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SDD20: Improving Shared Governance at ACC
Hours: 1.5
Effective Shared Governance is an important goal of every institution of higher education. To ensure that we help our students to the best of our ability, students and employees from across the college must participate in the work of vetting and supporting initiatives. Only when many voices are heard and integrated can we be confident that the college will be successful in supporting its mission and goals.
ACC has outlined a method for Shared Governance, but over the years, we have fallen behind on educating employees about how the process should work. As a result, many faculty and staff have become less engaged in the process, which can comprise its effectiveness.
In this session, you’ll have the opportunity to hear from college administrators, employee association leaders, and a national expert on college culture, Alison Kadlec of SOVA (https://sovasolutions.org/about/). Through a series of active interactions, you’ll develop an understanding of our processes, and offer your suggestions for improvement.
Join us for an in-depth conversation about how every person at the college can become an engaged and important part of guiding the work we do to support our students.
A participant walks away with:
An understanding of ACC’s Shared Governance Processes, and how they can engage with it.
The opportunity to provide input for improving ACC’s Shared Governance Process.
Presenter(s):
Missi Patterson earned her Ph.D. in Psychology at Texas A&M University, where her research specialization was in cognitive development and creativity. She expected to be a researcher for the rest of her life, but discovered her love for teaching as a graduate student at A&M. She joined the ACC (Austin Community College) Psychology department in 1999 as an adjunct instructor and then became full-time in 2008.
From 2014 to 2018 Missi served as the first Assistant Dean of Faculty Development at ACC. In this capacity, she worked with a team of faculty colleagues to create the Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning (FCTL). In this role, she to provided faculty-led development opportunities to educators. The goal of her work at the center was to engage her teaching colleagues in creating a culture of collaboration and lifelong learning for instructors at Austin Community College. She enjoyed learning from passionate instructors across the college as they honed their teaching skills together.
In 2018, Missi began her work with ACC’s Full-Time Faculty Senate as President-Elect. This year, she is serving as President of the Senate, and she once again is making her focus collaboration, silo-busting, and communication. Higher Education is complex and full of challenges, and Missi believes that we can serve our students best when we learn from each other.
Alison Kadlec specializes in building cultures and climates for innovation in higher education and workforce development.
She has worked with dozens of colleges and universities across the country to support the capacity of institutional leaders and faculty at every level to effectively engage members of their communities as constructive partners in the hard work of change on behalf of student success. Alison and her team also work with the U.S. Department of Education, state policymakers and system leaders in more than half the states in the U.S. to help improve the quality of policy development and implementation around higher education and workforce issues.
Before launching Sova, Alison was Senior Vice President at Public Agenda, a visiting professor in the political science department at Macalester College and an adjunct professor in the political science departments at the University of Minnesota, Baruch College and Hunter College.
Alison is the author of a book on the democratic theory of John Dewey, Dewey’s Critical Pragmatism. She is also the author or co-author of a number of articles on subjects related to stakeholder engagement and public deliberation both within and outside of higher education including: “Putting it All Together: Strengthening Pathways Between Comprehensives and Community Colleges”; “Deliberative Democracy and the Problem of Power”; “Changing the Conversation About Productivity”; and “Play and Public Life.”
She holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of Minnesota and BAs from Michigan State University in Political Theory, Constitutional Democracy and English Literature. |
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