| THE PREPARING FUTURE FACULTY PROGRAM: WHAT DIFFERENCE
DOES IT MAKE?
by A. Leigh DeNeef
IV. Conclusion
Graduates now serving in administrative positions
illustrate the commitment of alumni to promoting
continuation of PFF and PFF-type activities.
Alumni are grateful to the program for what
it gave to them, and they have assumed, perhaps
as part of their “service” to
the academic profession, the responsibility
to give something back. Thus Jason Cody participated
in development of the chemistry component
through the American Chemical Society program
of Preparing Future Faculty, and Jennifer
Egert, through participation in the American
Psychological Association's (APA) Teaching
and Educational Issues workgroup, has now
become involved in its leadership of department-based
PFF initiatives. Angela Bryan has also assumed
a major role in the APA's development
of a cross-country collaboration on a PFF
program in psychology at Colorado and Yale.
Other alumni are currently involved in what
might be called “next generation”
professional development projects in higher
education. Charles Carter has been selected
as a Pew/Carnegie Fellow in their new initiative
on the scholarship of teaching and learning.
As one of twenty-eight faculty from across
the country chosen for this honor, Charles
will be conducting a project on the relationship
between interdisciplinary studies and multimedia
in promoting deeper learning. Jason Cody is
now involved in both Project Kaleidoscope
and the F21 Network for Science, Mathematics,
and Technology educators. The goals of these
projects are a research-rich curriculum and
continuing innovation in the classroom.
For all of these academics, PFF has not
only smoothed the transition between graduate
school and their initial academic positions,
but it has also brought them into the larger
conversation of academic reform generally.
At the center of this reform is the effort
to create a better and more seamless fit between
new Ph.D.s and the faculty roles/tasks they
assume as they take their places in the full
range of institutions of higher learning.
Our alumni all agree that the essential principles
of Preparing Future Faculty are ones that
need to be promoted and expanded in order
to be successful in that effort. As they become
active voices in this broader national reform
of higher education, there is every reason
to expect that the success story of PFF will
continue to be written.
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