Curious David Redux

Reflections on Psychology at Carroll: 2002 to 2011.

    I'm writing this primarily for the 459 alumni that I recently attempted to contact via a letter who graduated with a Psychology major between 2002 and 2010. Though one of my intentions in that letter was to alert you to the 2011 - 2012 Power of Ten fund-raising campaign of our Carroll Advancement Office, I genuinely am and always have been interested in staying in touch and learning what paths your lives have followed since graduating from Carroll. My undergraduate experience at Oberlin College was formative, informative, and transformational, and I hope that with the passage of time you will feel the same way about Carroll.

    Since a large number of you who responded to the online survey (which my research students and I included in that letter) indicated an interest in staying in touch, I am specifically sending to each of you a link to this short reflection piece. I welcome YOUR reflections and comments about your experiences. If you did not receive the letter I am alluding to or would like an additional opportunity to complete the short (5-item survey) whose link I included in the letter (and therefore help out my students), contact me and I'll send you the link. Feel free to pass along this opportunity to share reflections with other Carroll psychology major alumni.

    I arrived at Carroll ABD (All But Dissertaion) from Ohio State in 1978 at the same time as Greg Schneider (Walter Young Center), Jerry Isaacs (Computer Science), and Phil Krejcarek (Art). Greg (no longer at Carroll) is now my business partner. Jerry and Phil are still here though we three and Gary Olsen now are marching at the FRONT of the processional of faculty at convocations. At the time I joined Carroll we had maintained an enrollment of 1200 students for the past 10 years or so. Today our enrollment is over 3000.

    I joined a pychology faculty of two (Ralph and Viginia Parsons) and I had an opportunity to get to know almost every Carroll psychology major because they all HAD to take Psycholoy 205 (Statistics and Experimental Design) from me to graduate(---today it sadly is possible for a student to graduate with a psychology major and never to have taken a class from me). At that time we had very few adjunct faculty teaching and a token evening school program that "traditional students" were forbidden to take. I proudly introduced the first microcomputer into the department---my TRS80 Model I level II machine with 16K memory. One of our first adjunct faculty was Peggy Kasimatis.

    Fast forward...The Carroll College of 2002 was much different. Psychology faculty now included Dr. Denise Guastello (who still is here), and Dr. Keri Hainsworth, a former student, who now is happily doing research at Children's Hospital of Milwaukee.  By then I was having in the classroom children of former students! Also, I was became the short-lived Chair of the Psychology Department before by administrative fiat there were no longer chairs or departments at Carroll. Shortly thereafter, Ralph and Virginia Parsons retired after having given more than twenty-five years of their lives to developing what was correctly recognized as one of the academically strongest departments at Carroll ---and still is. I know that they were deeply touched by the reminiscences that many of you shared with me about them when I contacted alumni to help me prepare a memory book for them.

    Fast forward again... In addition to Denise and me, the full-time faculty today include Dr. Chris May, who just received tenure, Dr. Matt Scheel, former Carroll student Dr. Tara Schmidt (who teaches all sections of Experimental Psychology), and Dr. Sandy Arntz, who specializes in Developmental Psychology. Psychology, now a "program" within the Department of Life Sciences at "Carroll University", continues to be one of the most popular majors at Carroll (we presently have about 230 majors) with a strong research emphasis. Both Chris and Matt have been especially successful since their arrival in involving students in research which has resulted in publications and professional presentations.

    Do stay in touch. Let me know what/how/ you are doing and what advice you would give to present students--or to things within the psychology area I should try to change or maintain before I depart from Carroll (sometime within the next seven years). --DS

 

 

 

 

 

Musings about Introducing Global Issues Into My Classroom.

Just finished a Skype session with a former student now in Nicaragua. Though I had (from time to time) been following his blog, it was nice to hear his familiar voice (and would have been even nicer if our cameras were working). How egocentric of me to assume that he had the same technological resources as I.

