Faculty Highlights: Dr. Rick Chaffee

Dr. Rick Chaffee’s understanding of leadership and mentoring practices is informed by a diverse background in professional ski racing, a Master's degree in Economics from the University of Denver and a Ph.D. in Applied Social Sciences from Union Institute & University. Dr. Chaffee’s has experience teaching both at the high school and collegiate level. He also has worked extensively in leadership training for the Marathon Oil Company, as well as working as a manager for the Catholic Diocese of Toledo. More recently Dr. Chaffee has been recruiting and mentoring members of the National Guard and employees of various corporations to focus on their degree completion through Union Institute & University.For this issue of the Union Strasse, we asked Dr. Chaffee about what has influenced his career path and his passion for socially responsible leadership in the workplace and in the academy.
The Union Strasse: Your first career was as an Olympic skier. What started you on that path of professional skiing?

Dr. Rick Chaffee: I was born in Rutland, VT and my mom and dad both ski raced. My mom was an alternate on the 1940 Olympic Team but that year the games were cancelled because of the war.

There was a ground swell of interest in skiing around Pico Peak near Rutland as a local woman, Andrea Mead Lawrence, became the first American to win Olympic gold medals in skiing in 1952.

This ground swell of interests gave rise to organized efforts to support ski racing in the region. I ski raced from the age of five or so. My sister, Suzy Chaffee participated with me in the '68 Olympics in France and I competed again in Japan in 1972. Our University of Denver ski team won the NCAA Championships during each of my four years there.

TUS: After you transitioned out of skiing professionally, you went on to teach and to help establish the Green Mountain Valley School. What was your vision for that school?
RC: After teaching for six years with Johnson State College, I was asked to help a local academy, The Green Mt. Valley School, become an elite ski racing academy. I taught, coached and was director of community life with the school.

Our vision was to create a high school in which students could excel both academically and athletically. The goal was for faculty, staff and students to create a supportive learning community in which students could pursue their dreams. The school has since developed into one of America’s leading ski racing academies and college preparatory schools.

TUS: You teach in Union's Leadership program and are invested in both educational and corporate leadership training.  What are the aspects of leadership that you see as essential today both in the academic world and in the corporate world? What aspects of leadership do you feel are essential for your students to grasp?
RC: Leadership is influence in service of a common purpose. The participants in our leadership classes become excited when they discover that many of the theories validate an intuition that they have had for some time. The courses I teach with UI&U and those I taught in corporate training, focused on helping both leaders and followers organize what they already know so that it becomes more useful to them. Teaching is especially fun when that happens.

Most Union students are adults with years of experience in organizations. My role then is to bring together a field of knowledge such as leadership and the lived experience of our participant. When that happens, the learning takes place very fast because the participants already know experientially these concepts and theories.What I find most satisfying about teaching leadership is helping our leadership students remember what is most important to them, which is keeping their integrity.

It seems that we are so challenged by the environments in which we work, so caught up in surviving, that we often lose touch with what is most important to us. Such things as:

• Doing our best and being of good will; 
• Avoiding the tendency to create in-groups and out-groups in our organizations. Because our mind operates by categorizing, there is a natural tendency for leaders to classify their followers and thereby create in-groups and out-groups. Building high quality one-on-one relationships with each team member, despite the differences in intelligence, motivation, career aspirations, and skill level, will take us a long way toward developing a sound organizational climate. 

Here is an example of what I enjoy most in teaching leadership. I ask students to respond to this handout as we approach the end of the leadership course. This piece resonates strongly with our leadership participants:

“You are nearly finished with the course.  

Whatever you have learned here, the insights from the instruments, from the theories, from your application of theory to the cases, and all the insights you have had from your whole life, these will not be lost.

What is important now is this: When you find yourself in a situation, whether you are the leader, follower or a peer, do not try to remember these theories or past insights. Instead, be present to the situation, to the people, to the issues….listen. Be open to whatever is happening…to your own thoughts and feeling and the responses and feelings of the other parties. Then draw on your intelligence, your concern for the well being of people and your sense of beauty and fairness.If you do that, if you do your best to be present to this unique situation and these unique people at this unique moment, with deep concern for both people and the task at hand, what you need to know will be made available to you.It is impossible to determine what to do ahead of time, for every moment is new and fresh and calls for its own unique response.It is in the humility of being open and present, trusting that the right words and responses will come to us, that we find our ‘voice’ and truly serve.”  

