Category: academia

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Summertime mantra, or remembering why we do what we do

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As we get close to a month away from classes starting again at UMW, I am working (as I often do in this months long in-between space of spring and fall classes) to hold on to those critical interactions with students which are at the core of why we do what we do in higher ed. It helps that students have been on campus working on summer research, that HS students have been participating in an on-campus summer enrichment program about which I’ve only heard good things, that we have amazing students staying on campus to mentor in-coming students, and that I’ve been fortunate enough to work with a student on her senior thesis over the last two months. It also helps to be working through the course plans for the fall semester and the students I will teach then. [And I know that I have colleagues who have been working with students all summer and those who have been prepping their own classes and writing their own scholarship. And I have other colleagues who have been working hard to orient and welcome those students and support faculty colleagues. I hope they know how much I appreciate that work, and how much our students do too.] I also have multiple opportunities this summer to celebrate—through recommendations and evaluations—the work of multiple faculty-scholars for whom I have incredible admiration.

All of which is to say that I am grateful for my job, my colleagues (near and far), and for the opportunities I have to do this work.

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A Plethora of Riches

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So, let me start by noting that this kind of post is not typical.  People don’t generally write these kind of posts. And, frankly, there are good reasons for that. And yet, here I am writing it.  I’ll explain why shortly.

But let’s start with the context.  I’ve been working as the Special Assistant to the Provost for Teaching, Technology, and Innovation at the University of Mary Washington since April of 2014.  It’s a great job where I get to be a faculty member (a Professor of History and American Studies) half time and the rest of the time oversee our Center for Teaching Excellence and Innovation, our Division of Teaching and Learning Technologies, our recently created (but thoroughly awesome) Digital Knowledge Center, and one of the coolest student-centered buildings in academia, the Information & Technology Convergence Center (now named after our current president, the Hurley Convergence Center). Although we’ve seen turnover this past year in DTLT (no year when you lose Tim Owens, Ryan Brazell, Andy Rush, Jim Groom, and Lisa Ames can be all good), we’ve also done some amazing hiring, bringing in Jess Reingold, Jesse Stommel, and Lee Skallerup Bessette, and soon Nigel Haarstad, with another superb new colleague soon to be announced.  They are creative, terrific, brilliant people who have joined Martha Burtis, Mary Kayler, Leah Tams, Amanda Rutstein, Cartland Berge, Roberta Gentry, and Zach Whalen in the Teaching, Technology, and Innovation Unit.

So, despite these changes (in fact, partly because of them), I wasn’t looking for a new job.  And yet, one came looking for me.  A search firm contacted me late last fall about a new position at a Research 1 University at the Vice Provost level.  I’m a big fan of this school, having worked for many years with great people there.  The job is a new position that brings together a number of elements that exist at a university that is clearly on the move, clearly on its way upward, clearly at the forefront of the struggle over the soul of higher education.  And after an application and an initial interview with the search committee, I was a finalist for the position with an on-campus interview.  Now, I know that I’m operating from a place of remarkable privilege, a privilege that so many other academics have not and do not have.  I have a full-time position and I love my job, one that has tenure and a good salary and terrific colleagues, and I’m fortunate enough to have developed a reputation within the discipline that has allowed me to travel around the country giving workshops on digital history, digital humanities, and digitally enabled pedagogy, as well as editing a section of a leading journal for one major organization on digital history projects, and leading a digital history working group for another major professional organization.  Most importantly, I applied for this job knowing that I loved the position that I’m currently in with no risk of losing that position if it didn’t work out.

Yesterday, about a month after my on-campus interview, I found out that I am no longer being considered for the position, that they have offered the job to someone else.

Now we get to the point about why posts like this are unusual.  Typically people don’t talk about these positions when they don’t get them, in part because they don’t want people at their current job to know that they were willing to consider leaving, in part because they are worried that they might be embarrassed by not getting the job, in part because they are worried about what the people at the job they applied for will think about them, and in part because they worry about how people at potential future jobs might view someone who talks about the often-closed search process.  These are very good reasons not to talk about jobs for which you have applied but not been selected.

