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Matthew Lynch published in Equity, HBCU's, Higher Education, International Education

The covert racism that is holding back black academics

Kalwant Bhopal, University of Southampton

Students are walking out in protest against racial inequality and injustice in the US and have been rallying together in days of action at campuses across the country. The #StudentBlackout movement has challenged and confronted white supremacy and anti-black attitudes on university campuses, and has made demands for more black and minority ethnic faculty members.

So it is ironic that the US is the destination of choice for British black and minority ethnic academics who feel worn down by incidents of racism, exclusion and marginalisation in Britain. Recent research that I worked on, published by the Equality Challenge Unit, found that as a result of their experiences black and minority UK academics were significantly more likely to consider a move to overseas higher education than their white counterparts.

Many spoke of the potential opportunities they identified in working for American universities. I can’t help feeling they might have to re-evaluate their options in the light of what is going on in the US. Many of the demonstrations across American campuses have been triggered by specific local circumstances – such as reports of all-white parties and students in blackface at Yale.

But taken as a whole they represent a response to more widespread concerns about racism within American academic culture. These demonstrations also reflect the wider groundswell in concern across America exemplified by the Black Lives Matter demonstrations which have been sparked by unlawful killings by the police.

Protecting white privilege

In the UK, such protest has not yet been seen. Academics present themselves as guardians of a space that highlights liberal sentiments, progressive values and a commitment to meritocracy. Many regard their “seats of learning” as places that challenge inequalities and injustice. But this is clearly not always the case in reality.

My research has found that many black and minority ethnic academics report experiences of subtle, covert and nuanced racism in higher education in which white identity is privileged and protected within the space traditionally reserved for the white middle class.

During the past decade there has been a significant increase in the numbers of black and minority UK academic staff in higher education – from 6,000 staff in 2003-4 to almost 10,700 in 2013-14. There were even more non-UK black and minority academic staff, as the graph below shows.

But black and minority ethnic academics are far less likely to be in senior roles compared to their white colleagues: 11.2% of UK white academics were professors compared to 9.8% of UK black and minority ethnic staff (of which only 4.5% were black). There are only 20 deputy or pro vice-chancellors who are black or minority ethnic compared to the majority, 530, who are white.

Significant policy changes in the UK, such as the 2010 Equality Act and the introduction of the Race Equality Charter, designed to measure how successful universities were at delivering inclusive policy in practice, might suggest higher education had become more inclusive. But in reality, covert racist behaviour impacts heavily on the career trajectories of many black and minority ethnic academics.

A total of 21 higher education institutions took part in the pilot of the Race Equality Charter 2014 of which eight were successful in gaining a bronze award. The Race Equality Charter works in a similar vein to the Athena Swan charter, which was introduced in 2005 to advance the representation of women in science and engineering subjects.

On the outside

It is often hard to pin down or confront racist behaviour in universities because it is indicative of an environment in which inequality flourishes behind the scenes, rather than centre stage. For example, black academics report goalposts, such as selection criteria, being moved when they apply for promotion – which doesn’t happen for white colleagues.

In my research, which included interviews with 30 US-based academics and 35 who were based in the UK, respondents indicated that in both the UK and US an increase in fragility and risk within academia had resulted in greater competition for new jobs, threats of pay cuts, and fears about job security and tenure.

In a climate of financial global insecurity, competitiveness over job security was far more likely to privilege those from white middle-class backgrounds. Black academics I interviewed in both the US and UK were less likely than their white colleagues to have access to established networks of knowledge and support. These networks open the door for new opportunities in which job offers are made and access granted to particular institutions and insider processes.

I found that “who you know” still counts for far more than “what you know” and fears of job insecurity and fragility actively work to promote the interests of white established elites in academia. This environment of insecurity is of greater value to white academic elites, for who it serves to maintain their ascendancy.

While public displays of racism in the academy are rare, a more pernicious set of behaviour has emerged. Black and minority ethnic academics told me of instances when colleagues would not make eye contact with them in meetings, their opinions were not taken into account and there was constant undermining or criticism of their work.

We must continue to disrupt, challenge and dismantle such covert racism if we are to move forward in our quest for a socially just society.

The Conversation

Kalwant Bhopal, Professor of Education and Social Justice, University of Southampton

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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Matthew Lynch published in EdTech & Innovation, HBCU's, Higher Education

Can schools punish students for off-campus, online speech?

Clay Calvert, University of Florida

In January 2014, Reid Sagehorn, a student at Rogers High School in Minnesota, jokingly tweeted “actually yeah” in response to a question about whether he had made out with one of his high school teachers.

The public school, acting on the tweet, suspended him for seven weeks. Sagehorn, a member of the National Honor Society, fought the suspension in a federal court, claiming the actions of school officials violated his First Amendment right to free speech.

Did the school have the right to punish him for his off-campus expression? It turns out – no.

In August 2015, a federal judge rejected the school officials’ motion to have the case dismissed. After all, the court found that Sagehorn made the post while away from campus, during nonschool hours, without using the school’s computers. And last month Sagehorn collected a settlement of more than US$400,000.

Sadly, Reid Sagehorn’s case is not unique. For at least the past 15 years, schools across the nation have engaged in Orwellian overreaches into the homes and bedrooms of students to punish them for their off-campus, online expression regarding classmates, teachers and administrators.

Despite the bevy of cases, the issue of whether schools can punish students for off-campus, online speech remains unresolved.

Cases where school kids were suspended

For instance, in April 2015, a federal court in Oregon considered a case called Burge v Colton School District 53 in which an eighth grader was suspended from his public middle school based upon out-of-school comments he posted on his personal Facebook page.

And in September 2014, a federal court in New York considered a case called Bradford v Norwich City School District in which a public high school student was suspended “based on a text-message conversation he had with another student regarding a third student while outside of school.”

Judge Glenn Suddaby observed in Bradford that “the Supreme Court has yet to speak on the scope of a school’s authority to discipline a student for speech that does not occur on school grounds or at a school-sponsored event.”

Silence from the Supreme Court

Indeed, a key problem here is that the US Supreme Court has never ruled in a case involving the off-campus speech rights of students in the digital era.

Public school students do possess First Amendment speech rights, although those rights are not the same as those of adults in nonschool settings.

A case in point is the Supreme Court’s famous 1969 proclamation in Tinker v Des Moines Independent Community School District that students do not
“shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.”

A key problem has been the silence of the Supreme Court on free speech rights of students.
Jeff Kubina, CC BY-SA

In this case, a divided court upheld the right of students to wear to school black armbands emblazoned with peace signs as a form of political protest against the war in Vietnam. The majority reasoned that such speech could be stopped only if school officials had actual facts to believe it would lead to a substantial and material disruption of the educational atmosphere.