TUS: Who are the leaders and examples that you look to or aspire to be like? Why? 

RC: In my classes I use Dr. Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech and Joshua Chamberlain’s speech to the mutineers of the 20^th Maine at the Civil War battle of Gettysburg. I am also a great admirer of Nelson Mandela and the Persian poets Rumi and Hafiz.These are leaders who were fearless in their support of freedom, equality and community. I admire all who try, as best they can, to live the qualities of intelligence, beauty and love.Ultimately, however, leadership is a matter of the heart.

TUS: What are your current projects that you’re most excited about?  

RC: Our BS Business Management and Leadership faculty have been working together to develop ‘sound guidelines’ for our collaboration forums, ways to strengthen the quality of our on-line courses in CampusWeb.Another project of special interest is an application of ‘Appreciative Inquiry’ to our peer review process. The Faculty Affaires and Development Committee, FAD, has been creating a peer review process that focuses on two things: developing faculty and celebrating the good things happening in the university as we share our interests and our successes with our peers.Appreciative Inquiry is a process for developing organizations by identifying and celebrating its strengths. Or, as Peter Drucker stated so well in one of our training videos for this process [...] “The task of leadership is to create an alignment of strengths that make our weaknesses irrelevant.”

TUS: What does “social responsibility” means to you, and how you live out that value in your life?

RC: My interest in social responsibility at the moment is focused on the leader-follower relationship in organizations whether public, private or corporate. The leader-follower relationship has profound ethical implications. Organizations and their leadership have a social responsibility to see that the leader-follower relationship is ethical.There are many methods that leaders can employ to get things done. There is coercion, manipulation, mutually agreed upon transactions, and inspiration. Only two of these are ethical.

Freedom to follow without threat or coercion is part of social responsibility in our organizations. Our essential equality as persons, despite differences in roles, is another requirement of social responsibility in the leader-follower relationship. The leader-follower relationship has not been a focus of social responsibility until recently. It is, however, a major focus in our Ethics and Leadership class.

Within our own organization, Union Institute and University, it is important that we help each other keep our personal and institutional integrity. That’s how we live social responsibility in our own house.

From the Desk of the VPAA: Cultivating Community--Online!

Creating a class environment where students feel that they belong to a learning community is crucial to their academic success.

How does a professor cultivate such a community to academically
engage his or her students in a virtual environment?
Below I have highlighted three resources with tools and strategies for increasing student engagement and building supportive, learning communities in an online setting.   

Social Presence: “Tips for Building Social Presence in Your Online Class”--Dr. Oliver Dreon points out that while many instructors create fantastic teaching and cognitive tools for their students, they often forget to develop their social presence in an online course. Social presence in the online classroom is vital for increasing student engagement. Read the article to learn five simple ways to increase your own online social presence!  

New Media Resources: Through the UI&U Library, faculty have access to Films on Demand—an online resource for educational films. New videos relating to art, criminal justice, literature, education, political science, psychology, and social justice have been uploaded. Faculty can create links to these films in
CampusWeb and incorporate the content into their courses. Check out the UI&U Library Blog for details!

See what other education professionals are doing: Faculty Focus is an excellent resource of short articles written by working educators. The site features a variety of teaching strategies and approaches to learning, in addition to providing information about higher ed. seminars and conferences. 
What other resources have you found helpful in creating online learning communities? Send me your ideas for tools and strategies that you have found most effective at Feedback.VPAA@myunion.edu

Faculty Highlights: Dr. Andrew Harvey

Giving back to one’s surrounding community is an integral part of leadership and social responsibility, but it is not always as easy as it sounds. Dr. Andrew Harvey, professor in the Bachelor of Science, Criminal Justice Management program at Union Institute & University is a model of giving back to his community in a way that is empathetic, creative, and effective. I am proud to highlight Dr. Harvey and his work this month, both as a professor and in his active engagement outside the academy walls.

Dr. Andrew Harvey brings a wealth of professional and academic experience to his role as a Union Institute & University professor within the Criminal Justice Management Program. He is both a nationally recognized author and resource for leadership strategies and an award-winning college instructor.