So, why am I doing so?  I spend a great deal of time telling my students that they should create a digital identity that reveals who they are, that makes it clear what they want to do and be, that claims boldly what they believe in and what they want to do, and that acknowledges (even celebrates) failures or incomplete paths as part of the learning and development process.  I was unsuccessful in applying for this job; now what have I learned from it?

You know what I’ve learned? That I’m glad. [Now, I know that it’ll be easy for people who don’t know me to dismiss this as simply me settling, or me rationalizing not getting a job.  To them, I’ll just say, “That’s a reasonable point of view given the evidence you have, and you’re wrong.”]  I’m really happy I didn’t get this job, and not because I have anything against the school to which I applied, but because I’m convinced that I already have an important contribution to make, that I have an amazing team to work with, that I have colleagues who value what matters in higher education right now where I am right now.  [Let’s be clear: there was much to attract me to the school I applied to, and not just the increased money and significant promotion.  It was a chance to work on a different stage, as part of a school that is often mentioned in conversations about higher education. And there were great, terrific colleagues there to work with as well.]  But in the end, as I thought about the two positions in the weeks after the on-campus interview, I increasingly realized that UMW was the place where I wanted to be, a place where I was able to make a bigger difference, a place where my students continue to inspire me every day, a place where my team, my colleagues, and even my incoming president shared the values that I believe in, a place that keeps the focus on students, that believes that a liberal arts education is the best foundation for a changing world, that integrates digital tools into that liberal arts education better than almost any school in the nation (and has earned a national reputation and big grants for doing so), that balances teaching and learning and research and service and community in ways that represent one incredibly valuable path for higher education over the next few decades.

So, today, I’m incredibly glad to be at the University of Mary Washington with my colleagues and my friends and my students.

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Sharing my teaching and learning

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I’ve been fortunate lately to have a number of things come out recently featuring my teaching and research.

1) In October my US History in Film class was recorded by C-SPAN’s American History TV as we discussed the 1939 movie Gone with the Wind.  It was a wide-ranging discussion of the movie as a flawed secondary source about the Antebellum, Civil War, Reconstruction eras in the South, as well as its role as a primary source for the 1930s perspectives on that past.  

I did an introduction and conclusion, but the bulk of the class was the students delving deeply into the interpretations, implications, and lessons of the film.  They did a terrific job.

[I’ve gotten a number of nice responses from people who watched it, but the best was from an 87-year old Holocaust survivor who wrote me that GWTW had been her first exposure to American History.  She then told me that she was inspired to learn about the actual historical background of the time.]

You can watch the whole class here.

2) A couple weeks later, I did a talk for the Fredericksburg Area Museum on the Coming of the Battle of Fredericksburg as part of the celebration   C-SPAN came to that as well and you can see that talk here.

3) A few weeks after that, I was the moderator for a great series of talks about the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Fredericksburg by George Rable, Susannah Ural, and Frank O’Reilly.  They put up with my unorthodox introductions and gave great talks which can be found here.

4) Finally, UMW did a nice profile of me and my teaching for the main page of the website.  It’s overly generous, but I appreciate it just the same.

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2012 UMW Convocation Keynote

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The following is a speech that I was invited to give to graduating seniors at the pre-graduation awards ceremony known as Convocation.  If you’re not at UMW, some of the inside jokes will not make as much sense so I’ve included some links or annotations).  
 
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May 11, 2012

Thank you for that introduction, Austin, and thanks to the Senior Class Officers for this opportunity to talk to the graduating class of 2012, and our honored guests, family and friends.

 

As Austin mentioned, four years ago I was the first faculty member to talk to all you graduating seniors as a class of UMW students [as part of the opening Honor Code ceremony]; I’m honored to be the last faculty member to do so before you walk tomorrow.

