Resources

Most of the scholarship on learner-centeredness is focused on individual classroom pedagogy, but this book takes learner-centeredness beyond the classroom and asks academic leaders to consider the broader implications of making their institutions fully learner-centered. Systemic change is needed, and curriculum is at the heart of what higher education does. To truly effect change, the curriculum needs to be examined and aligned with learner-centered practices. In this book the authors offer both design specifications for a learner-centered approach to curriculum as well as practical recommendations for implementation and assessment. The book covers the need for redesigning curriculum, curriculum design in the instructional paradigm, learner-centered design in practice, implementation, program assessment (including a helpful rubric for this), innovating through technology, and learning spaces that support learner-centered curricula. (From the Publisher)

The Christian College Phenomenon explores the explosive growth over the last twenty years of institutions affiliated with the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU). While public institutions of higher learning in the United States experienced a 3% growth in enrollment from 1990-1996, CCCU institutions witnessed a 36.9% growth during that same period. And in 2006, enrollment over the previous year at public universities grew by 13% and at other private colleges by 28%, but enrollment at CCCU institutions rose by 70.6%. Editors Thomas Chesnes and Samuel Joeckel have taken an empirical approach, surveying over 1900 professors at ninety-five CCCU colleges and universities and 2300 students at twenty different schools. The editors compiled responses to quantitative and open-ended questions on topics from pedagogy and politics to faith learning integration; they then made that data available to nearly thirty scholars who have turned their considered responses into chapters that are now organized into seven book sections, covering topics in gender, evolution, faith, learning, scholarship, and race/ethnicity: • TARGET AUDIENCE: The Christian College Phenomenon goes out to all those who study trends in American universities. Scholars and analysts, regardless of their faith commitments, will be interested to see what's happening in the CCCU schools that have experienced tremendous enrollment growth, particularly in comparison to their counterparts. What are these schools doing differently that can give all universities a new perspective on movements in contemporary education? This book offers a window into possibilities (From the Publisher)

Journal Issue.

As the commercialization of American higher education accelerates, more and more students are coming to college with the narrow aim of obtaining a preprofessional credential. The traditional four-year college experience--an exploratory time for students to discover their passions and test ideas and values with the help of teachers and peers--is in danger of becoming a thing of the past. In College, prominent cultural critic Andrew Delbanco offers a trenchant defense of such an education, and warns that it is becoming a privilege reserved for the relatively rich. In arguing for what a true college education should be, he demonstrates why making it available to as many young people as possible remains central to America's democratic promise. In a brisk and vivid historical narrative, Delbanco explains how the idea of college arose in the colonial period from the Puritan idea of the gathered church, how it struggled to survive in the nineteenth century in the shadow of the new research universities, and how, in the twentieth century, it slowly opened its doors to women, minorities, and students from low-income families. He describes the unique strengths of America's colleges in our era of globalization and, while recognizing the growing centrality of science, technology, and vocational subjects in the curriculum, he mounts a vigorous defense of a broadly humanistic education for all. Acknowledging the serious financial, intellectual, and ethical challenges that all colleges face today, Delbanco considers what is at stake in the urgent effort to protect these venerable institutions for future generations. (From the Publisher)

In this book, Mike Higton provides a constructive critique of Higher Education policy and practice in the UK, the US and beyond, from the standpoint of Christian theology. He focuses on the role universities can and should play in forming students and staff in intellectual virtue, in sustaining vibrant communities of inquiry, and in serving the public good. He argues both that modern secular universities can be a proper context for Christians to pursue their calling as disciples to learn and to teach, and that Christians can contribute to the flourishing of such universities as institutions devoted to learning for the common good. In the process he sets out a vision of the good university as secular and religiously plural, as socially inclusive, and as deeply and productively entangled with the surrounding society. Along the way, he engages with a range of historical examples (the medieval University of Paris, the University of Berlin in the nineteenth century, and John Henry Newman's work in Oxford and Dublin) and with a range of contemporary writers on Higher Education from George Marsden to Stanley Hauerwas and from David Ford to Rowan Williams. (From the Publisher)

* This irreverent, but serious, guide to what life in higher education institutions is really like, now enhanced by 100 new tips * Invaluable advice that ranges from getting your Ph.D. to setting the course of your academic career Just landed your first faculty position? Close to getting your Ph.D., and planning a career in academe? What will academic life be like? How do you discover its tacit rules? Develop the habits and networks needed for success? What issues will you encounter if you’re a person of color, or a woman? How is higher education changing? Paul Gray and David E. Drew share their combined experience of many years as faculty and (recovering) administrators to offer even more insider advice—the kind that’s rarely taught or even talked about in graduate school – to help you succeed. The 100 new hints expand sections on the dissertation process, job hunting, life in the classroom and on dealing with students, as well as on matters that affect readers’ careers, such as research, publication, and tenure. The book concludes with a tongue-in-cheek appendix on How to Become a Millionaire while an academic. Already have the first edition? Give it to someone less fortunate than you, and take advantage of the new advice you will find in these pages. Too penurious to buy this book? Persuade a family member or friend to get it as a gift. (From the Publisher)

For those considering adopting team teaching, or interested in reviewing their own practice, this book offers an over-view of this pedagogy, its challenges and rewards, and a rich range of examples in which teachers present and reflect upon their approaches. The interaction of two teachers—both the intellectual interaction involved in the design of the course, and the pedagogical interaction in the teaching of the course—creates a dynamic environment that reflects the way scholars make meaning of the world. The process naturally breaks down the teacher-centered classroom by creating a scholarly community in which teachers and students work together to understand important ideas, and where students don’t just learn content, but begin to understand how knowledge is constructed, grasp the connections between disciplines as well as their different perspectives, see greater coherence in the curriculum, and appreciate how having more than one teacher in the classroom leads naturally to dialogue and active learning. Each of the five examples in this book shares the story of a course at a different institution, and each is designed to reflect a number of different variables in team-taught courses. They represent courses in a variety of different disciplines, including the sciences, social sciences, humanities, and the arts; and at a range of levels, from first-year seminars to graduate courses. They also illustrate a number of different models for instructional teams, such as faculty from the same disciplines, from related disciplines, from two very different disciplines, from different institutions, and one pairing of a faculty member and a staff member. This book provides insight into the impact of team teaching on student learning and on faculty development. It also addresses the challenges, both pedagogical an administrative, that need to be addressed for team teaching to be effective. (From the Publisher)

Journal Issue.

Members of the Association of Theological Schools' Chief Academic Officers Society (CAOS) -- deans and CAOs at more than 250 theological schools in the United States and Canada -- face a number of unique vocational tasks and trials. C(H)AOS Theory brings together in one volume perspectives from more than thirty veteran deans on a variety of topics related to academic leadership, from understanding institutional contexts and nurturing relationships to negotiating conflict, setting and meeting academic goals, building budgets, working with assessment and accreditation, and more. With its rich amalgam of useful information, bold instruction on a host of academic leadership issues, and lively narratives on the ways different colleagues address common challenges, C(H)AOS Theory will serve as a helpful resource for academic leaders. (From the Publisher)

In Teachers as Learners, a collection of landmark essays, noted teacher educator and scholar Sharon Feiman-Nemser shines a light on teacher learning. Arguing that serious and sustained teacher learning is a necessary condition for ambitious student learning, she examines closely how teachers acquire, generate, and use knowledge about teaching over the trajectory of their careers. Together, these essays bear witness to the evolution and development of a body of scholarship about teacher learning in which the author herself played a catalyzing role. (From the Publisher)