Previous Book Spotlights

• Co-Creating Equitable Teaching and Learning by Alison Cook-Sather Expand dropdown
  

  Summary:

  Alison Cook-Sather, a pioneer of this co-creative approach, draws on more than twenty years of experience developing student–teacher partnerships in higher education to offer a wise and generous work that speaks to both students and educators. As her research underscores, a co-creative learning environment, in which relationships and communication between students and teachers are prioritized, benefits the educational experience on many levels.

  Cook-Sather demonstrates how pedagogical partnerships give students the tools to advocate for their own learning while giving educators the feedback they need to improve classroom experiences. She shows how the co-creative model helps to bring about inclusive spaces and equitable teaching practices that better foster student success, especially among underrepresented and minority student populations.

  Offering actionable guidance, Cook-Sather advocates enacting the following four principles to structure student voice into higher education: embracing a commitment to equity and justice; providing structure rather than prescriptions for engagement; making rather than taking up space; and developing a partnership mindset. She grounds these principles in examples of practices drawn from an undergraduate education course; a faculty development program; and cross-disciplinary, cross-constituency institutional dialogues.

  This work calls for readers to reimagine the higher education structure and to cultivate an environment in which all stakeholders can work together to advance inclusivity, accessibility, and equity. As the author argues, co-creation can be a catalyst for change throughout the system.

   

  Reviews: 

  “To move the needle in higher education towards more equitable learning environments, we need to use strategies that demonstrate impact. Co-Creating Equitable Teaching and Learning highlights the critical importance of integrating student voices, a powerful approach that can lead to transformation at the course through the institutional level.”

  — Tracie Marcella Addy, Associate Dean of Teaching & Learning, Lafayette College

  “Cook-Sather’s research has been both radically innovative and universally accessible. This new work offers a compelling argument for engaging practices of co-creation to implement a practice of equity and justice in higher education. It is essential reading for instructors, institutional leaders, and staff, as well as students.”

  — Steven S. Volk, Co-director, Consortium for Teaching and Learning, Great Lakes Colleges Association

  “This book is a must-read for educators ready for the next big step in their teaching and curriculum design.”

  —Carol A. Hurney, Associate Provost, Faculty Development & Diversity, Colby College

• The Neurodiverse Classroom: A Teacher’s Guide to Individual Learning Needs and How to Meet Them by Victoria Honeybourne Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  With specific learning difficulties more prevalent than ever in mainstream schools, this is the essential guide for teachers wishing to create inclusive and successful learning environments in diverse classrooms. Focusing on promoting acceptance and self-esteem of each child rather than on labeling their difficulties, it shows how to make good use of simple resources and meet a wide range of needs, including children with ADHD, autism, OCD, dyslexia and special speech and language needs.

  The practical advice and strategies in this book enable schools to become more accepting places for all pupils, and embrace neurodiversity as the new 'normal' in education today.

  
  Reviews

  "Victoria Honeybourne has written an innovative book which presents new ways of approaching individual needs and inclusion in schools. It is a thought-provoking book emphasizing the benefits of embracing neurodiversity and celebrating difference. Victoria clearly describes how to implement a whole school approach to promote positive attitudes to neurodiversity, and provides practitioners with a wealth of easy-to-use resources and strategies. This book will help practitioners who are struggling to cope with the wide range of needs presented by the pupils in their class and enable them to learn and thrive.

  —Joy Beaney

  "A refreshing new approach to neurodiversity within the classroom. Victoria Honeybourne supports the notion of teaching all students as individuals and not categorizing them by the 'labels' that some have for their learning difficulties. All students have strengths and weaknesses and there is no one 'correct' way of teaching for all. The book gives useful ideas, advice and checklists and is a stimulating and thought-provoking resource for all involved in education."

  —Dr. Diana Hudson

  "Victoria Honeybourne's The Neurodiverse Classroom is a groundbreaking book. This book will have an impact on the reframing of classroom practice and creating successful and fully inclusive schools - moving from the rhetoric to the reality.

  "Clearly organized and well-written, this is a superb book for all educators. The term 'neurodiversity' is clearly explained and Honeybourne, using her personal and vast professional experience, provides practical arguments as to why a paradigm shift in inclusion is needed. As she indicates, 'neurodiversity' should be accepted and celebrated. This is a positive book with a persuasive message. It will, and certainly should, become a popular book for those entering the profession and for experienced practitioners. There are many practical strategies contained within comprehensive coverage of the challenges experienced by children with learning differences and how these can be overcome. An exciting, thought-provoking and practical book."

  —Dr. Gavin Reid

• Pedagogical Partnerships: A How-To Guide for Faculty, Students, and Academic Developers in Higher Education by Alison Cook-Sather, Melanie Mahti, and Anita Ntem Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  Pedagogical Partnerships and its accompanying resources provide step-by-step guidance to support the conceptualization, development, launch, and sustainability of pedagogical partnership programs in the classroom and curriculum. This definitive guide is written for faculty, students, and academic developers who are looking to use pedagogical partnerships to increase engaged learning, create more equitable and inclusive educational experiences, and reframe the traditionally hierarchical structure of teacher-student relationships. Filled with practical advice, Pedagogical Partnerships provides extensive materials so that readers don’t have to reinvent the wheel, but rather can adapt time-tested and research-informed strategies and techniques to their own unique contexts and goals. 

   

  Reviews

  “We see this book not only as a valuable window into the day-to-day functioning and processes of one highly successful partnership program, but also as a call to develop a wide range of partnership practices that respond to and work within diverse institutional and cultural contexts.”

  —Beth Marquis, Mick Healey, and Kelly E. Matthews

   

  “This is one of the most valuable books I have read over the past two years. I first read it before the Covid outbreak and appreciated the really wonderful insights and reflections from the authors, who take advantage of their different positions and experiences with pedagogical partnership programs. I also really value the style of writing answering specific questions and I continually felt like when new questions arose they would always be addressed in the coming pages. The writing as answering questions is mixing with really detailed and insightful quotations from a wide range of participants in these programs, particularly students. They make it clear that a partnership-based approach to education has the potential for profound and long-lasting impacts.”

  —Dan Guberman, Center for Instructional Excellence, Purdue University

• The Identity-Conscious Educator: Building Habits and Skills for a More Inclusive School by Liza A. Talusan Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  Learn powerful, practical strategies for creating an inclusive school community. The Identity-Conscious Educator provides a framework for building awareness and understanding of five identity categories: race, social class, gender, sexual orientation, and disability. Connect with vignettes and personal stories from the author that illuminate how to address identity topics in your personal and professional life. Then, develop skills in engaging in meaningful interactions with students and peers.

  • Discover how identity affects both personal and professional lives;;
  • Review a framework for building habits and skills of identity-conscious teaching and learning;
  • Build knowledge of five different identity categories and experiences – race, social class, sexual orientation, gender, and disability – and then act for positive change;
  • Reflect with end-of-chapter questions;
  • Review practical, research-based strategies, and activities for having difficult conversations and creating more inclusive communities.

  Reviews

  "This is essential reading and work for educators seeking to transform classrooms, schools, and communities from color blind to color conscious, one habit at a time. "

  ―Jennifer De Leon, Creative Writing Associate Professor and Author of Don’t Ask Me Where I’m From

   

  "Liza A. Talusan weaves the conceptual and the practical in ways few authors have managed to do. Her conversational tone reminds readers they are her collaborators in the collective work she’s laid out. "

  ―Paul C. Gorski, Founder, Equity Literacy Institute, Columbia, South Carolina

   

  "The Identity-Conscious Educator is an indispensable work for every educator! From building your identity-conscious foundation to implementing that practice in real-world scenarios, this book walks you through the entire process. "

  ―Shalen Lowell, Author of Gender Optics and Publishing Project Assistant, South Berwick, Maine

• We Can't Teach What We Don't Know by Gary R. Howard Expand dropdown
  

  Summary:

  For author Gary Howard, the issues and passions that sparked the writing of the first edition of this now classic work are as intense today as they were then. In the third edition, Howard reviews the progress we have made in the interim (for example, the first Black president in the White House), as well as the lack of progress (the gutting of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, the epidemic of Black youth killed by police, and the persistence of race-based educational disparities). Making a case for the “fierce urgency of now,” this new edition deepens the discussion of race and social justice in education with new and updated material. Aligned with our nation’s ever more diverse student population, it speaks to what good teachers know, what they do, and how they embrace culturally responsive teaching. This essential text is widely used in teacher preparation courses and for in-service professional development.

  
  
  

  Reviews:

  "While we continue the work that must be done, more teachers need to read this book, more schools need to make sure it is in their libraries, and more colleges of education need to include it as mandatory reading. One book cannot change the world, but as this book has demonstrated since it was first published, it can begin the process." 

  ―From the Foreword by Sonia Nieto, professor emerita, Language, Literacy, and Culture, College of Education, University of Massachusetts at Amherst

  “This Third Edition of We Can’t Teach What We Don’t Know deepens the critically conscious framework it provides to support the development of especially White, middle-class teachers becoming highly effective, culturally relevant, and responsive educators to all students, especially those in the most poorly resourced schools. It also conveys, with the appropriate utter urgency, the need for teacher education to recruit and retain highly race-conscious teachers of color.”

  ―Christine Clark, professor and senior scholar in multicultural education; founding vice president for diversity and inclusion, University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV)

  "Gary Howard’s greatest gifts to me as a White educator are how he challenges me to see the subtle inequities I otherwise might struggle to see, and his commitment to doing so with humility and integrity: always the bridge, never the judge. What excites me about this new edition of We Can’t Teach What We Don’t Know is how, as Howard expands his own sphere of influence beyond schools and into school reform policy, he invites me, as a reader, along for the ride, helping me expand my own sphere of influence―always the bridge."

  ―Paul Gorski, founder of EdChange; associate professor of Integrative Studies at George Mason University

• Super Courses: The Future of Teaching and Learning by Ken Bain Expand dropdown
  

  Summary:

  Decades of research have produced profound insights into how student learning and motivation can be unleashed―and it’s not through technology or even the best of lectures. In Super Courses, education expert and bestselling author Ken Bain tells the fascinating story of enterprising college, graduate school, and high school teachers who are using evidence-based approaches to spark deeper levels of learning, critical thinking, and creativity―whether teaching online, in class, or in the field.

  Visiting schools across the United States as well as in China and Singapore, Bain, working with his longtime collaborator, Marsha Marshall Bain, uncovers super courses throughout the humanities and sciences. At the University of Virginia, undergrads contemplate the big questions that drove Tolstoy―by working with juveniles at a maximum-security correctional facility. Harvard physics students learn about the universe not through lectures but from their peers in a class where even reading is a social event. And students at a Dallas high school use dance to develop growth mindsets―and many of them go on to top colleges, including Juilliard. Bain defines these as super courses because they all use powerful researched-based elements to build a “natural critical learning environment” that fosters intrinsic motivation, self-directed learning, and self-reflective reasoning. Complete with sample syllabi, the book shows teachers how they can build their own super courses.