The world is open. I've been thinking about how to make our campus and curriculum more global. Here are some incipient thoughts about how that might de done. I'd welcome your thoughts.

• Increase awareness and use of media such as BBC News, Google News, and Newsvine.
• Incorporate Kiva into the classroom.
• Explore global views of religion, spirituality, and being.
• Tap into high quality online  or "portable" courses.
• Explore other languages.
• Capitalize on cultural universals such as music, cusine, sports, and literature.
• Reading: Let's encourage our faculty, staff, and students to read, discuss, and discover world literature. Though no substitute for reading, excellent recordings exist of introductions to world literature, world history, world religions, etc.

What suggestions do you have that are simple and cost effective?

First Day of Classes (Professor's Perspective)

Even after all my years of teaching, the first day of class is anxiety-arousing, pressured, critical, and rewarding. As a youth, I was so anxious about giving oral presentations that I fainted when I gave my first high school debate. I had a similar melt-down during the oral component of my graduate school general qualifying examinations in Social Psychology at Ohio State. With experience and a few set backs I've learned to overlearn and to reframe (attribute) the anxiety I inevitably feel from negative feelings into excitement.

The pressures I feel are primarily situational nuisances : making sure that syllabi and handouts are up-to-date, proof-read, sufficient in number; visiting the classrooms ahead of time to better guarantee that there are enough seats, that the equipment works; thinking through how to handle disruptive classroom situations in that particular environment; and of course responding in timely fashion to the myriad course-related emails and missives. [Note the irony that I just now am posting this due to first-semester busyness!].

For me the first class meetings are critical for getting to know my students, for creating shared and appropriate expectations, and for establishing standards. This semester I am teaching my "usual" three courses yet, as in the previous three decades, each has features unique to it from previous semesters.

Based on 1) student evaluations, 2) what my students demonstrate that they can do at semester's end, and 3) how I feel every time I teach it, my "Statistics and Experimental Design " is without doubt my best course. Among the challenges in teaching such a class successfully are the attitudes that some students bring ("I hate math"; "I don't do well in math"; "I'm afraid"), weaknesses in students' fundamental computational skills, and their inexperience with my strongly believed outlook that statistics and data analysis is a tool, a language and a way of thinking.

With considerable trepidation I'm teaching my "Introductory Psychology" course in an entirely different way, pioneering how it will be taught to all our students starting next semester. Instead of the traditional survey course (as I have taught it since 1974), the focus will be on developing students' capacity for clear thinking and a better appreciation and understanding of evidence-based, scientific approaches to answering questions addressed by psychology. Here is what the syllabus presently looks like Download PSY_101B-D._SimpsonSpring2011. I hope to involve the students considerably in developing the course by introducing them to a number of tools such as Diigo , so I hope that I have a much enriched syllabus by the end of the semester.

The third course I am teaching this semester, "Psychological Testing and Assessment" inexplicably has only 7 students enrolled (usually I have more like 20). Given its small size and the fact that I know well 6 of the seven students, I may well be able with them to actually do something I've long hoped to do--- build a psychological test from scratch or improve an extant instrument. I'm also hoping to bring into the classroom a number of professionals (including former students) who in many different ways use psychological tests in their work.

Let the semester begin!

 

 

 

Paean: Reflections on My First 32 Years of Teaching at Carroll

No longer can I ignore the emails from campus indicating that Fall semester will soon begin. Nor can I put off too much longer that manuscript review which is due September 3. Time to doff my invisibility cloak and return to campus rejuvenated, reinvigorated, enriched by extensive reading, and with a clear (closely guarded) plan of what I want to accomplish over the next five years. Invite me to coffee if you'd like to trade closely guarded secrets!