Dr. Harvey embodies the cross-disciplinary expertise of the scholar-practitioner that Union celebrates. He spent the last 12 years of his 25-year law enforcement career as a police captain with an agency in Southern California. He said that the variety of roles in law enforcement and the desire to give back to the surrounding community are aspects that attracted him to the work. “I wanted a career that would be challenging; one in which every day would be different. I wanted to make a contribution to the community I grew up in, and to society at large. In evaluating my individual abilities, I felt that what I had to offer would be a good fit for the profession of law enforcement. The ‘job loop’ of a police officer is utterly extraordinary—in a given day you might have to confront armed suspects, work in an undercover capacity, investigate a murder, give a community talk, or handle almost any other duty imaginable. The opportunity of having to handle so many different kinds of challenges on a daily basis was appealing to me.”Combining that experience with his doctorate in education from Pepperdine University, his training at the FBI National Academy, and his experience in the West Point Leadership Program, Dr. Harvey has become a passionate, innovative instructor, seeking to encourage social responsibility through personal responsibility in his students. “For me, social responsibility begins with personal responsibility. I believe everyone should take care of their own family, and their own individual responsibilities to the best of their ability. If this is done, the strain on the society collective is reduced greatly. This allows society to direct limited resources to those most in need; those in our society who have the least physical or psychological ability to take care of themselves and others.”

What shines through in Dr. Harvey is his obvious respect and admiration for the students in the Criminal Justice Management program. “As a professor at Union in the Criminal Justice Management program, most of my students are working police officers; their entire careers are devoted toward improving society within the boundaries of their jurisdictions. As such, social responsibility is not something I have to ‘teach’ them—it is already fully ingrained in them. As part of their key role in society, they literally risk their lives to protect and serve.”

Dr. Harvey is committed to his students’ success, and this means ensuring that many of the returning students are supported and encouraged as they navigate new academic and technological challenges. “Many of our Criminal Justice Management students are coming back to school after being away from it for many years. They will confront a fleeing bank robber without missing a beat, but the APA format will bring them to a breaking point! I work to reduce their anxiety levels from the first moment they hit the seat. Second, although many of our younger students are masters of technology, our older mid-career professionals in many cases struggle with this, and everyone at Union should be sensitive to helping them with this issue that can lead to much frustration.”

Dr. Harvey continually returns to themes of leadership through persistence and care for others. His heroes in this area are men like Nelson Mandela and Abraham Lincoln. “Both of these individuals led through a great combination of common sense, logical analysis, and concern for people,” Dr. Harvey said. “No matter how difficult times were, they maintained their visions and were undeterred no matter what. If you want to know about leadership at the very highest levels, these are two great people to study.”

National television and radio programs, such as the Bloomberg Business television show and The Joey Reynolds Radio Show, have hosted Dr. Harvey as an expert on creative leadership principles, and his two books, The Call to Lead: How Ordinary People Become Extraordinary Leaders, and Leadership: Texas Hold 'Em Style have garnered Dr. Harvey national attention.The kind of leadership that Dr. Harvey champions builds on the foundation of relationships. “I am a believer in the concept of emotional intelligence, as outlined by Daniel Goleman and others, and empathy is a key component of this. If I had to sum up what leadership is in one sentence, I would say, ‘Leadership is about building relationships with people through trust.’  If you truly focus on doing this on a daily basis, it's amazing how well things fall into place, in both the world of academia and the field of law enforcement.”

Go to Dr. Harvey’s website to read more about his leadership principles and training resources.
 