Four years ago I told you all about my own Honor Convocation. Four years ago we were preparing for a presidential election, much as we are today.  Four years ago I talked about having iPhone envy; now it’s iPad envy. 

In the last four years, Facebook gained hundreds of millions of users, tens of billions of dollars, its own tell-all movie, and, very recently, a few questionable UMW Grad Ball pictures. In the last four years, Twitter became so mainstream that President Hurley has an account (though I wish he’d stop competing with Lady Gaga for followers—it’s getting embarrassing).  In the last four years, we saw the beginning and the end of Kim Kardashian’s marriage, but sadly not the end of her 15 minutes of fame. 

On a more serious note, as a class you’ve witnessed a nation involved in multiple wars/conflicts; you’ve seen a world coping with man-made disasters of massive oil spills and natural disasters of earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanic ash; you’ve seen the rise of the Tea Party and of the Occupy Movement; and the so-called Great Recession has, more or less, spanned your time here.

Of course, you all have been busy these four years as well.  A few weeks ago, I asked you for your favorite UMW memories.  Hundreds of you responded and for that I thank you.  I was moved by your passion for this school and for your time here.

When I asked what three things you would most remember about your time at UMW, several items stood out.  Your professors, your campus, your friends, your community, your Honor.
http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/5251798/2012-Convo–Honor
 
 
Several of you asked me to convey to your families “the essence of UMW and why [you] love it here: the honor code, the beauty of campus, the [caring] professors, the engaged classmates, knowing so many people as [you] walk down campus walk.” 

Whether it was playing on Ball Circle, lounging in the big white chairs, fountain swimming, eating at Seaco or McDonalds or Hyperion, watching or joining UMW sports, or studying in the library, you told me of “Good friends, good times, and good memories.” 
A number of you remarked on the visit by then-presidential candidate Barack Obama to campus in the fall of 2008. 
 
Others remembered how distraught you were to have classes cancelled during Snowpocalypse 2010’s 50+ inches of ice and snow. 
 
 
 
[The student in the laundry basket seems particularly distraught, no?]
 
Several of you commented on the constant state of campus construction; others talked about the change in University presidents.  One of you combined the two, remembering that some presidents came, started construction (including some really nice book cases) and then went.  [Actually quite a few of you remarked on how wonderful and approachable President and Mrs. Hurley are.]

Over and over, you told me about the power of the time spent in your department, your academic community, of your close relationships with faculty and fellow majors, of the process of “Mentors…becoming friends”.  Many of you wrote of being challenged by rigorous professors, about the discomfort and benefits of trying out new things, about how much you learned when operating out of your comfort zone, even if you weren’t able to do it easily.
 
Now, students who have taken my classes know that I have a phrase to describe that sweet spot in which real learning occurs: uncomfortable, but not paralyzed.   The comments you all made reflect that your UMW experiences were full of these moments of uncomfortable learning, real learning.  Scary at times, yes, but if you were ever paralyzed you knew you could turn to faculty and friends and family to help you through it. 

Even more importantly, you’ve learned to handle that discomfort of new things on your own.  As one of you noted: “I think part of becoming sure of yourself is not always being given advice but finding your own way.”  So, like your fellow student who began four years ago as a pre-dental, bio major who became an art major and will soon be an art teacher, you all have found your own way, tried new things, and learned about yourself and the world around you.

Tomorrow you will walk in front of your families, your friends, and your faculty. I, as many people have done and will do over the next few weeks, asked about your plans after college. 
 
http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/5251832/2012Convo–Post-grad
You told me of plans for graduate schools or jobs or internships or taking time off.   

But one of you challenged the simplicity of the question itself, saying, “instead try and imagine a life that will forever change, evolve, adapt, revolt and challenge the complex conventions of life that are so commonly reduced to a series of words.”  I like that reminder that graduation is just the beginning, not the end, of figuring out who you are, what you believe in, what you do.

