Individual Book Selection: Stommel, J., Friend, C., & Morris, S. M. (2020). Critical Digital Pedagogy. Hybrid Pedagogy Inc. https://cdpcollection.pressbooks.com/ If anyone else picked the same book for their individual selection, I strongly recommend reading chapter 15. It talks about the “hamster-wheel cultures of academic over-work” and it presents the education system as the “anxiety machine”. I think this topic is extremely relevant to all of us, especially now during the pandemic when we find ourselves working more than ever. I liked the strategy used by the authors in this chapter to not provide any suggestions for a problem solution. Instead, the authors call for all of us to reflect on the things we are chasing after and decided whether we should try to change them and why. I agree with the authors’ statements about how ambition can be exploited and how some educators push themselves to their limits.

External Resource Recommendation: McNulty, S., Meyers, G. (2021). Seeing clearly the blurred boundaries. Inside Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2021/03/12/colleges-must-acknowledge-challenges-facing-female-academics-who-juggle-work-and

“Our preliminary research on the challenges facing scholars who conduct research programs that require juggling fieldwork and family demands has shown that female-identified academics disproportionately struggle when boundaries between home and work blur” (McNulty & Meyers, 2021). This is a great article that outlines the challenges faced by women academicians, who are also taking care of their children while working from home. The article suggests that as challenging as this combination can be, there are some strategies that could potentially mitigate the “inherently gendered and inequitable nature” of pandemic. Examples of strategies include using some of the research funds to fund childcare and extending tenure-track time. I think that this topic deserves attention, and it should be addressed by leaders of higher education institutions.

External Resource Recommendation: Many faculty members are concerned with integrity of online assessments, especially during the rapid move into online and remote learning. The following podcast presents many practical ideas that instructors can incorporate into their online assessments right away to increase integrity and minimize the risk of cheating. https://www.insidehighered.com/audio/2021/02/16/ep-38-combatting-cheating-covid-era

One of the statements highlighted in the article is about higher education institutions being able to make “small adjustments easily” but having much more difficulty when it comes to major changes. I agree with this observation. Further, I have noticed at my own institution that implementing any college-wide initiatives/changes is very challenging, especially in a unionized environment. It is very difficult to obtain faculty members' buy-in and implement changes that are not reflected in a contractual agreement. Vision, initiative, and capacity for action are mentioned in the article as necessities to achieve a template for contextual change. Further, “inquiry and dialogue” are needed to “plan, implement, and sustain” change. The article’s conclusion is that in order to sustain change in a higher education institution, it is necessary to also sustain “learning”. The learning part refers to previously mentioned inquiry and dialogue and understanding the contest of the environment around the institution. In my opinion, the learning part is equally challenging and time consuming to achieve as the overall change efforts.

The article acknowledges the fact that even before the COVID-19 pandemic, there were already significant problems in higher education such as low completion rates, enrollment disparities between different ethnic groups, and the rising student debt. The pandemic intensified these problems, and at the same time, higher education institutions were forced to quickly adapt to the new reality. The authors suggests that there is a need for institutions to “reimagine the next five to ten years and beyond”. Answering some distinctive questions listed in the article might assist colleges in this “reimagining” process.<br> In my opinion, the questions listed by the article’s authors are relevant and can assist any higher institution in redefining its future. Deciding about university’s distinctive features, how to build diverse and inclusive institution, and to maintain high-quality student experience are among the questions that leaders must ask and strive to answer. From a technology point of view, deciding to what extent remote and online learning will be utilized post pandemic is a topic to address. As the article suggest, these modalities are here to stay, and it is up to the institutions to figure out how to properly utilize them. Challenging the conventional wisdom, and especially making decision at a much faster pace than usual, might be difficult to achieve. As we know, shared governance structures are complex, involve many stakeholders, and are rather slow to make any decisions.