I did an unusually large amount of reading this summer---at least 20 novels including Stieg Larson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy, Richard Russo's Straight Man and his Empire Falls, Rebecca Newberg Goldstein's 36 Arguments for the Existence of God, David Lodge's Thinks; Gary Shteyngart's Super Sad True Love Story, Lesley Kagen's Whistling in the Dark, Benjamin Taylor's The Book of Getting Even, and Brady Udall's magnificent The Lonely Polygamist. Among the nonfiction books I found especially interesting, provocative, or intellectully stimulating were Chris Anderson's Free: The Future of A Radical Price, Nicoholas Carr's The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains, and two books by social psychologist Ellen Langer, The Power of Mindful Learning and Counterclockwise: Mindful Health and the Power of Possibility. More about each of these good reads can be found elsewhere. What else should I read?

The other day I decided to read cover-to-cover and, yes, word-by word the official 2010 - 2011 Carroll University catalog. How things have changed since I joined the Carroll community! I wonder if I have changed to the same degree (but please don't send me photos of me from 1977).

Of the 120 individuals listed as Carroll faculty for 2010 - 2011 (included are administrators and librarians with "faculty status") I am now seventh-most senior in years of continuous service. Three of those faculty listed who are more senior than I plan to make 2010 - 2011 their last year here (or so I have been told). Almost half the faculty and most administrators have only been at Carroll since 2006. 

It might make an interesting exercise in my statistics class to use this data (faculty colleague, academic degrees earned, institutions from which degrees were earned, years of continuous service, academic rank) to better see who we are and how we have changed. Hmm, carpe diem (seize the the teaching moment)---I think I may have developed the content of my first Lab in PSY205 "Statistics and Experimental Design" on September 1.

What are the responsibilities of a senior faculty, such as I, who is such an increasingly scarce commodity? I've seen far too many former colleagues across these 32 years at my stage of faculty development become bitter, angry, despondent, frustrated or exhausted, as they tried to do too much (serving on every committee and task force and accreditation visit) or resisted institutional change they found inappropriate. How can one protect the integrity of an institution one has grown to love, preserve traditions deserving of being kept, and be guided and anchored by the collective wisdom and core values of Carroll's founders---and yet be open to new ideas and supportive of younger colleagues who need the opportunity to make mistakes and to have the same growth opportunities as did I?

In a week I'll have an opportunity to have lunch with members of Carroll's 25-year Club (faculty, staff, and emeriti) who have served Carroll for at least 25 years. I enjoy that annual celebration with these campus colleagues, faculty and non-faculty, who have been mentors, friends, teachers and role models to me.  How many lives these dedicated individuals have affected---and continue to do so as they've shaped and lived core institutional values across the years and have produced a rich collective legacy of traditions, successes, failures, and reasons for celebration. How they have enriched my life and inspired me.

Disentangling Oneself from the Stickiness of the Web

Thesis:

"Anonymous blog comments, vapid video pranks, and lightweight mashups may seem trivial and harmless, but as a whole, this widespread practice of fragmentary, impersonal communication has demeaned interpersonal interaction." So writes Jaron Lanier in a provocative and thought-provoking book You are not a gadget which I am currently reading. How curious (ironic, creepy) to find a preview version of it online.

Antithesis:

"The Web has accelerated access to learning. There has never been a time in the
history of this planet when so much learning was possible throughout our lifetime. Not
only is learning access instantaneous, but you can also learn from global partners via
technology that is increasingly social, ubiquitous, and inexpensive. Despite persistent
complaints about the state of education today, when it comes to opportunities to learn
outside as well as inside schools, these are auspicious times."  So writes Curtis J. Bonk, on the other hand, in his online prequel to the book The world Is open: How web technology is revolutionizing education which I also  am reading. Not surprisingly, much of this is also available online.

Synthesis:

Stay tuned! I'm still trying to decide whether to move closer to the Web (while avoiding the spiders) by using more Internet tools personally and in my classes or to move away from it lest it take even control of me! The distinctions between science fiction and science fact are both harrowing and narrowing---and I am determined to be in control rather than be controlled by technology. Thoughts of Isaac Azimov'vs CAL and Arthur C. Clarke's HAL haunt and taunt me. Time for a vacation full of reflection, rejuvenation, redirection, and resolution of conflicting thoughts about how best to teach and to learn well.