  The story of a hugely important breakthrough in education, Super Courses reveals how these classes can help students reach their full potential, equip them to lead happy and productive lives, and meet the world’s complex challenges.

   

  Reviews

  “In Super Courses, Ken Bain draws us in with the promise of superlatives, but make no mistake―his examples offer wisdom that can readily transform a wide variety of courses into more heroic versions of themselves. Through compelling stories and research, Bain asks readers to imagine how we might build on these courses to make even more meaningful experiences for students. I plan to do just that with dozens of ideas gleaned from this enjoyable and inspiring volume.”

  ―Cassandra Volpe Horii, Founding Director, Caltech Center for Teaching, Learning, and Outreach, and former President, POD Network

   

  “Yet another outstanding book by Ken Bain.”

  ―Daniel K. Bubb, University of Nevada, Las Vegas

   

  “Ken Bain’s provocative book, like the courses it describes, invites readers to think deeply about teaching, learning, and perhaps even the role education can play in society. Grounded in learning sciences and pedagogy research, Super Courses explores an array of case studies of fascinating approaches to teaching, challenging us to consider how to build student passion, curiosity, and autonomy into our teaching and learning. Super Courses will leave many teachers eager to find ways to reimagine their own classes.”

  ―Bruce Lenthall, Executive Director, Center for Teaching & Learning, University of Pennsylvania

   

  “Super Courses will be of great use for all teachers.”

  ―Jennifer Snodgrass, Appalachian State University

   

  “Super Courses offers specific and useful examples for promoting deep and meaningful learning. But I am most moved by the way Ken Bain’s book promotes the development of the student as a human being. These courses work not only because of a set of research-based strategies, but because of the powerful assumption that students are curious, altruistic, social, and aspirational human beings. The super courses profiled here are built on that understanding and thus promote human flourishing as well as learning.”

  ―Pamela E. Barnett, Dean, School of Arts & Sciences, La Salle University

• Presumed Incompentent II: Race, Class, Power, and Resistance of Women in Academia  Expand dropdown
  

  Summary:

  This week’s book spotlight features Presumed Incompetent II: Race, Class, Power, and Resistance of Women in Academia,which was also highlighted by Dr. Uttara Manohar, our faculty fellow for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, in her Racial Microaggressions Workshop. This book identifies and examines the obstacles and systemic barriers that women in academia face throughout their careers and how women can fight back in the workforce to make a real change. This book comes at a time where white supremacy and misogyny are a constant forefront of conversation and identifies ways to shift the narrative, allowing women – of all backgrounds – to thrive in their work environments.

  Reviews:

  “This work is a powerful call to action and must read for chief diversity officers, deans, department heads, presidents, and provosts. Building on Presumed Incompetent, these are courageous and bold testimonies of racism, sexism, and bullying faced by Women of Color—who continue to survive and thrive, in spite of it all. The academy can no longer use the excuse of not knowing or understanding the experiences of Women of Color. It now has a responsibility to respond, change, and eliminate these unjust and unfair barriers. Reading this work is an important step for those who consider themselves allies, advocates, and leaders who are committed to inclusive excellence. It is also essential for Women of Color in the academy to know that they are not alone in their experiences and journeys.”

  —Menah Pratt-Clarke, Vice President for Strategic Affairs and Diversity, Professor of Education, Virginia Tech

  “Presumed Incompetent II offers proof that Women of Color are neither crazy nor alone as we make sense of our experiences in higher education. Each essay calls out and looks squarely in the eye the oppressive structures designed to eradicate our very presence from the academy. Painful, and at times heartbreaking, this text is a testament to the brilliance, creativity, and power of Women of Color—proof that, in spite of it all, ‘still we rise!’”

  —Karen L. Dace, Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis

  "Presumed Incompetent II leaves a legacy for contemporary women as well as those who had to remain silent in their academic isolation. The voices of stoic, unapologetic, and courageous women who put up and pushed back in the culture of patriarchy can embolden many others. This second book again captures the nuances of intersecting identities for women in the academy and highlights the systemic bias that persists. Their lived experiences need to be shared and honored."

  —Patricia Arredondo, American Association of Hispanics in Higher Education

• Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman

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  Summary

  In the highly anticipated Thinking, Fast and Slow, Kahneman takes us on a groundbreaking tour of the mind and explains the two systems that drive the way we think. System 1 is fast, intuitive, and emotional; System 2 is slower, more deliberative, and more logical. Kahneman exposes the extraordinary capabilities—and also the faults and biases—of fast thinking, and reveals the pervasive influence of intuitive impressions on our thoughts and behavior. The impact of loss aversion and overconfidence on corporate strategies, the difficulties of predicting what will make us happy in the future, the challenges of properly framing risks at work and at home, the profound effect of cognitive biases on everything from playing the stock market to planning the next vacation—each of these can be understood only by knowing how the two systems work together to shape our judgments and decisions.

  Engaging the reader in a lively conversation about how we think, Kahneman reveals where we can and cannot trust our intuitions and how we can tap into the benefits of slow thinking. He offers practical and enlightening insights into how choices are made in both our business and our personal lives—and how we can use different techniques to guard against the mental glitches that often get us into trouble. Thinking, Fast and Slow will transform the way you think about thinking.

  Reviews

  “It is an astonishingly rich book: lucid, profound, full of intellectual surprises and self-help value. It is consistently entertaining . . . So impressive is its vision of flawed human reason that the New York Times columnist David Brooks recently declared that Kahneman and Tversky's work ‘will be remembered hundreds of years from now,' and that it is ‘a crucial pivot point in the way we see ourselves.'”

  ―Jim Holt, The New York Times Book Review

  “Profound . . . As Copernicus removed the Earth from the center of the universe and Darwin knocked humans off their biological perch, Mr. Kahneman has shown that we are not the paragons of reason we assume ourselves to be.”

  ―The Economist

  “[A] tour de force of psychological insight, research explication and compelling narrative that brings together in one volume the high points of Mr. Kahneman's notable contributions, over five decades, to the study of human judgment, decision-making and choice . . . Thanks to the elegance and force of his ideas, and the robustness of the evidence he offers for them, he has helped us to a new understanding of our divided minds―and our whole selves.”

  ―Christoper F. Chabris, The Wall Street Journal

  “Daniel Kahneman is one of the most original and interesting thinkers of our time. There may be no other person on the planet who better understands how and why we make the choices we make. In this absolutely amazing book, he shares a lifetime's worth of wisdom presented in a manner that is simple and engaging, but nonetheless stunningly profound. This book is a must read for anyone with a curious mind.”

  ―Steven D. Levitt, William B. Ogden Distinguished Service Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago; co-author of Freakonomics and SuperFreakonomics

  “Thinking, Fast and Slow is a masterpiece―a brilliant and engaging intellectual saga by one of the greatest psychologists and deepest thinkers of our time. Kahneman should be parking a Pulitzer next to his Nobel Prize.”

  ―Daniel Gilbert, Harvard University Professor of Psychology, author of Stumbling on Happiness, host of the award-winning PBS television series "This Emotional Life"

  “Daniel Kahneman is among the most influential psychologists in history and certainly the most important psychologist alive today. He has a gift for uncovering remarkable features of the human mind, many of which have become textbook classics and part of the conventional wisdom. His work has reshaped social psychology, cognitive science, the study of reason and of happiness, and behavioral economics, a field that he and his collaborator Amos Tversky helped to launch. The appearance of Thinking, Fast and Slow is a major event.”

  ―Steven Pinker, Harvard College Professor of Psychology, Harvard University, and author of How the Mind Works and The Better Angels of our Nature

• Teaching Inclusively: Resources for Course, Department & Institutional Change in Higher Education Expand dropdown
  
  

  Summary:

  Teaching Inclusively: Resources for Course, Department & Institutional Change in Higher Education is a collection of works focused on creating change initiatives through course design, teaching, as well as both departmental and university wide change initiatives focused on making college campuses more inclusive. This book is part of the News Forum Faculty Development Series and is meant to inform educators about how to implement change initiatives on their own campuses.

  Reviews:

  “A unique and amazing gem among a crowded field of texts on multiculturalism in higher education that distinguishes itself in many ways. First, the volume engages theoretical discussions of “diversity” and curricular transformation while remaining grounded in the concrete experiences of those who implement, teach, and evaluate courses. Second, it emphasizes context by examining how diversity issues play out in the classroom, in departments and programs, and in the campus-wide institution as a whole. Third, it highlights the lessons learned from a variety of efforts so that readers come away with a clear sense of the best practices in the field.” - Thomas S. Edwards, Vice President for Academic Affairs, Thomas College, Maine. Past President of the New England Faculty Development Consortium. Coeditor of At Home on This Earth: Two Centuries of U.S. Women’s Nature Writing.

   

  “As director of faculty and organizational development at a large public research university, I want to give a ringing endorsement of Mathew Ouellett’s Teaching Inclusively. I am so grateful to have a resource book on multicultural education that captures the complexity of the dynamic relationships among course, department and institutional change efforts. This handbook offers a rich tapestry of theoretical frameworks that take institutional context into account, best practices, and compelling new research by seasoned practitioners in multicultural education. Matt Ouellett has been leading efforts to promote and support diversity and social justice in higher education for decades. This book reflects his expansive understanding of the issues and numerous promising practices that are emerging throughout higher education. The articles are well written and skillfully edited, providing readings on multicultural education that are both accessible and nuanced, able to meet the needs of both novices and experts in diversity work. As I prepare my wish list of new books on multicultural education, this is first on my list – for myself and to share with colleagues.” – Sonia Nieto, Professor of Language, Literacy, and Culture in the Department of Teacher Education and Curriculum Studies, University of Massachusetts Amherst. Author of Why We Teach, as well as more than 10 other books on education. 

• The Innovative University: Changing the DNA of Higher Education from the Inside Out

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  Summary:

  The Innovative University illustrates how higher education can respond to the forces of disruptive innovation, and offers a nuanced and hopeful analysis of where the traditional university and its traditions have come from and how it needs to change for the future. Through an examination of Harvard and BYU-Idaho as well as other stories of innovation in higher education, Clayton Christensen and Henry Eyring decipher how universities can find innovative, less costly ways of performing their uniquely valuable functions.

  This book offers new ways forward to deal with curriculum, faculty issues, enrollment, retention, graduation rates, campus facility usage, and a host of other urgent issues in higher education.  It discusses a strategic model to ensure economic vitality at the traditional university, and contains novel insights into the kind of change that is necessary to move institutions of higher education forward in innovative ways.  This book uncovers how the traditional university survives by breaking with tradition, but thrives by building on what it's done best.