Individual Book Selection: Stommel, J., Friend, C., & Morris, S. M. (2020). Critical Digital Pedagogy. Hybrid Pedagogy Inc. https://cdpcollection.pressbooks.com/

Chapter 8 explored the idea of why pedagogy matters and why it should be utilized and changed accordingly by the teachers to improve the students’ learning process. “Rather than feeling overwhelmed and oppressed by the unfairness of the world, be an activist in the realm where you have control” (Stommel, Friend, & Morris, 2020). The chapter provides very practical recommendations how any classroom can be changed into a “student-centered and engaged classroom”. I really liked the idea of “Everyone raise Your Hand” activity. I think it might be a little awkward to implement at first, but I agree with the authors that it is an activity that is a good practice of participation and to “teach people they are important enough to say what they have to say” (Stommel, Friend, & Morris, 2020). Some other ideas were the “Exit Ticket” and the “Think, Pair, and Share” activities. These are small changes that can create big effects in students’ engagement.

Individual Book Selection: Stommel, J., Friend, C., & Morris, S. M. (2020). Critical Digital Pedagogy. Hybrid Pedagogy Inc. https://cdpcollection.pressbooks.com/ Chapter 4 talks about a plagiarism detection software such as Turnitin. While the motivation behind this tool is to discourage cheating, there are some concerns that the work of students might be potentially used and sold without their consent. There is a disclosure provided by the software that any information posted will be treated as “non-confidential and nonproprietary”. This statement poses risks, but not all educators are aware of it. Friend and Morris (2020) go as far as drafting a letter that students might potentially send to their instructors to petition against using Turnitin. From my personal experience as a student, whenever my instructors used the Turnitin service, it would create an additional anxiety. Instead of relying on the software, Stommel and Friend (2020) suggest to “keep academic integrity a human problem with human solutions”.

Stommel, J., Friend, C., & Morris, S. M. (2020). Critical Digital Pedagogy. Hybrid Pedagogy Inc. https://cdpcollection.pressbooks.com/

In Chapter 3, the authors describe online communities and characterize them as being increasingly “less friendly, less welcoming, more superficial, more controlling, more restricting”. Further, an analogy is made to Bob Dylan’s song “Maggie’s Farm” from 1965. The authors challenge the reader to reflect “on whose farm are you working”? One of the underlying questions and concerns is about the safety of our students in an online environment. Who is controlling the content, data, and who is profiting from the students participating in online communities? Reading this chapter has made me reflect on my role as an instructor and whether I exercise enough care and responsibility in choosing my instructional materials, especially those that are digital and online. It is easy to get accustomed with an online publisher’s content and just assign it to our students, but do we ever pause and question “whose farm are we working on” and who is profiting from it?

The article outlines the differences between accountability and responsibility. While colleges are called to be accountable (reactive approach) for their actions just like business entities, a much more efficient approach would be for colleges to adopt a culture of responsibility (proactive approach). The following quote describes a position that any higher education institution should most likely avoid: “While others are driving the conversation, we are reacting; while others are setting expectations, we are fighting to explain ourselves”. Another major takeaway from the article is the author’s suggestion that higher education institutions should move toward creating “cross-functional integration”. This is further defined as “more interdependence, more coordination, and more information flow”. Creating an office of institutional effectiveness, to oversee improvement efforts and monitor the progress, is listed in the article as one of the elements of the cross-functional integration. According to the author, there might be no need to hold an institution accountable if that institution is “too busy convincingly demonstrating its responsibility”. Personally, I cannot conclude whether my own institution is one way or another. I have observed some situations where my college accepted the reactive approach and was being held accountable. I can only hope that we are now moving toward the responsibility approach so we can advance and deal appropriately with the future challenges.

