March 2007 Articles
Story ideas? Opinions? Questions, Compliments, or Complaints? Send us an email at facultyadvocate@gmail.com.
Let's All Get Something To Talk About! by Glenn Hansen
Undergraduate Research by Richard Jarman
COD Is Bright with Fulbrighters!! by Ben Whisenhunt
Worth Noting! Installation by John Arndt by Marina Kuchinski
How Many Does It Take To Do Program Review? by Karin Evans
Welcome to ESL: Meet John Stasinopoulos by Tom Tipton
Let's All Get Something To Talk About! by Glenn Hansen
Welcome to the inaugural issue of the Faculty Association Newsletter! In this forum, we hope to focus on our colleagues' achievements from a faculty perspective. We have many stories to tell, but there's not always a formal way to recognize our efforts.
We hope that this newsletter will highlight the day-by-day work of our Association members. How do you or your colleagues inspire your students? How have you innovated your curriculum? What new techniques in teaching have worked for you? How has your scholarship or research been recognized? We want to know your story. And if you won't tell your own story, will you at least please tell us about the achievements of our colleagues-your suite-mate, or someone in your discipline?
The folks putting out this newsletter are eager to hear your ideas and receive your submissions at facultyadvocate@gmail.com. So much of our work here seems to go on unnoticed, almost invisible. Many of us go beyond the call of duty. It is time for us to share our stories with each other, be recognized, and be respected as the professionals that we are.
Undergraduate Research by Richard Jarman
Given its traditional association with workforce preparation, the last thing that most people expect
to find taking place within the walls of a community college is authentic scientific
research. But the times, they are a-changing, as I believe someone once croaked. Even the mighty National Science
Foundation (NSF), broker of much of the nation's basic scientific research and best friend of every
prestigious university, is waking up to the fact that the community college is playing an increasingly
important role in the preparation of our future scientists.
However, it's no surprise that faculty members here at COD are promoting undergraduate research. Physicist Tom Carter, Natural and Applied Science Division's Faculty of the Year for 2007, has been instrumental in obtaining internships for students at prestigious research facilities such as Fermilab. Tom played a significant role in promoting the career of one of the College's brightest stars, Marsella Jorgolli, All-USA Community College Academic First Team member and Barry Goldwater Scholarship recipient, now at the University of Chicago.
In chemistry, Susan Shih is a joint principal investigator on a major multi-site NSF-funded project in collaboration with Purdue University and the University of Illinois-Chicago, which created a Center for Authentic Science Practice in Education.
These developments are likely to be just the tip of the iceberg as greater emphasis is placed on funding research initiatives across the sciences at the community college level, especially in hot-button topics like nanotechnology.
COD Is Bright with Fulbrighters!! by Ben Whisenhunt
Dr. Carol Riphenburg (Political Science) spent Fall 2006 on sabbatical as a senior scholar in the Fulbright Middle East and North Africa Regional Research Program. Carol's research topic was the relationship among Islam, democracy, and women's organizations in the Maghreb (Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia). In addition to interviewing the leaders of prominent women's organizations, she travelled widely in North Africa. Her experiences included visiting remote religious outposts, sleeping in a Berber tent in the desert, and staying in a traditional Moroccan home (riad) in Marrakech.
Carol's career has been devoted to Middle Eastern Studies. She has traveled extensively in the area, done research in Afghanistan, Oman, and Yemen, published a book on the Sultanate of Oman, and presented papers on the status of women and other aspects of these societies at numerous professional conferences. In her recent research, she was able to draw upon her three decades of teaching and research experience on Middle Eastern and North African governments and politics. Her knowledge of Arabic and French provided appropriate tools to conduct interviews and read material in the field.
