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Saving Alma Mater
A Rescue Plan for America's Public Universities
James C. Garland
University of Chicago Press, 2009

America’s public universities educate 80% of our nation’s college students. But in the wake of rising demands on state treasuries, changing demographics, growing income inequality, and legislative indifference, many of these institutions have fallen into decline. Tuition costs have skyrocketed, class sizes have gone up, the number of courses offered has gone down, and the overall quality of education has decreased significantly.

Here James C. Garland draws on more than thirty years of experience as a professor, administrator, and university president to argue that a new compact between state government and public universities is needed to make these schools more affordable and financially secure. Saving Alma Mater challenges a change-resistant culture in academia that places too low a premium on efficiency and productivity. Seeing a crisis of campus leadership, Garland takes state legislators to task for perpetuating the decay of their public university systems and calls for reforms in the way university presidents and governing boards are selected. He concludes that the era is long past when state appropriations can enable public universities to keep their fees low and affordable. Saving Alma Mater thus calls for the partial deregulation of public universities and a phase-out of their state appropriations. Garland’s plan would tie university revenues to their performance and exploit the competitive pressures of the academic marketplace to control costs, rein in tuition, and make schools more responsive to student needs.

A much-needed blueprint for reform based on Garland’s real-life successes as the head of Miami University of Ohio, Saving Alma Mater will be essential for anyone concerned with the costs and quality of higher education in America today.

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School Principal
Managing in Public
Dan C. Lortie
University of Chicago Press, 2009

When we think about school principals, most of us imagine a figure of vague, yet intimidating authority—for an elementary school student, being sent to the principal’s office is roughly on par with a trip to Orwell’s Room 101. But with School Principal, Dan C. Lortie aims to change that. Much as he did for teachers with his groundbreaking book Schoolteacher, Lortie offers here an intensive and detailed look at principals, painting a compelling portrait of what they do, how they do it, and why.

Lortie begins with a brief history of the job before turning to the daily work of a principal. These men and women, he finds, stand at the center of a constellation of competing interests around and within the school. School district officials, teachers, parents, and students all have needs and demands that frequently clash, and it is the principal’s job to manage these conflicting expectations to best serve the public. Unsurprisingly then, Lortie records his subjects’ professional dissatisfactions, but he also vividly depicts the pleasures of their work and the pride they take in their accomplishments. Finally, School Principal offers a glimpse of the future with an analysis of current issues and trends in education, including the increasing presence of women in the role and the effects of widespread testing mandated by the government.

Lortie’s scope is both broad and deep, offering an eminently useful range of perspectives on his subject. From the day-to-day toil to the long-term course of an entire career, from finding out just what goes on inside that office to mapping out the larger social and organizational context of the job, School Principal is a truly comprehensive account of a little-understood profession.

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Schooled and Sorted
How Educational Categories Create Inequality
Thurston Domina
Russell Sage Foundation, 2023
We tend to view education primarily as a way to teach students skills and knowledge that they will draw upon as they move into their adult lives. However, schools do more than educate students—they also place students into categories, such as kindergartner, English language learner, or honor roll student. In Schooled & Sorted, Thurston Domina, Andrew M. Penner, and Emily K. Penner, explore processes of educational categorization in order to explain the complex relationship between education and social inequality—and to identify strategies that can help build more just educational systems.
 
Some educational categories have broadly egalitarian consequences. Indeed, Domina, Penner, and Penner argue that when societies enroll young people in school, making them students, they mark them as individuals who are worthy of rights. But other educational categories reinforce powerful social categories—including race, gender, and class—and ultimately reproduce social and economic inequality in society. Elite colleges, tracked high schools, and elementary school gifted programs provide not only different educational experiences, but also create merit and inequality by sorting students into categories that are defined by the students who are excluded.
 
Schooled & Sorted highlights that many of the decisions that define educational categories occur in school-based committee meetings and other relatively local settings. The local nature of these decisions provides many opportunities to define educational categories differently, and for school communities to bring about change.
 
Schooled & Sorted is an illuminating investigation into the ways sorting within schools translates into inequality in the larger world. While some educational categorization may be unavoidable, the authors suggest ways to build a more equitable system—and thus a more equitable society.
 
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Schools Under Surveillance
Cultures of Control in Public Education
Monahan, Torin
Rutgers University Press, 2009
Schools under Surveillance gathers together some of the very best researchers studying surveillance and discipline in contemporary public schools. Surveillance is not simply about monitoring or tracking individuals and their dataùit is about the structuring of power relations through human, technical, or hybrid control mechanisms. Essays cover a broad range of topics including police and military recruiters on campus, testing and accountability regimes such as No Child Left Behind, and efforts by students and teachers to circumvent the most egregious forms of surveillance in public education. Each contributor is committed to the continued critique of the disparity and inequality in the use of surveillance to target and sort students along lines of race, class, and gender.
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Sensemaking for Writing Programs and Writing Centers
Rita Malenczyk
Utah State University Press, 2023
In this collection writing program and writing center administrators from a range of academic institutions come together to explore their work through the lens of sensemaking. Sensemaking is an organizational theory concept that enables institutions, supervisors, teachers, tutors, and others to better understand the work they do by using narrative, metaphor, and other theoretical lenses.
 