While resignation of the president is the main focus of the article, I can’t help but wonder whether there might be some other college-wide issues present especially in the overall decision-making processes. There might be a bigger problem hiding behind the scenes that has led to the outbreak and the president’s resignation. I am questioning whether the decision to hold in-person classes was made by the president alone and what type of pressures were present to do so from other stakeholders, including the board of directors. Hardly ever a single person would make such decision in isolation. As indicated in the article, the university’s reopening plan was not properly designed in the first place and did not have sufficient controls in place to prevent and manage outbreaks. As we have experienced at our own institutions, there is a lot of misinformation when it comes to Covid-19.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-covid-19-college-university-graduation-virtual-20210209-557rzbjmkrggrgfkqp5g6jd6ia-story.html

This article outlines plans some of the major colleges and universities in the Chicago area are making for the commencement ceremonies. Majority of these events will be held virtually. Some of the institutions have announced their decisions as early as November of last year, and some are yet to make an official announcement.

In the video, Dr. Biden was pointing to the unique challenges of military families, and especially military children. The multiple deployments and constant moves from a place to place are just some of the contributing factors. Dr. Biden mentioned cases how teachers can thoughtfully design their lessons to recognize and appreciate the military children in their classes. She also mentioned an example of how some teachers might not even be aware of the military children in their classrooms. This realization has led her to the project: Educate the Educators. She has called for the higher education professionals to recognize military children in their curriculum and prepare teachers in terms of best classroom practices, where military children are present. Such teacher preparation would increase awareness of military children experiences and eventually lead to providing necessary and relevant resources to support them. Dr. Biden mentioned the gap in research addressing this topic, and she called for action to do more research that would “build a knowledge base that would allow to have accurate information” about military children. I think, this is an extremely relevant topic. My institution provides some resources to veteran and military affiliated students, but during the pandemic, I am not sure whether these resources are still available such as a safe physical space. I also think that research in this area would be very helpful to increase understanding of the needs of this student group.

This article provides many reflections about a higher education leadership role within a unique setting of a university in South Africa. It outlines the complexity of the role where racial and political components play significant parts. Many other leadership challenges are described and ways to overcome them are explained. What I found particularly useful is that the article provides so many wonderful quotes that can be used to define leadership in any environment. I particularly liked the statement: “Leadership is as much a spiritual connection to the hearts of people as it is a managerial concern about professional performance”. In my opinion, it is very easy to sometimes get caught up in the measurable goals, performance targets, and other quantifiable results. However, a leader must also exhibit the connection with the people. Gaining their trust and respect is just as important as reaching other targets. Another quote that resonated with me was: “It is impossible to lead students without being among them as a constant presence”. Not only I have seen administrative leaders making decisions on their own without letting the students voice their opinions, but I have also seen the gaps in connection, communication, and interactions between institutional leaders and the students.

I would like to recommend this very recent article that shows troubling data about increased number of cases on some campuses in the spring semester compared to fall. Some of the possible reasons include increased social interactions between the students, but also the presence of new and more contagious variants of the virus. I think as many colleges are planning to go fully face-to-face in the upcoming fall, the leaders should also consider other options.

Diep, F. (2021). Some Campuses Have Already Eclipsed Their Fall Covid-19 Case Totals. What’s Going On? The Chronicle of Higher Education. http://www.chronicle.com/article/some-campuses-have-already-eclipsed-their-fall-covid-19-case-totals-whats-going-on

The author makes a statement that many people still believe that leaders are just born that way. I think to some degree, we might be born with some predispositions to assume various leadership roles throughout our life; however, I do not think that just those predispositions are enough to become a great leader. This would represent a very closed mindset and an assumption that people cannot grow intellectually and learn leadership skills. Continuous learning and improvement processes and a comprehensive knowledge about a given subject matter also play an important role in becoming a leader.

This is very helpful to allow the participants different methods of expression. Just like we should provide our students with multiple means of content and variety of assessment methods, in this case, the participants/teachers were given choices. I also liked the statement about "keeping the participant close to the experience". In my opinion, reflecting on a specific "situation, student, and event" adds to the validity of the findings and mitigates the risk of making general statements.

While the number of participants is eighteen, the concept and phenomena being researched affects many individuals, which is consistent with phenomenology. I like the idea of allowing the research participants to write their answers instead of providing them over a traditional interview. If this is an acceptable method within phenomenology, I would like to explore this for my own research capstone. I wonder if anyone else has any thoughts on using this method to gather data and possible advantages and disadvantages of doing so.