  Reviews:

  "Scholars will find this work a good point of departure for asking more pointed questions about how best to meet the demands of an increasingly disparate population of students (and potential students) who have different needs and expectations from previous generations of college-going individuals." - Journal of College Student Retention Vol. 15 (3)

  “This superbly documented book is a must read for anyone who cares about America’s universities and colleges and the invaluable role they play in our contemporary society. Henry Eyring and Clayton Christensen remind us of higher education’s history and thoughtfully examine the critical strands of its DNA that require ‘re-engineering’ to insure survival and good health for our richly diverse system. Perhaps the best feature of this volume is that it goes beyond analysis to offer what is possible through models that are scalable, transferable, and responsive to the needs of learning, discovery, and engagement.” - Molly Corbett Broad, President, American Council on Education

  “The Innovative University offers fascinating new perspectives on very old questions: What defines a university’s identity? Are all universities clones from the same ancestral stock? Are there still opportunities for diversity in American higher education, or is [a] single ideal to be approximated with greater or lesser fidelity? These questions resonate through the book’s narrative histories of an old university and a bold new one.” - Harry Lewis, Gordon McKay Professor of Computer Science, Harvard University; author, Excellence Without a Soul

  “With changing demographics, new information technologies, and competition from for-profit enterprises challenging the hegemony of traditional colleges and universities, the discourse of crisis in American higher education abounds. In place of conventional nostrums that lead merely to incremental change, Henry Eyring and Clayton Christensen offer disruptive strategies that preserve what remains viable in the organizational genetic code while advancing differentiated models for institutional innovation. Yet further evidence to beat Berkeley and Harvard at their own game are futile.” - Michael M. Crow, President, Arizona State University

  “There is little doubt that American higher education is at a crossroads. Accessibility and affordability issues abound. Learning outcomes are increasingly unclear. Technology surfaces as a disruptive influence. Financial support is declining precipitously. Chistensen and Eyring step into this challenging setting with a comprehensive look at two ends of the higher education universe. The answers their contrasts provide to those of us looking for ways to move forward are both compelling and challenging. A must read for all who care about the future of colleges and universities. - Leonard A. Schlesinger, President, Babson College

• The Pact: Three Young Men Make A Promise And Fulfill A Dream

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  Summary: 

  A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

  A remarkable story about the power of friendship.

  Chosen by Essence to be among the forty most influential African Americans, the three doctors grew up in the streets of Newark, facing city life’s temptations, pitfalls, even jail. But one day these three young men made a pact. They promised each other they would all become doctors, and stick it out together through the long, difficult journey to attaining that dream. Sampson Davis, George Jenkins, and Rameck Hunt are not only friends to this day—they are all doctors.

  This is a story about joining forces and beating the odds. A story about changing your life, and the lives of those you love most... together.

   Reviews:

   "Sampson Davis, Rameck Hunt, and George Jenkins-- M.D., M.D., and D.M.D., respectively-- are something more than the sum of their degrees." --Newsday

   "[A] prescription for success." --The Philadelphia Enquirer

   "Eye-opening and moving... The Pact is a lesson in the power of peers." --The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

   "A powerful message of hope to inner-city youngsters." --The Dallas Morning News

   "While their story is sometimes tragic, sometimes funny and sometimes remarkable, it is always inspirational." --St. Louis Post-Dispatch

   "Will inspire and entertain... The Pact is the impressive true story of three teenag boys from Newark, New Jersey, who became outstanding men." --Essence

   "Starkly honest... a dramatic firsthand narrative detailing how each doctor managed to rise above the ills of city life-- violence, drugs and poverty-- to achieve what once seemed like a far-fetched dream." --The Newark Star-Ledger

   "It is probably the most important book for African-American families that has been written since the protest era... Get The Pact. It just may change a teen's future." --Chicago Sun-Times

• Educating Citizens: Preparing America’s Undergraduates for Lives of Moral and Civic Responsibility

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  Summary: 

  There is increasing attention to the idea that colleges and universities should help students become more informed, thoughtful, and engaged citizens who are prepared to navigate a complex world. These goals were central to American undergraduate education in its early years, but have been pushed aside by many institutions. Educating Citizens is a path-breaking book offering an instructive and inspiring vision of how such work can be undertaken. 

  What are important elements of moral and civic learning? How can higher education contribute to them effectively? What challenges do institutions face when they try to undertake efforts for moral and civic learning and how can these challenges be addressed?  These are the questions that spark this book, and they are also issues at the heart of democracy's future in America. Through a grand tour of American higher education, the authors show how institutions can equip students with the understanding, motivation, and skills of responsible and effective citizenship. The book describes general principles of moral and civic learning and uses rich examples from in-depth case studies and a range of programs and approaches to consider how these goals are approached in different educational contexts. Readers gain a new vantage on the fundamental importance of moral and civic learning, the educational and developmental goals and processes it involves, and how it operates in the landscapes of higher education. 

  Educating Citizens is essential reading for all who believe that higher education can play a critical role in the health of American democracy by helping students become responsible citizens of the nation, the world, and their own communities.

  Reviews:

  "The authors have provided a superb account of civic education on college and university campuses in these troubled times. They combine specific examples of best practices with an exceptionally thoughtful philosophical exploration of the meaning and impact of civic learning."  -Nannerl O. Keohane, President, Duke University

  "[A] profoundly timely and enlightening book." - Eamonn Callan, Professor of Education, Stanford University

  "Educating Citizens will become the benchmark resource for everyone who views effective citizenship as an essential outcome of liberal education for the twenty-first century."

  -- Carol Geary Schneider, President, Association of American Colleges and Universities 

  “Although other books and articles address aspects of this topic, I know of none that address it as clearly and as comprehensively or from so many angles--historical, philosophical, pedagogical, and practical, to name but four....The authors set out to elucidate why moral and civic education should be a central goal for higher education and how colleges and universities can achieve this ambitious goal. I believe that they succeed admirably.” - Barbara Jacoby, University of Maryland, in the Journal of College Student Development

  "A comprehensive, thoughtful, and beautifully crafted analysis.... If you have any interest in the civic and moral education of our nation's college students, read this book!" - Alexander W. Astin, Professor and Director, HERI, UCLA

• Creating Significant Learning Experiences

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  Summary:

  A still highly relevant, “oldie but goodie,” L. Dee Fink’s Creating Significant Learning Experiences poses the question of “How can I create courses that will provide significant learning experiences for my students?” Through the process of answering this question, the author encourages educators to “shift from a content-centered approach to a learning-centered approach,” and provides tools to help teachers design their classes. This book also provides new ideas in the field of higher education, giving recommendations on what higher education organizations can do to support “better teaching.” These recommendations come directly from what Fink finds as the six key needs of faculty who are looking to change the way they teach and come with specific actions to support these needs. 

  Reviews:

  “When we think of college teaching, we usually think of what goes on in classrooms. Faculty members, administrators, and others who read Dee Fink’s book, Creating Significant Learning Experiences, will recognize that the effectiveness of what goes on in the classroom depends fundamentally on what goes on outside the classroom – thinking about learning objectives, designing a course, and developing learning strategies that will maximize achievement of the objectives by every student.” –Wilbert McKeachie, author, Teaching Tips

  “In addition to introducing a new model for designing significant learning experiences, Fink also identifies specific types of support that faculty members will require from their own institutions and from national organizations – if they are to sustain the profound changes in teaching that must occur to produce societally and personally significant learning. If his recommendations and vision of what is possible today were widely adopted, they would result in a transformation of American higher education and thus of society.” –Lion F. Gardiner, author, Redesigning Higher Education

  “With its clear, practical focus on promoting significant student learning through intentional course design, this book offers a ‘significant learning experience’ for faculty, faculty developers, and academic administrators alike.” –Thomas A. Angelo, coauthor, Classroom Assessment Techniques

• Teaching Effectively with Zoom: A Practical Guide to Engage Your Students and Help Them Learn

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  Summary:

  In early 2020, because of COVID-19, many colleges and schools around the world closed, and many teachers, instructors, and faculty members had to learn how to teach online in a hurry. This book takes a step back, and focuses on helping educators teach effective live online sessions with Zoom. Dan Levy offers practical pedagogical advice for educators on questions such as:

  • Why and how to use breakout rooms?
  • Should you use chat, and if so, how?
  • How do you build community in a virtual classroom?

  The book is based on the author’s experience teaching online, observations of several colleagues teaching online at Harvard University, research-based principles of effective teaching and learning, and, perhaps just as importantly, interviews with dozens of students who recently experienced online learning for the first time and also had to adapt to this way of learning in a hurry.

  Review: 

  “Every single one of us should read Teaching Effectively with Zoom. Written by one of the most effective teachers in the business, Dan LEvy offers highly practical guidance about how to utilize the many features of the ubiquitous Zoom platform – from polling chats to breakout rooms – to achieve a wide range of pedagogical objectives.”

• Teaching Civic Engagement: From Student to Active Citizen

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  Summary

  Teaching Civic Engagement provides an exploration of key theoretical discussions, innovative ideas, and best practices in educating citizens in the 21st century. The book addresses theoretical debates over the place of civic engagement education in Political Science. It offers pedagogical examples in several sub-fields, including evidence of their effectiveness and models of appropriate assessment. Written by political scientists from a range of institutions and subfields, Teaching Civic Engagement makes the case that civic and political engagement should be a central part of our mission as a discipline.

  Reviews

  "The volume is a powerful one-stop shop for political scientists interested  in  conceiving, implementing,  and  assessing  new  civic  engagement education programs. It is well written and likely to be easily understood by political scientists just beginning to consider forms  of community-engaged  scholarship  and  civic  engagement education practices. Readers can expect to gain tangible and practical understandings of how civic engagement education can intersect  with  their  own  work.  The  strength  of  the  volume  rests  in  its general applicability. Political scientists interested in civic engagement education and forms of community-engaged scholarship will gain a clear sense of how the field is realized across different institutional types and subfields within political science. The content of the volume also holds relevancy for community-engaged scholars who  work  in  areas  of  advocacy,  indigent  legal  defense, electoral politics,  human  rights,  and  a  range  of  other  public  participation and policy issues."

  • Brandon W. Kliwer, Kansas State University

  "Into this critical juncture enters Teaching Civic Engagement with its ambitious agenda of putting civic and political involvement at the forefront of political science education. By demonstrating best practices in the field of civic engagement and pointing the way forward to the next generation of teaching, curriculum reform, and research, this volume makes an important contribution to the discipline and our efforts to educate for democracy."

  -E. Fletcher McClellan, Elizabethtown College

• How to Write a Lot: A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing

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  Summary

  All academics need to write, but many struggle to finish their dissertations, articles, books, or grant proposals. Writing is hard work and can be difficult to wedge into a frenetic academic schedule. How can we write it all while still having a life?

  In this second edition of his popular guidebook, Paul Silvia offers fresh advice to help you overcome barriers to writing and use your time more productively. After addressing some common excuses and bad habits, he provides practical strategies to motivate students, professors, researchers, and other academics to become better and more prolific writers. Silvia draws from his own experience in psychology to explain how to write, submit, and revise academic work, from journal articles to books, all without sacrificing evenings, weekends, and vacations. The tips and strategies in this second edition have been updated to apply to academic writing in most disciplines. Also new to this edition is a chapter on writing grant and fellowship proposals.

  Reviews

  “Do you find your grant-writing intruding on time you’d rather spend with your family?  Did revisions to that last journal article ruin your vacation? Then this book might be just the thing you need… tips and tricks hold true for academics in almost any field…Silva backs up all his recommendations with evidence from behavioral studies and personal experience that is often as witty as it is insightful.”