To Twit or not to Twit?... That is not really the question.

When I was Carroll's Director of Institutional Research I recall being amazed and amused that the format and substance of many institutional reports was dictated by 1) to what degree the secretary could fit the information on a page and 2) how she had done it in the past---rather than by using the latest technology and the latest thinking about how best to present the most informative data. I have continued to be hesitant to use Twitter extensively out of a resistance to trying to force my thoughts, ideas, and communication into 140 characters or less (thought bytes) and to my trying to decrease and slow down my communication and information acquisition activities (leaving me time to reflect, to read, to assimilate, and to create). Though I've graduated from a rotary phone, I still refuse to use my cell phone except for emergency calls!

Jane Hart's recent thoughtful,reasoned exposition of how to use Twitter, however, has caused me to consider seriously adding Twitter to my aramentarium of communication/learning/teaching tools. It also motivated me to revisit her list of 100 learning professionals she suggests that one might wish to follow.

But do I REALLY need that medium to keep up to date? I think not---I do just reasonably well with the learning tools I presently use without being overloaded.  Do I want or need to follow others---or to be followed? Though I admire very much what these learning professionals are doing, I don't want my energies or my focus drowned or diluted  by the deluge of additional information flow they provide.

"To Twit or not to Twit?" for me is not the question. Rather, the questions for me are:

• Under what circumstances might Twitter be useful to me for successful teaching?
•  Does Twitter add to my ability to find answers to questions I am investigating?
• What are the costs to me (time away from other things; wheat to chaff ratio) of my using Twitter?

.Time to curl up with a novel.

Tools for Re-Engaging Alumni---and Oneself

Several years ago I wrote a blog piece for the  electronic version of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel lamenting how the meaning of ENGAGEMENT was (over)used in higher education circles. Recently, however, I had reason to reread a marvelous handbook written by "virtual friend" and social media evangelist Jane Hart "Engaging with Social Media Activity Pack." This is a marvelous resource which I originally I drew upon extensively during my adventures teaching a freshman seminar about " Web 2.0 tools." (Download FYS 100 Section U Syllabus - Dr, David Simpson Labor Day Version PDF-1).

I now realize that Jane's Model of Engagement With Social Media captures what I am attempting to do in the classroom---moving students from "reader" to "participant" to "creator." Moreover, it suddenly dawned on me that in the process of attempting to achieve this goal, I myself have been transformed in that direction!

There are a number of social media platforms available for encouraging this kind of "engagement development". Jane has provided a wonderful summary of some of the strengths and weakness of several of them (Twitter, Facebook, Ning, and Elgg). 

During the past month I have devoted considerable time to mastering Ning. I had used it twice before with modest success---one year with freshmen and a second year with a research seminar of seniors. This time I elected to build a Face-book-like entity "Pioneer Place'" for Carroll alumni whom I have personally come to know across my 32 years of teaching here.

Here are a list of questions (with tentative answers) that guided this project:

1.  What are my goals for Pioneer Place? (To provide a virtual location which, for now I control, where invited members of my extended Carroll community can drop in, reconnect, share, contribute, and celebrate their Carroll experiences.) For now it is a virtual sandbox where former students and mentors and I can play and build community.
2. Whom should I invite? (Initially people whom I know well, whom I respect, and who might share my goals). The initial group consists of former and future members of the Board of Trustees, present students and faculty, former advisees, individuals currently residing in foreign countries, and even a few Chicago Cubs fans!
3. How many (other) Ning Networks can I manage? (Right now I am focusing only on developing Pioneer Place.Perhaps in the near future, I'll develop one for my consulting partners, both of who have Carroll connections.
4. How many other Nings should I belong to? (Right now I am a member of six other Nings, primarily for benchmark-purposes.)
5. How can I learn more about creating and developing Nings? (In addition to the introduction i received from following Jane Hart, I have found especially useful Manny Hernandez's marvelous book Ning for Dummies--see my review of the book on Amazon.com. I have also found useful this slideshare production:

Latest Ning Tutorial December

Here is what this very-much-under-development Pioneer Place project looks like. What fun it is to attempt to build bridges across generations of individuals who have touched (and continue to affect) my life!

