Multilitteratus Incognitus

I guess this is my "806 is dead, long live 806!" post ;-)  One of the final requirements for EDDE 806 is to: Create a final blog post linking to the 6 earlier posts and providing a final reflection, feedback and any recommendations on the course as a whole. For those who are keeping score at home, other course requirements included the following: Present a 30-45 minute presentation on their proposal or dissertation work and progress and respond to comments and questions. Post reactions and reflections on at least 6 of the presentations (over one or more semesters) using a response template created by the instructor, to their blog in the Athabasca Landing (tagged with EDD 806) Attend and participate in discussion in at least 6 sessions over one or two semesters of the course I am not really sure what a final reflection really looks like for 806, especially considering that I will most likely attend quite a few sessions next fall when the remainder of my co...

Alright folks!  That's a wrap for EDDE 806 for this semester!  The semester went out with a bang with three members of my cohort presenting their dissertation proposal work in progress (and for those on the east coast the session was a little long - after a long day - but well worth it!). The three proposed research projects are  Kim's, titled " Student Satisfaction Levels among Canadian Armed Forces Members toward their distance learning experiences " which deals with Canadian armed forces training and distance education; Rosemarri's , titled " Transforming Learning in Higher Education: Implementing UDL in Higher Education "; and Scott's, titled  " College Leadership and Distance Learning " There were some common themes between these three presentations, and presentations that have been done previously in the semester, be it underlying reasons for the research, methodologies employed, or potential timelines.  Having seen the timel...

Last evening we had our penultimate EDDE 806 session for this season. On tap for the evening we had Neera's presentation (originally of Cohort 6, but now firmly "one of our own" in cohort 7), and a presentation by Stephanie. One question that came to mind, outside of the context of these presentations, was how long do EdD students stick around in 806 after they have met the requirements of the course?  If they don't come back, why is that?  If they do return, why do they return, and what influences their regularity of participation?  I guess this could be a dissertation topic in and of itself, but it's a question that came to mind as I saw some very familiar names in the guest list on Adobe connect last night, and noticed the absence of other names that I've seen over the last year or so of my 'informal' 806 participation.  Of course, a dissertation topic like this would most likely add 2-3 years to my studies, and that doesn't seem like an a...

[Warning: longer than usual post] Recently I came across an article on InsideHigherEd titled In Higher Ed, Loyalty Is a One-Way Street , and the tagline was "Loyalty of students and faculty is often demanded. Is it returned?"   The main thesis of the article is that in higher education the job you're in is the job you're in unless you apply for another job and get in, at which point you can either leave your old job or use your new offer as leverage for a better job (or better pay) at your current job.  The article is written from a faculty perspective, but it resonated with my own experiences at the university.  However, I wouldn't really call it an issue with loyalty , but rather it's an issue of organizational culture and lack of meaningful (to the individual) rewards for that loyalty.   Here are my observations as a staff member from the last (close to) 20 years at my institution, and a story from my first job on-campus. When I first started working...