Now, when I asked what else you wanted to hear about in this speech, many of you asked me to inspire you, to tell you it was going to be okay, to tell you that life after college would be good.  
 
So…in order to do all of those things, I’m going to tell you about moving back in with my parents.
 
Four years ago I told you about how amazing it was to walk across the stage in Ball Circle in 1994.
UMW Graduation — http://archive.umw.edu:8080/vital/access/HandleResolver/10154/1459 

I didn’t mention, that after walking across the stage and shaking the president’s hand, as you’ll do tomorrow, I walked back to Alvey Hall, packed up my things and moved back home.  I had been conflicted my senior year about what I was going to do after college. For a while I was sure that I would become a minister.  That didn’t work out, though it was not because, as one student recently suggested, of any youthful indiscretions on my part.   [Honestly the student in question seemed disappointed that I wasn’t that cool.]

Instead I applied to graduate school in history.  Now, in retrospect, I realize that I didn’t know how to present myself or my time at Mary Washington; I didn’t tap into the resources on campus.  I didn’t make the case, as I should have, as you should, that the liberal arts & sciences at Mary Washington had helped to create me as an adaptable, engaged, well-rounded citizen, a critical thinker eager and able to continue learning throughout my life.   Perhaps not surprisingly, I was only accepted at one of the six schools to which I applied.  Without any funding, it wasn’t something that I could make work.

So, moving back in with my parents (who are wonderful, wonderful people, as your parents undoubtedly are), I went back to working at a movie theatre making minimum wage, a movie theatre I had worked at in high school.  I had some moments where I wondered what I had done with my four years of amazing time at MW.

I interviewed for a few jobs, though none of them worked out.  I did turn down a chance to manage a movie theatre for the princely sum of ~$300/week and all the popcorn I could eat.  Instead, I offered to volunteer on one of the first digital history projects and ultimately was hired as a paid employee. 

With this experience under my belt, and with the help of my professors here I applied again to graduate school, this time to 11 schools, getting into six, including a fully funded scholarship to Johns Hopkins University’s History PhD program.  Within four years I was back teaching here at this place we all love.
 
[Oh, and though I didn’t know it when I graduated 18 years ago, I’d already met the fellow Mary Washington student who I would somehow figure out how to propose to while in graduate school, the woman I’ve now been married to for 15 years.]
 
I tell you all of this, not because I think you should follow my path (my wife is already married), but because I want you to know that it’s okay not to know yet what your path is. It’s okay to be uncomfortable, but don’t be paralyzed.

Some of you have jobs.  Congratulations.  Some of you are already set for graduate school in the fall.  Congratulations.  Some of you are planning to work, then go to graduate school later.  Congratulations.  But even if you don’t have a job yet, and you’re not alone if you don’t, congratulations.   Why? Because historically, liberal arts and sciences graduates may take longer to get their first job, but are more likely to hang on to jobs and to adapt as fields change.

Know as well, that for some people, not going to graduate school, not getting a job immediately is the right choice. You have fellow graduates who are planning to backpack in Latin America, or to work for volunteer organizations, people who are excited by the chance to do something different.  Try being uncomfortable, just don’t let yourself be paralyzed.

Four years ago, I told many of you that you were entering an academic community of scholars, engaging in a partnership in learning with me and with my colleagues.  You have done so.  You have thrived, you have grown, you have joined us in an academic enterprise of consequence. 
 
Alan Levine–http://www.flickr.com/photos/cogdog/7174181426/
 
As you walk across that stage in Ball Circle, know that we, your professors, are proud of you and all that you have achieved.  Know that we are grateful for the time we have spent with you and hope that you have felt challenged, inspired, and ultimately rewarded by your time with us.  Know that we look forward to hearing of your opportunities, successes, and accomplishments in the years to come.  No matter where you go, or what you do, you will always be alums of Mary Washington. That community lasts a lifetime.  

