Professing to Learn : Creating Tenured Lives and Careers in the American Research University

by Neumann, Anna

• ISBN13: 9780801891311
• ISBN10: 0801891310
• eBook ISBN(s): 9780801896408
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-06-10
• Publisher: Johns Hopkins Univ Pr
• More Book Details

Summary

Research, teaching, service, and public outreach -- all are aspects of being a tenured professor. But this list of responsibilities is missing a central component: actual scholarly learning -- disciplinary knowledge that faculty teach, explore in research, and share with the academic community. How do professors pursue such learning when they must give their attention as well to administrative and other obligations?Professing to Learn explores university professors' scholarly growth and learning in the years immediately following the award of tenure, a crucial period that has a lasting impact on the academic career. Some launch from this point to multiple accomplishments and accolades, while others falter, their academic pursuits stalled. What contributes to these different outcomes?Drawing on interviews with seventy-eight professors in diverse disciplines and fields at five major American research universities, Anna Neumann describes how tenured faculty shape and disseminate their own disciplinary knowledge while attending committee meetings, grading exams, holding office hours, administering programs and departments, and negotiating with colleagues. By exploring the intellectual activities pursued by these faculty and their ongoing efforts to develop and define their academic interests, Professing to Learn directs the attention of higher education professionals and policy makers to the core aim of higher education: the creation of academic knowledge through research, teaching, and service.

Author Biography

Anna Neumann is a professor of higher education at Teachers College, Columbia University, and coauthor of Redesigning Collegiate Leadership: Teams and Teamwork in Higher Education, also published by Johns Hopkins.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. vii
	p. 1
Into the Middle: Mapping the Early Post-Tenure Career in the Research University	p. 16
The Heart of the Matter: Passionate Thought and Scholarly Learning	p. 43
Mindwork: What and How Professors Strive to Learn	p. 74
Location: Where Professors Pursue Their Scholarly Learning	p. 103
Becoming Strategic: Recently Tenured University Professors as Agents of Scholarly Learning, with Kimberley B. Pereira	p. 137
Organizing to Learn: What Universities Provide for Professors' Scholarly Learning	p. 172
The Middle Remapped: Toward an Ecology of Learning in the Early Post-Tenure Career	p. 218
Study Designs and Background Data	p. 233
Interview Protocols and Consent Forms for the Four Universities Project	p. 243
Framework: University Professors' Scholarly Learning	p. 255
Notes	p. 269
Bibliography	p. 287
Index	p. 301
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