The book is divided into two sections: Sensemaking with Tutors and Teachers, and Sensemaking and Institutional Structures. Chapter authors employ several theoretical approaches to sensemaking, ranging from individual experience to institutional history to document design, providing readers with ideas for how to administer and teach within their programs more effectively; how to advocate for their programs within larger university contexts; and how to positively influence the lives and careers of those they work with.
 
Sensemaking for Writing Programs and Writing Centers theorizes daily experiences from working lives and suggests problem-solving strategies. Writing program administrators, writing department chairs, and writing center directors, tutors, and staff will find value in its pages.
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The Small And Rural Academic L Library
Leveraging Resources
Kaetrena Davis Kendrick
Assoc of College & Research Libraries, 2016

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Small Public Library Management
Jane Pearlmutter
American Library Association, 2012

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So You Want to Be an Academic Library Director
Colleen S. Harris
American Library Association, 2017

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Society and Education in Brazil
Robert J. Havighurst
University of Pittsburgh Press, 1969
A groundbreaking English-language study of the transformation in education in mid-twentieth century Brazil, and the social and economic forces that shaped it. It also looks at how, in turn, education is shaping the rapid transformation of Brazilian society.
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Space-Time Perspectives on Early Colonial Moquegua
Prudence M. Rice
University Press of Colorado, 2024
In this rich study of the construction and reconstruction of a colonized landscape, Prudence M. Rice takes an implicit political ecology approach in exploring encounters of colonization in Moquegua, a small valley of southern Peru. Building on theories of spatiality, spatialization, and place, she examines how politically mediated human interaction transformed the physical landscape, the people who inhabited it, and the resources and goods produced in this poorly known area.

Space-Time Perspectives on Early Colonial Moquegua looks at the encounters between existing populations and newcomers from successive waves of colonization, from indigenous expansion states (Wari, Tiwanaku, and Inka) to the foreign Spaniards, and the way each group “re-spatialized” the landscape according to its own political and economic ends. Viewing these spatializations from political, economic, and religious perspectives, Rice considers both the ideological and material occurrences.

Concluding with a special focus on the multiple space-time considerations involved in Spanish-inspired ceramics from the region, Space-Time Perspectives on Early Colonial Moquegua integrates the local and rural with the global and urban in analyzing the events and processes of colonialism. It is a vital contribution to the literature of Andean studies and will appeal to students and scholars of archaeology, historical archaeology, history, ethnohistory, and globalization.

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Speaking of Duke
Leading the Twenty-First-Century University
Richard H. Brodhead
Duke University Press, 2017
Over the course of his thirteen years as president of Duke University, Richard H. Brodhead spoke at numerous university ceremonies, community forums, and faculty meetings, and even appeared on The Colbert Report. Speaking of Duke collects dozens of these speeches, in which Brodhead speaks both to the special character and history of Duke University and to the general state of higher education.

In these essays, Brodhead shows a university thinking its way forward through challenges all institutes of higher education have faced in the twenty-first century, including an expanding global horizon, an economic downturn that has left a diminished sense of opportunity and a shaken faith in the value of liberal arts education, and pressure to think more deeply about issues of equity and inclusion. His audiences range from newly arrived freshmen and new graduates—both facing uncertainty about how to build their future lives—to seasoned faculty members. On other occasions, he makes the case to the general public for the enduring importance of the humanities.

What results is a portrait of Duke University in its modern chapter and the social and political climate that it shapes and is shaped by. While these speeches were given on official occasions, they are not impersonal official pronouncements; they are often quite personal and written with grace, humor, and an unwavering belief in the power of education to shape a changing world for the better.

Brodhead notes that it is an underappreciated fact that a great deal of the exercise of power by a university leader is done through speaking: by articulating the aspirations of the school and the reasons for its choices, and by voicing the shared sense of mission that gives a learning community its reality. Speaking of Duke accomplishes each of those and demonstrates Brodhead's conviction that higher education is more valuable now than ever.
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Standards Deviation
How Schools Misunderstand Education Policy
James P. Spillane
Harvard University Press, 2004

What happens to federal and state policies as they move from legislative chambers to individual districts, schools, and, ultimately, classrooms? Although policy implementation is generally seen as an administrative problem, James Spillane reminds us that it is also a psychological problem.

After intensively studying several school districts' responses to new statewide science and math teaching policies in the early 1990s, Spillane argues that administrators and teachers are inclined to assimilate new policies into current practices. As new programs are communicated through administrative levels, the understanding of them becomes increasingly distorted, no matter how sincerely the new ideas are endorsed. Such patterns of well-intentioned misunderstanding highlight the need for systematic training and continuing support for the local administrators and teachers who are entrusted with carrying out large-scale educational change, classroom by classroom.