So, go, be uncomfortable in new jobs, new internships, new business ventures, new schools, traveling to new places, or even with just a new attitude in your old room at home.  Be okay with being uncomfortable, because that’s where the real learning, the real change, the real fun is.  And come back and tell me in 18 years how it all turns out.
Thank you.
 
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Acknowledgments
 
Thanks to Tim O’Donnell and Carter Hudgins for their help/inspiration on earlier versions of this.  Thanks as well to the hundreds of 2012 UMW graduates who responded to my request for feedback, information, and memories of their time at Mary Washington.  I included as many of their words and ideas as possible here.
 
Image Credits
 

 

  • Word clouds from Wordle.net, based on response from hundreds of 2012 UMW Graduating Seniors.
  • Obama Visit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/panandrao/
  • Snowpocalypse Collage: Heather Thompson, Jenn Arndt; http://umwbullet.com/files/2010/02/igloo-300×201.jpg; http://fourword.umwblogs.org/files/2011/01/DSC_1325.jpg
  • 1993 graduation photo: http://archive.umw.edu:8080/vital/access/HandleResolver/10154/1459
  • 2012 Ball Circle photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cogdog/7174181426/

 

 
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What do we call that “digital” thing that we want to teach?

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I’ve been wrestling with the notion of an interdisciplinary academic program for undergraduates that engages students in thoughtful consumption of digital media, in production of scholarly and creative work in various forms of digital media, and in exploration and analysis of the implications of such media.  In trying to clarify my thoughts before I go talk to people about this idea at my school and elsewhere, I asked for help on Twitter.  The following is the conversation that emerged.  I’m still analyzing it–I’m clearly still stuck, for example, in my quest to find a term that captures much of what I like about “Digital Humanities”, while including the social sciences and sciences as well–but I thought it might be useful to have the whole thing in one place for me and for anyone else who is interested.  I’d welcome any other comments or contributions to the discussion.

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Banner Lecture for VHS

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I was truly honored when the Virginia Historical Society, a wonderful museum and archive, asked me to give one of the famous Banner Lectures on my book. Oddly enough, though I’ve presented various parts at a number of conferences, I’ve never done a formal presentation of the whole project. So, I had a good time putting this talk together and it turned out pretty well. I got some great questions from the audience.

Thanks again to Nelson Lankford, Frances Pollard, and the rest of the VHS staff for all the work that they do to contribute to the history of Virginia.

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AAHC–Teaching with Digital Tools

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I’m pleased to be part of a roundtable on “Teaching with Digital Tools” at the American Association of History and Computing conference at George Mason on April 4.

The panel (with the classy Clioweb (Jeremy Boggs) and UCLA’s Joshua Sternfeld), we’ve decided to avoid formal presentations and to organize our discussions around six key questions about the subject. We’ll each give our answers and look to the audience for comments and further questions.

  • What are your goals in terms of using digital tools in teaching?
  • What evaluation standards do you employ in evaluating your students’ digital work?
  • How do you balance teaching historical content and teaching tech skills?
  • How have you integrated historiography into your teaching methods?
  • Tell us a particular assignment involving digital tools that was very successful (or very unsuccessful). What was it, and why do you think it was successful/unsuccessful?
  • What do you see as the future of teaching and technology?

I know we’re missing some things here, but these seem like a good start. What would you ask?

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Contemplating Online Academic Publishing

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This post began as a comment on Laura Blankenship’s Emerging Technologies Consulting blog. Laura noted that the topic of online academic publishing and how it relates to tenure and other institutional academic concerns was going to be part of her formal role as a speaker/leader at this year’s Faculty Academy. My response was as follows:

I can’t wait to hear what you have to say in May. This is a particularly tough issue and one that has gotten a great deal of resistance when broached (at UMW and elsewhere) in formal or informal ways in a variety of conversations I’ve been a part of lately.