But Tinker was an on-campus speech case. And although the Supreme Court has considered three more student speech cases since Tinker, none involved either off-campus or digital expression.

A chance to resolve the issue

Schools today are trying to exert their authority far beyond the schoolhouse gate. Some courts have allowed these efforts and others have rejected them, but now the Supreme Court has a prime opportunity to resolve the matter in a case called Bell v Itawamba County School Board.

In January 2011, a Mississippi high school student, Taylor Bell, was suspended from Itawamba Agricultural High School after he posted, while away from campus during nonschool hours, a homemade rap video to Facebook and YouTube.

In the video, Bell criticizes in no uncertain terms two male teachers for their alleged sexual harassment of minor female students. A version of rap that describes the resulting controversy is available online.

In August 2015, the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit narrowly ruled that high school officials in Mississippi did not violate the First Amendment speech rights of Bell when they punished him for posting the video because it allegedly threatened two teachers.

In a ruling against Taylor Bell, the Fifth Circuit majority concluded that the rule from the Tinker case applies to off-campus speech:

when a student intentionally directs at the school community speech reasonably understood by school officials to threaten, harass, and intimidate a teacher, even when such speech originated, and was disseminated, off-campus without the use of school resources.

One of the judges in the case, James Dennis, writing in dissent, ripped into the majority for broadly proclaiming “that a public school board is constitutionally empowered to punish a student whistleblower for his purely off-campus Internet speech publicizing a matter of public concern.”

Judge Dennis stressed that the rule from Tinker, which requires school officials to reasonably predict a substantial and material disruption will be caused by speech before it can be stopped, does not apply to off-campus speech cases.

Why the Supreme Court should hear the Taylor Bell case

Some minors inevitably will post and upload – while away from campus and using their own digital communication devices – allegedly disparaging, offensive or threatening messages and images about fellow students, teachers and school officials on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Snapchat.

The key question, then, is whether and to what extent public schools, consistent with the First Amendment, may discipline students for their off-campus speech.

In November 2015, Bell filed a petition with the US Supreme Court asking it to hear his case.

As Bell’s attorneys argue, the court should take the case because whether or not Tinker applies to off-campus speech cases has “vexed school officials and courts across the country.”

In December, the organization I direct, the Marion B Brechner First Amendment Project, filed a friend-of-the-court brief urging the court to take the case.

Briefs from the attorneys for the school are due January 20, and the court will decide whether to hear Bell later this spring.

The bottom line is this: public school students deserve the right to know, pre-posting and pre-texting, what their First Amendment rights are when they are away from campus.

They must, in other words, be given fair notice. The court should hear Bell to let them know precisely what their rights are. It is an issue not likely to go away soon.

The Conversation

Clay Calvert, Brechner Eminent Scholar in Mass Communication, University of Florida

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Matthew Lynch published in HBCU's, Higher Education

Fulfilling Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream: the role for higher education

Roland V. Anglin, Rutgers University Newark ; David D. Troutt, Rutgers University Newark ; Elise Boddie, Rutgers University Newark ; Nancy Cantor, Rutgers University Newark , and Peter Englot, Rutgers University Newark

Fifty years ago, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote “Why We Can’t Wait” to dispel the notion that African Americans should be content to proceed on an incremental course toward full equality under the law and in the wider society. King observed,

Three hundred years of humiliation, abuse, and deprivation cannot be expected to find voice in a whisper.

Yet waiting and whispering, rather than raising their voices for genuine inclusion, is what many seem to expect of the children and grandchildren of King’s generation even today.

At stake is the perceived legitimacy of American institutions, not just educational but those that we educate for: the police, the courts, government, the media, cultural institutions, banks and so on. These institutions are under scrutiny over their failure to evoke trust and to show that they are visibly open to the public – especially those groups, who too often and for too long have been left out.

Arguably, we are not the “land of opportunity” for most first-generation, poor, black, brown, Native American, or immigrant children. Gaps in educational achievement persist, and at every level: from kindergarten through to the years after high school.

The label applied to so many immigrant youth, Dreamers, might well be adopted more broadly, capturing as it does both the aspiration and perhaps the unreality of educational opportunity for so many.

And the students are right to worry.

The question is: what role can our universities play so the dividing lines can be crossed?

‘Baked-in’ privilege

Consider some statistics from Essex County, New Jersey, where our city, Newark, a college town with over 50,000 students, is located:

  • 47.54 percent of black third graders attend schools that perform at the bottom 10 percent of schools in the state compared to 0.04 percent of white third graders.
  • About 4,000 high school students in the Newark Public Schools are “missing” during the school day, not in their seats; often labeled as “disconnected youth,” it would be better to consider them as youth connected to a pathway to prison.
  • Another 3,000 are off-course from graduating.
  • Only 36 percent of Newark residents have finished high school and only 17 percent hold any kind of post-secondary degree.

This story is not unique to Newark.

Economists such as Raj Chetty and his colleagues note that nationally “the consequences of the ‘birth lottery’ – the parents to whom a child is born – are larger today than in the past.”

We – the universities – are the ones sitting in the midst of these realities, facing the choice between being walled citadels that separate the privileged from the uninvited other or being welcoming hubs connecting young individuals with opportunity.

Universities’ responsibility

The uncomfortable truth is, that we, in some very real sense, have contributed to this winnowing of opportunity.

Chancellor Nancy Cantor speaking at the “Rally in Solidarity” organized by Rutgers Newark students in support of students at University of Missouri in November 2015.
Rutgers University Newark, Author provided

For too long, the traditional measures of student potential have relied on standardized – and therefore narrowly framed – merit selection processes, such as SAT and ACT scores.

These tests have been grossly inadequate, measuring only a narrow band of potential, while missing wide swaths of our talent pool whose excellence is not readily detected through the use of such “blunt” instruments.

They neglect whole communities whose students don’t have access to the test preparation industry, prompting legal theorist Lani Guinier to implore us to redefine the merit in meritocracy.

Intergenerational privilege is rooted in place – in the home values and tax base, the schools and transportation networks available to people because of where they are fortunate to live. Decades of white flight, suburbanization, the abandonment of urban centers and regressive housing policies have contributed to a pervasive disconnection across racial, ethnic and class lines.

This segregation has reinforced the corrosive effects of historical prejudice and biases that already divide society and make Americans, in effect, strangers to each other.

It should come as no surprise, then, that the social landscapes of university communities are just as divided.

Crossing boundaries

Diversity is growing explosively and redefining American society before our eyes.

Yet lines of class, gender, ethnicity and race continue to redraw themselves in dorm life, lunch tables and indeed the classroom.

Indeed, it is hard to erase them.

How do you cultivate connection to another person’s future and commitment to their success when you don’t live together in the same neighborhood, reside near each other in the same city or at least share some similar daily experiences such as rush hour on a crowded subway?

