Introduction: Pharmacy education has standards for assessment that must be met, prompting many programs to develop cultures of assessment. This study assesses the extent to which assessment personnel perceive that a culture of assessment has been established within their schools/colleges of pharmacy (S/COPs) and determines whether a relationship exists between assessment structure and the perceived strength of the culture of assessment. Methods: An electronic survey was administered to assessment personnel at 134 S/COPs. Respondents were asked about changes within the past five years pertaining to assessment personnel/committees and factors prompting these changes. They were also asked to rate items related to support for institutional assessment (SIA scale) and faculty engagement with assessment (FEA scale). The reliability of each scale was estimated using Cronbach alpha and bivariate correlations were conducted to estimate the relationships among the two scales and other survey items. Results: The S/COP response rate was 84% (113/134). Most (58%) noted the formation or re-structuring of the assessment office, with 26% creating one or more new assessment positions. The most common source of change was new accreditation standards (55%) followed by a new leadership position created in assessment (40%). Cronbach alpha for the SIA scale was 0.79 and 0.84 for the FEA scale. Program size was strongly negatively correlated with school age (rs = −0.58) and the FEA scale (r = −0.21). Conclusions: There was a strong relationship between SIA and FEA. Future studies are warranted to determine the interdependency of support for assessment and faculty engagement with assessment.

The success of internationalization depends heavily on faculty support and engagement. Nonetheless, the motivations of faculty heavily engaged in international activities—described by scholars as champions and advocates—are not well understood, despite the fact that their efforts have been labeled as critical to advancing such efforts. This study examined the perceived motivating factors of faculty members heavily engaged in international activities at Virginia Tech, a university that created a strategic plan aimed at increasing such endeavors in 2004. Interviews with identified champions and advocates of internationalization in two colleges at Virginia Tech—the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences and the Pamplin College of Business—sought to explore the benefits and elements that led these faculty members to become and remain engaged in international activities. This study also investigated whether faculty members' involvement in international concerns could be linked to the influence of factors proposed in the faculty engagement literature as commitment enabling. Specifically, this research sought to test Wade and Demb's (2009) Faculty Engagement Model, which asserts that certain professional factors contribute to professors becoming involved in community engagement. This analysis found that five of the professional factors in Wade & Demb's (2009) model, discipline, status/rank, socialization, professional community and department support—are useful for examining faculty members' willingness and ability to engage in international activities. However, it also found that faculty member involvement is shaped by a convergence of professional, institutional and personal factors. These together enabled faculty members to begin and remain engaged in international activities. In addition, despite the rationales offered by leadership and through strategic plans for becoming engaged in international concerns, the most common motivating factors identified by champions and advocates were intrinsic or personal influences that are not captured in institutional efforts to internationalize. These findings suggest that although universities may create mission statements, strategic plans and policies to guide internationalization, the motivations of faculty members who undertake and implement such initiatives in their classrooms and through their research and outreach play a large part in whether and how such efforts will be realized. / Ph. D.

American universities have been internationalizing for decades, and their leaders often contend they must engage globally to stay relevant and prepare students adequately for a rapidly changing work environment. Faculty members, as keepers of the curricula and pivotal university actors, are critical to global engagement efforts on their campuses. However, many university leaders have yet to engage individual professors in ways that have resulted in securing their sustainable support for comprehensive internationalization (CI). A similar weakness of CI related research to date has been its failure to include a broad group of voices when investigating faculty engagement in internationalization. Following Childress’ framework (2010), this study explored the meaning-making, motivations, and perceptions attached to CI through individual interviews with a sample from all ranks of U.S. civil and environmental engineering faculty members from three Land Grant universities. Interviewees highlighted a variety of barriers and motivations linked to internationalization including, historical constructs, personal and professional values, and perceptions of potential outcomes of CI engagement. The analysis highlights and explores these factors and their connections to the international outlook ranking for interviewees’ institutions. / Ph.D. / American universities have been addressing global concerns and challenges for decades. Their faculties have for just as long sought palliatives and solutions to those issues. One element of that work is efforts to prepare students to work in an internationally connected world. University professors who design classes for students and conduct research are critical to all of these initiatives. However, university leaders have not been able to find ways to involve a sufficient and sustainable group of professors to make globally focused research and teaching efforts a central priority. Past studies investigating faculty involvement in internationalization have not yet researched a full range of professorial perceptions of such efforts. This study sought to understand what a sample of civil and environmental engineering faculty members at three American Land Grant universities perceived concerning internationalization initiatives at their institutions. I chose this group for study because their views have not been examined systematically and because there are more students studying engineering and in this one field within engineering than ever before. Those I interviewed included faculty members of all ranks and they also exhibited a wide range of levels of engagement in globally focused research and teaching. Interviewee responses highlighted a diverse array of motivations for international engagement and as many disincentives for faculty to do so. Professors’ work histories, values, and personal and professional perspectives all mediate their involvement in globally relevant issues. This analysis identified a list of concerns that university leaders can address to encourage their faculties to pursue internationalization. It also examined the connection between university reputations and faculty engagement with international concerns.