Faculty Highlights: Dr. Carole Stokes-Brewer

Giving back to one’s surrounding community is an integral part of leadership and social responsibility, but it is not always as easy as it sounds. Dr. Carole Stokes-Brewer in the Bachelor of Science, Social Work program at Union Institute & University is a model of giving back to her community in a way that is empathetic, creative, and effective. I am proud to highlight Dr. Stokes-Brewer and her work this month, both as a professor and in her active engagement outside the academy walls.
“The more you give, the more you receive,” this was the often-repeated family phrase that Dr. Carole Stokes-Brewer remembers from her childhood. The motto inspired Dr. Stokes-Brewer’s more than 35-year commitment to the field of psychotherapy, social work, consultation, training, and education. She is currently the Director of Field Education in the Bachelor of Science, Social Work program at Union Institute & University and she is an exceptional example of the socially responsible scholar-practitioner that defines Union Institute & University’s spirit of outreach and engagement.
Dr. Stokes-Brewer’s life reveals a unique kind of leadership rooted in the principle of giving back. “I am so grateful that I often experience that awesome feeling of giving, whether it’s through community service, helping a student, or just giving a smile,” she said. “Previously, I was a Black Achiever and a Big Sister. Along with other community involvement, I enjoy serving as a role model for young people on their journey through life. Cincinnati is the 10^th poorest city in the country.
My newest volunteer activity is with City Link Center, a place people go to learn how to overcome poverty through a variety of services, resources and hope. Specifically, I am in training to help people prepare for employment. As Director of Field Education, it gives me pleasure to represent Union and in seeking learning experiences for our students to prepare them professionally in the field of social work.” In addition to her responsibilities at Union Institute & University and her volunteer work, Dr. Stokes-Brewer is also CEO of Consultants at Mind Matters, Inc., a company providing psychosocial resources for groups, individuals, and couples. She is also the former co-director of Behavior Science for the Cincinnati Family Practice Residency Program, where she developed programs for adults and adolescents relating to chemical dependency issues. 
Creating programs, developing curriculum, and producing content for conferences and national presentations have long been a passion for Dr. Stokes-Brewer. “Currently, I am developing a program for a Fortune 500 company," she said. "At Union Institute & University, I'm excited about assisting and supporting Nina Lewis, chair of the social work department, in preparation of the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) accreditation. I am also developing social work presentations for state and national conferences.”
Dr. Stokes-Brewer holds several professional licenses. Among these, she is an Independent Social Worker with supervisory designation, a Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor with supervisory designation, and she is a Licensed Independent Chemical Dependency Counselor. She is also an Approved Consultant in Clinical Hypnosis. “Many years ago, I had a client who was impressed with the experience she had with clinical hypnosis to enhance her self confidence. I became curious about this science and began to explore it in depth. I have always been interested in the power of the mind. After many years of study, training, and practice with clinical hypnosis, I’ve enjoyed watching many people stop smoking, reduce pain, overcome phobias, improve relationships, and recover from illnesses. What’s even better, it is a technique they can learn to continue their self-growth."

Helping people gain a better sense of self, of life-and-work balance and a greater appreciation and knowledge of maintaining personal health is something Dr. Stokes-Brewer is passionate about. “I find that the more balance I have in life, the more fulfillment I experience. Good health is important. I was on a panel with Dr. Nancy Snyderman discussing the importance of women’s health,.  she inspired me to take a more active role in taking care of myself."
Following some of her spiritual and artistic heroes, Dr. Stokes-Brewer has found that artistic expression contributes significantly to maintaining a healthy attitude and lifestyle. "Writing poetry is one of my favorite forms of expression. There are so many poets and writers that inspire me.  Margaret Walker and Maya Angelo are two of my favorites for their brilliant poetry and storytelling. Self reflection is important to me.  I am interested in meditation for its ability to quiet the mind.. Deepak Chopra and Thich Nhat Hanh are a couple of my favorites.  I love the spirit of Cicely Tyson to remind me, in a quiet spiritual way, to develop grace."
Helping people maintain good health and take time for personal development remains central to Dr. Stokes-Brewer’s life-philosophy to “give back” to others, but giving back is not always as easy as it might sound, she notes. One of the principles she tries to instill in her students is the awareness of how to help others creatively help themselves. “Most students come into the field of social work because they have an admirable desire to help people. Along with that desire, comes the belief that ‘help’ is something they tell a person to do. If only they do what I say, life would be better. After that, they don’t understand their clients’ resistance. True help comes when you understand the dynamics of the situation and begin a process that allows individuals to develop better outcomes for themselves. ’Give me a fish and I eat for a day, teach me to fish and I eat for a lifetime,’” she quotes the old proverb.She remembered her own process of learning to reach out to help others different from herself. “It was March 1965, when state troopers marched in Selma, Alabama to the capitol in Montgomery Alabama to persuade a change allowing all to be free to vote. The outcome became known as the Voting Rights Act of 1965. I was a student at Tuskegee University. The excitement of freedom for all inspired me to participate in a student forum to spread the message of voting to people in isolated rural areas. We would find them living in dirt-floor rooms, we encouraged them, showed them the voting process, and even took them to the polls.  I learned so much from listening and connecting with people so much like me, yet so different. It was at that point that I made a commitment to prepare myself educationally to assist others in improving their plight. “To be of help to others, you have to know your strengths and weaknesses,” Dr. Brewer emphasized. “You have to learn how to be detached enough, yet empathic to help others define their experiences that can contribute to the betterment of their situation.” The process of learning to give to others has been a varied and an incredibly rewarding one for Dr. Stokes-Brewer. “I’ve never forgotten that the more you give, the more you receive,” she said. “I do believe it prepared a path in my career, connections with others, and the universe.”
Find out more about Dr. Stokes-Brewer at her website.