As higher educational institutions, we should be the place where dividing lines can be crossed. And that includes crossing the boundaries of our communities.

Our work in the city of Newark is just one illustration of crossing these boundaries.

Newark’s story

In this postindustrial city of 280,000 people, 29 percent of residents have incomes below the poverty line.

Newark’s social and economic challenges are common among cities that have lost their tax base and whose residents have fled to the suburbs since the 1960s. The resulting economic and racial segregation has produced structural inequalities in health, education and other public services.

Today, Newark, a proud, resilient city, is coming back from years of disinvestment. As an engaged “anchor institution”, we are partnering with the community on many fronts.

The future home of Express Newark – the historic Hahne Building
Rutgers University Newark, Author provided

We are investing in spaces for local artists and the community to collaborate, as we develop nearly 50,000 square feet in the iconic former Hahne & Company department story as an arts “collaboratory” – dubbed “Express Newark.”

We are working with small and midsized entrepreneurs and firms and taking an active role in helping Newark’s police address crime hotspots through data collection and analysis.

Organizations – public and private – have banded together in the Newark City of Learning Collaborative (NCLC) to raise the post-secondary attainment rate of residents of Newark to 25 percent by 2025.

For the higher education partners in NCLC like us, this means working with Newark Public Schools to help their students continue their education past high school, beginning in community colleges, the institutions where the vast majority of first generation students will have their first taste of higher education.

At Rutgers University – Newark, for example, we are providing tuition support to low-income residents of Newark and to any New Jersey community college transfer with an associate degree as of fall 2016.

We are recruiting these students based on assessments of leadership, grit and entrepreneurial skills – not just grades – into a residential Honors Living Learning Community (HLLC). In addition to gleaning information about applicants from the standard application form, the HLLC team engages with applicants in person and in groups to see how they collaborate with one another to solve problems. Their on-the-ground knowledge of urban life has much to contribute, as we see it, to the HLLC’s curriculum focus of “local citizenship in a global world.”

The first cohort of HLLC students
Rutgers University Newark, Author provided

Ashlee is one of the inaugural class. Born and raised in Newark, she speaks openly of “being a product of my environment…exposed to so much just by walking outside of
my house…[including] murder at the age of 12.” Her options, she says, were two: “conform to what’s going on in society or try to make a difference.” She is now a criminal justice major keenly interested in issues of social equality and inequality.

Academic ‘farm teams’

Rutgers-Newark is not alone in looking to build on the assets of this fresh talent pool for America.

There is an increasing number of so-called collective impact initiatives across the higher education landscape, including STRIVE, a nonprofit started in Cincinnati, and three large city-wide initiatives in Syracuse, Buffalo and Guilford County, North Carolina mounted by Say Yes to Education.

Collective impact projects like these can be taxing and messy, but by bringing so many different partners together – from education institutions to businesses and faith-based centers – to focus on enabling the talented next generation to thrive from school to college and beyond, we put a stake in the ground together for social justice. It’s admittedly still one step at a time, but one step in many places.

When higher education bands together to support and recruit talent from these regional hubs, it gives a new meaning to the notion of “farm teams.”. After all, if major league baseball can do it, why can’t higher education?

The impatient students protesting a sense of exclusion today have undeniable facts to support their argument. Our institutions, we believe, can help them overcome the barriers they, and others, face in their search for economic opportunity and a sense that they are valued.

How could anyone continue to “wait and whisper” while witnessing the enormous and cumulative effect of disparity unfold for another generation, with so many children never even getting to first base and some starting out on third?

The Conversation

Roland V. Anglin, Director, The Joseph C. Cornwall Center for Metropolitan Studies, Rutgers University Newark ; David D. Troutt, Professor of Law and Justice John J Francis Scholar, Rutgers University Newark ; Elise Boddie, Associate Professor of Law, Rutgers University Newark ; Nancy Cantor, Chancellor, Rutgers University Newark , and Peter Englot, Senior Vice Chancellor for Public Affairs, Rutgers University Newark

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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Matthew Lynch published in HBCU's, Higher Education

College grads still earn a premium — if they can find a good job

Robert Reich, University of California, Berkeley

The early admissions deadlines for universities across the country have come and gone, and acceptance letters are on their way. But with the cost of a four-year college education rising an average of 5% a year, many students and parents are likely wondering whether the cost of a degree is worth it.

The simple answer is yes because people with degrees continue to earn far more than those without them. Last year, Americans with four-year college degrees earned on average 98% more per hour than people without them, according to the Economic Policy Institute. In the early 1980s, they earned 64% more.

But that’s only if the graduate can find a good job, which is no longer guaranteed.

Instead, almost half of new college graduates will likely end up spending at least a few years in jobs for which they are overqualified. According to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, 46% of recent college graduates are now working in jobs that don’t require college degrees. That figure is about a third for all college graduates.

And the main reason a degree still demands a premium salary is that wages for non-grads are dropping. Employees choose college grads over non-grads on the assumption that more education is better, but as a result more of the latter are being pushed into ever more menial work, if they can find a job at all.

For years, I along with others argued that globalization and technological advances lift demand for well educated workers. But in 2000, the outsourcing of skilled jobs and advanced software reversed this trend.

First, millions of people in developing nations became far better educated, while the internet gave them an easy way to sell their abilities in advanced countries like the US, leading to ever more skilled work being outsourced to them.

Second, advanced software is taking over many tasks that had been done by well educated professionals – including data analysis, accounting, legal and engineering work, even some medical diagnoses.

As a result, the demand for well educated employees in the US seems to have peaked around 2000 and fallen since, even as the supply of such workers globally continues to grow.

That increase in supply even as demand drops is why the incomes of people who graduated after 2000 have barely risen. Indeed, the starting wages for graduates have dropped since then, 8.1% for women and 6.7% for men.

And that’s why a record number of well educated young adults are living at home with their parents.

The deeper problem is that while a college education is necessary to join the middle class, its share of the total economic pie continues to shrink, while that of the very top keeps growing.

An education is still worth the cost because without a degree young people can easily be left behind. But even with one, it’s hard to do much more than tread water. Some will make it into the top 1%, but the path keeps getting narrower and often requires the right connections.

Of course, going to college is not only about making a lot of money. An education gives our youth tools to lead full and purposeful lives.

It’s still worth paying for, but in such a perilous economy, young people and their parents should know the economics before they make such a large investment.

This is an adaptation of a post that appeared in November on Robert Reich’s blog.

The Conversation

Robert Reich, Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy, University of California, Berkeley

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Matthew Lynch published in HBCU's, Higher Education

What kind of university can help reduce poverty?

Tristan McCowan, UCL Institute of Education

For decades, development agencies have encouraged low and middle-income countries to focus their education spending on primary schools and basic vocational skills. They have considered that universities provide lower rates of return on public investment and benefit elites at the expense of the poor.