  —Edgeforscholars.org

  “Silvia draws from his own experience in psychology to explain how to write, submit, and revise academic work, from journal articles to books, all without sacrificing evenings, weekends, and vacations. The tips and strategies in this second edition… have been fully updated to apply to academic writing in most disciplines.”

  —Midwest Book Review

  “Perhaps there are graduate students or faculty members who write as much as they think they should but, if so, I haven’t met any of them in nearly 40 years being a professor. But I’ve certainly met many people who manage to write a lot, and all of them employ one or more of the tactics that Silvia describes. Henceforth, no one should be allowed to complain about how little writing they are getting done unless they have read—and applied—the wisdom in this book.”

  - Mark R. Leary, PhD, Garonzik Family Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University, Durham, NC

  “Silvia demystifies the process of writing and deftly debunks common excuses academics make for not getting it done! The message is simple but powerful: When writing becomes a workday habit, you can write a lot and find more time for life outside of work.” 

  -Monica Biernat, PhD, Distinguished Professor of Psychology, University of Kansas, Lawrence

  “In this second edition, Silvia helps readers solve the riddle of writing. By using a mixture of science, humor, and compassion, he shows how he has helped thousands of people become productive writers. If you want to stop worrying about writing, this book is required reading.” 

  -C. Nathan DeWall, PhD, Professor of Psychology, University of Kentucky, Lexington

• Distracted: Why Students Can't Focus and What You Can Do About

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  Summary:

  Keeping students focused can be difficult in a world filled with distractions -- which is why a renowned educator created a scientific solution to one of every teacher's biggest problems.

  Why is it so hard to get students to pay attention? Conventional wisdom blames iPhones, insisting that access to technology has ruined students' ability to focus. The logical response is to ban electronics in class.

  But acclaimed educator James M. Lang argues that this solution obscures a deeper problem: how we teach is often at odds with how students learn. Classrooms are designed to force students into long periods of intense focus, but emerging science reveals that the brain is wired for distraction. We learn best when able to actively seek and synthesize new information.

  In Distracted, Lang rethinks the practice of teaching, revealing how educators can structure their classrooms less as distraction-free zones and more as environments where they can actively cultivate their students' attention.

  Brimming with ideas and grounded in new research, Distracted offers an innovative plan for the most important lesson of all: how to learn.

  Reviews:

  “This book will change how you think about education. Distracted takes us o a phenomenal ride into a much-misunderstood aspect of human learning and finally into the refreshing light that science, literature, philosophy, and history bring. Anyone who cares about learning–their own or anyone else’s–should take this journey.”

  -Ken Bain, Author of What the Best College Teachers Do

  “Lang’s books have held a place in honor in my library of parenting and education books, and Distracted will, too. It is a delightful mash-up of the research and history on attention and learning. I adore this book  and will be recommending it to parents and teachers.”

  -Jessica Lahey, Author of The Gift of Failure

  “Distraction didn’t begin with digital devices–and it won't end by banning them from classrooms. The human mind has always been a wandering mind. James Lang offers a fresh and hopeful analysis of this enduring problem. This is an essential primer for helping students learn to cultivate attention.”

  -Daniel H. Pink, Author of When, Drive, and A Whole New Mind

  “Distracted gives teachers a powerful way to address one of the knottiest problems they face. Lang is an empathetic and knowledgeable guide, and reading this book feels like being in the middle of a conversation with dedicated, supportive, and enthusiastic colleagues. Whether you’re new to the classroom or a veteran teacher, Distracted is a must-read.”

  -Kevin Gannon, Grand View University

  “In order for learning to happen, we need our students to be fully present in the classroom–and we need to be fully present for them as well. This book tells us why we must actively cultivate our students’ ability to focus, weaving together compelling and unexpected approaches for addressing the age–old problem of distracted students.”

  -MIchelle D. Miller, Northern Arizona University

• Making the Most of College: Students Speak Their Minds

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  Summary: 

  Winning the Virginia and Warren Stone Prize from Harvard University in 2001, Making the Most of College: Students Speak Their Minds enlights us on the choices students make and what we as leaders can do to help improve those choices to help them succeed. 

  In this classic book about facilitating student feedback, Richard J Light gets real students' advice, stories and gets suggestions. He talks about creating the most effective classes, faculty who make a difference, and what university leaders can do to help students. Light conducts interviews over a span of ten years with Harvard seniors to build this advice and let “Students Speak Their Minds.”

  Light’s project was started in 1986 to “evaluate the effectiveness of what the university does, and to devise ways to improve it.”  It began with 65 colleagues, but from 25 different colleges even though a lot of the work was done at Harvard. It began as the “Assessment Project'' trying to figure out the answers to these fundamental questions. “How well do we teach now, and what changes will make it better? How well do we advise students now, and what changes will make it better? Do our students write enough? How do we know? Can we improve this? Do we demand enough of our students? Do our faculty members help students to become more effective students? How can we do this even better?”

  Reviews: 

  “Dick Light cares and knows about teaching and learning. And when he says we should listen to what students say works, we should listen to Professor Light! This is a valuable book filled with superb insights and guidelines on how collaborative work among students can enhance learning. Everyone who cares about students and how they learn should read Dick Light’s book–and pay attention to what he, and the students, are teaching us.”

  -C. Peter Magrath, President, National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges 

  “Making the Most of College is an excellent book which will be of practical help to students and teachers alike. It shows close attention to the ways students learn; what they tell the interviewers, the author's own experience, and that of other teachers together provide a rich account of the college experience. I will buy the book and use it, and be grateful to Richard Light for his sensitivity and creativity as a teacher, and a teacher of teachers.” 

  -Martin Trow, University of California, Berkeley

• Dare to Lead

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  Summary:

  In her #1 NYT bestsellers, Brené Brown taught us what it means to dare greatly, rise strong and brave the wilderness. Now, based on new research conducted with leaders, change makers and culture shifters, she’s showing us how to put those ideas into practice so we can step up and lead.

  Leadership is not about titles, status and power over people. Leaders are people who hold themselves accountable for recognising the potential in people and ideas, and developing that potential. This is a book for everyone who is ready to choose courage over comfort, make a difference and lead.

  When we dare to lead, we don't pretend to have the right answers; we stay curious and ask the right questions. We don't see power as finite and hoard it; we know that power becomes infinite when we share it and work to align authority and accountability. We don't avoid difficult conversations and situations; we lean into the vulnerability that’s necessary to do good work.

  But daring leadership in a culture that's defined by scarcity, fear and uncertainty requires building courage skills, which are uniquely human. The irony is that we're choosing not to invest in developing the hearts and minds of leaders at the same time we're scrambling to figure out what we have to offer that machines can't do better and faster. What can we do better? Empathy, connection and courage to start.

  Brené Brown spent the past two decades researching the emotions that give meaning to our lives. Over the past seven years, she found that leaders in organisations ranging from small entrepreneurial start-ups and family-owned businesses to non-profits, civic organisations and Fortune 50 companies, are asking the same questions:

  How do you cultivate braver, more daring leaders? And, how do you embed the value of courage in your culture?

  Dare to Lead answers these questions and gives us actionable strategies and real examples from her new research-based, courage-building programme.

  Brené writes, ‘One of the most important findings of my career is that courage can be taught, developed and measured. Courage is a collection of four skill sets supported by twenty-eight behaviours. All it requires is a commitment to doing bold work, having tough conversations and showing up with our whole hearts. Easy? No. Choosing courage over comfort is not easy. Worth it? Always. We want to be brave with our lives and work. It's why we're here.’

  Reviews:

  “Brené visited Pixar to talk with our filmmakers. Her message was important, as movies are best when they come from a place of vulnerability, when the people who make them encounter setbacks and are forced to overcome them, when they are willing to have their asses handed to them. It is easy to sit back and talk about the values of a safe, meaningful culture, but extraordinarily difficult to pull it off. You don’t achieve good culture without constant attention, without an environment of safety, courage and vulnerability. These are hard skills, but they are teachable skills. Start with this book.” - Ed Catmull, President, Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios“With Dare to Lead, Brené brings decades of research to bear in a practical and insightful guide to courageous leadership. This book is a road map for anyone who wants to lead mindfully, live bravely and dare to lead.” - Sheryl Sandberg, COO, Facebook, founder of LeanIn.Org and OptionB.Org.

• Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life

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  Summary

  What is Violent Communication?

  If “violent” means acting in ways that result in hurt or harm, then much of how we communicate—judging others, bullying, having racial bias, blaming, finger pointing, discriminating, speaking without listening, criticizing others or ourselves, name-calling, reacting when angry, using political rhetoric, being defensive or judging who’s “good/bad” or what’s “right/wrong” with people—could indeed be called “violent communication.”

  What is Nonviolent Communication?

  Nonviolent Communication is the integration of four things:

  1. Consciousness: a set of principles that support living a life of compassion, collaboration, courage, and authenticity

  2. Language: understanding how words contribute to connection or distance

  3. Communication: knowing how to ask for what we want, how to hear others even in disagreement, and how to move toward solutions that work for all

  4. Means of influence: sharing “power with others” rather than using “power over others”

  Nonviolent Communication serves our desire to do three things:

  1. Increase our ability to live with choice, meaning, and connection

  2. Connect empathically with self and others to have more satisfying relationships

  3. Sharing of resources so everyone is able to benefit

  Reviews

  “Dr. Rosenberghas brought the simplicity of successful communication into the foreground. No matter what issue you’re facing, his strategies for communicating with others will set you up to win every time.”  —Anthony Robbins,author, Awaken the Giant Within and Unlimited Power

  "You have to be able to say, 'Where is this person coming from?' he says. 'What makes them tick? Why are they excited or frustrated by something that is happening, whether it’s about computing or beyond computing?' There’s far more to McCracken’s outstanding piece. Nadella gave him a close and honest look at both himself and Microsoft, and the result is a fun must-read." — Ben Kerschberg, Forbes

  "Upon becoming Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella asked his top executives to read Marshall Rosenberg's Nonviolent Communication. . . . If empathy as a measure of emotional IQ is a predictor of success, then Nadella hit the nail on the head by inculcating the corporate giant with the trait from top to bottom. Why else is empathy important? Microsoft is both a services and a product company, and its offerings have to resonate with users. Nadella states: 'You have to be able to say, "Where is this person coming from? What makes them tick? Why are they excited or frustrated by something that is happening, whether it's about computing or beyond computing?"' — Harry McCracken, Fast Company

  “Marshall Rosenberg’sdynamic communication techniques transform potential conflicts into peaceful dialogues and create compassionate connections. I highly recommend this book.”  — John Gray, Ph.D., author of Men are From Mars, Women are from Venus

• Discussion in the College Classroom: Getting Your Students Engaged and Participating in Person and Online

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  Summary

  Keep students engaged and actively learning with focused, relevant discussion

  Second only to lecture as the most widely used instructional strategy, there's no better method than classroom discussion to actively engage students with course material. Most faculty are not aware that there is an extensive body of research on the topic from which instructors can learn to facilitate exceptional classroom discussion. Discussion in the College Classroom is a practical guide which utilizes that research, frames it sociologically, and offers advice, along with a wide variety of strategies, to help you spark a relevant conversation and steer it toward specific learning goals.

