Learning Analytics in Higher Education

Intergroup dialogue promotes student engagement across cultural and social divides on college campuses through a face-to-face, interactive, and facilitated learning experience that brings together twelve to eighteen students from two or more social identity groups over a sustained period of time. Students in intergroup dialogue explore commonalities and differences; examine the nature and impact of discrimination, power, and privilege; and find ways of working together toward greater inclusion, equality, and social justice. Intergroup dialogue is offered as a cocurricular activity on some campuses and as a course or part of a course on others. The practice of intergroup dialogue is considered a substantive and meaningful avenue for preparing college graduates with the knowledge, commitment, and skills essential for living and working in a diverse yet socially stratified society. The research evidence supports the promise of intergroup dialogues to meet its educational goals?consciousness raising, building relationships across differences and conflicts, and strengthening individual and collective capacities to promote social justice. This volume outlines the theory, practice, and research on intergroup dialogue. It also offers educational resources to support the practice of intergroup dialogue. Addressing faculty, administrators, student affairs personnel, students, and practitioners, this volume is a useful resource for anyone implementing intergroup dialogues in higher education. This is the 4th issue of the 32nd volume of the Jossey-Bass report series ASHE Higher Education Report Series. Each monograph in the series is the definitive analysis of a tough higher education problem, based on thorough research of pertinent literature and institutional experiences. Topics are identified by a national survey. Noted practitioners and scholars are then commissioned to write the reports, with experts providing critical reviews of each manuscript before publication.

In 2012, soon after his election to a third presidential term as president, following a four-year stint as prime minister (to avoid modifying the constitution), and in the wake of an unprecedented wave of popular protests, Vladimir Putin issued his “May Decrees.” Notable among them was the government’s commitment to increase the salaries of doctors, scientific researchers and university teachers to double the average in their respective regions by 2018. But then on December 30 of that year, the government issued a “road map” for education, revealing that the salary increases in higher education would be paid for, not by significant new government funding, but by “optimization,” which would eliminate 44% of the current teaching positions in higher education. This was justified in part by a forecasted drop in student enrollment. Thus opened a new, accelerated period of reform of higher education. David Mandel examines the impact of these reforms on the condition of Russia’s university teachers and the collective efforts of some teachers, a small minority, to organize themselves in an independent trade union to defend their professional interests and their vision of higher education. Apart from the subject’s intrinsic interest, an in-depth examination of this specific aspect of social policy provides valuable insight into the nature of the Russian state as well as into the condition of “civil society,” in particular the popular classes, to which Russian university teachers belong according to their socio-economic situation, if not necessarily their self-image.

Using Cases in Higher Education: A Guide for Faculty and Administrators is an essential resource created for faculty and administrators who utilize case studies to analyze, assess, and respond to the complex and difficult issues facing higher education leaders. While this volume will prove useful with any case study, it is specifically designed to complement the series of casebooks and teaching notes, starting with Casebook I: Faculty Employment Policies and Teaching Notes to Casebook I: Faculty Employment Policies.

Contemplative pedagogy is a way for instructors to: empower students to integrate their own experience into the theoretical material they are being taught in order to deepen their understanding; help students to develop sophisticated problem-solving skills; support students’ sense of connection to and compassion for others; and engender inquiries into students’ most profound questions. Contemplative practices are used in just about every discipline—from physics to economics to history—and are found in every type of institution. Each year more and more faculty, education reformers, and leaders of teaching and learning centers seek out best practices in contemplative teaching, and now can find them here, brought to you by two of the foremost leaders and innovators on the subject. This book presents background information and ideas for the practical application of contemplative practices across the academic curriculum from the physical sciences to the humanities and arts. Examples of contemplative techniques included in the book are mindfulness, meditation, yoga, deep listening, contemplative reading and writing, and pilgrimage, including site visits and field trips.

American higher education needs a major reframing of student learning outcomes assessment Dynamic changes are underway in American higher education. New providers, emerging technologies, cost concerns, student debt, and nagging doubts about quality all call out the need for institutions to show evidence of student learning. From scholars at the National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment (NILOA), Using Evidence of Student Learning to Improve Higher Education presents a reframed conception and approach to student learning outcomes assessment. The authors explain why it is counterproductive to view collecting and using evidence of student accomplishment as primarily a compliance activity. Today's circumstances demand a fresh and more strategic approach to the processes by which evidence about student learning is obtained and used to inform efforts to improve teaching, learning, and decision-making. Whether you're in the classroom, an administrative office, or on an assessment committee, data about what students know and are able to do are critical for guiding changes that are needed in institutional policies and practices to improve student learning and success. Use this book to: Understand how and why student learning outcomes assessment can enhance student accomplishment and increase institutional effectiveness Shift the view of assessment from being externally driven to internally motivated Learn how assessment results can help inform decision-making Use assessment data to manage change and improve student success Gauging student learning is necessary if institutions are to prepare students to meet the 21st century needs of employers and live an economically independent, civically responsible life. For assessment professionals and educational leaders, Using Evidence of Student Learning to Improve Higher Education offers both a compelling rationale and practical advice for making student learning outcomes assessment more effective and efficient.