That is changing and it’s now acknowledged that strong higher education systems are also a vital piece in the puzzle of poverty reduction. Countries need well-trained professionals to staff public services, as well as technological innovators and researchers to tackle local and national development challenges. The debates on what the priorities should be after the Millennium Development Goals end in 2015 have shown a stronger endorsement for the role of universities.

However, higher education won’t have a real impact on countries’ development unless three key things take place. First, universities have to function together as part of a coherent system in the public interest. Second, access to higher education must be equitable and allow admission for talented students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Third, teaching, research and community engagement must address key local and national development needs.

But none of these three elements can be taken for granted given universities’ current direction of travel.

Two major global trends in higher education are challenging these assumptions: commercialisation and “unbundling” – the gradual breaking up of the traditional campus university. Commercialisation has affected all aspects of universities’ operations, from “cost-sharing” or the introduction of tuition fees, to providing consultancy for the private sector and commercial outsourcing of campus services. Given the squeeze on public funds for universities across the world, there are few places in which institutions are not being strongly encouraged to commercialise their activities.

“Unbundling” refers to the process through which the combination of functions of the traditional university are separated out, potentially leading to the disintegration of the institution as we know it, according to Pearson’s chief education advisor Michael Barber in the report An Avalanche is Coming.

The unity of teaching, research and public service – with its roots in Humboldt’s University of Berlin in 1810 and developed through the US Land Grant universities – is slowly being unravelled. Teaching-only institutions, employer-based degree programmes, the movement of research to private laboratories and consultancy firms, and particularly the emergence of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are contributing to this trend.

The huge growth of distance education providers, such as the Indira Gandhi National Open University in India, has also contributed to challenging the notion of university as a physical location. There are also moves towards separating out the teaching and accreditation functions of the university, with skills “badges” now awarded by external agencies.

Proceed with caution

The implications of these trends for addressing development needs in the resource-constrained countries of Africa, Asia and Latin America need careful assessment. Evidence from the process of commercialisation has been mixed to say the least.

Liberalisation of higher education in Brazil from the 1990s led to an exponential growth in the private sector, now accounting for three quarters of enrolments, with nearly half of these in for-profit institutions. While undoubtedly having a positive impact on the expansion of access to university beyond just the most well-off in society, fees still put them out of the reach of many and there are widespread concerns about the quality of provision of these institutions. Profit incentives lead to a driving down of investment in academic staff and learning resources, and attempts at regulating the sector have had limited success.

Kenya, with a much smaller enrolment base and weaker public and private financial capacity than middle-income Brazil, has also witnessed its own form of commercialisation. Since the mid-1990s, state universities have introduced a parallel stream – admitting fee-paying students alongside the government-subsidised ones. In some institutions these parallel streams have spiralled out of control, reaching well over half of enrolments.

A tight squeeze at Kenyatta University library.
Book Aid International/flickr, CC BY-NC-ND

While for Kenyan universities these are a welcome source of revenue in the context of scarcity of public funds, they have led to an intolerable strain on quality. Recruitment of new lecturers has lagged way behind the expansion of enrolments and institutional infrastructure cannot support the influx of students.

Don’t push efficiency too far

In contrast to commercialisation, which has been developing for decades, unbundling is still in its infancy and we have no clear examples of systems in which the process is fully under way – so to a large extent we are reliant on extrapolation from initial signals.

One implication of the unravelling of higher education systems is decreasing state leverage, with an obvious impact on the ability to regulate for equality of opportunity in admissions. The importance of cross-fertilisation between teaching and research – benefiting both students and staff – is widely recognised. MOOCs, often touted as a potential saviour for impoverished regions of the globe, have limited potential in contexts in which poor primary and secondary schooling has hampered young people’s ability to learn on their own.

One of the best-known contemporary initiatives in this area, the non-profit university Kepler in Rwanda, in fact shows a trend of what might be called “re-bundling”, providing face-to-face tuition and dormitory facilities to support students undertaking MOOCs.

So there is a worrying disjuncture between the hopeful vision of the potential of higher education held by development agencies, and the current trends for delivery endorsed by many of them. Bilateral and multilateral donors have shown strong support for new private sector providers and online distance education under the emblem of innovation.

Efficiency and affordability when pushed too far can undermine the raison d’être of the whole venture. If universities are to succeed in fostering both poverty reduction and development for the benefit of society, they must provide high-quality teaching and research in the public interest, and engage with local communities. Ultimately, it’s not just any higher education that will do.

The Conversation

Tristan McCowan, Reader in Education and International Development, UCL Institute of Education

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Matthew Lynch published in Equity, HBCU's, Higher Education, Matthew Lynch

Diverse Conversations: Being Transparent

Many higher education professionals often complain that the higher ups at their institutions are not transparent in their dealings. This can have a negative impact on faculty morale and thus a devastating effect on the functioning of an institution. To talk about how institutions can actually ensure transparency and counteract the problem of lacking transparency, I recently sat down with Laurie M. Joyner, president of Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio.

Transparency is, of course, a vital component of just about any professional enterprise, but it is particularly important in higher education for maintaining positive relationships within the organization structure – between higher education and those that I am referring to here as “the higher ups”, which include administrators and so forth. Why do you think transparency is so important in this context?

Transparency in communication and action builds trust, which is essential to effective shared governance. The strategic challenges facing higher education today, including remaining mission-driven within the context of a sustainable financial model, touch upon deeply held beliefs about institutional direction. Our academic values and tradition recognize that such critical decisions are best informed by the perspectives of faculty, staff, students, alumni and board members. A lack of transparency with any constituent group compromises our ability to form effective partnerships necessary for creating a shared vision required to move our institutional agenda forward.

Q: In your experience, what are some of the most common problems when transparency is not maintained? What does that look like in terms of organizational function and relationships between higher education professionals and the administrators, the leaders?

A: The most common problem is that a perception of mistrust is likely to develop making it more difficult to align priorities and efforts designed to strengthen the institution. When priorities are not aligned between faculty, administrators, and the governing board, organizational functioning may be negatively impacted. This often appears as tensions surrounding the rights and responsibilities of various groups for certain types of decisions. The challenge, of course, is that more attention and energy can become focused on who has prime responsibility for what decisions versus figuring out how to collaborate in a collegial manner to address the most pressing issues facing the institution. In some cases, relationships become strained, decision making can stall, and ultimately, organizational effectiveness is compromised.

It’s also important to note that while transparency is a healthy aspect of organizational culture, it is not necessarily sufficient for effective governance. Effective governance requires ongoing education regarding the strategic issues impacting the organization (e.g., shifting demographics, improving educational outcomes, exploiting competitive strengths, etc.) Insisting on transparency regarding key institutional metrics can build support for difficult decisions, facilitate continuous improvement, and meet the growing demand for quantitative outcome data.

