newsadvancements and initiatives - Faculty Matters

FM How do students reconcile the abstract concept of scholarship and the
hands-on role our faculty members play in their learning?
JM A classic critique of academe is that there is a huge chasm between what
we do as scholars and what we do as instructors. In many institutions, there’s a
long hallway that separates the laboratory where faculty do research and the
classroom where they lecture. It’s reasonable for our students to expect us to
be able to link the ways we discover, innovate and apply scholarship.
What we are telling our students is that they should care about a given topic.
Even if the work I am engaged in is highly theoretical, I should still be able to
explain it to students in a way that leads them to ask questions about it. Our
“Successful scholars ultimately
are not thwarted by rejection.
They don’t perceive it as failure
but rather as an opportunity
to extend their thinking via the
feedback of others.”
— Jeremy Moreland, Executive Dean, School of
Advanced Studies, University of Phoenix
students shouldn’t be perplexed when we tell them
about our work. The way our research connects to the
curriculum should make perfect sense.
FM Beyond sharing scholarship outcomes and
knowledge with our students, why is it important for
our faculty members to share their scholarship efforts
with each other?
JM The practice of peer review among scholars creates
a safe place for them to experiment in terms of the
expression of their ideas and research. We, as faculty,
can take the spirit of this model from the scholarly
community and bring it into our conversations, where
we can foster the spirit of enthusiastic collaboration
toward each other’s work. Peer review is collaborative
at the summative phases. I have found that our
faculty and students seem to have some of their most
rewarding experiences when they work closely with one
another. After all, scholarship is inherently communal.
FM It’s relatively easy for our faculty who teach on
campus to collaborate with one another. How can our
online faculty do the same?
JM PhoenixConnect® offers all our faculty members a
powerful way to collaborate with one another virtually
and to benefit from each other’s research. This summer,
we are launching a new Faculty Scholarship Group on
PhoenixConnect® as a means for our faculty members
to share their scholarship with one another. I encourage
all our faculty members to join the conversation and
engage in the communal spirit of scholarship.