On one hand the change to a new system is always complicated (and frankly, even in the old system, the disciplinary differences are enough to make university-wide review committees shudder–e.g., how many psychology articles equal a book in history? I have my own argument, but all would agree that my perspective on this is fairly biased). So, that resistance isn’t that surprising.

Yet, on the surface, online publishing should make a lot of things easier, not harder, to assess for tenure and/or merit pay:

1) Financial limitations that restrict #/size/scope of published works exist on a completely different scale in the online world, especially once a system for peer-reviewed academic e-publishing is built.

1a) It seems almost a no-brainer that scholarly journals should move on-line completely (or at least in part) given the large percentage of costs that publishing those journals entails.

2) Measuring impact — There must be some way of measuring the number of readers/links/hits/formal citations in other peer-reviewed articles or books/presence in syllabi. Now, obviously these things could be gamed (i.e., hits and uniques) or narrowed by restrictive access to some of the examples (BB course syllabi aren’t accessible, for example, nor are many online, but peer-reviewed articles in collections like JSTOR).

I’m sure there are many things I’m forgetting/overlooking here, but I’m really looking forward to Laura’s exploration of the topic in May. Every institution needs to have that conversation.

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Writing a Strategic Plan for Academic Technologies & Libraries

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Our institution is going through a major process of strategic planning, and one on a fairly accelerated timetable. We need to have a complete draft by May and after feedback from the Board and the rest of the academic community, have a plan in place by November. I’m a member of the strategic planning steering committee, the group responsible for directing the process and for writing the final report, as well as being part of some of the discussions of the pieces of the report.

Now, strategic plans are funny things. Done right, they can set aspirational and practical goals for an institution that can drive fund-raising, shape organizational decisions, and determine the investment of key resources. Done wrong, they can create needless animosity, fear, confusion, and leave an institution in worse shape than before the process. But even when done well, the best strategic plan is useless unless the administration and the academic community as a whole relies on it, turns to it, uses it. So, the first question might be, why bother? Why invest time in an enterprise that has such a potential for failure? The answer is that I believe that this effort is a real opportunity for change, a true chance to articulate a vision for the direction of this institution, a remarkable moment in the life of the institution. I, and many of my colleagues, choose to see this as a time to think boldly about the future of the liberal arts university we care so much about.

One area in which I believe bold, visionary thought is both required and possible is in the area of academic technologies and libraries. I see the three key reasons why this area of discussion is particularly important for Mary Washington right now.

  1. Virtually everyone who talks about the future of institutions of higher education sees academic technologies and libraries as critical vehicles (paths, jump-starters, incubators, facilitators — choose your metaphor as you wish) for the growth of colleges and universities.
  2. Academic technologies offer a chance for smaller institutions to compete with much larger schools with much more sizable resource budgets. Also, assuming a basic computing infrastructure is in place, digital tools and technologies also allow for a quick ramp-up time for projects, easier piloting of new ideas, access to significantly larger (and better organized) library and archival collections, and widespread changes to existing systems or practices.
  3. Finally, UMW already has a number of critical resources in place with which we can build, create, and innovate boldly. [UMWblogs is perhaps the best known digital tool, and Faculty Academy may be the best-known event; but by “resources” I really mean a dedicated group of librarians, instructional technology artists, staff, and faculty. It is these genuinely creative, caring, thoughtful, reflective, and revolutionary people who must lead and effect the bold changes for which I’m hoping.]

In the next month, the strategic planning discussion group on Academic Technologies and Libraries needs to come up with 2-3 big goals in this area for the institution with several smaller objectives and a number of specific measurable benchmarks that would reflect progress toward those goals and objectives.

So, help me and UMW to think boldly about these critical components of a successful institution. What would be on your top list of goals for a small (~4,000 undergraduates, ~1,000 graduate and professional students) institution of higher learning? What are the necessary digital and/or library components of an liberal arts university of the 21st century? What could we do to be a leader among our peers in the fields of academic technology, library services and information resources?