Q: Drawing from these first two questions, what would you say are the most important areas for maintaining transparency; where is it particularly important in higher education institutions?

A: A commitment to transparency should be pervasive for the benefit of all internal and external stakeholders. This transparency can be exceedingly helpful in facilitating data-driven decisions, supporting continuous improvement, and fostering a culture of accountability regarding institutional performance at all levels. From a faculty perspective, transparency is of special importance in the following areas: institutional planning and budgeting; curricular requirements; academic integrity; academic freedom; and the selection, evaluation and promotion of faculty colleagues.

In my experience, there are two areas that present special challenges to administrative leaders who value transparency. These areas relate to personnel and legal issues where one is not at liberty to discuss the circumstances surrounding particular decisions. It is frustrating to face community resistance that is not based on complete information and not be in a position to respond.

Q: What are the key benefits for maintaining transparency in higher education, from an administrative and leadership standpoint?

A: The main benefit is that it builds a culture of open communication and trust, both of which are necessary to create a sense of partnership for effectively accomplishing the important work of the institution. Given the challenges facing higher education today, it is critical to do everything possible to align our collective efforts around shared priorities as we work toward achieving our common purpose.

An additional benefit of transparency is that it also supports the development of increasingly refined performance metrics that are useful in supporting a culture of continuous improvement across the organization while also responding to calls for greater accountability for student and institutional outcomes.

Q: How, then, do you go about establishing and ultimately maintaining transparency in higher education institutions?

A: I think this is best accomplished by respecting the systems of shared governance involving the Board, the President and senior administrators, and the faculty. In many cases, this is easier said than done because different constituent groups have varying levels of understanding as it relates to effective governance practices (e.g., who has more or less responsibility and authority for making certain types of decisions). Given this, I believe ongoing professional development is required at every level of the organization to ensure that all key constituent groups are being supported as they adopt best practices to enhance shared governance.

A deep commitment to transparency also supports continuous improvement across the organization and contributes to a culture of assessment and accountability. Once these elements are structured into organizational policies and practices, they strengthen and reinforce one another, ultimately improving shared governance and educational quality.

Q: At Wittenberg University, transparency is something that you emphasize at these various levels. Beyond these basic methods and strategies for establishing and maintaining transparency, what strategies have you found to be most effective for maintaining transparency?

A: We have worked hard to try to educate our campus on some of the core challenges facing Wittenberg. This is a critical point. There must be general agreement on the challenges if there is any chance of aligning the efforts of the campus community and Board. We have also worked very hard to communicate early and often using a range of strategies. For example, I host community dialogue sessions to discuss areas of concern and to respond to any community questions. I also distribute Board agendas to the faculty, report the actions taken at each Board meeting to all faculty and staff, and distribute an electronic newsletter to faculty, staff, and retirees every two weeks. I also provide similar monthly updates to Board and Emeriti Board members. In addition, we are working to develop more refined outcome metrics to assess progress toward key institutional goals. The intent is to eventually have all these metrics readily available to anyone interested in tracking institutional performance over time.

Q: In your experience, when there are transparency issues and they are proving problematic, how have you proceeded to address the issues and restore transparency?

A: In my experience, proceeding in an honest, open and authentic way is always the preferred approach with all constituencies. Further, ensuring that all elements of the governance system are working as effectively as possible and then routinely consulting with appropriate groups is essential. If there are not effective structures or systems in place, then creating meaningful structures to bring various groups together to focus on important issues can help foster understanding, enhance transparency, increase collaboration, and improve results.

Q: Inevitably there are some instances in which administrators inherit transparency issues and that’s what I’d like to focus on in this question. What advice would you give to a higher education administrator who is facing problems with transparency? What advice would you give in terms of establishing transparency and, if you like, dealing with the fallout of the initial transparency issue?

A: Communicating about the issues in a forthright manner and establishing structures to help address difficult questions are important. I also think recognizing that shared governance is challenging and requires ongoing attention is critical. At Wittenberg, we have initiated an effort to strengthen Board governance with support from the Association of Governing Boards (AGB). From my perspective, there are few issues more strategic than ensuring that our governing Board understands its rights and responsibilities as it relates to our institution.

My hope is to initiate a similar process internally to enhance the working relationships between our faculty committees, senior administrators, and Board. Through these parallel efforts to strengthen governance, I believe Wittenberg will be better served because our systems will become more closely aligned as we work toward shared priorities within the context of clearer expectations regarding our respective responsibilities. Ultimately, I believe this work will result in greater satisfaction for our faculty leaders, administrators, and Board members and will also foster improved institutional outcomes.

Thank you for your time, President Joyner. This concludes our interview.

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Matthew Lynch published in Diversity, Equity, HBCU's, Higher Education, Matthew Lynch

How can HBCUs raise more alumni dollars?

Anyone following Historically Black Colleges and Universities knows that it has been a tumultuous few years. Saint Paul’s College closing its doors to new students and placing current students at other schools. Morris Brown College filing for federal bankruptcy protection. Most recently, the nation’s oldest HBCU, 119-year-old South Carolina State University, declared financial exigency.

Between schools being shuttered or declaring bankruptcy, it’s a distressing time for HBCUs and anyone attending or working at them. Online colleges, robust diversity programs at predominantly white institutions and more affordable community college offerings are all competing for the students who once could really only find a quality education at a HBCU.

Finding ways to keep these institutions relevant is more important than ever and that includes one part of financial responsibility that I believe is being overlooked: alumni giving.

HBCU graduates are some of the proudest in the country, often with a stronger sense of social responsibility than their PWI-graduate peers. Yet HBCUs aren’t doing a strong enough job tying that pride back into alumni giving programs. Case in point: Harvard raised a record-breaking $752 million in alumni and other gifts in the fiscal year 2013. At HBCU “black Ivy League” Spelman College saw just $157.8 million ($20 million from alumni) during its Every Woman Every Campaign in 2013 that was a special, targeted campaign beyond normal annual endeavors.

Perhaps comparing Harvard’s financial gifts to any other school isn’t completely fair, but it does give an idea of what HBCUs are up against in the non-elite college market. If Spelman, considered the “best” HBCU, can only bring in one-fifth of the giving of Harvard in a year when Spelman aggressively went after donations, what does that say for every other HBCU?

An even better question is this: What can HBCU alumni giving campaigns improve upon to bring in more dollars to benefit their current crop of students?

Make college affordable.

Even the best college education will come with resentment attached once a student has to start paying back those burdensome loans. HBCUs have a better shot at alumni giving back once a college education is paid off, so why not make that debt burden lighter? HBCUs have some of the best statistics when it comes to financial aid in the form of Pell grants and scholarships and these institutions should continue to push for the funding to make obtaining a degree affordable – particularly for minority and first-generation college students. More money in these graduates’ pockets will translate into more alumni giving in the early years following graduation.