Institutional diversity serves as one of the fundamental hallmarks of American higher education. After a long history of support for many institutional types, the past 40 years have seen a decline in institutional variety. Through a discussion of history, theoretical contexts, and causes of homogenization, this monograph examines how higher education policymakers and leaders can strengthen institutional mission and preserve the benefits of institutional diversity. Higher education needs to serve a variety of functions for students, from liberal arts education to vocational training programs. No single institution or institutional type can adequately fulfill all of these roles, and this monograph considers the rewards and challenges of maintaining a healthy, beneficial diversity. It also covers the roles, purposes, trials, and benefits of institutional diversity. It provides practical examples and theoretical perspectives useful in understanding the complexities of higher education systems and the external pressures faced by colleges and universities that challenge institutional mission and threaten institutional diversity and its well-established benefits for students and society. This is the third issue of the 39th volume of the Jossey-Bass series ASHE Higher Education Report. Each monograph is the definitive analysis of a tough higher education issue, based on thorough research of pertinent literature and institutional experiences. Topics are identified by a national survey. Noted practitioners and scholars are then commissioned to write the reports, with experts providing critical reviews of each manuscript before publication.

How far have universities in post-Communist states adopted the practices and habits of their branded and consumer-oriented equivalents in the English-speaking world? While not assuming that university education in those states reflects in any mechanistic way the regulated, business-led system long established in places like the US, and now being dramatically realized in countries like Britain, this edited collection identifies some marked shifts in the direction of what might best be described as ‘neoliberalisation’, examining its particularities in local situations where establishment ideologies were, until the early 1990s, deeply alien to all kinds of commercially driven entities. Many of the authors are concerned not only with the linked issues of commercialism, instrumentalism, bureaucracy, and managerialism, framed locally and nationally, but also with the meaning and purpose of universities outside or against their status as efficient gatherers of income. The collection makes specific reference to Lithuania, Hungary, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, Georgia, and Russia, and comprises theoretical as well as empirical studies of diverse but connected subjects, including the marketization of the academy, regional reactions to globalization as expressed in the representational rhetoric of specific curricula, the role and place of civic education, comparisons between educational settings, pedagogies for a critical and ethical consciousness, corporate and state demands and their effects on academic freedom, and the positive potential of new communication technologies. In all these cases, the system of neoliberalism, or rather an uneven process of neoliberalisation, forms a backdrop to the particular issues discussed.

Both colleges and policymakers recognize the importance of supporting students experiencing homelessness in higher education. The challenges involve both addressing issues of college access as well as developing strategies to support retention and degree completion once enrolled. This volume explores how homelessness intersects most social issues that marginalize individuals and negatively influence postsecondary completion, including poverty, foster care, and LGBTQ+ discrimination. As becomes evident, students experiencing homelessness should be considered in conversations about equity and access. For these students, completing some form of degree or certification beyond high school is a vital step in achieving future stability. Topics covered include: how residential experiences influence educational engagement and retention an overview of research related to housing insecurity in higher education federal and state policies related to homelessness in higher education a trauma-informed care approach to this issue an approach to understanding and studying housing insecurity among students ideas that will be necessary for policy and program development.

Take a candid look into how some traditional liberal arts colleges have incorporated nontraditional adult degree programs. This volume of case studies shows how a number of small, independent universities addressed various administrative and service functions for their adult programs. When taken together, it captures the emulsive nature of this imperfect blend as well as the fluidity of solutions. This issue covers: The dynamics that an adult program can bring to an institution Colleges that combine the adult program within university-wide, centralized processes Colleges that have mostly autonomous programs Institutions that developed a hybrid model The current status of incorporating nontraditional programs into traditional colleges and universities. This is the 159th volume of this Jossey-Bass series. Addressed to higher education decision makers on all kinds of campuses, New Directions for Higher Education provides timely information and authoritative advice about major issues and administrative problems confronting every institution.

This volume delivers a cutting-edge analysis on vernacular globalization, or how local forces mediate global trends. It delves into the vital facets of the quest for global competitiveness, including: Global university rankings World-class universities University mergers Quality assurance Cross-border higher education International education hubs. The authors situate their topics within current international scholarship and demonstrate the myriad avenues through which local actors in higher education may respond to global competition. They pose critical questions about the impact of global competition in an increasingly hierarchical higher education environment, interrogating the potential for social injustice that arises. By providing an alternative perspective to the descriptive, normative approach that dominates the scholarship on global competition in higher education, the chapters in this volume open a fresh and invaluable dialogue in this arena. This is the 168th volume of the Jossey-Bass quarterly report series New Directions for Higher Education. Addressed to presidents, vice presidents, deans, and other higher education decision makers on all kinds of campuses, it provides timely information and authoritative advice about major issues and administrative problems confronting every institution.