  Applicable across a spectrum of academic disciplines both online and on campus, these ideas will help you overcome the practical challenges and norms that can undermine discussion, and foster a new atmosphere of collaborative learning and critical thinking. Higher education faculty are increasingly expected to be more intentional and reflective in their pedagogical practice, and this guide shows you how to meet those expectations, improve student outcomes, and tackle the perennial problem of lagging engagement.

  Thoroughly grounded in the scholarship of teaching and learning, this book gives you concrete guidance on integrating discussion into your courses. You'll learn to:

  • Overcome the challenges that inhibit effective discussion
  • Develop classroom norms that facilitate discussion
  • Keep discussion focused, relevant, and productive
  • Maximize the utility of online student discussions

  The kind of discussion that improves learning rarely arises spontaneously. Like any pedagogical technique, careful planning and smart strategy are the keys to keeping students focused, engaged, and invested in the conversation. Discussion in the College Classroom helps you keep the discussion applicable to the material at hand while serving learning goals.

  Reviews

  “Jay Howard’s Discussion in the College Classroom opened my academic eyes to be sensitive to teaching better. I had fallen into the trap – I assumed that because there were no questions the students had listened to and processed everything that I had said. Howard calls this “civil attention,” something that the author claims has become common in college classrooms across the country.”

  “The author has a lot of insight into the mind of a college instructor, and so I felt very seen while reading this book. I think my biggest takeaway was that if I want my students to participate more in classroom discussion, I have to plan it. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone looking”

  “When a classroom discussion goes well, it can feel almost magical—students are engaged and willing to speak up, and they are experiencing the kind of learning that will last them a lifetime. Excellent discussion need not be rare. Discussion in the College Classroom is a guide to creating that meaningful learning experience every time.”

• The Happiness Hypothesis: Putting Ancient Wisdom and Philosophy to the Test of Modern Science Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  The Happiness Hypothesis is a book about ten Great Ideas. Each chapter is an attempt to savor one idea that has been discovered by several of the world's civilizations—to question it in light of what we now know from scientific research, and to extract from it the lessons that still apply to our modern lives and illuminate the causes of human flourishing. Award-winning psychologist Jonathan Haidt shows how a deeper understanding of the world's philosophical wisdom and its enduring maxims—like "do unto others as you would have others do unto you," or "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger"—can enrich and transform our lives. 

  Reviews

  The Happiness Hypothesis is a wonderful and nuanced book that provides deep insight into the some of the most important questions in life--Why are we here? What kind of life should we lead? What paths lead to happiness? From the ancient philosophers to cutting edge scientists, Haidt weaves a tapestry of the best and the brightest. His highly original work on elevation and awe--two long-neglected emotions--adds a new weave to that tapestry. A truly inspiring book." -David M. Buss, author of The Evolution of Desire: Strategies of Human Mating

  "Haidt's remedy for the modern glut of frivolous self-help literature is to review and revise the classics, examining the ideas of thinkers like Plato, Buddha and Jesus in light of modern research into human behavior. Along the way, Haidt, a social psychologist, provides practical advice for parenting, romance, work and coping with the political and cultural divisions currently preoccupying the country. The new science he outlines mostly confirms ancient wisdom, but Haidt finds several instances where the two disagree, suggesting that the surest path to happiness is to embrace and balance both old and new thinking." -Psychology Today

  "In this beautifully written book, Jonathan Haidt shows us the deep connection that exists between cutting-edge psychological research and the wisdom of the ancients. It is inspiring to see how much modern psychology informs life's most central and persistent questions." -Barry Schwartz, author of The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less

  "The most brilliant and lucid analysis of virtue and well-being in the entire literature of positive psychology. For the reader who seeks to understand happiness, my advice is: Begin with Haidt."  -Martin E.P. Seligman, University of Pennsylvania and author of Authentic Happiness

• Helping College Students in Distress: A Faculty Guide Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  This important resource draws from counseling and higher education professionals’ insights to unpack real-life dilemmas of students in distress both inside and outside the classroom, while providing readers with essential tools and recommendations for assisting distressed students. The chapters in Part I examine the impact of emotional and mental health on the college campus, what college campuses are doing to address students’ emotional and mental issues, the potential legal implications when dealing with students, and how faculty can and should approach this challenging topic. Each chapter in Part II includes a case narrative, along with a "Takeaways" section, which outlines and delineates the primary points faculty should consider when facing similar episodes involving distressed students. A "Questions for Reflection" section provides an opportunity for the reader to apply knowledge, reflect on their decision-making, and generate ideas individually or with peers. Helping College Students in Distress is a roadmap providing direction and examples of best practices for Higher Education faculty on the "front lines" in academia.

  Reviews

  It would be particularly fitting for college and university departments to provide this guide to faculty at the beginning of a semester or as part of the new faculty onboarding process to show institutional solidarity and support in assisting students. Overall, anyone who is currently helping distressed students or is interested in fostering their helping skills and competencies would likely consider this text a must-have addition to their office and would want to keep it easily accessible.

  -Tabitha Epperson-Graham, Journal of Faculty Development

• Asked and Answered: Dialogues on Advocating for Students of Color in Mathematics Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  From the hosts of the podcast Mathematically Uncensored and inspired by the authors’ work on creating and leading professional development programs that bring together mathematics/math education faculty and K-12 STEM educators throughout the United States, the book “Asked and Answered: Dialogues On Advocating For Students of Color in Mathematics” provides the reader with a window into the process of going from a bystander to an advocate for students of color in mathematics. Covering 5 Dialogues between the authors, the content is raw, emotional, humorous, and real. Readers should expect to be challenged and unsettled, as oftentimes the authors directly address the readers in multiple calls to action while guiding them in self-reflection. - From Amazon book description

  Reviews

  "The book is "easy" to read since you are really listening to an authentic conversation between the authors. It is also incredibly engaging, there are writing prompts before and after each dialog, and the reader is being addressed personally in the text. It is almost as if you are "there." I have read/heard other work on white privilege and racism before - so there weren't necessarily new big ideas for me BUT there were many small ideas about what I (a white mathematician) could do and how. It was a great motivation and inspiration to do better.” - Christine von Renesse, Amazon review

  “This book is broken up into dialogues, and one of the reasons I love this book is its thoughtful pre- and post-dialogue reflections. If you are committed to supporting students of color in your math department, this is a practical and worthy book to work through. The authors have created an incredible resource for the community, and I can't recommend it highly enough!” - C. R. Gibbons, Amazon Review

• What Universities Owe Democracy Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  Universities play an indispensable role within modern democracies. But this role is often overlooked or too narrowly conceived, even by universities themselves. In What Universities Owe Democracy, Ronald J. Daniels, the president of Johns Hopkins University, argues that—at a moment when liberal democracy is endangered and more countries are heading toward autocracy than at any time in generations—it is critical for today's colleges and universities to reestablish their place in democracy.

  Drawing upon fields as varied as political science, economics, history, and sociology, Daniels identifies four distinct functions of American higher education that are key to liberal democracy: social mobility, citizenship education, the stewardship of facts, and the cultivation of pluralistic, diverse communities. By examining these roles over time, Daniels explains where colleges and universities have faltered in their execution of these functions—and what they can do going forward.

  Looking back on his decades of experience leading universities, Daniels offers bold prescriptions for how universities can act now to strengthen democracy. For those committed to democracy's future prospects, this book is a vital resource.

  Reviews

  "American colleges and universities are being tested like never before in their commitment to inquiry and dialogue that is as open as it is diverse. As the son of a Jewish refugee who fled Poland in 1939, Ron Daniels' insights on the essential role of colleges in a democracy ring with particular power. He offers a compelling history of the important relationship between higher education and democratic values—and a path forward to strengthen both."

  — Michael R. Bloomberg, founder of Bloomberg LP and Bloomberg Philanthropies / Mayor of New York, 2002–2013

  "Weaving personal history with his passion for democracy, Daniels has crafted a beautifully written story of the essential role of universities in maintaining and reinforcing fairness and justice in America. To discover the new role universities must play in the contest between liberal and illiberal ways of thought, and how institutions of higher learning need reform, read this essential book. There is no other like it."

  — Jonathan R. Cole, author of The Great American University: Its Rise to Preeminence, Its Indispensable National Role, Why It Must Be Protected

  "Daniels rivets attention on the obligation of universities when democracy is in global retreat and provides specific, illustrative changes needed not just to improve education and research but to tackle mounting distrust of journalism and science, and intolerance toward people with different views. Hopeful despite the clear-eyed account of profound challenges, this book is essential for any who care about the prospects for social trust, truth-seeking, and the promise of America."

  — Martha Minow, author of Saving the News: Why the Constitution Calls for Government Action to Preserve Freedom of Speech

  "Daniels makes an important contribution to not one but two urgent and topical subjects: the weakening of American self-governance and the overall role of higher education in countering that dangerous trend. One hopes that Daniels's sterling academic reputation, and that of his institution, leads to a wide readership."

  — Mitch Daniels, President of Purdue University - Washington Post

• Engaging Student Voices in the Study of Teaching and Learning Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  This book addresses the all-important dimensions of collaboration in the study of learning raised by such questions as: Should teachers engage students directly in discussions and inquiry about learning? To what extent? What is gained by the collaboration? Does it improve learning, and what do shared responsibilities mean for classroom dynamics, and beyond?

  Practicing what it advocates, a faculty-student team co-edited this book, and faculty-student (or former student) teams co-authored eight of its eleven chapters.

  The opening section of this book explores such dimensions of student voices in the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) as power and authority in the classroom, collaborative meaningmaking, and the role of students as both learners and experts on their own learning. It opens up the process of knowledge-building to a wider group of participants, and expands our conception of who has expertise to contribute – for instance recognizing students’ “insider” knowledge of themselves as learners.

  The case studies in the second half of the volume illustrate how these concepts play out inside and outside the classroom when students shift from serving as research subjects in a SoTL study to working as independent researchers or as partners with faculty in such work as studying curricular design/redesign, readings, requirements, and assessment.

  Review

  "Engaging Student Voices in the Study of Teaching and Learning illustrates the pedagogical power of extending the teaching and learning relationship to form an engaged and interactive partnership inside and outside the classroom. Not only does this book ground the practices of engaging students in developing and implementing the learning process theoretically, it illustrates the successes and challenges of establishing a shared responsibility for conceptualizing and constructing knowledge and ways of knowing. A must read for those teachers seeking to increase student engagement and to enhance each student's self-authorship in the learning process.