Faculty Highlights: Dr. Robert Kirkland

Dr. Robert Kirkland began serving as an instructor at Union Institute & University in the Criminal Justice Management program and in the Emergency Services Management program in 2012. Dr. Kirkland is an exemplary scholar-practitioner with an extensive military background in addition to a robust CV of academic achievements.His life experience as a military officer and as an emergency service provider are inspiring and compelling for UI&U students in the field. One of Dr. Kirkland’s strengths is the ability to see the potential for synergistic partnerships between military services and law enforcement and local emergency services. This kind of “interdisciplinary approach” stems from a desire to meet the security and legal needs at a local level and to train individuals to be able to serve their communities better.Dr. Kirkland received a Bachelor of Science degree from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1988, and he went on later to earn his Master’s degree and his Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh, graduating in 2001. 
His interests lie in Latin American Studies, having achieved a certificate in the field and then writing his doctoral dissertation on the history and relationships of the U.S. military with the countries of Guatemala, Cuba, and Bolivia, a topic on which he continues to research and publish.

Dr. Kirkland recently retired from the Active Army and is now drawing on his wealth of experience and knowledge to train others. “Most of the students we have [in Los Angeles] are with law enforcement, fire or other emergency services backgrounds.

Their agencies often work with the military in disaster relief efforts or homeland security operations.   In my courses, I give the students a military perspective that helps them build on their skill sets they already have in their chosen field.”

Along with his military experience and training, Dr. Kirkland is a graduate of the U.S. Air War College with a concentration in Homeland Security. He is passionate about showing students how the different law enforcement department and emergency services at a local level can coordinate with state and federal security departments.

“Since 9-11 there have been a number of federal agencies which have been involved more extensively in Homeland Security issues,” Dr. Kirkland said. “With the myriad of agencies, including the US military, students who study Criminal Justice or Emergency Management need to be aware of these agencies and how they impact their field. The synergistic efforts of all agencies will increase our ability at the federal, state and local levels to deal with threats.”

Dr. Kirkland’s own career has a strong component of integrating different services for the purpose of achieving a common goal. Over the years he regularly employed his military training within the context of emergency relief services. From 1993-1996, he participated in hurricane preparedness for coastal towns in North Carolina and hurricane disaster relief efforts while serving as a military officer at Fort Bragg. He was also member of the Emergency Operations Center for Hurricane Iniki relief efforts in 1992.

Bringing his experience to meet the needs of the local community is at the heart of what it means to be socially responsible for Dr. Kirkland: “To me, social responsibility means to have a keen interest in what is happening in our communities and to actively participate in solving problems. As a CJM/ESM faculty member, by helping to educate practitioners in the field, I can make them better and more proficient in their jobs which in turn helps them to serve their community more effectively.”It is precisely in this area of education and teaching that Dr. Kirkland is investing at present. He is currently working with Dr. Beth Pastores-Palffey to update the Emergency Services Management program, designing the curriculum around the standards set by the Foundation for Higher Education Acceditation (FFHEA). “The FFHEA is really the ‘gold standard’ for Emergency Management program accreditation at the post-secondary level. One of trustees at Union, Kay Goss, serves as President of the FFHEA.  We hope to have the revised curriculum and courses up and running later this year.”

Faculty Highlights: Dr. Richard Sears

Dr. Richard Sears is a professor in the Doctor of Psychology program at Union Institute & University and has been a part of the Union community since 2006. He comes from an incredibly diverse background, both in business and in academia. Dr. Sears’s life is characterized by a passion for understanding and experiencing the world, and also by a strong desire to use his knowledge to help others. He achieved a Doctorate in Psychology from Wright State University in 2005, and he has continued to develop his study of the mind through clinical research inspired by Eastern mental and spiritual traditions.

