Quarterly Newsletter: Spring 2024

See below for highlights from the Spring 2024 Academic Affairs Quarterly Newsletter. Click the link to read the full newsletter. Reach out to Sawyer Dedmon with any questions.

From the Vice Chancellor

Dear Campus Community,

In our last e-newsletter for 2023-2024, I’ve highlighted where we landed in terms of our overarching goals for the division during this academic year. Each is listed below with a brief update. With the hard work of many faculty and staff in our division, along with our many campus partners, we accomplished a lot together. In addition, I am proud of all that our schools and offices across the division accomplished in their units this year. You remind me every day of how committed you are to our students, our campus, the region, and each other. Thank you!

1. Complete the undergraduate advising framework changes:?We’ve made significant strides this year towards a new era of comprehensive advising for UW Bothell undergraduates. Our?Academic Advising?unit is eagerly anticipating its fully centralized launch on July 1st, with new assistant directors joining the team. We’re excited to provide holistic advising from our new UW-1 location and pleased to announce Jessica Trenkamp as Assistant Director of Advising, Hiring & Training, and Nhi Tran as Assistant Director of Advising, First-Year and Pre-Major Liaison.?This year we were able to create a career ladder for professional academic advisors, craft agreements with each school on advising work responsibilities, create a transition plan for current students, and begin an assessment plan for the new advising model. Many thanks to the staff and faculty on the Advising Advisory Council for their input and guidance on this work. In the autumn, look for a call for participation in a new student success leadership group to continue to support our work.?
2. Complete the creation of a major declaration/change process for undergraduate students:?After two years of collaboration between the Division of Enrollment Management and academic affairs, and multiple faculty discussions, we’ve implemented a streamlined degree matriculation and change process. 真人线上娱乐s at UW Bothell can now declare their major more easily for programs with open enrollment or minimum requirement declarations. This simplification reduces administrative barriers and enables earlier matriculation.?Visit our new “Declaring Your Major” webpage?to see which majors have adopted this equitable, accessible process, with more to come in the next year.
3. Revise the formula for faculty office space:?真人线上娱乐?Office Allocation Guidelines Work Group, comprised of faculty representatives and chaired by Brinda Sarathy, Professor and Dean of IAS, and Dr. Shauna Elbers Carlisle, Associate Professor at IAS and GFO past chair, was tasked with evaluating the faculty office space allocation process. 真人线上娱乐 committee recommended maintaining the current allocation formula. Based on this advice, along with several follow-up conversations, the updated policy now reads as follows: Since the number of full-time faculty members typically exceeds the number of available faculty offices, the total number of offices assigned to each school will equal at least 90% of the combined total of tenure-track and teaching track faculty (regular appointment 100% FTE) in the school. From the pool of offices allotted to each school, the deans will assign individual faculty offices based on school policies and needs.?
4. Strengthen support for excellent and transformative pedagogy:?真人线上娱乐 Learning and Teaching Collaborative continues to grow and strengthen support for pedagogy on campus. Some of the current work includes promoting and developing inclusive learning environments and reimagining how we use digital technology and tools such as AI to support student learning and engagement. 真人线上娱乐 team also continues to meet with faculty 1:1 working on topics such as Canvas design and support, trauma-informed teaching, teaching with AI, and active learning strategies in large enrollment courses. Additionally, in collaboration with the Office of Connected Learning, we are wrapping up year one of our inaugural High Impact Practice Faculty Fellowship, supporting Pre-Major students.?With the L&T team transitioning to the?Office of Faculty Success?next academic year, we expect this support to be strengthened even more.
5. Strengthen support for research, scholarship, and creative practice:?真人线上娱乐 Office of Faculty Success’ portfolio expands next year to include support for faculty research, scholarship, and creative practice in addition to support for sponsored research.
6. Strengthen support and structures for faculty success at all career stages:?After a two-year start up, the?Office of Faculty Success’?portfolio will expand starting next academic year to meet the needs identified by our faculty of all ranks and tracks in numerous listening sessions. Congratulations to Dr. Wadiya Udell on their appointment as associate vice chancellor for faculty success!
7. Improve communications and engagement across the division:?This is an area that did not get as much attention as we hoped, however we experimented with a few ideas that we will continue and expand on for next year.?
8. Maintain momentum for all students to meet the campus-wide community engagement undergraduate learning goal at graduation:?We paused on this goal as the campus-wide effort to again get the Carnegie Foundation’s Classification for Community Engagement geared up. In the meantime, our assessment team is currently working with faculty to identify student sample assignments that focus on community engagement.
9. Revisit the undergraduate learning goals so that assessment is feasible and meaningful:?In light of tri-campus discussions regarding the general education requirements,?Campus Council on Assessment and Learning (CCAL)?is also revisiting the remaining undergraduate learning goals. This will guide the work moving forward so that our campuswide assessment process is more meaningful.
10. Identify the campus-wide structural needs to support graduate programs:?A campus-wide discussion on enhancing graduate student recruitment led to the formation of the?Graduate 真人线上娱乐 Recruitment Workgroup?in Winter 2024. Chaired by Dr. Tyson Marsh and supported by Sheneetra Wilson, Assistant Director of Graduate Studies, and Emily Christian,?Dean of Enrollment Services, the group aims to address priority needs identified during a consultation meeting with Jim Black of SEM Works in November 2023. By the end of Spring quarter, the workgroup plans to present a prioritized list of implementation strategies and financial requests to the Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs and Vice Chancellor of Enrollment Management & 真人线上娱乐 Affairs. We will share widely.

As the quarter and the academic year ends, below are just a few of the many highlights about our faculty and staff. Thank you to everyone in the academic affairs division for working hard, engaging with challenging issues, and caring about each other and our amazing students. I hope we all find good ways to recharge this summer. As always, please fill out our feedback form, stop my office in UW2–124B, or invite me to your space.

Sharon A. Jones, Ph.D., VCAA

Cross-disciplinary
Connected Learning
Community Engagement.