Feed back is welcome---especially from alumni and future alumni of the Carroll College (WI)/ Carroll University (WI) extended community.

Stay tuned.

What is the Role of a Faculty Adviser?

I've been reflecting lately on my role as faculty adviser to undergraduates here at Carroll and about those faculty who played such a crucial role in that capacity for me, shaping how and why I relate to students and former students. At Oberlin College my most influential adviser was Ralph H. Turner. Ralph, the first faculty member to invite me to address him by his first name,somehow was able to provide the right balance of challenge and support I most assuredly needed both inside and outside the classroom. I fondly and respectfully remember him as intellectually curious, patient, playful, generous in his time with me, kind, and willing to stay in touch with me even across the years that I was continuing my education at The Ohio State University.  

I was blessed with a similar and even deeper rich and enduring relationship at Ohio State with Tom Ostrom, adviser, research collaborator, mentor, friend, and role model until the day of his untimely death. Tom provided emotional support for me while I struggled with the likelihood of being pulled out of graduate school to be sent to Vietnam, listened to me as I sorted out my thoughts about getting married, wrote me a teasing letter about a study I should do if I ended up in jail, guided me in the transition from the intense research world of Ohio State to my current home at Carroll and inspired me to share with others my love of learning. His wisdom, lust for life, optimism, sense of humor, firmness, and candor still guide and humble me.

As I've written elsewhere,  both individuals so impacted my life in so many ways. I draw upon their wisdom each time I am interacting with a student in an advising capacity. Advising is much more than helping students make the transition from high school, providing advice in course selection, or giviing guidance in deciding whether there is an afterlife after graduating from Carroll. The lessons taught me by Ralph and Tom and the wisdom shared with me by alumni aren't and can't be learned from adviser training workshops! 

Going Global

I'm still reflecting on some interesting ideas that emerged in a "listening session" I attended today with two other faculty colleagues concerning a proposed change in our general education program for students at Carroll. I left quite confused, but that is not atypical for me.

What is the appropriate foundation for general education in the 21rst century? Are we faculty appropriately educated for teaching in the 21rst century? What skill sets, traditions, and knowledge are as vital today as when this academic institution was founded? Can we change our general education program without intentionally changing our institutional mission? How do we avoid throwing out the baby with the bath water?

Should part of a general education be mastery of another language? If so, how does one define mastery---knowing the right phrases to allow one to travel within another country? Or should one be fluent in another culture's history, customs, idioms, national concerns, and language? Can this be achieved within the traditional four years of a college education and still allow students a traditional major? If we are interested in being more global, shouldn't we append USA to all our institutional publications?

Can internationalization be achieved through the 21rst century equivalence of international pen pals using Skype or VoiceThread? Can "mastery" be achieved through online tools alone such as Ella or Rosetta Stone?  Through BBC language acquisition in 12 weeks courses? Or by other such (free) online language learning resources?

What does is mean to globalize or internationalize a campus? How can that best be achieved? Is the best way to do so to bring international students and faculty to campus? To send our students and faculty abroad? To create communication opportunities world-wide through Internet means? To expand faculty and students' knowledge of history, cultures, international economics, and international relations? To conduct collaborative international research and learning projects? The simple answer is, "yes"

I just received an invitation to join Division 52, the Division of International Psychology. Should I join it or join the International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology? 

Which organizations do I drop out of to allow time and money for these new ones?

Ayuda me. I'm going global.

CD

For any of your aware of my Pioneer Place project...give me some feedback.

Thanks. Share the project idea with anyone who might be interested in contributing

CD