Dr. Ben Whisenhunt (History) was awarded a Fulbright Senior Scholar Award to teach American Studies at
Ryazan' State University in Ryazan', Russia, in Fall 2006. Ben's specialty is Russian history, and his
current area of research is Russian-American relations. While in Russia, he traveled to St. Petersburg,
Moscow, and the Russian countryside. He gave guest lectures at private educational centers as well as at
the Ryazan' Airborne Academy. He has a book forthcoming, co-authored with Marina Swoboda (McGill
University), entitled A Russian Paints America: Pavel P. Svin'in's Impressions of Early Nineteenth Century
America (McGill-Queen's University Press).
Ben's knowledge of Russian greatly helped in his teaching and living in Russia. He has been working since his return to form a lasting partnership between College of DuPage and Ryazan' State University.
Worth Noting! Installation by John Arndt by Marina Kuchinski
In a gallery installation at Rowland Contemporary, Chicago-based artist John Arndt, who teaches sculpture and 3-D design at COD, explores the visual territory between musical notes and the quality of negative space, probing the viewer to regard empty space as art. One untitled work consists of a tangled mass of cords, wires, and remnants of a disassembled piano sitting on the gallery floor. Using sound, sculpture, and drawings, Arndt invokes the legacy of John Cage and other pioneers who pushed the boundaries of experimental music and sound. Arndt received his MFA from the University of Illinois at Chicago and recently completed a residency at the Center for Land Use Interpretation. The exhibition is open through 3/17.
How Many English Professors Does It Take To Do Program Review? by Karin Evans
It's taking just about all 37 English faculty members to write the program review reports, or at least that's the way the emails looked in the second half of February.
English had its program review deadline moved back from March 1, 2008, to March 1, 2007. Last spring, thinking we had almost two years to conduct a meaningful program review process with lots of faculty discussion and involvement, we spent a beautiful spring in-service day talking about how we would assess what we truly value.
Then we came back in the fall. And we learned that our deadline was only 6 months away. ICCB had decreed that all English departments must report in 2007.
English has a few programs: composition, for starters, which enrolls over 4,000 students every fall, but then there's also literature, creative writing, technical writing, journalism, and developmental reading and writing. Most of these areas require separate reports, since they function as separate areas in the curriculum.
Throughout fall semester we struggled: we tried to plan, we re-planned, and we re-planned again as new versions of templates and instructions and reporting deadlines cascaded down the chain of command.
We were assured that all sorts of data would be provided to us by October 15, so we would have plenty of time to digest and write. But as of February 15, the bits and pieces were still finding their way slowly into our in-boxes.
The good news is that the new report format is less burdensome than the old one, and the reports are shorter. Summaries have replaced tedious and undigestible pages of raw data, and the faculty has room to write its own brief accounts of its history as well as its plans for the future.
As for visionarily assessing what we value, well, that will have to wait for the next round - and I hope we will have plenty to show for it in 2011. For this round, I'll have to be personally satisfied knowing that every slot in the template is filled in in the report for the composition program.
And, just for the record, the very shortest section reads like this: "No graduate survey data were provided."
Welcome to ESL: Meet John Stasinopoulos by Tom Tipton
The poster on John Stasinopoulos's office door simply says "welcome" - in over 50 different languages.
Some of those languages were added by his students, when they couldn't find their own language on the
printed poster.
As professor of ESL, John plays a crucial role in welcoming students from all over the world and bringing them together within the community of the English language. Yet when John was hired seven years ago, he was the first full time faculty member in that program.
Since then, John has seen many changes and has accomplished much to be proud of. While still relatively new, he served on high profile committees such as the Restructuring Committee and the Presidential Search Committee.
He has created several courses, including a History of American Culture course. He has co-taught with faculty across the college community, such as his honors class in Cultural Linguistics with Ellen Johnson, and the Vocational ESL (VESL) program, a learning community with Math, Career Services, and ESL.
John has also found time to maintain extensive involvement in scholarship, presenting yearly at the national and state TESOL conferences, the flagship conferences in his field, and authoring the chapter of a scholarly book. This March alone, he is scheduled to give four presentations at conferences, one of which is international.
What does John love most about his job? It's not hard to guess. "I love meeting people from all over the world," he says.