Personalize giving.

I don’t know about you, but getting a standard alumni giving form in the mail with a return envelope does not usually inspire me to pull out my checkbook. The same is true of emails without much personality. Instead of just asking for the money, HBCUs need to put faces and causes along with the requests. What are some of the upcoming projects that this money could go towards? Who will receive scholarships from this giving? Even non-glamorous giving campaigns that go towards basic infrastructure have a better shot of meeting goals if alumni are informed of what money is being solicited to do. HBCU alumni who can associate their own positive memories with money-making campaigns are more likely to want to be a part of making those things happen.

Get alumni involved before they leave campus.

Don’t wait until students are off campus to solicit them for help facilitating the college experience of the classes who follow them. Cash in on the good feelings that accompany graduation time from both the students earning degrees and their families. Even those who don’t have much may be willing to give a little to keeping the college dream alive for other students who are still trying to accomplish their academic goals. Set up a table outside commencement with giving forms and other alumni information. Have literature that explains to students how alumni giving dollars have facilitated what they’ve enjoyed while on campus. Send out an email blast to soon-to-be graduates that invites them to visit the alumni website, like its Facebook page, and join its official club. Don’t wait to chase alumni down after they’ve left; rope them in before they leave and keep them active in the coming years.

Just as HBCUs have a responsibility to get their students workforce-ready, alumni have a responsibility to give back to their institutions. HBCUs need to do a better job of conveying that though and encouraging former students to step up to the plate.

Read all of our posts about HBCUs by clicking here.

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Matthew Lynch published in EdTech & Innovation, HBCU's, Higher Education

US losing its dominance in global higher education market

Jason Lane, University at Albany, State University of New York

The Conversation’s international teams are collaborating on a series of articles about the Globalisation of Higher Education, examining how universities are changing in an increasingly globalised world. This is the third article in the series. Read more here.

Students have come back to college. But not all to the United States.

The idea that a student would study in another country is not a new concept. The media frequently reports on the number of international students studying in the United States. And that is exactly how we tend to think about it – students from other countries coming to the United States.

Yet, a growing number of US students are now looking overseas for their college degree. Germany alone, with its essentially free higher education system, is drawing a fair number of prospective US college students. Some 4,660 US students were enrolled in German universities last year – a number that has increased by 20% in three years.

While the number of US students attending college in Germany remains very small relative to the some 21 million individuals pursuing a post-secondary education, it represents two important shifts in the international student market: a rapidly increasing global market for international students and a growing number of US students looking to earn degrees overseas.

As a researcher of international education, a key concern for me is understanding the ways in which the changing global economy is reshaping educational opportunities and potentially how the US dominance in the international education market is being threatened.

US students studying abroad

There is no central source that tracks the total number of US students enrolled in foreign institutions.

There is also no international repository of enrollment trends worldwide. In the US, the federal government tracks enrollments in domestic higher education institutions. In addition, the Institute of International Education (IIE)’s annual Open Doors report gathers data about American students at US colleges studying abroad for academic credit.

In fact, there were about 290,000 students studying abroad for academic credit, but not a full degree, in the 2012 academic year, more than double the number who studied abroad 15 years earlier. However, these numbers do not include students pursuing a full degree from an overseas institution, as they are not tracked by the US government.

But based on national data sets, IIE’s Project Atlas has put together a patchwork picture about students pursuing college degrees elsewhere.

The UK has been the leading destination for US students.
Shane Global, CC BY

According to a Project Atlas report (the most recent aggregated data on this issue), there were more than 43,000 US students enrolled in degree programs in foreign countries in 2010 (this is in addition to the number of students studying abroad not for a degree). However, it should be noted that Project Atlas, has data only from the IIE’s 13 partnering nations. So these data may actually undercount the number of students enrolled in such programs.

Even so, based on these data, we can confidently say that the United Kingdom was the leading destination for US students. Most US students (72%) in this data set head to anglophone countries. Master’s degree programs are the most popular option (followed by undergraduate programs and then doctoral).

Recent reports, such as those about Germany, suggest that the number of students pursuing a degree outside of their home country, including students moving outside of the US, is growing rapidly. But, in order to gather information about US citizens who pursue degrees elsewhere, that information must be gathered from those nations.

Growing competition for international students

The fact is that today, there is a large market for students in higher education.

In 2000, according to UNESCO’s Education at a Glance, there were only 2.1 million students studying abroad in both short-term and full-degree programs. Today, there are roughly 4.5 million.

And, the competition for those students has become quite fierce. Today, countries like China, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, Taiwan, Thailand, Argentina, Brazil and Chile, who once primarily sent students abroad, have enacted policies and strategies to actively recruit international students.

In fact, according to our research, places like Singapore, Malaysia and United Arab Emirates want to become regional educational hubs – serving students from their neighboring countries.

With this increase, the market for international students has also become quite volatile in the last decade. Many of the earlier entrants to this market are losing share.

For instance, even though the total number of international students studying in the US continues to grow, the US market share has dropped from 23% in 2000 to 16% in 2012. Countries such as Germany, France, South Africa and Belgium have also lost about 5% market share collectively, with Germany and France having the largest remaining share of the group at about 6% each.

At the same time, places like China, Canada, the United Kingdom, Russia, Korea and New Zealand each picked up larger proportion of the market, with the United Kingdom and Russia both gaining two points of the market and the others a little less. In fact, at 13% of the market share and growing, the United Kingdom may be on track to overtake the US’ market lead.

Opening up borders

In such a market, some countries are taking advantage of their language of instruction which can offer a competitive advantage, while others are offering low-cost or even free tuition.

So, nations whose language of instruction is widely spoken elsewhere, such as English, French and Spanish, are becoming leading receivers of international students.

Some countries are providing nearly free education for international students.
Wellington College, CC BY-NC

Some countries, such as Austria, France, Germany and Norway, are providing de facto free education for all students, including those from foreign countries.

This low cost of education can help countries attract students already looking to go abroad as well as elicit attention from students looking for alternatives to the high costs of higher education in their own countries.

Countries are getting much savvier about their efforts to recruit foreign students – adopting more student-friendly immigration policies, offering financial incentives and even setting national strategic recruitment goals.

The German government, for instance, has a goal of attracting 350,000 international students by 2020. To do so, Germany is actively recruiting students and lowering barriers to entry.

Today, an increasing number of degree programs offered in Germany are in English and searchable through a national database. They have even amended their laws to make it easier for international students to work while going to school. The German academic exchange service, DAAD, also provides scholarships to offset the cost of other academic and living expense.