  --Barbara Mae Gayle, Academic Vice President

• Relationship-Rich Education: How Human Connections Drive Success in College

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  Summary

  What single factor makes for an excellent college education? As it turns out, it's pretty simple: human relationships. Decades of research demonstrate the transformative potential and the lasting legacies of a relationship-rich college experience. Critics suggest that to build connections with peers, faculty, staff, and other mentors is expensive and only an option at elite institutions where instructors have the luxury of time with students. But in this revelatory book brimming with the voices of students, faculty, and staff from across the country, Peter Felten and Leo M. Lambert argue that relationship-rich environments can and should exist for all students at all types of institutions.

  In Relationship-Rich Education, Felten and Lambert demonstrate that, for relationships to be central in undergraduate education, colleges and universities do not require immense resources, privileged students, or specially qualified faculty and staff. All students learn best in an environment characterized by high expectation and high support, and all faculty and staff can learn to teach and work in ways that enable relationship-based education.

  Reviews

  Full of numerous examples of enacting relationship-rich environments, this book marshals a broad range of evidence to make a coherent argument about the importance of relationships while offering specific ways in which they can be enhanced at an individual, departmental, and institutional level. Relationship-Rich Education will resonate with higher education practitioners.

  — Nicholas A. Bowman, University of Iowa, coauthor of How College Affects Students: 21st Century Evidence That Higher Education Works

  The content of this impressively researched book has the potential to transform institutional culture. The voices of these students grabbed me in powerful ways, enabling me to understand more deeply the value of rich relationships to undergraduate success across institutional types and student status.

  — Louis Albert, Arizona State University

  Education luminaries Peter Felten and Leo M. Lambert challenge us never to forget that undergraduate education is at heart a relational enterprise. Relationship-Rich Education offers a cogent practitioner's guide to the art of teaching and mentorship—and a stern challenge to institutional leaders to prioritize and celebrate relationship-rich cultures. A game-changer in higher education.

  — W. Brad Johnson, United States Naval Academy, author of On Being a Mentor: A Guide for Higher Education Faculty

  This book takes an innovative approach to student success interventions, focusing on the essential role of relationships in shaping student experience and long-term success. The book includes numerous and detailed examples of how to create relationship-rich environments and incorporates the voices of faculty, staff, administrators, and students to bring its big ideas to life.

  — Adrianna Kezar, Pullias Center for Higher Education / Delphi Project on Changing Faculty and Student Success, University of Southern California, coauthor of The Gig Academy: Mapping Labor in the Neoliberal University

• Small Teaching Online: Applying Learning Science in Online Classes

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  Summary

  The concept of small teaching is simple: small and strategic changes have enormous power to improve student learning. Instructors face unique and specific challenges when teaching an online course. This book offers small teaching strategies that will positively impact the online classroom. 

  This book outlines practical and feasible applications of theoretical principles to help your online students learn. It includes current best practices around educational technologies, strategies to build community and collaboration, and minor changes you can make in your online teaching practice, small but impactful adjustments that result in significant learning gains.

  • Explains how you can support your online students

  • Helps your students find success in this non-traditional learning environment

  • Covers online and blended learning

  • Addresses specific challenges that online instructors face in higher education

  Small Teaching Online presents research-based teaching techniques from an online instructional design expert and the bestselling author of Small Teaching.

  Reviews

  "For anyone teaching online—novice or seasoned—Small Teaching Online is a must-read! Darby expertly combines educational research and her expertise as an instructional designer to suggest practical solutions to challenges faced in the online environment in bite-sized chunks that don't overwhelm."—MEL YOUNG, Teaching and Learning Innovation Hub, Cambrian College, Blogger, disruptivepedagogy.ca

  "Any professor would find this book useful, whether you teach entirely online, in a flipped classroom, or just want your course website to be more than a folder of readings. Flower Darby mixes her rich experience as a teacher and learner with a careful review of the most current literature to bring us a work that's deep with context and immediately applicable."—JOSEPH M. MURPHY, Director of the Center for Innovative Pedagogy, Kenyon College

  "The work of teaching is hard. Coupled with the often-uncharted paths involved in teaching online, it can feel downright discouraging. Enter Small Teaching Online. It is a practical guide to help us design our online classes to support learning, be more experimental in our pedagogy, give effective feedback, help students persist, and create more authentic connections. This book helps us see how we can continue to iterate one small step at a time toward excellence in online teaching."—BONNI STACHOWIAK, Director, Institute for Faculty Development, Vanguard University; host,Teaching in Higher Ed podcast

  "What faculty members teaching online need most of all are research-based, but very practical strategies they can use in their online learning environments tomorrow. Darby and Lang's book, chock full of great ideas that faculty can use right away, is just the resource we have all been looking for."—LARRY GALLAGHER, Former Director of Faculty Professional Development at Northern Arizona University

• Not Light, But Fire: How to Lead Meaningful Race Conversations in the Classroom

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  Summary

  Do you feel prepared to initiate and facilitate meaningful, productive dialogues about race in your classroom? Are you looking for practical strategies to engage with your students?

  Inspired by Frederick Douglass's abolitionist call to action, “it is not light that is needed, but fire”, Matthew Kay has spent his career learning how to lead students through the most difficult race conversations. Kay not only makes the case that high school classrooms are one of the best places to have those conversations, but he also offers a method for getting them right, providing candid guidance on:

  • How to recognize the difference between meaningful and inconsequential race conversations.
  • How to build conversational “safe spaces,” not merely declare them.
  • How to infuse race conversations with urgency and purpose.
  • How to thrive in the face of unexpected challenges.
  • How administrators might equip teachers to thoughtfully engage in these conversations.

  With the right blend of reflection and humility, Kay asserts, teachers can make school one of the best venues for young people to discuss race.

  Reviews

  "I found myself thinking, 'How different would the field of education be if Matt Kay had advised John Dewey? How different would I be if Matt Kay had been my teacher?' The answer: radically so. He is that important, and his work on race is that essential."​—Cornelius Minor

  "I can’t recommend this book highly enough for its scaffolding and stories on how to create a classroom culture that supports serious conversations about difficult topics....Having read this book, in many ways I feel I can’t return to the teacher I was....This is not a book to be skimmed in one sitting, but instead to be digested, then acted upon."—Sarah Cooper, Middleweb

  “This is the book we need to shift the "tried and tired" practice of touting empty rhetoric about race to a practice that puts us firmly on a pathway toward achieving racial equity. Matt is a master facilitator and shares the tools every teacher needs to hone their practice to make conversations about race commonplace.”—Sonja Cherry Paul

  “Not Light, But Fire is a masterful combination of pedagogy and critical consciousness. It is impossible to come out on the other side of this book without experiencing some sort of growth. It was like Matthew had watched videotapes of my most ineffective teaching moments and devised a plan to help me improve. I’d been that teacher who engaged in privilege walks and shock pedagogy in the misguided belief that this would help my students engage with race. I had watched my classroom discussions flounder, unaware that I was setting my bar too low and staying away from the ‘hard problems.’ Thank goodness Matthew Kay is willing to share his own path and his own knowledge with folks like me. Every chapter contains relatable anecdotes, instructional strategies, and incisive commentary. Matthew Kay pushes us to see ourselves and our students as scholars, critical thinkers capable of high-level discourse. In an ideal world, my teacher training would have prepared me for the ethical and professional challenges I (and any teacher) face on a daily basis. But it didn’t. For that and other reasons, I am profoundly grateful that this book exists.”—Peter Anderson

• Teaching as Community Property: Essays on Higher Education

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  Summary

  For almost two decades, acclaimed education scholar and current president of The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Lee S. Shulman has been bringing uncommon wit, passion, and vision to issues of teaching and learning in higher education. Teaching as Community Property brings together a brilliant collection of Shulman's papers and presentations since 1987, giving readers a unique window into his ideas and proposals for the improvement of teaching and learning in higher education. What emerges is a vision of Shulman's overarching agenda--to improve the quality of teaching for all students by making teaching a more respected dimension of all the disciplines and professional fields.

  Reviews

  “The globalization and diversity of today’s college students demand that higher education better prepare them to successfully meet the challenges of the 21st century. These students are increasingly diverse in many ways, including in physical, developmental, and intellectual abilities. Teaching as Community Property by Lee S. Shulman not only gives us answers, but guides us in asking the right questions. It maps out a highly creative and cogent path for the academy to reinvent itself and offers a fine blueprint for developing the excellent teaching faculties necessary to educate this student population." -  Lynne McVey, Salve Regina University

  “Lee Shulman requires us to do our best thinking in response to his inspiring and insightful ideas on teaching and learning. He provokes deep reflection on our assumptions, concepts, visions, and understandings about how we learn. He is a constantly self-sustaining reservoir upon which we all draw. To have all these essays compiled in one place is a major contribution to education at all levels.” - Jody D. Nyquist, associate dean emeritus, Graduate School, University of Washington

  “Lee Shulman writes exactly as he thinks and talks, with engaging insight and richness sustained by incredible breadth and depth. This book will inform and sustain those who have devoted their lives to the academy, as well as those who seek fresh perspectives and reformed policy and practice in teaching. It should be read by all of us.” - Stanley O. Ikenberry, regent professor and president emeritus, University of Illinois

• Universal Design in Higher Education: From Principles to Practice (2nd Ed.)

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  Summary

  “Universal Design in Higher Education looks at the design of physical and technological environments at institutions of higher education; at issues pertaining to curriculum and instruction; and at the full array of student services. Universal Design in Higher Education is a comprehensive guide for researchers and practitioners on creating fully accessible college and university programs. It is founded upon, and contributes to, theories of universal design in education that have been gaining increasingly wide attention in recent years. As greater numbers of students with disabilities attend postsecondary educational institutions, administrators have expressed increased interest in making their programs accessible to all students. This book provides both theoretical and practical guidance for schools as they work to turn this admirable goal into a reality. It addresses a comprehensive range of topics on universal design for higher education institutions, thus making a crucial contribution to the growing body of literature on special education and universal design. This book will be of unique value to university and college administrators, and to special education researchers, practitioners, and activists.” -Retrieved from Harvard Education Press

  Reviews

  “Inclusion has come to higher education! More than explaining what the law requires, Burgstahler and Cory have given us a primer on how universal design in education can improve university and college life for everyone.” — Douglas Biklen, Dean of the School of Education, Syracuse University

  “Burgstahler and Corey have put together a groundbreaking, comprehensive text that brings together all the best information about the theory and practice of Universal Design (UD) and its potential in higher education. As a paradigm of inclusion, UD offers a modelfor addressing issues of equality, accessibility, and social and intellectual integration.Demonstrating the breadth and depth of this powerful model in higher education, thistext covers the application of UD in campus design, student services, faculty development, instructional technology, academic administration, and classroom instruction, from first-year courses to advanced study. “— Brenda Jo Brueggemann, Professor of English & Disability Studies, The Ohio State University

  “It is wonderful to have one book that explains and gives illustrations of Universal Design in one fell swoop! I’ve read and re-read descriptions of what UDL is, but am always left wondering how to put it into action. This books answers that question.” — Judy Elimelech, Coordinator of Disability Services, Missouri Southern State University

  “This book makes a compelling case for adopting universal design in all postsecondary offerings in order to support a diverse educational community and an inclusive approach to academic excellence. There is something here for everyone.”— Michael K. Young, President of the University of Washington

• Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  In Teaching to Transgress, bell hooks--writer, teacher, and insurgent black intellectual--writes about a new kind of education, education as the practice of freedom.  Teaching students to "transgress" against racial, sexual, and class boundaries in order to achieve the gift of freedom is, for hooks, the teacher's most important goal. bell hooks speaks to the heart of education today: how can we rethink teaching practices in the age of multiculturalism? What do we do about teachers who do not want to teach, and students who do not want to learn? How should we deal with racism and sexism in the classroom? Full of passion and politics, Teaching to Transgress combines a practical knowledge of the classroom with a deeply felt connection to the world of emotions and feelings. This is the rare book about teachers and students that dares to raise questions about eros and rage, grief and reconciliation, and the future of teaching itself.

