare them for work inside and outside academe. Underpinning that effort is the notion -- as articulated by Jim Grossman, executive director, in a 2015 essay for Perspectives on History -- that “to be a historian is to be a teacher.”  "We have failed to integrate the teaching of history into the profession of being a historian -- other than by example, or perhaps by sending our students across campus to teaching and learning centers generally considered marginal to the main pathway," Grossman wrote.  Perhaps things are changing for the better: the AHA's survey of history departments found nearly half of respondents had a pedagogy course within their programs. Grossman said this week that it’s not just about learning how to teach, which "implies specific methods and strategies.” It’s about "learning how to think about teaching," which necessitates taking the scholarship of teaching and learning in history, across multiple audiences, as seriously as research.    “Nobody says, ‘Here are some strategies and tips on research, now go off and do it,'" Grossman said.   The Modern Language Association has made a series of recommendations concerning teacher training. A 2013 report on improving institutional circumstances for students says that, “Given the large amount of teaching done by graduate students, departments and universities should provide ongoing training and support to prepare graduate students for a variety of teaching situations.” Specific recommendations include providing pedagogy workshops, access to teaching mentors and opportunities to design their own courses or versions of a syllabus.   The National Science Foundation does not require that grantees in its research traineeship program include pedagogical elements in their proposals. But some do, and the program over all promotes communication skills. Nirmala Kannankutty, acting director of the Division of Graduate Education at the NSF, said that being “a good teacher requires good pedagogical and communication skills,” and that communication is a “core element of professional skills development.” Those aren’t the only necessary skills graduate students need to acquire, however, she said, hence the flexibility in proposals on that front.   Leonard Cassuto, professor of English at Fordham University and a vocal proponent of graduate education reform, is co-writing a forthcoming book from Johns Hopkins University Press on why all students need to be trained as educators, across contexts.   “Even if they don't work in a formal school classroom, their teaching skills are a fundamental part of their package,” Cassuto said this week. For too long, he added, graduate education -- including pedagogical training -- has been looked as a byproduct of faculty research work. That is, students will somehow learn to be faculty members by a kind of osmosis, working alongside their advisers.   
At Fordham, English doctoral students take a two-semester pedagogical training sequence, Cassuto said. The first term involves a seminar on pedagogical theory and practices and shadowing a more senior graduate student instructor. The second term is a practicum, where students share their experiences and get feedback on teaching their own students.   What’s the ideal number of courses? Cassuto said that two is better than one, but that one is still much better than none.   Jason Herbert, a Ph.D. candidate in history at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities who is now teaching at a private high school in Florida as he finishes his dissertation, would agree. He said this week that he didn’t have a required pedagogy course in graduate school and that he’s had to teach himself -- with the help of colleagues and other educators on Twitter.   “I’ve been fortunate to be surrounded by really talented educators who have shared their thoughts and experiences with me,” he said. “But much of what I’ve learned has been through trial and error.”   Herbert's department doesn't require a pedagogy class, but it does offer workshops for teaching assistants. The department says that faculty members with whom these TAs work are also supposed provide pedagogical support and guidance.     "We see the TA appointment as a type of teaching practicum," said Howard Louthan, professor of history and director of graduate studies at Minnesota.   As for the idea -- still held by some -- that teaching can’t really be taught, Cassuto, of Fordham, called “bullshit.”   “You can teach teaching. Teaching is craft, not just an art,” he said. To begin, Cassuto continued, there’s learning to promote good discussions (no yes-or-no questions, for example), and learning how to design a syllabus so that a course arcs and doesn’t just plateau.   Melissa Johnson, an Oregon-based historian and graduate of the University of Michigan, said that "teaching comes more naturally to some people than others, but that only goes so far.” Even "natural" teachers need to "constantly work on learning how to do it better."   Johnson took one course in pedagogy and attended a short training during her Ph.D. program but later helped design and adopt a multiple-course requirement. Most of her own teaching training was “on the job” and she would have liked more preparation, she said. But there’s a timeliness to getting teaching right, as well.    "It's never been more important to be reflective about our classroom work,” Johnson said. Because university funding is under threat and students are going into debt, there’s a value argument for good teaching preparation. Inclusion is a major concern, too.    “If we want to work for more equity in schools and in the workforce, we have to figure out how to reach all of our students.”  FacultyTeaching and LearningEditorial Tags: Graduate educationGraduate studentsImage Caption: TwitterAd Keyword: OK4FidelityIs this diversity newsletter?: Newsletter Order: 0Disable left side advertisement?: Is this Career Advice newsletter?: Magazine treatment: Trending: Trending text: Teaching the TeachersTrending order: 2College: CUNY Graduate School and University CenterFordham UniversitySpringfield CollegeUniversity of Michigan-Ann ArborUniversity of Minnesota-Twin CitiesDisplay Promo Box: 

