Chairing the Academic Department Workshops
2009 Course Descriptions
Following each course description, we have listed the month in which
the course will be offered. This links you to the full schedule for that
workshop. Five sessions are offered at each workshop.
Budgeting in the New
Millennium with Natalie (Nikki)
Krawitz
As a department chair, you have responsibility for garnering human,
financial, and physical resources to support your department's vision
and mission. This session will focus on understanding the fiscal context
within which you operate and using that knowledge to develop and
implement a fiscal strategy. This topic will be offered in February.
Conflict
Management with Walter Gmelch
or Mary Lou
Higgerson
Even experienced chairs lament the problems and discomfort associated
with managing conflict. This session helps participants recognize the
nature and causes of conflict; identify interpersonal conflict skills;
explore response options; and experiment with the art of strategic
resolution. This topic will be offered in , February,
June and
November.
Developing a
Faculty with Jeffrey L.
Buller
Department chairs understand the importance of a comprehensive approach
to faculty development. But how do you move beyond faculty development
to developing a faculty? How do you implement strategies that will make
the members of your department more cohesive, working together as a team
for the good of your discipline? This course will explore strategies
that you can use to promote collegiality and team building in any type
of departmental environment. This topic will be offered in February.
Effective Fundraising
for Chairs with Dean A. Van
Galen
Charitable gifts have the ability to provide the margin of excellence
for higher education institutions and their academic departments.
Indeed, chairs often play a special role in cultivating, soliciting and
ensuring good stewardship of these gifts. In this session, some
important principles, issues and misconceptions related to fundraising
will be discussed. The focus will then turn to the process of gift
solicitation and participants will engage in an interactive session that
will help develop their fundraising skills. This topic will be offered
in November.
Evaluating College
Teaching with Peter
Seldin
Virtually every college and university evaluates teaching performance.
Some do it effectively, while others do not. This interactive session
focuses on student ratings of instruction and the teaching portfolio. It
examines important new lessons about what works and what doesn't, key
strategies, tough decisions, and the latest research results. This
topic will be offered in February,
June,
and November.
Introducing Campus
Risk Management with Ann Franke,
Esq.
What could possibly go wrong? A successful leaders looks ahead to events
that can derail a department's mission. A widespread cheating scandal
might rock a program. An earthquake might rock the entire region. A good
department chair or dean is alert to, but not alarmist about risks to
academic people, programs, and property. This interactive session covers
the most common and most serious campus risks. Using a basic risk
management framework, participants will learn to anticipate the "hidden
risks" in their own programs. Whether your concern is menacing students
or safety in off-campus programs, this session will equip you with
practical tools to manage the broad range of campus risk. This topic
will be offered in June.
Leadership and
Teamwork with Walter H.
Gmelch
This session will address the "call to leadership" and assist department
chairs to reflect on their motives, roles, and stresses as they journey
down the road of academic administration. Specifically, the session will
examine the trade-offs and pay-offs in department leadership. A
simulation exercise provides participants the opportunity to examine
both the phenomenon of leadership and the art of encouraging team work.
This topic will be offered in November.
Legal Issues for
Chairs with Fernando
Gomez
If good fences make good neighbors, then your institution's lawyer can
help keep your fences in good order. This session focuses on the legal
questions that most concern chairs: How do I remain immune from
lawsuits? Where is the line between a professor's free speech rights and
unprotected griping? What is due process? How can I legally terminate an
employee? When are recommendations confidential and when are they not?
This session uses interactive and participatory methods to look at
current court cases and legal trends. This topic will be offered in
November.
Systems Thinking
with Janet
Wessel Krejci
This session will introduce the participants to the concept of "Systems
Thinking" as it can apply to higher education. Academic leaders often
find themselves spending an enormous amount of time dealing with crisis
or chronic problems that may feel unrelated to academic progress.
Paradoxically these problems often interfere with moving departments
forward. Systems thinking principles and concepts will be presented to
help academic leaders achieve higher leverage in order to be more
effective and more efficient. Cases will be presented with applicable
strategies that will assist academic leaders to achieve higher success
and satisfaction. This topic will be offered in February.
Using Data to Guide
Departmental Planning and Decision-Making with Mark L.
Putnam
Chairs who can effectively use key data sources are at a tremendous
advantage in developing departmental plans, making the case for
departmental resource needs, facilitating program reviews, and
satisfying accreditation standards. This session is designed to
familiarize participants with strategies for obtaining both
institutional and comparative data, turning data into information that
can guide planning and decision-making, and presenting information in
the most effective manner. Course materials will include an annotated
list of web-based resources and related publications. This topic
will be offered in June.
Working with the
Dean with Mary Lou
Higgerson
The working relationship between academic chairperson and dean is
sometimes described as the "essential partnership" because the success
of each depends upon how the two carry out their different, but
interdependent role responsibilities. Chairpersons have considerable
control in establishing their credibility with the dean and in shaping
the way in which the dean works with them. This session will focus on
practical leadership communication strategies that enable chairpersons
to cultivate a productive working relationship with the dean.
Participants will have ample opportunity to practice the leadership
communication strategies being presented. This topic will be offered
in June.
Please direct questions about this page to:
brinda_albert@ace.nche.edu
This page last updated on 12/17/2008
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