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Starting, Strengthening and Managing Institutional Repositories
Jonathan A. Nabe
American Library Association, 2010

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Stepping Away
Returning to the Faculty After Senior Academic Leadership
Lisa Jasinski
Rutgers University Press, 2023
In no other professional field do senior leaders habitually return to the rank-and-file workforce in the twilight of their careers. Corporate CEOs rarely conclude their working lives by resuming the duties of a mid-level account executive; on the verge of retirement, four-star generals do not return to the infantry. But in academia former senior leaders often conclude their careers by reprising the roles and responsibilities of a professor. Until now, leaders and institutions have been left to navigate these transitions on their own—often learning hard lessons that might have been avoided. Stepping Away moves beyond the well-worn clichés of “stepping down” to examine how senior leadership role changes impact individuals and the institutions they serve. Drawn from empirical research involving more than fifty college presidents, provosts, and deans, this book delivers fresh understanding of the challenges and opportunities leaders face as they assume a new place in the social architecture of their campus. Bridging the gap between theory and practice, Stepping Away translates research into practical strategies that leaders can use to make this change successfully, providing guidance about when to speak up and when to remain quiet, how to develop new relationships, where to office, whether to apply for new jobs, and how to use their knowledge and skills to add value to their campus communities, on-campus and off.
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Strategic Planning for Results
Sandra Nelson
American Library Association, 2008

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Structures of Indifference
An Indigenous Life and Death in a Canadian City
Mary Jane Logan McCallum
University of Manitoba Press, 2018

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Struggle For Academic Democr
Abraham Edel
Temple University Press, 1990
On June 20,1938, the trustees of the City Colleges of New York changed the by-laws on the governance of the colleges. The transformation of New York City's colleges from autocratic to democratic rule virtually overnight was a revolutionary event in American higher education within the context of the 1930s. Abraham Edel writes of this revolution as an active participant and as an eminent philosopher who has experienced more than a half century of educational reform. The book focuses on the meaning and import of democratic organization in the governance of universities, but, at the same time, the author's personal reflections make it an intellectual memoir that charts the evolution of an idea. Labor unionism, the Great Depression, and the rise of fascism shaped the political, social, economic, and intellectual climate of the 1930s. Edel relates this milieu to the authoritarian system of governance in the City Colleges. He describes the growth of a college teachers union, a sit-down strike by students, and the controversy, agitation, and organizing that hurled the teaching staff into political action. He identifies the pioneering significance of this revolution--this experiment in democracy at a time when dictatorship was viewed as more efficient--and examines the lessons learned by sudden rather than piecemeal reform, by human responses to institutional change, and by the relation of ideas to social movements. After tracing the history of this transformation, Edel works toward a philosophy of democratic governance by evaluating the variety of claims for participation in terms of the ultimate mission of the university. Admitting a preference for democratic forms, Edel examines current issues in academic governance and the often acrimonious debate over participation by various groups.
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Students Lead The Library
The Importance Of Student
Carissa Tomlinson
Assoc of College & Research Libraries, 2016

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Success for All
Programs to Support Students Throughout Their College Experience
Melisa N. Choroszy
University of Nevada Press, 2019
While the most important measure of success for many degree-seeking students is the timely attainment of a Bachelor’s degree, there remains a host of other indicators of student success that vary by student population and students’ personal goals. Many of these smaller successes lead to the ultimate goal of graduation and are significant triumphs throughout the journey through higher education.

Success for All is a strategic guide for administrators and educators that offers methods for advising students through the myriad of challenges they face. Every bit of success contributes to the accomplishment of a larger goal, and this book highlights success at every level. It provides a specific roadmap to the research, services, and programs at the University of Nevada, Reno and Truckee Meadows Community College that support student success in undergraduate and graduate programs regardless of a student’s social, emotional, or prior academic experiences. Contributors discuss how to make students feel welcome in their social and educational environments and how to directly assist them with the timely completion of their degree. Administrators and educators demonstrate how these programs help make a positive contribution to the students and the institutions they serve while implementing practical solutions to increase graduation rates.
 
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The Successful Library Trustee Handbook
Mary Y. Moore
American Library Association, 2010

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The Sustainable Learning Community
One University’s Journey to the Future
John Aber
University of New Hampshire Press, 2009
University communities have the potential to serve as models in the development and application of sustainability principles and practices, not only by what they teach and study, but also by how they operate facilities and engage with off-campus partners. With the oldest endowed campus-wide sustainability program in the country, established in 1997, the University of New Hampshire has become a leader in advancing a campus culture of sustainability. The UNH experience provides a unique window into the development of a new and integrated approach to teaching, learning, research, and operations. It is also a valuable guide for other institutions that aim to enhance the quality of campus life while reducing their environmental footprint. The book's organization along four functional domains (curriculum, operations, research, and engagement) allows faculty, staff, students, and managers to focus on sections of particular relevance to their university roles. Each chapter develops standards of best practices and presents interesting case studies to humanize the larger effort.
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