Competing for brain power

Attracting international students, then, is not just about bringing in tuition dollars. Countries offering free or reduced tuition are often seeking to rebuild national workforce as their domestic population ages and younger talent pools shrink.

So, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden are now developing study-to-work pathways and “train and retain policies” to encourage international students to transition into the workplace.

Some of these efforts are paying off. Students are not only choosing to study abroad; many are also staying abroad after they graduate.

For example, a survey of more than 11,000 international students in Germany found that three in 10 plan to stay in Germany permanently after their studies and four in 10 plan to stay for at least 10 years.

A globally competitive market

The increasing number of students pursuing their college years in a foreign country is symptomatic of two important trends.

First, it reflects a rapidly changing world economy, where it is not only the workforce opportunities that are global, but also the educational experiences that prepare students for those opportunities.

As a result, more and more students from both developed and developing countries are looking beyond their national borders for their collegiate experience.

Second, as economies become more knowledge-based, the competition for brains is heating up.

The US has long dominated this market. But as more nations have seen international students as part of their strategic interests, the US market has begun to shrink significantly.

Without a similar strategic national interest, will the US’ dominance fall all together?

The Conversation

Jason Lane, Associate Professor of Education Policy & Co-Director of the Cross-Border Education Research Team, University at Albany, State University of New York

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Read all of our posts about EdTech and Innovation by clicking here. 

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Matthew Lynch published in EdTech & Innovation, HBCU's, Higher Education

Early-career researchers the missing link for STEM diversity

Maggie Hardy, The University of Queensland

When high school physics teacher Moses Rifkin wrote a recent blog post on “Teaching Social Justice in the Physics Classroom,” he ignited a new round of conversation about white privilege and the kinds of skills scientists need. Rifkin outlined how he incorporates into his teaching a unit on “Who does physics, and why?” to highlight the lack of diversity in science, particularly physics.

The problem isn’t new and it isn’t going away by itself. But it is getting more and more attention. The United States National Science Foundation (NSF) recently released a report, “Pathways to Broadening Participation in response to the Committee on Equal Opportunities in Science and Engineering 2011–2012 Recommendation,” intended to “build on best practices and offer new approaches” that would “increase participation in STEM [Science, Technology, Engineering and Math] from underrepresented groups.” This isn’t the first initiative of its kind for the agency; since 1980, NSF has had a mandate to increase the participation of women and minorities in science and engineering.

A diverse science and engineering workforce is critical for innovation, entrepreneurism and a competitive national economy.

Researchers should reflect the country’s population.
MissTessmacher, CC BY-NC

Scope of the problem

Although women earn about half the bachelor’s degrees awarded in biology and chemistry, they are underrepresented in all other STEM disciplines – mathematics, computer science, earth sciences, engineering and physics. Women are half the population, but hold only 28% of science and engineering jobs.

Native American and Alaska Native students earn bachelor’s degrees in STEM fields at about the same rate as white students (21% for women and 27% for men), but are not employed in STEM fields proportionally. The number of black and Hispanic students earning degrees in STEM fields is lower than the national average, and their employment in STEM – once again – isn’t proportional. We train students in STEM fields, but ultimately they leave the carousel that is employment in research.

The current demographics of scientists do not reflect our population.
National Science Foundation Broadening Participation Report

The issues with relying largely on one demographic group to do science are many, particularly when that group does not reflect the population. Research has shown that “promoting diversity not only promotes representation and fairness but may lead to higher quality science.” Policies that increase equity are often good for everyone – here is a recent example showing this using standardized math test scores.

Increasing the diversity in science opens up the possibility of stable, high-paying jobs in STEM fields to more Americans. Pulling from the entire population, including traditionally underrepresented communities, provides a more robust base for economic innovation and the knowledge-intensive jobs of the future.

Equity is good for business, too. Although women in technology are some of the highest performing entrepreneurs, men receive 2.8 times more startup capital.

Where do we need to be?

The National Science Foundation is a key player for academics, as its budget ($7.3 billion for 2015) funds approximately 24% of all federally supported basic research. NSF uses a peer-based merit review system to invest in basic research that lays the foundation for important discoveries, as well as applied research that provides innovative fodder for our economy. Its prominence as a funding source for colleges and universities is part of the reason its initiatives are important for many researchers.

According to the new diversity report, “the ultimate goal is to have participation in STEM fields mirror the population of the Nation.” Specifically, that means we need to focus on recruiting and retaining the best talent from currently under-represented groups: blacks, Latinos and indigenous communities, including Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders. Based on recent estimates, by 2044 the United States will be a majority-minority country, so to have the research workforce mirror the population we need a clear path to retain people in research positions.

By 2044, the United States will be a majority-minority country.
Ruy Teixeria, William H. Frey, Rob Griffin/Center for American Progress

There is a need for a clear, well supported career pathway for early- and mid-career researchers, with an emphasis on retaining traditionally underrepresented groups. And NSF isn’t the only institution focusing on this issue. The National Institutes of Health, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the scientific journals Nature and Science) have all discussed the problematic lack of diversity in science. In 2013 the White House released a 5-year strategic plan for STEM Education, which emphasized creating a diverse STEM workforce.

How do we get there?

NSF has pulled together the most current evidence-based strategies to increase diversity in STEM. The report groups proposed interventions into the following six categories.

  • Financial support, primarily geared toward supporting college students
  • Professional and social support, with renewed emphasis on the importance of learning in both formal and informal settings
  • Mentoring, to provide one-on-one career advice and role models to show the path, as well as the destination
  • Research experience, critical to develop and sustain interest in STEM education and careers
  • Combating stereotype threat, the fear of “confirming a negative stereotype about one’s group (e.g., women aren’t good at math)”
  • Community building, combining all the above ideas, adding institutional commitment and support for building scientific capacity. Setting and measuring the achievement of specific goals, and accountability when they are or are not met, is key

Most importantly, what is the career pathway that will take students on to careers in science and engineering research? The total number of postdoctoral researchers (those who have recently earned their PhD) at federally funded research centers dropped between 2012 and 2013; the loss was more pronounced for women (-13%) than for men (-4%).

These data were compiled from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Survey of Postdocs at Federally Funded Research and Development Centers, Fall 2013.
National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES)

NSF could expand postdoctoral fellowship programs, implementing some designed to foster collaboration with industry. They could increase funding for the Centers for Research Excellence in Science and Technology, which earmarks resources for minority-serving institutions and historically black colleges and universities.

Traditionally underrepresented scientists should be more common, and not just in stock photos.
Scientists image via www.shutterstock.com

The bottom line

The research community has made it clear that the reasons for attrition need to be better understood. But more importantly, we need to stem the tide of highly specialized, highly trained people leaving research.