Dr. Sears’ extensive training in the martial arts—he has a fifth degree black belt in Ninjutsu—initially introduced him to ideas and philosophies of Eastern mindfulness practices. The experience of learning and teaching martial arts has led him to continue to study how these ancient disciplines are still relevant to us today. As of this February, Dr. Sears completed his Doctorate of Ministry in Buddhist Studies, from the Buddha Dharma University in Los Angeles.

Far from a purely theoretical academic, Dr. Sears earned his M.B.A. degree from Wright State in 2004, in addition to working several years as a manager for a Fortune 500 company. As a true scholar-practitioner, he says that he desires to understand the context and organizational systems at work in different institutions, both from an academic perspective and from a business perspective.

This business background has not only been helpful to Dr. Sears in terms of career flexibility and creating a broad professional base from which he can draw—a strategy he advocates for his students—but it has also been valuable for him to understand how businesses and universities approach things like diversity issues within an institutional structure.“My training at Wright State strongly emphasized diversity,” Dr. Sears said. “That was really important to me. Being a white male, I didn’t even recognize the privilege I had. I was very naïve to how much injustice there is in the world. It was really eye-opening to take all these courses and hear all the experiences of my classmates.”

Diversity issues and promoting equality in the classroom and in the workplace are two crucial concerns for Dr. Sears, and yet his experiences have taught him that the best organizational change often happens gently and subtly. “In therapy, or in working with organizations, or even in bodyguard work, the change has to be subtle. If not done carefully, you could end up creating more resistance to the change. How do we turn [awareness] into action? How do we make real change in the world? And not in an idealistic kind of way that makes the situation worse. Alan Watts was a philosopher that I heard this illustration from: ‘Kindly let me help you, or you’ll drown, said the monkey as he safely put the fish up in a tree.’ We often think we’re helping, but we don’t really understand. Having that bigger, broader understanding of context and systems is important."
The discipline or practice of “mindfulness” is one of the ways that Dr. Sears encourages his students and patients to gain that bigger, broader understanding of the world. “My mentor, John Rudisill, said one of the best compliments he ever got as a consultant is, ‘You ask very good questions.’ To me, I like how mindfulness ties in with that. Mindfulness doesn’t tell you what to do. It’s just about increasing your awareness. If you know more about what the situation is, then you’ll make better choices, and better understand the implications. Also, I think the better we are at managing our own emotions, the better the place we’ll be starting from to make a change, instead of for the wrong reasons, or in a reactionary kind of way.”

Mindfulness, he said, is “obviously a common word in the English language, meaning to pay more attention. It has a long history of being associated with a lot of spiritual and secular traditions, especially in the East, but it’s a natural human process we all possess. It’s been used in psychology as an intervention, as a way of strengthening our attention for being able to work with our own thoughts, emotions, and body sensations in a wiser way.”
What is so interesting about this emerging trend of “mindfulness” is that psychologists and other mental health professionals are witnessing dramatic, concrete results. “It’s a whole lot like exercising our muscles. We exercise our ability to pay attention to what’s happening. Our minds tend to just go off on all kinds of thoughts. Mindfulness allows us to be able to bring it back to what we’re doing, or noticing what we’re feeling in our bodies, or what emotions or thoughts are here. There’s an area of the brain called the prefrontal cortex—this area has a lot to do with planning, abstract thought, and managing our emotions. Brain scans before and after an eight-week mindfulness course shows that this area becomes thicker—which means there’s been more growth. The way the brain works, the more you fire certain neural pathways, the thicker and the stronger they get. Just like, the more you use a muscle pathway, the bigger it starts to get over time.”

For Dr. Sears, some of the newest research indicates that not only are mindfulness exercises useful for stressed-out, anxious adults with busy lives, but it is dramatically beneficial for children as well.“The research team that I’m on at Children’s Hospital [in Cincinnati] is taking kids through 12 weeks of practicing these mindfulness exercises, and scanning their brains before and after. This is first time scans have been done with kids—and we’ve already found changes in their brains, as well as significant reductions in their anxiety levels from practicing this. The team is thrilled. The lead researcher is a psychiatrist, and she basically said any medication that they’ve ever tried not only doesn’t help the population she works with (kids with a parent with bipolar), but has side effects that make the kids worse off oftentimes. So she’s just thrilled to find something that’s helpful with no side effects. It’s an exciting time.”
Dr. Sears stressed that mindfulness practices are not a cure-all or a silver-bullet replacement for other medical treatments, but it is a significant, demonstrable aid to a person’s well-being. Dr. Sears said that the core of mindfulness really is about moving deeper into our every-day experiences.