  Reviews

  "After reading Teaching to Transgress I am once again struck by bell hooks's never-ending, unquiet intellectual energy, an energy that makes her radical and loving." -- Paulo Freire

  “Criticizing the teaching establishment for employing an over-factualized knowledge to deny and suppress diversity, hooks accuses colleagues of using “the classroom to enact rituals of control that were about domination and the unjust exercise of power.” Far from a castigation of her field, however, Teaching to Transgress is full of hope and excitement for the possibility of education to liberate and include.” -- Publishers Weekly

  “For those of us who do not mind her holistic rhetoric or who desperately need to refurbish the drying-out sources of professional inspiration, Teaching to Transgress, with its contagious energy and its attempts to restore dignity to classroom interactions, may be the right cure.”  --College Quarterly

• Minding Bodies: How Physical Space, Sensation, and Movement Affect Learning Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  “Starting from new research on the body—aptly summarized as “sitting is the new smoking”—Minding Bodies aims to help instructors improve their students’ knowledge and skills through physical movement, attention to the spatial environment, and sensitivity to humans as more than “brains on sticks.” It shifts the focus of adult learning from an exclusively mental effort toward an embodied, sensory-rich experience, offering new strategies to maximize the effectiveness of time spent learning together on campus as well as remotely.

  Minding Bodies draws from a wide range of body/mind research in cognitive psychology, kinesiology, and phenomenology to bring a holistic perspective to teaching and learning. The embodied learning approaches described by Susan Hrach are inclusive, low-tech, low-cost strategies that deepen the development of disciplinary knowledge and skills. Campus change-makers will also find recommendations for supporting a transformational mission through an attention to students’ embodied learning experiences.” —Retrieved from West Virginia University Press

  Reviews

  “Beautifully written and packed full of ideas, Minding Bodies is a timely and necessary intervention that questions our long-held assumptions about sedentary teaching and learning. There is something that will enlighten any teacher on every page. This is a welcome book that is trying its best to get education back on its feet.”—Vybarr Cregan-Reid, author of Primate Change: How the World We Made Is Remaking Us

  “For too long, faculty have only focused on the education of the mind, ignoring the importance of the body in that process. SUsan Hrach’s book conveys an authentic sense of wonder and excitement about the topic, and it is a timely and relevant text for higher education faculty.”—Kathryn Byrnes, Bowdoin College

• UNgrading: Why Rating Students Undermines Learning (and What to Do Instead) Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  The moment is right for critical reflection on what has been assumed to be a core part of schooling. In Ungrading, fifteen educators write about their diverse experiences going gradeless. Some contributors are new to the practice and some have been engaging in it for decades. Some are in humanities and social sciences, some in STEM fields. Some are in higher education, but some are the K–12 pioneers who led the way. Based on rigorous and replicated research, this is the first book to show why and how faculty who wish to focus on learning, rather than sorting or judging, might proceed. It includes honest reflection on what makes ungrading challenging, and testimonials about what makes it transformative.

  Reviews

  “I love this book. It undermines the mythology around grading, helping us understand that (a) grading is a construction, and a relatively recent one at that, and (b) we’d better be better off without it— as would our students.” — Paul Handstedt, author of Creating Wicked Students: Designing Courses for a Complex World

  “Nuanced and well balanced.”— Choice Reviews

• Funding Your Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences: A Practical Guide to Grant and Fellowship Proposals Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  “Grants and fellowships are increasingly essential to an academic career, and competition over federal and foundation funding is fiercer than ever. Yet there has hitherto been little training available for this genre of writing.

  Funding Your Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences demystifies the process of writing winning grant proposals in the humanities and social sciences. Offering practical guidance, step-by-step instructions, and examples of successful proposals, Walker and Unruh outline the best practices to crack the proposal writing code. They reveal the most common peeves of proposal reviewers, and offer advice on how to avoid frequent problem areas in conceptualizing and crafting a research proposal in the humanities and social sciences. Contributions from agency and foundation program officers offer the perspective from the other side of the proposal submission portal, and new research funding trends, including crowdfunding and public scholarship, are also covered.

  This book is essential reading for all those involved in funding applications. Graduate students, research administrators, early career faculty members, and tenured professors alike will gain new and effective strategies to write successful applications.” - Retrieved from official book description

  Reviews

  "Early on, the authors of this book clearly spell out their goal: "This book will walk you through the process of finding the best funding opportunities for your research and career goals" (p.14). Chapter by chapter, the book lays out the steps in the entire endeavor. The first section explores finding the proper agencies to approach and creating a plan for the proposal. The next section, the heart of the book, discusses the writing of the various sections of the proposal, and is followed by sections on collaboration, rebounding from rejection of a proposal and other print and online resources worth exploring. Given the diverse types of research funding sources in the humanities and social sciences, a key aspect of this book is its focus on understanding which agency or foundation will be most interested in a scholar’s project. A number of contributors share their real-life experiences on both sides of the process, with excerpts from actual successful proposals, which are useful additions to the text.

  This book is clearly aimed at academics and the libraries that serve them. In fact, the authors mention that having "an affiliation with an accredited institution" is necessary in almost every case. Stylistically, the authors’ decision to use the second person (you/your/yours) throughout the book reinforces their connection with and support of the readers of the work. The approach enhances the reading of the text. Highly recommended."

  American Reference Books Annual (review by Mark Schumacher, University of North Carolina Greensboro, USA)

• Engaging Ideas: The Professor's Guide to Integrating Writing, Critical Thinking, and Active Learning in the Classroom (3rd Ed.) Expand dropdown
  

  Summary 

  “The newly revised third edition of Engaging Ideas delivers a step-by-step guide for designing writing assignments and critical thinking activities that engage students with important subject-matter questions. This new edition of the celebrated book (now written by the co-author team of Bean and Melzer) uses leading and current research and theory to help you link active learning pedagogy to your courses' subject matter. You'll learn how to:

  Design formal and informal writing assignments that guide students toward thinking like experts in your discipline
  Use time-saving strategies for coaching the writing process and handling the paper load including alternatives to traditional grading such as portfolio assessment and contract grading
  Help students use self-assessment and peer response to improve their work
  Develop better ways than the traditional research paper to teach undergraduate reading and research
  Integrate social media, multimodal genres, and digital technology into the classroom to promote active learning
  This book demonstrates how writing can easily be integrated with other critical thinking activities such as inquiry discussions, simulation games, classroom debates, and interactive lectures. The reward of this book is watching students come to class better prepared, more vested in the questions your course investigates, more apt to study purposefully, and more likely to submit high-quality work. Perfect for higher education faculty and curriculum designers across all disciplines, Engaging Ideas will also earn a place in the libraries of graduate students in higher education.” (Summary from Amazon)

  Reviews

  “More than any single text, Engaging Ideas has had a profound and lasting influence on the writing-across-the-curriculum movement in the United States and around the world. This third edition, now written collaboratively by John Bean and Dan Melzer, promises to extend that influence with several new areas of coverage while retaining all the original features that have made it such a groundbreaking work” - Dr. Chris M. Anson, Professor and Director of Campus Writing & Speaking Program, North Carolina State University. 

  “Engaging Ideas, Third Edition, retains the very best features of John Bean’s now classic first and second editions, while adding a new coauthor, Dan Melzer, along with new pedagogies based on the most current writing research and practice. The result is even more practical nuts-and-bolts compendium of ideas to help students incorporate critical thinking into their writing. As someone who has relied on Engaging Ideas for faculty development since 1996, I know that busy faculty from every discipline will find the third edition an essential component of their work going forward.” - Martha A. Townsend, Professor Emerita, University of Missouri

• Academic Ableism: Disability and Higher Education Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  Academic Ableism brings together disability studies and institutional critique to recognize the ways that disability is composed in and by higher education, and it rewrites the spaces, times, and economies of disability in higher education in order to place disability front and center. For too long, argues Jay Timothy Dolmage, disability has been constructed as the antithesis of higher education, often positioned as a distraction, a drain, a problem to be solved. The ethic of higher education encourages students and teachers alike to accentuate ability, valorize perfection, and stigmatize anything that hints at intellectual, mental, or physical weakness, even as we gesture toward the value of diversity and innovation. Examining everything from campus accommodation processes, to architecture, to popular films about college life, Dolmage argues that disability is central to higher education, and that building more inclusive schools allows better education for all.

  Reviews

  “Academic Ableism is a landmark book for higher education. Using disability as the frame, it is the first and only of its kind to take on structural ableism in the academy.”

  —Brenda Brueggemann, University of Connecticut  

  “For those new to the field of Disability Studies, Dolmage provides clear, authoritative definitions of terms and the opportunity to analyze, critically, what students know best and need tools to think about, their own spaces and roles. For those who are old hats, this book is game-changing.”

  — Susan Schweik, University of California, Berkeley 

   

• Wellness Issues for Higher Education: A Guide for Student Affairs and Higher Education Professionals Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  Wellness Issues for Higher Education is an essential resource that addresses a range of student wellness issues confronting professionals in college and university settings. Organized around five dimensions of Wellness―Emotional, Social, Intellectual, Physical, and Spiritual―this book comprehensively covers key topics that contribute to students’ success in college. Each topical chapter includes proactive wellness advice, and is designed to prepare the reader to better understand the facts, issues, and strategies appropriate for addressing the issue.

  Each Chapter Features:

  • Background information, theory, and research
  • Historical and emerging issues
  • Common questions, controversies, challenging situations, and misconceptions
  • Practical applications for the campus

  This practical guide prepares practitioners to understand and deal with the wellness and health promotion issues contributing to their students’ overall success and well-being. Armed with this valuable resource, higher education and student affairs professionals can work to improve academic performance, retention, satisfaction, and quality of life. This thorough resource will guide those working at any level in residence life, student activities, orientation, health education, student leadership, advising, instruction, and other areas of student development.

  Reviews

  "Anderson provides a much-needed, timely resource for the student affairs profession. As higher education professionals continue to serve students with increasingly complex and diverse personal life experiences, Wellness Issues for Higher Education offers a broad and practical approach to supporting student success."

  --Frank E. Ross III, Vice President for Student Life, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

  "This book should be on the 'must read' list for not only every higher education counselor and health provider but also for every parent who sends a loved one off to college. This book provides a clear pathway to maintaining one's health and wellbeing during trying or difficult times."