Non-scientists – including journalists and media personalities – who comment on what skills scientists need to be successful are often terrifically far off the mark, but could be influencing the next generation of potential STEM workers. Scientists believe we need to broaden participation so we have the most creative problem-solvers trained and ready to work. Recognizing and rectifying inequity is part of our core work, because it helps us do better research. Researchers working at the cold face of problems that didn’t even exist ten years ago realize we need a diverse range of scientists to pull from to be competitive, and this is exactly what the report from NSF illustrates.

If we really want the best scientists doing research, as we say we do, then we must have a hiring pool that reflects the diversity of the nation. Our best scientists aren’t getting any younger, and we need support for early-career researchers in academic, industry and government positions now.

Editor’s note: Maggie will be available online to answer questions about the STEM/diversity job connection from 5-6pm EST on Thursday March 5, which is 8-9am AEST on Friday March 6 . You can ask your questions about the article in the comments below.

The Conversation

Maggie Hardy, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, The University of Queensland

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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Matthew Lynch published in HBCU's, Higher Education

At UC San Diego, retired professors are mentoring first-generation college students

Melvin H Green, University of California, San Diego

My mother cried when I told her I was changing my major from engineering to chemistry. Her fear was that I would never earn a living as a chemist.

When she heard a few years later that I planned to go for a PhD in chemistry, her only comment was,

So why don’t you at least become a real doctor?

Doctor, lawyer, engineer – these were careers that Eastern European immigrants such as my mother and father knew had definite earning power. Having survived the Great Depression, they believed earning a living was all that mattered.

As a student in the 1950s, I had never heard of the word “mentor.” In retrospect, as a first-generation college student, I would have really been helped by having a “mentor,” especially with regard to choosing a career.

So, for the past 10 years, following my retirement as professor of biology at the University of California, San Diego, my greatest joy and sense of satisfaction has come from mentoring undergraduates.

First-generation students

It wasn’t always that way.

As a young professor, struggling to climb the academic ladder toward tenure and a full professorship, my research took precedence over all else, including teaching and even family life.

But, following my retirement, I thought of helping the many first-generation students who faced life challenges similar to mine. Some students shared similar pressure from parents to major in premed, while others told me how their parents wanted them to receive straight A’s. These students didn’t even know that there was far more to being a successful student than getting good grades.

This led to my creation in 2006 of the Emeriti Mentor Program (EMP). Our mentees are first-generation college students from low-income families. Nationally, of the 7.3 million undergraduates attending four-year public and private colleges and universities, about 20% are first-generation students. About 50% of all first-generation college students in the US are low-income. These students are also more likely to be a member of a racial or ethnic minority group.

Mentoring programs for youth have become popular all over the US because of their positive emotional and behavioral impact. A review of 55 evaluations of mentoring programs has further confirmed their effectiveness for academic achievement, as well as employment or career development.

However, our program is unique, as our mentors are emeriti professors who bring a wealth of experience in and out of the university. Currently at UC San Diego, 50 emeriti professors in the EMP mentor nearly 100 first-generation freshmen and sophomores from low-income families. The main goal of these mentors is to provide career guidance and an understanding ear.

Other campuses throughout the country, including some other UC campuses, have expressed interest in starting similar mentoring programs.

Challenges of mentoring

Serving as an effective mentor is not an easy matter. Teaching a class of 30 or 300 students is nothing like the one-on-one experience of mentoring. Lecturing in front of a class with students taking notes as fast as possible puts the professor in full command.

Listening to a crying student who has just failed his or her first exam can often leave the prof feeling helpless. Additionally, many first-generation students are told by their parents that anything less than an A grade is tantamount to failure with a capital F.

There can be many challenges to a mentoring program.
Merrimack College, CC BY-NC-ND

Communication between mentor and mentee can be difficult, especially in their first few meetings. While young professors at times appear intimidating, elderly emeriti almost always are.

Mentors need to get past other barriers as well. Cultural differences can pose problems.

For example, one of my mentees, a Chinese immigrant, seemed rude because she never looked me in the eye during her entire freshman year. Another Chinese-American student taught me that it was rude for a young person to look an elderly person in the eye.

Here’s what we did

Here’s one approach we take to break the ice and help our students and mentors communicate with one another.

We start by introducing our students to some real-life stories from my book, Will It Be on the Exam? 21 Stories about Unforgettable Students. One particular story, Follow Your Passion, helps students understand the role and value of mentoring.

The story is about a freshman who chooses chemistry as his major to please his parents. However, his mentor urges him to switch to a music major and follow his passion.

Danny drops out of chemistry after the first quarter and graduates with honors in jazz performance and composition. Students learn how Danny has gone on to a very successful career as a jazz pianist and composer. They also learn that at times it is the mentor, not the parents, who must provide the encouragement to follow your passion.

Slow Starters is another story that many students find relevant to their own lives.

It tells the story of a young man, Ari, who spent five years in and out of community college while working numerous part-time jobs. Not until Ari met the “girl of his dreams” did he begin taking a serious interest in finding a career path.

Subsequently, he transferred to a four-year university and, with sports being his primary interest in life, chose physical education as a major. To his parents’ amazement, after graduation Ari was accepted into an osteopathic medical school. He became a highly successful doctor. And yes, he did marry that dream girl.

Creativity and Courage is yet another inspiring story about a Japanese graduate student who started his doctoral thesis research in my laboratory shortly after I came to UCSD.

Students can get inspiration through a mentoring program.
Alessia D’Urso, CC BY-NC-ND

Alone in a foreign culture, Susumu demonstrated a great deal of grit and courage. He completed his PhD and postdoctoral research in San Diego, then went on to another foreign country, Switzerland, where he took on a project in a totally unrelated field to that of his earlier research.

Working alone for two years, he solved a very complex problem before anybody else could. For this creative accomplishment, Dr Tonegawa received the Nobel Prize in 1987.

Through this story, students learn about the value of motivation, persistence and courage.

A win-win process

The Emeriti Mentor Program serves both professors and students.

After retirement, professors typically experience a sense of sudden loss from their once productive lives because they are no longer involved in teaching or research. Those that want to maintain some involvement with the university find mentoring a very worthy and satisfying activity.

A successful mentor involves being part teacher, part advisor and part friend. The proportion of each varies from one mentor to the next.

It is difficult to evaluate the success of a mentor program, or even that of a specific mentor. The following comments by mentees about the Emeriti Mentor Program are probably the best indicators of its success:

Being able to have such a close relationship with someone who has been through college…has been an invaluable resource for someone who has very few people to turn to.

Just knowing that I had a retired professor giving me tips raised my confidence level.”

The Emeriti Mentor Program has to be one of the most crucial…factors that aided me throughout my first year in college.”

Universities need to realize the great resource they have in their retired professors and find ways to keep them actively involved.

The Conversation

Melvin H Green, Professor Emeritus Biology, University of California, San Diego

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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