The purpose of this study was to investigate faculty and administrator perceptions of online learning compared to traditional face-to-face instruction by exploring the factors that impact online instruction. Strategies that can lead to effective online learning environments were explored. Faculty and administrators working with online education at 6 traditional, regionally accredited, degree granting higher education institutions were included in the study. The number of participants consisted of 169 from the public university, 98 from the private institutions, and 33 from the community college. The survey used a Likert-type scale, and had 4 dimensions (student engagement, student-student interactions, faculty engagement, and academic dishonesty) to measure faculty and administrator perceptions of online education. It contained 17 statements and 9 demographic questions. Statistical analyses of the data revealed: (1) No significant difference in the perceptions of faculty and administrators as measured by mean scores on the 4 dimensions of the survey by type of higher education institution, (2) No significant difference in the perceptions on the 4 dimensions of the survey between administrators and faculty, (3) No significant relationship in participants’ years of service and mean scores on the 4 dimensions of the survey, (4) No significant difference in the perceptions on the student-student interactions dimension between faculty who teach primarily online and those who teach primarily face-to-face, and a significant difference in the perceptions on the other 3 dimensions, (5) A significant difference in the perceptions of faculty towards academic dishonesty dimension depending on the percentage of online classes taught by the faculty (25% or less, about 50%, about 75%, and 100%). Group 1 (25% or less) had significantly lower mean score than the groups 2 (about 50%), 3 (about 75%), and 4 (100%), (6) A significant positive relationship in the perceptions on the academic dishonesty dimension based on the number of years teaching online courses, (7) No significant difference in participants’ mean scores on the 4 dimensions based on faculty members’ and administrators’ age, and (8) The perceptions of male faculty and administrators on student engagement tended to be significantly higher than the perceptions of female faculty and administrators.

Faculty citizenship and institutional culture are critically important to the health and success of any college/school of pharmacy. This commentary describes the current relevance and importance of faculty citizenship in the broader context of institutional culture and provides a definition of faculty citizenship for use across all aspects of faculty roles in the pharmacy academy. The definition includes two key components (engagement and collegiality) that can be used to measure citizenship behaviors. Continued discussion and study of faculty citizenship will further the academy’s understanding and use of the concept

No description available.

This commentary describes the significance of faculty citizenship in the broader context of institutional culture and defines faculty citizenship for use across all aspects of faculty roles in the Academy. The definition includes two key components (engagement and collegiality) that can be used to measure citizenship behaviors. Continued discussion and study of faculty citizenship will further the Academy’s understanding and use of the concept.

This commentary describes the significance of faculty citizenship in the broader context of institutional culture and defines faculty citizenship for use across all aspects of faculty roles in the Academy. The definition includes two key components (engagement and collegiality) that can be used to measure citizenship behaviors. Continued discussion and study of faculty citizenship will further the Academy’s understanding and use of the concept.

No description available.

For decades colleges and universities have been perplexed by the problem of retaining students within systems of higher education. With the advent of more diverse student populations and the increasing demands for more innovative pedagogical approaches, many universities have implemented learning community programs. To study how learning communities impact first generation college students, this study was undertaken to formulate a better understanding of student retention, peer learning, and faculty engagement. This was accomplished by drawing upon both qualitative and quantitative research methods to explore the data concurrently to derive a comprehensive picture of the phenomena under scope. Using a grounded theory approach for the qualitative data analysis, 24 interviews were conducted, an exhaustive document review transpired, and the researcher engaged in 32 hours of observation for a 16-week period. From this analysis, four primary themes emerged: psychosocial integration, intellectual integration, familial integration, and ecological integration. In addition, stages of peer learning were developed from the observations of the students in the learning community setting, as well as positions of faculty engagement in the learning communities program. From the grounded theory analysis, a socialization model was built to explain first year student retention. The study also employed a logistic regression analysis in the quantitative component of the research investigation, to determine how well the following variables could predict first year student retention: high school grade point average (GPA), first semester GPA, first year academic standing, gender, ethnicity, admission status, major decidedness, ESL status, and the number of developmental courses needed upon enrollment in college. A total of 900 archival student records were examined using a forward logistic regression and a 3-predictor model of student retention was yielded with a classification accuracy of 80.1%. The three significant variables in the model included: first semester GPA, first year academic standing, and ethnicity. When this model was applied to a cross validation sample (n = 685), the classification accuracy was found to be 82.0%. Overall, the findings generated from this study help to shed light on factors that might be predictive of student retention among first generation college students in a learning communities program.