  --William Modzeleski, Former Associate Assistant Deputy Secretary, Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools, U.S. Department of Education

  "This work addressed a myriad of college wellness topics that were categorized into five overarching areas: emotional, social, intellectual, physical, and spiritual. Grounded on the premise that academic performance, retention, satisfaction, and quality of life will improve for students if wellness issues are better understood and addressed, this work comes at a time where college students in fall 2010 reported the 'lowest self ratings of emotional health since 1985' (p. 6)."

  --Gerson Sanchez, Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice

• Flip Your Classroom: Reach Every Student in Every Class Everyday Expand dropdown
  

  Summary 

  It started with a simple observation: Students need their teachers present to answer questions or to provide help if they get stuck on an assignment; they don’t need their teachers present to listen to a lecture or review content. From there, Jonathan Bergmann and Aaron Sams began the flipped classroom: Students watched recorded lectures for homework and completed their assignments, labs, and tests in class with their teacher available. What Bergmann and Sams found was that their students demonstrated a deeper understanding of the material than ever before. This is the authors’ story, and they’re confident it can be yours too.

  Learn what a flipped classroom is and why it works, and get the information you need to flip a classroom. You’ll also learn the flipped mastery model, where students learn at their own pace, furthering opportunities for personalized education. This simple concept is easily replicable in any classroom, doesn’t cost much to implement, and helps foster self-directed learning. Once you flip, you won’t want to go back! (Retrieved from Amazon description)

  Reviews

  “I liked Flip Your Classroom so much, I picked up four additional copies to give to my teammates as well as some other departments. Bergmann and Sams speak from extensive experience. Their insights are valuable and are packaged quite neatly in one book. If you are an instructor and interested in flipped instruction, I would definitely recommend Flip Your Classroom.  I think all disciplines can use flipped instruction.” -Stan Skrabut, Ed.D. 

  "Throughout, [Bergmann and Sams] maintain their passion about serving students, of putting kids at the front of every decision and ensuring the technology choices follow the learning goals. They are open-minded, experimental, and truly innovative in all the right ways… They take care to offer clarity of direction, to be nuanced and open-minded, allowing for nuance and for variety." -Jonathan Martin, education writer and consultant

• Overwhelmed: How to Work, Love, and Play When No One Has the Time Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  Overwhelmed by Brigid Schulte is a book about time pressure and modern life. It is a deeply reported and researched, honest and often hilarious journey. It takes you from feeling that, as one character in the book said, time is like a "rabid lunatic" running naked and screaming as your life flies past you, to understanding the historical and cultural roots of the overwhelm. It also shows how worrying about all there is to do and the pressure of feeling like we never have enough time to do it all (or do it well) is "contaminating" our experience of time. Schulte addresses how time pressure and stress is resculpting our brains and shaping our workplaces, our relationships and squeezing the space that the Greeks said was the point of living a Good Life: that elusive moment of peace called leisure.

  Reviews

  "Overwhelmed is a time management book that's not just about how to be more productive and effective - it's about the broad and fascinating role time plays in our emotional satisfaction, our physical health, and even our notions of gender equality. The more overwhelmed you feel, the more crucial it is to take the time to read this important book." - Daniel H. Pink, author of Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us"Every parent, every caregiver, every person who feels besieged by permanent busyness, must read this book. A new wave of research, experience, and insight is challenging deep assumptions about why we have to live and work the way we do. Overwhelmed is a wake-up call and an exhilarating prescription for change." - Anne-Marie Slaughter, president and CEO of the New America Foundation and author of Why Women Still Can't Have It All

  "Why is life so insanely busy? What happened to 'leisure' time? Tired of the modern hamster wheel, Brigid Schulte set out to find a better way to live. Her voice is delightful, her findings surprising and hopeful. Overwhelmed is a passionate, funny, very human book that reads like a detective story." - William Powers, author of Hamlet's BlackBerry: Building a Good Life in the Digital Age

• The New Science of Learning: How to Learn in Harmony With Your Brain Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  “Recent advances in brain science show that most students’ learning strategies are highly inefficient, ineffective or just plain wrong. While all learning requires effort, better learning does not require more effort, but rather effectively aligning how the brain naturally learns with the demands of your studies. This book shows you what is involved in learning new material, how the human brain processes new information, and what it takes for that information to stick with you even after the test.

  Taking a small amount of time to read and act upon the material in this book will prove to be one of the best decisions you can make as a learner. What you discover will change the way you learn in college and will be helpful in your personal and professional life. You live in a world where you will have to be a lifelong learner, constantly updating your skills and changing jobs to compete in the global marketplace. Most college students today will have as many as 10-14 different jobs by age 38. Learning how to learn in harmony with your brain is crucial to your long-term success.

  This succinct book explains straightforward strategies for changing how you prepare to learn, engage with your course material, and set about improving recall of newly learned material whenever you need it. This is not another book about study skills and time management strategies, but instead an easy-to-read description of the research about how the human brain learns in a way that you can put into practice right away.

  Did you know neuroscientists have shown that memories are made while you sleep, and by studying right before sleeping you can make stronger memories for your information? In this book the authors explain the role that sleep, exercise and your senses play in learning; how memory works and what makes the brain pay attention; the importance of your mindset towards learning and pattern recognition; as well as new breakthroughs in brain science that can enhance your ability to learn new information and make later recall (for tests or everyday life) easier.

  This book will put you on the path to reaching your full learning potential.”- Official Book Summary

  Reviews

  “This book is meant to be put into someone’s hands in the months before they begin college, but it also serves as a useful tool for anyone contemplating returning to school after time away – adults getting ready to begin seminary, for example, after years in first or second careers – or for anyone wishing to become a “life-long learner,” whether in formal academic circles or in private life. Written in accessible language and peppered with illustrative examples, this slim volume blends common sense – such as eat a healthy, balanced diet, make time for regular exercise, get enough sleep, don’t cram – with a wide array of insights from neuroscience research and learning theory of the last fifteen years. Both authors have extensive experience and publications focused on the integration of cognitive research, biology, and learner-centered teaching: Doyle at Ferris State University and Zakrajsek in the Department of Family Medicine at UNC-Chapel Hill.” -Stanley Saunders, Columbia Theological Seminary

  “The New Science of Learning is a very concise and easy-to-read advice guide for undergraduates that is based on the findings of cognitive science research.” - Chad Raymond, Active Learning in Political Science

• Cultivating Genius: An Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy Expand dropdown
  

  Summary

  In Cultivating Genius, Dr. Gholdy Muhammad presents a four-layered equity framework—one that is grounded in history and restores excellence in literacy education. This framework, which she names Historically Responsive Literacy, was derived from the study of literacy development within 19th-century Black literacy societies. The framework is essential and universal for all students, especially youth of color, who traditionally have been marginalized in learning standards, school policies, and classroom practices. The equity framework will help educators teach and lead toward the following learning goals or pursuits:

  Identity Development—helping youth to make sense of themselves and others;
  Skill Development— developing proficiencies across the academic disciplines;
  Intellectual Development—gaining knowledge and becoming smarter;
  Criticality—learning and developing the ability to read texts (including print and social contexts) to understand power, equity, and anti-oppression.
  When these four learning pursuits are taught together—through the Historically Responsive Literacy Framework - all students receive profound opportunities for personal, intellectual, and academic success. Muhammad provides probing, self-reflective questions for teachers, leaders, and teacher educators as well as sample lesson plans and text sets (across grades and content areas) that are culturally and historically responsive. In this book, Muhammad presents practical approaches to cultivate the genius in students and within teachers. (Description drawn from Amazon and Scholastic)

  Reviews

  “Cultivating Genius is a timely, important, and educator friendly book that is needed now more than ever before. One cannot fully engage the power of what is available through culturally responsive lesson planning without applying Dr. Muhammmad’s brilliant and innovative framework. This practical guide illuminates and translates theory in ways that will help educators bring out the change needed in literacy classrooms-- change that culturally responsive sustaining pedagogies promise. In a sentence; This is the book we in the teacher education literacy field have been waiting for.” -Yolanda Sealy-Ruiz, Associate Professor of English Education, Teachers College, Columbia University

  “THIS IS THE BOOK I’VE BEEN LOOKING FOR MY ENTIRE TEACHING CAREER! Dr. Gholdy Muhammad connects the excellence of the past, Black literary societies, to how we need to teach for our Black and Brown (and all) students today. I’m so sick of teaching skills, skills, and more skills. That’s not what literacy is about. Literacy is about being human, figuring out who we are, knowing our world, and critiquing our world to make it a better place for everyone. Literacy is action. Literacy is love. We can do better for our students, and we can do it now. Dr. Muhammad shows us the way through her genius, excellence, love, and honesty.”- Allison Sirvory, Goodreads review

  “Any unit of study or lesson plan can be created using this framework across all disciplines of study. We urge you to pick up this amazing book. Dr. Gholdy Muhammad provides multiple examples and lesson plans to walk you through the whole process and teach how to implement this framework into your own classroom.” -The Teaching Distillery

• Teaching Environmental Literacy: Across Campus and Across the Curriculum Expand dropdown
   

  Summary

  Environmental studies and awareness is typically taught or denoted as something each individual must work on themselves, whether it be researching climate change or consciously monitoring your carbon footprint. Teaching Environmental Literacy, edited by Heather L. Reynolds, Eduardo S. Brondizio, and Jennifer Meta Robinson, offers guidance on preparing students to face today’s environmental challenges by incorporating environmental literacy in the classroom. The book is split into a model for grassroot, core learning goals revolving around environmental literacy, strategies for teaching environmental literacy, and environmental literacy beyond classrooms and across campus. It seeks to change the narrative surrounding environmental literacy to one that prioritizes it on campuses and curricula as a core learning goal across disciplines. The book showcases how environmental literacy can be taught/incorporated in a variety of disciplines and is organized accordingly: from “Environmental Justice and Sense of Place (Law)” to “Economics and Sustainability (Economics)”, scholars in almost any field can find a way to endorse environmental awareness and work towards a better planet through the engaging topics covered in this book. 

  Reviews

  What makes Teaching Environmental Literacy noteworthy is its coherence and accessibility. . . . Providing useful overviews of topics such as ecosystem services, population, and sense of place, the authors focus on specific disciplines as well as cross-disciplinary topics. While not designed as a how-to guide, Teaching Environmental Literacy would serve well any institution seeking to implement revisions to the curriculum―or individuals looking to create or revise courses that foreground environmental literacy. 

  ― Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment

  Anyone reading this book will walk away with ideas for how to address the most critical issue of the 21st century in his or her classroom. For that reason, I recommend this book for a much larger audience than college and university faculty. Even educators who work with our youngest children will find fodder in this book for self-reflection about what, why, and how to teach. I recommend it for teachers of all stripes who work to promote a sustainable future for our children.

  ― National Science Teachers Association

  This collection is an invaluable resource for developing integrated, campus-wide programs to prepare students to think critically about, and to work to create, a sustainable society. 
  ― Abstracts of Public Administration, Development, and Environment