Providing researcher's interpretations along with "verbatim excerpts" is very helpful. It allows the reader not only to see the researcher's perspective, but also to draw their own conclusions. This technique reminded me of the quantitative methodology, where in addition to presenting the findings using highly complex statistical terminology, there was also a section explaining the findings in a plain language.

This statement is in agreement with this week's presentation about phenomenology being "less about the narrative, and more about the phenomenon" which in this case is the "pedagogical moment". Further, the research concentrates on experiences of many rather than one participant. I also think that this approach is highly philosophical pursuing the "deeper significance and meaning" as mentioned later in the article. I am a little concerned whether I would be able to write my own capstone project using such a philosophical "lens".

I selected the Critical Digital Pedagogy as my personal book choice. I felt it was important for me to explore this topic in more detail. Over the past several months, I have noticed how my institution and its various departments within have been immensely impacted by the sudden switch to hybrid or online teaching and learning mode. I agree with the authors that the definition of “critical digital pedagogy” is complex and requires proper understanding. All of the three words (critical, digital, and pedagogy) can be interpreted separately. When doing so, it is possible to overly concentrate just on the technology part and underestimate the value and importance of pedagogy. It is also possible to fail to realize the critical aspect of the entire concept. Therefore, it might be most beneficial to approach this definition as a “combination” of the three words and equally value the importance of each one.

The ever-growing student loan debt is a well-known problem in higher education. Many students are hesitant to go to college because of the fear of getting loans. Other students question whether it is worth it because of the consequences connected with getting a student loan and the risk of not being able to pay it off. I think, it is wonderful that the colleges mentioned in the article are being proactive and unconventional in the way they help their students by offering grants instead of loans in the financial-aid packages. I also liked the idea of making sure that such loan-removing programs are being designed with a sustainability goal in mind. This article shows that even in such challenging times as we are experiencing right now, there are some positive outcomes that might happen through well-thought out plans.

The article points out that many colleges were influenced by state politics rather than by public-health related issues in making decisions whether to teach in person or online in the fall semester. Based on the American Council on Education survey of college presidents, 43 percent listed “long-term financial viability” as their underlying motivation. In my opinion, which might sound too naive or idealistic, political affiliations or influences should not be part of such decisions. It is sad that higher education leaders might ignore science and the best interest of the health of the students and employees and make their decisions in agreement with political beliefs.

I am grateful that I got the chance to listen to the interviews in the podcast, and that it happened in the beginning of this course. Although I have been personally impacted by COVID-19, listening to the stories of other people made me realize how much more they have suffered during the last several months. It truly expanded my views and made me recognize that the impact of the pandemic has been such widespread and complex and far beyond just a physical sickness. The separation and the loss of loved ones, the loss of jobs and housing, the emotional toll, depression, anxiety are just a few examples mentioned by the podcast participants within the scope of Covid-19. What made me hopeful was that both the youngest and the oldest participants expressed enthusiasm and were able to still identify good things despite the challenges. Not losing hope, “picking up the pieces” and going on, holding on to our own unique “things” that make us stronger was a really valuable advice.

The article presented a detailed and realistic outlook on the current situation and listed many possible implications that come with the COVID-19 vaccines and the processes surrounding it. The title of the article, mentioning year two, caused me to reflect on the uncertainty that is still ahead of us. What I, and probably many others, had hoped to be over in a few months might be a process lasting a few years. As the author points out, having the vaccines gives hope, but there is so much more that needs to be done in order for have a proper distribution channel. I agree with the author about the dangers of misinformation. We have all witnessed the effects of lack of information or spreading false information. I have recently watched the “Social Dilemma” movie and it was eye opening how different forms of manipulation can influence our choices. The authors conclusions about the need to “reimagine what preparedness looks like” are accurate, but as mentioned in the article, will take years to implement.