An appellate court’s decision could minimize colleges and universities’ responsibility to provide remedies for victims of sexual misconduct on campus. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled that Michigan State University and one of its senior administrators cannot be held liable for student victims’ emotional distress after seeing their alleged perpetrators on campus because the interactions did not lead to further sexual harassment or assault, according to an opinion issued Thursday. Legal experts said the decision is a narrow interpretation of the protections for victims of sexual misconduct under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, which prohibits sex discrimination, including sexual assault, on college campuses. The court’s opinion, written by Judge Alice Batchelder, could set a “very clear and straightforward standard” for how federal judges interpret whether universities showed “deliberate indifference” when addressing reports of sexual misconduct, said Jake Sapp, deputy Title IX coordinator and institutional compliance officer at Austin College, in Texas. Deliberate indifference in student-on-student sexual misconduct cases occurs when an institution causes further harassment or fails to act upon an accusation of sexual misconduct, leaving the complainant "subject to" harassment, Sapp said. The decision clears Michigan State of wrongdoing and sends the case back to the district court for dismissal. The primary complainant in the case, Emily Kollaritsch, said she suffered panic attacks after seeing the male student whom the university confirmed had sexually harassed her back in 2011. The male student was placed on probation and issued a no-contact order, which Kollaritsch alleged he broke, but the university was unable to find evidence of that, reported the Lansing State Journal. The same male student had previously been expelled for the rape of a different female student, plaintiff Shayna Gross, but the university ended up allowing him back on campus after an independent investigation could not prove he committed the rape, the Lansing State Journal reported. Another anonymous female student said she was raped by him in 2014, but the male student withdrew from the university before Michigan State’s investigation was complete, according to the court’s opinion. In all instances, Michigan State was found to have investigated the reports and disciplined the perpetrator for the only accusation it could prove -- sexual harassment against Kollaritsch, Sapp said. Even though the perpetrator was accused of subsequent misconduct after the first instance, Michigan State is only deliberately indifferent if the same student is victimized, Batchelder wrote. There is a distinct split between several circuits on how deliberate indifference can be applied. Some courts maintain that if a victimized student is merely vulnerable to harassment -- though the harassment does not actually occur -- this means an institution is failing to provide an equal educational environment. But the Sixth Circuit on Thursday upheld the very specific language used in Title IX, requiring an alleged victim to prove that an institution’s decision not to remove the perpetrator from campus “resulted in further actionable sexual harassment against the student-victim, which caused the Title IX injuries,” Batchelder wrote. Thursday’s decision is not a “seismic shift” from how the law is actually stated, said Michael Dolce, a lawyer with the firm Cohen Milstein and chair of its sexual abuse practice group. A student’s fear of coming to campus because they know their perpetrator will be there is not enough to argue a Title IX violation, he said. “In some views, the mere contact on campus is enough to cause action against the school,” Dolce said. “Courts across the country have said that the mere presence of the perpetrator on campus does not qualify … If the standard was otherwise, anytime a student sexually assaulted someone, you would have to expel them. Title IX is never going to be interpreted that way even in the most liberal courts.” But the interpretation does set a precedent that more conservative courts can turn to for a narrow view of the law and will upset some who argue Title IX should protect against the adverse effects of sexual assault and harassment on a student’s mental health, Sapp said. It’s not a favorable ruling for victims, said Laura Dunn, a lawyer who represents campus sexual assault survivors. “What judges should keep in mind is that it’s a choice,” Dunn said. “There’s an ability to interpret the law and you have to decide what perspective you’re coming from. A lot of conservative ones think, ‘We’re going to be close to the law.’ I really suggest you think about the effect on social issues … That’s a horrible ruling and a horrible reality to subject victims to. This judge has no understanding beyond the law of how her words will impact survivors.” The ruling is reflective of the Department of Education’s proposed regulations, which it published for review in November 2018, said KC Johnson, a professor of history at Brooklyn College who writes about due process violations in Title IX proceedings. “The court said that the complainant doesn’t have the right to a specific punishment,” Johnson said. “It’s a recurring theme to how the Sixth Circuit has approached this more broadly, and how [Education Secretary Betsy] DeVos approached the regulations.” Dunn said the ruling severely damages students’ protections under Title IX once the university has found one of their peers sexually harassed or assaulted them. Batchelder does not mention the words “hostile or abusive educational environment” in her opinion, which is what she should be evaluating in the case -- whether a student being fearful of seeing their perpetrator or experiencing panic attacks creates that environment, Dunn said. “Sexual assault does not need to be pervasive -- it can happen once and that’s enough,” Dunn said. “You’re not only narrowing the law, you’re pretty flagrantly narrowing it so far to render it almost useless.” Editorial Tags: Sexual assaultTitle IXIs this diversity newsletter?: Newsletter Order: 0Disable left side advertisement?: Is this Career Advice newsletter?: Magazine treatment: Trending: Trending text: Narrow Standards for Title IXTrending order: 1College: Michigan State UniversityDisplay Promo Box: