N2025 Conversations | Aim 6: Participation and Professional Development

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04/20/2022 Added

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In the final video of a six-part series, University Of Nebraska-Lincoln deans discuss progress on the N2025 strategic plan. The conversation explores Aim 6: Participation and Professional Development.

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[00:00:05.730]I'm gonna walk through the professional
[00:00:08.640]development opportunities that we have in place
[00:00:11.190]already for faculty. For all faculty, we have our
[00:00:15.150]membership in the National Center for Faculty
[00:00:17.040]Development and Diversity. That is a partnership
[00:00:19.740]between Faculty Affairs in the EVC office, the
[00:00:23.250]Office of Diversity and Inclusion and the
[00:00:26.370]Institute for Agriculture and Natural Resources.
[00:00:28.980]So it's a three way partnership that pays for
[00:00:31.560]individual memberships, that anybody with an
[00:00:34.110]@unl.edu email address can sign up for their
[00:00:38.820]individual membership. That program comes with
[00:00:42.990]all kinds of resources that I think a lot of you
[00:00:46.200]are already familiar with. We also have in house
[00:00:49.890]professional development workshops that we've
[00:00:51.660]developed in Faculty Affairs, and our Faculty
[00:00:54.060]Affairs fellows are available to give those
[00:00:57.120]workshops to departments or colleges, or I think
[00:01:01.890]we did it once for a group of graduate students
[00:01:03.810]that requested one. So those are those are always
[00:01:06.420]available as well. But what used to be called the
[00:01:08.550]Peer Review of Teaching project is now called
[00:01:10.470]FIRST. That's still around, and the teaching and
[00:01:13.170]learning symposia is there as well. We also have
[00:01:17.190]faculty tip sheets, and I think we're up to almost
[00:01:18.990]20 of those faculty tip sheets. These things on
[00:01:21.630]this slide are available to all faculty; any
[00:01:23.850]faculty member can access these. We then have
[00:01:27.240]things that are available for certain cohorts of
[00:01:29.220]faculty. So any new new faculty member, within the
[00:01:34.050]first three years, they're invited to our new
[00:01:36.300]faculty development program that kicks off with
[00:01:38.490]new faculty orientation. And then we also have
[00:01:41.370]this external mentoring grant program that we just
[00:01:44.370]started this year. What we're doing with that
[00:01:46.320]program is providing a little bit of money for a
[00:01:49.500]new faculty member to build a mentoring
[00:01:51.750]relationship with a faculty member somewhere else.
[00:01:54.960]We also for faculty who are in leadership, so our
[00:01:58.440]department chairs, our associate dean's, most of
[00:02:01.440]those individuals will will return to the faculty.
[00:02:03.990]And so we want to make sure that we're still
[00:02:05.970]focusing on their professional development as
[00:02:08.250]faculty and as leaders, and the DL leadership
[00:02:11.910]series and the associate Dean's Leadership Series
[00:02:13.920]do just that.
[00:02:14.000]This this slide has application based by which I
[00:02:20.750]mean cohort selective based professional
[00:02:23.780]development opportunities. So these, these are
[00:02:25.940]programs that people have to apply to so faculty
[00:02:28.910]leadership in academia from inspiration to to
[00:02:31.460]reality, that's our newest program that we do from
[00:02:34.250]faculty affairs, that we call it FLARE, and that's
[00:02:37.130]for new and developing academic leaders. The
[00:02:40.850]Research Leaders Program actually come that comes
[00:02:43.280]out of ORED and it's for people who that are going
[00:02:47.360]to be leading large group team research or running
[00:02:51.770]research centers, that kind of thing.
[00:02:53.000]Brand new is the Developing Excellence in Academic
[00:02:54.140]Leadership Program. We are a partner in that.
[00:02:55.010]That's being run out of the new system. And it is
[00:02:56.600]a two-year program for fourr faculty a year, four
[00:03:02.720]academic leaders a year . And for that program,
[00:03:07.040]they do want people who are already in some form
[00:03:13.760]of leadership role. So that's sponsored by our
[00:03:17.960]chief academic officers on campus. So we have, we
[00:03:20.630]have both Kathy and Mike as part of the sponsoring
[00:03:23.480]group for that. And then the Big Ten Academic
[00:03:26.240]Alliance, because we are a Big Ten institution, we
[00:03:28.970]are able to participate in these programs. So
[00:03:31.370]there's the DEO seminar where I take five
[00:03:34.460]department chairs every year to a three day
[00:03:37.400]workshop. And then the Academic Leadership
[00:03:40.670]Program, which actually a lot of you have done,
[00:03:43.340]which is supposed to visit three campuses a year.
[00:03:46.490]And we just found out that our third visit this
[00:03:48.590]year will in fact, be a be a visit to Chicago. But
[00:03:52.610]but still. switching gears a little bit, I want to
[00:03:55.490]talk a little bit about faculty evaluations,
[00:03:58.430]annual evaluations of faculty. One of the points
[00:04:01.910]made in the N2025 strategic plan is that people
[00:04:05.870]should be evaluated on what they're supposed to be
[00:04:08.870]doing, which seems completely reasonable. That is
[00:04:12.740]actually one of our guiding principles and has
[00:04:14.480]been forever. But how that's done varies greatly
[00:04:18.740]across campus. We're a very decentralized campus.
[00:04:21.380]What that means is that our processes are going to
[00:04:24.920]vary by unit. So faculty governance has raised a
[00:04:29.210]concern that they don't have the ability to have
[00:04:32.450]meaningful conversations across different units
[00:04:35.480]about evaluations, because they don't know how
[00:04:38.120]everybody else is being evaluated. And the systems
[00:04:41.030]are different and the ratings are different. And
[00:04:43.580]then from an administrative standpoint, actually,
[00:04:45.980]we've had several programs come out of the EVC
[00:04:48.320]office lately, where we've said, you have to have
[00:04:50.690]had some satisfactory performance in the past
[00:04:53.720]three years to be eligible for this program and
[00:04:55.880]satisfactory doesn't actually have the same
[00:04:57.920]meaning in different units . And so we're actually
[00:05:01.280]having this conversation right now with the
[00:05:03.500]associate deans for faculty, trying to understand
[00:05:06.830]how everybody is doing evaluations with the goal
[00:05:10.070]of bringing some alignment, while still having
[00:05:13.100]full respect of the cultures of the individual
[00:05:16.010]units.
[00:05:17.290]So what I want to do is go through a few of the
[00:05:19.180]targets that we know are in this plan and let you
[00:05:23.770]get an idea of what what HR is doing for this
[00:05:26.530]target. So in terms of aligning duties with the
[00:05:29.830]evaluation, we have an HR template that absolutely
[00:05:33.580]aligns with duties. And so to our guidelines. We
[00:05:36.220]also have a performance management training that
[00:05:38.320]we give to our supervisors or offered to our
[00:05:40.240]supervisors, that helps them understand that
[00:05:43.240]evaluations and feedback need to align with
[00:05:45.550]duties. So I think we're in a good space there. In
[00:05:48.640]terms of next steps, we are continuing to
[00:05:51.100]communicate to HR leaders, that if they're not
[00:05:54.580]using the HR template, now's a good time to start
[00:05:57.760]thinking about how to align your templates to
[00:06:00.040]duties. And if you need our help, and HR will
[00:06:02.350]absolutely help you. Let's talk about ideas, let's
[00:06:04.660]use our best practices. So we've got quite a few
[00:06:07.420]units working on that, evaluating their own
[00:06:10.330]systems, spending a ton of time, we're working
[00:06:13.000]with you, your leaders and your line employees to
[00:06:16.360]make sure that everybody's on target with the
[00:06:18.370]same. In the future, what I think we also need to
[00:06:21.820]do is create a training for our supervisors so
[00:06:25.360]that they're clear when they're doing evaluations
[00:06:28.240]very specific that they should be talking about
[00:06:30.400]alignment with duties. We'll have to make sure
[00:06:33.400]that we're doing that in a way that, again, is not
[00:06:35.980]prescriptive to all of you in your units, but
[00:06:38.110]instead guidance for you. In terms of the next
[00:06:41.770]target, having a documented professional
[00:06:45.250]development plan, I'm pretty excited about what
[00:06:47.440]we've done here also. So our template already has
[00:06:50.560]a document or a documented way to focus on
[00:06:54.730]professional development. We already have a policy
[00:06:56.680]that says our employees need an evaluation
[00:06:59.410]annually. So we've chosen to put in our template
[00:07:02.200]that you can do the professional development plan
[00:07:04.210]with your eval. So I think that we meet this aim,
[00:07:07.660]but we can do better. So our next steps is one of
[00:07:11.290]the more exciting things I've been working on in
[00:07:13.090]the last month or so with our team is providing a
[00:07:16.810]training course for how to create a professional
[00:07:20.620]development plan. So I envisioned this to be very
[00:07:25.300]detailed, very comprehensive, it's going to be one
[00:07:29.410]in which an employee can review it with their
[00:07:31.210]supervisor, and really create a future for the
[00:07:35.830]employee and have that vision. So we plan to
[00:07:38.200]present that at the staff conference here in May
[00:07:40.600]2022. And then continue to have that online and
[00:07:44.380]adjust it so that you all can use it and
[00:07:46.240]incorporate it in your units if you'd like to. And
[00:07:48.940]then we will have to continue to evaluate what
[00:07:53.320]we're doing, we probably need to create a task
[00:07:56.080]force, some type of committee to support ongoing
[00:07:59.920]more programmatic professional development and
[00:08:02.560]resources for all of you so that we can continue
[00:08:05.950]to be on the same page.
[00:08:06.994]In terms of inclusive excellence and professional
[00:08:08.080]In terms of next steps here, I do think that we
[00:08:10.039]development plans, our team is working with lots
[00:08:13.023]of you and your teams to make sure that we're
[00:08:15.362]probably need to work on a committee taskforce
[00:08:15.824]putting inclusive excellence into every
[00:08:18.260]interaction, right. So in terms of our
[00:08:20.636]evaluations, we enhanced it, and we added a
[00:08:22.493]work with the ODI group to make sure that we're
[00:08:23.315]inclusive excellence area on the evaluations that
[00:08:26.360]we have for a template, we made sure that a
[00:08:29.040]professional development goal can be discussed,
[00:08:29.775]continuing to develop to develop more of a
[00:08:31.963]the guidelines are updated so that there is a
[00:08:34.765]conversation happening at the evaluation. And
[00:08:36.299]programmatic approach to DEI for our folks.
[00:08:37.566]since I said before, some of our units aren't
[00:08:40.368]using that template, we're working with our units
[00:08:42.974]Regarding the mentor activities, then placing the
[00:08:43.413]to make sure that they can support this aim and
[00:08:46.336]however makes sense to them. Another fun thing
[00:08:49.199]that's happening is our ODI team has created a
[00:08:50.560]mentorship activities on evaluations: Right now
[00:08:52.061]training or a course on how to create a
[00:08:54.497]professional development plan for supervisors to
[00:08:57.481]work with their employees. The feedback we've
[00:08:57.843]what HR is doing is spending time researching
[00:09:00.283]received from supervisors is I need some guidance.
[00:09:03.389]How do I do that and make it a good conversation.
[00:09:04.822]what's happening on campus, even within Academic
[00:09:06.434]So the ODI group and committee that we've been on
[00:09:09.479]has been working on that training, so that'll be
[00:09:12.256]Affairs, within the system and other peer
[00:09:12.463]delivered and ready in the next few weeks here.
[00:09:15.387]Additionally, the ODI group has been updating
[00:09:18.188]their website in terms of resources. So for those
[00:09:18.628]institutions so that we understand how we might
[00:09:21.233]who are really looking for a way to make sure that
[00:09:24.339]they're hitting their goals on inclusive
[00:09:25.910]get some good ideas to implement mentorship
[00:09:26.836]excellence, they have great resources to look to.
[00:09:29.881]So I think we're well on our way there.
[00:09:32.000]And then last, but not least, is this aim also
[00:09:32.586]activities for staff here. But in terms of next
[00:09:39.868]steps, I think that what we need to do is gather
[00:09:47.302]the information, share it and then see where we
[00:09:54.585]need to head. I'd like to utilize our newly formed
[00:10:02.322]Staff Council that should be in place by then,
[00:10:09.453]UAAD, UNOPA other areas to make sure that we are
[00:10:16.887]creating a really good mentorship program that the
[00:10:24.625]campus can can utilize and sort of adapt to their
[00:10:32.211]unit needs.
[00:10:39.770]includes creating the Staff Council. There's been
[00:10:41.930]a ton of work by a committee that was formed last
[00:10:46.520]year to get together a staff governance group,
[00:10:50.450]right. And talk a little bit about how that would
[00:10:53.810]look.
[00:10:54.530]So back in 2017, and 2018, our existing
[00:10:57.800]professional development organizations for staff
[00:10:59.690]on campus, UNOPA and UAAD began having
[00:11:02.180]conversations about what staff governance might
[00:11:04.700]look like at UNL. The N150 vision in the N2025
[00:11:08.840]strategic plan, both included aspirations for a
[00:11:11.540]Staff Council to be created. And there's been a
[00:11:13.520]group of 19 very dedicated staff members on campus
[00:11:16.340]for the last 18 months who have been working to
[00:11:18.650]advance this. And we're very pleased that they've
[00:11:20.810]drafted bylaws, are now hosting listening
[00:11:22.700]sessions, and plan to have officer elections later
[00:11:25.220]this spring to implement a Staff Senate here at
[00:11:27.230]UNL beginning this fall.
[00:11:29.900]One of the important reasons that I think we have
[00:11:32.720]professional development a part of N2025, is
[00:11:35.960]because we know that we are working to prepare
[00:11:39.530]students to enter a workforce that is always
[00:11:42.020]changing, that is dynamic, and resolve these major
[00:11:45.710]world issues or real problems, right. And our
[00:11:48.650]ability to do that relies on our faculty and staff
[00:11:52.430]being their best selves and having the most recent
[00:11:55.640]and updated understanding and knowledge around
[00:11:57.950]these issues. And so I wanted to first highlight
[00:11:59.840]that we're not talking about professional
[00:12:01.280]development, just because we want our employees to
[00:12:03.230]be wonderful. We I mean, we do. But we also want
[00:12:06.440]our employees, our faculty and staff to be in a
[00:12:08.480]position to really best support our students.
[00:12:11.000]It's really critical that we continue this work of
[00:12:14.330]redesigning our knowledge systems by continuing to
[00:12:17.540]educate and support the growth and development of
[00:12:19.850]all of our faculty and staff. And so we're working
[00:12:23.120]to make this just a very normal and expected part
[00:12:26.030]of our daily work. We are also so thrilled in the
[00:12:30.920]library's about the development of a Staff Senate
[00:12:33.830]because it mirrors activity that we've been
[00:12:36.380]engaged in over the last year. We have, we're
[00:12:39.680]about to complete a complete rewrite of our bylaws
[00:12:44.330]that formally recognize the staff in the
[00:12:47.090]libraries. We think sets the stage for us to co
[00:12:50.570]create a new organization that really values and
[00:12:55.550]prizes, the transparency, strong and robust
[00:12:59.780]communication, and really empowers everyone
[00:13:02.810]throughout the whole organization.
[00:13:04.610]The biggest predictor of retention is onboarding,
[00:13:09.080]that our people have a wonderful experience of
[00:13:12.620]what they experiene at UNL. And they want to be
[00:13:16.040]part of this wonderful organization. And so we
[00:13:20.300]also use Clifton Strengths, almost all our people,
[00:13:23.450]we use Trust Edge, we use Seven Habits. We're in
[00:13:27.260]the business of creating leaders and in
[00:13:29.660]professional development.
[00:13:30.000]And one of our goals is targeting professional
[00:13:33.480]development of our graduate student and includes
[00:13:35.670]student success plans, professional development
[00:13:38.310]roadmaps, opportunities for students to explore
[00:13:41.430]different career pathways. And to support that
[00:13:44.880]goal, we've been working on a couple of different
[00:13:47.310]initiatives. And it's not only for grad students,
[00:13:49.440]but also for undergraduates. One is development of
[00:13:52.590]digital badges. And so in partnership with
[00:13:55.080]Nebraska Extension, we have a portfolio of digital
[00:13:58.020]badges. And through these digital badges, non
[00:14:00.570]credit bearing, learners have the opportunity to
[00:14:03.780]acquire new information, put that information to
[00:14:06.720]practice, and then follow up with reflection. So
[00:14:10.140]really a holistic cycle on learning. And then the
[00:14:13.050]second thing that I would lift up is just
[00:14:15.000]establishment of hubs that are really focused on
[00:14:18.120]the professional development career-ready skills
[00:14:21.150]for our students.