One of the most rewarding aspects for him is seeing the people who are benefitting from the workshops he leads. “It’s fascinating to see the impact of the mindfulness groups that I do--the ripple effects those seem to have. I get broad varieties of people, with a broad variety of problems. Sometimes I invite people to come in for free if they can’t afford it, and I also work with CEOs, physicians, and attorneys. The other day someone called me up and told me she had learned that she has a terminal disease, and just how thankful she was that she had taken this course. She can be more in the moments that she has left, instead of spending the last remaining moments worrying about what’s going to happen and missing what she has left. It’s really rewarding to see the transformations in people.”

VPAA: Tools of Engagement--the Success of a Team

Success, whether in education or in life, is something that happens because people work together. Rarely do the best athletes achieve their goals without coaches, without families that believe in them and actively support them.

The same is true of students and of career professionals. Many of you have heard me express again and again my passion for improving our student retention practices at Union Institute & University—specifically at the undergraduate level. Our enrollment teams are truly excellent in recruiting a diverse student population—many of them returning adult learners.

What is exciting is that this is one of the areas where UI&U shines: we excel in being a degree-completion institution for undergraduate adult learners and career professionals. Our data from self-studies consistently indicates that this is where we win. Union empowers individuals to become employable, socially responsible contributors to their surrounding communities.

I want to continue ensuring that we serve those undergraduate, adult learners well. According to the Association of American Colleges and Universities, returning, undergraduate adult learners often have different expectations of their class experiences: 

1. Many adult learners see a university course as a place to gain skills that will directly benefit them in their personal and professional capacities;
2. They desire task-based approaches to learning with clearly defined outcomes—“What can I do as a result of completing this assignment / this course?”
3. They see their courses as places to engage with others and to share and hear professional and personal experiences that will benefit the group as a whole.

The Chronicle of Higher Education (available for free through the UI&U Library!) consistently recognizes the needs of returning adult learners and advocates new strategies for partnering with those students to ensure their success.

The Department of Education advocates that one of the ways main ways we can team up to support returning professionals is through technology. Many of you know that I am excited about promoting technological advancement and virtual, online tools at Union. The main reasons for this are:

1. Computer literacy is essential for competitive employability. The ability to use a computer and access the tools of the World Wide Web is no longer optional for our students. They must have proficient computer skills to be competitive in today’s job market.
2. Online, virtual learning allows busy, working adults to engage and network with other professionals and allows them to share work-related and personal experiences that benefits the larger group. This is the genius of the “flipped classroom” model, promoted by Jim Hicks and Jonathan Eskridge in the Center for Teaching and Learning. In this model, the professor’s strength shines greatest when he or she facilitates an active learning community—a space where students learn from and are supported by each other. They become their own support network. 

Technology is never an end unto itself. Technology provides tools for engaging our students and for helping them become successful. And their success is our success.

I want to highlight two specific examples of technological teaching tools that are immediately applicable for our students.

1.  Susan Whitehead, from the UI&U Library, developed a unique, online puzzle to help Union students capitalize on the online research resources available to them and to help them connect and interact with the library staff. Susan’s “treasure hunt” tool can easily be implemented as a class exercise and is a perfect example of leveraging technology as a tool for interaction and engagement. You can read more about the puzzle at the Union Library’s blogsite! 
2. Turnitin is an amazing automatic grading-feedback tool and is available for faculty use. We strongly encourage instructors to use Turnitin to check student papers for plagiarism as well as grammatical / writing feedback. Contact the IT Help Desk to request an account!

Student use of Turnitin is NOT currently available. It will be available in the future within CampusWeb, but we are waiting for Jenzabar to enable this integration.

Go to the Turnitin website or watch a short video to see more about how Turnitin works.

Union does well targeting the needs of undergraduate, returning adult learners and career professionals. Let us take advantage of the technological resources we have to engage our students and to interact and team up with them for their academic and professional success.

The research shows that “Adult learners who experience academic success in higher education tend to gain economic and personal benefits, which most likely provide social, political, and economic benefits for the broader society” (AACU).

When our students succeed, all of us win.