[00:14:22.480]The Office of Graduate Studies is a key player and
[00:14:24.940]training of teaching and instructional skills and
[00:14:27.880]graduate students. We offer TA trainings, teaching
[00:14:32.800]assistant trainings, for all students before they
[00:14:35.680]enter the classroom, including a special offering
[00:14:38.590]for international TAs to help orient them to the
[00:14:41.710]culture of the US educational system. Secondly,
[00:14:44.830]I'd like to note that we're a member of CIRTL,
[00:14:47.350]which is the Center for Integration of Research,
[00:14:49.870]Teaching and Learning. This is a very strong
[00:14:53.260]program that graduate students can engage in and
[00:14:55.930]earn a CIRTL certification which will help them as
[00:15:00.070]they move on to the next step of their career.
[00:15:02.770]Finally, I'd like to note that the professional
[00:15:05.530]development staff in the Office of Graduate
[00:15:07.060]Studies also meet individually and in small groups
[00:15:10.060]with many, many graduate students, helping them
[00:15:12.640]develop individual development plans, reviewing
[00:15:17.560]application materials for both academic and
[00:15:20.170]non-academic jobs, including reviewing CVS and
[00:15:23.710]cover letters and diversity statements.
[00:15:26.750]You know, connecting with our colleagues across
[00:15:29.330]the country is really, really important. And so I
[00:15:33.020]encourage our staff and our graduate students and
[00:15:36.320]faculty to really reach beyond the boundaries of
[00:15:40.580]Nebraska, and collaborate and connect with our our
[00:15:47.180]companions. Because, for example, Lacey Rohe is an
[00:15:52.010]emerging leader for the National Association of
[00:15:54.530]College and University Business Officers. Jim
[00:15:57.680]Jackson is a past president of APPA. And they are
[00:16:02.000]the facilities leaders within educational
[00:16:06.470]institutions. I think about Mary Guest in the
[00:16:10.400]Office of Research, and she's been a past leader
[00:16:13.130]of the Nebraska Educational Office Professionals
[00:16:16.940]Association. And so we're surrounded by people
[00:16:19.850]that have stepped up and really captured the
[00:16:25.340]opportunities that are available within higher
[00:16:28.340]education.
[00:16:29.870]And we have exceptionally high levels of
[00:16:34.400]leadership commitment across our faculty and our
[00:16:37.430]staff, leading nationally and in some cases,
[00:16:40.820]internationally, in these organizations. So it's
[00:16:44.300]something I would like to actually see us do a
[00:16:47.000]better job of capturing, you know, that that as
[00:16:51.050]well, you know, is is an important part of
[00:16:54.620]professional development. It is in yet kind of a
[00:16:58.280]different, different zone or different avenue, if
[00:17:01.490]you will.
[00:17:02.330]So a lot of different programs that that we do, we
[00:17:04.580]put a lot of focus as well on helping people
[00:17:08.390]across these different organizations understand
[00:17:11.030]what what each other is doing, both from the
[00:17:14.870]standpoint of cross training, but potentially
[00:17:17.510]career advancement as they move on. For our
[00:17:20.870]earlier faculty members, we offer a number of
[00:17:23.600]different programs.
[00:17:25.670]Some are a year long cohort programs where the the
[00:17:29.780]faculty members are working together to learn to
[00:17:32.690]be to be very competitive researchers. In those
[00:17:36.440]it's been the case, mostly that for capacity
[00:17:39.740]reasons, we always held all the spots just for
[00:17:44.540]tenure track faculty. We've now broadened that for
[00:17:48.020]faculty at all positions that have have some sort
[00:17:51.770]of a research focus. And so we're going to be
[00:17:54.140]adding capacity in order to do that.
[00:17:57.350]I just wonder if we don't have an opportunity here
[00:18:01.100]because of our decentralized nature and all the
[00:18:03.710]wonderful professional development that's offered
[00:18:06.470]for students, for staff, for faculty. If we
[00:18:09.710]couldn't work on a system again, I'm back to
[00:18:12.320]systems, that would help people find all these
[00:18:15.950]wonderful opportunities that are offered all over
[00:18:18.350]campus and how to organize them in their portfolio
[00:18:21.890]of learning. It seems like we have a great
[00:18:23.840]opportunity to take advantage of all these
[00:18:25.700]professional development opportunities.

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N2025 Conversations | Aim 6: Participation and Professional Development

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