Take notes at the focus group. In particular, write what you believe to be the most significant finding from each of the three questions asked in the focus group discussion. Post your answer as a comment to this blog entry. The three questions are:
1. What does the Claremont Conversation mean to you? How would you describe your 'scholarly' interaction within CGU and the other colleges?
2. Please describe the scholarly "life of the mind" at CGU?
3. What are specific examples of the nature of your work? To what extent is it emblematic or not of the scholarly life at CGU?
Comments
Q1. The musical knowledge is not established by it self. As medieval people did, it was involved with history (chronology), art (view, concept), psychology (emotional), geometry (notation, rhythmic structure), mathematics (counting), rhetoric (melismatic continuity in text and notes), linguistics(words), politics (e.g. Nationalism, French revolution and industrial revolution influenced music), social (event, e.g. Idea of Enlightenment movement) architecture (structure of motive and phrase), literature (writing, poetry and philosophy) religious (Chant, cantata, mass etc), astronomy (sign) and cultural study. All notations were designed geometrically, counted mathematically, using words by studying poetry, nuance of sound, music and word were put together for psychological effect. When we canalize the music, we have to know where all historical elements came from. The Claremont Conversation means to me relationship to music, to contact other fields, and get more information and learn its field, and the musical knowledge would then become more mature and richer. By sharing our ideas, we develop a unique understanding beyond the narrow world that we relate to within our own specialty of study.Q.2. I am an optimist who believes that every day is a new beginning that brings the chance to discover a better way for living life with music and for being a better person. We are improved by each day’s new experience. I always think that we are not just passing each day, but also we are creating each day individually. Today would not be same as tomorrow. While I was playing the same piece over again, it never comes out in same way. TDNY class at CGU helps me see how to approach my goal with more broad thinking to see an entire mountain rather than focus on a tree by using skillful insight. This is the life of the mind that I know.Q.3. As a pianist and music teacher, I was strongly influenced by my cultural background. I grew up in a big family in Korea. I was taught by my parent’s belief, which was Confucius’s doctrine and philosophy. How to live in this world morally, understanding disciplinary depth, right judgment, and having insight by learning and thinking. With a big family, I had to share with all members of family, and it brought me to thinking objectively. Discipline is like the universe. All elements come together and shows form. When I teach my students, I love to talk about history, art and literature and musical background as well as my philosophy that was influenced by my cultural background.Lively CGU Conversation Takes Place at the Interview Session at Transdisciplinary/IS Session
- What does the Claremont Conversation mean to you?, How would you describe your ‘scholarly’ interaction within CGU and the other colleges?,
- Please describe the Scholary “life of the mind” at CGU,
- What are specific examples of the nature of your work? To what extent is it emblematic or not of the scholarly life at CGU?
Everyone in the room agreed how such interesting and constructive conversations are occurring on campus between their colleagues and during the discussion on the collaborative works. Professor McHenry in his political science for instance has a negative view on some statistical numbers. He sometimes criticizes some statistical numbers due to their origin as well as how it does not represent the reality of things. Some colleagues counteract saying “If you don’t agree with it, why don’t you do it yourself?”Professor David Drew from Sociology Department who study scientists and mathematician also pointed out the alienation depending on what kind of institutions you are in as such as being a faculty of graduate school or undergraduate school. Professor Shaw who facilitates Provost Tea gatherings or brown bag weekly luncheons at CGU also brought out the logistical difficulties of where people are coming from or walking down on campus. She was suggesting that we almost have to structure it by creating situations such as the Transdisciplinary courses. It is true that the Transdisciplinary course with Prof. Horan has been a great place to interact and get to know each other with the people from the other departments. It has especially been hard for someone like myself who commute from place an hour away from CGU.
Division depending on the discipline also creates certain separations between the CGU professors. Prof. McHenry had pointed out the disagreements over qualitative v. quantitative methodology. Prof. Wendy Martin was emphasizing the importance of understanding both quantitative and qualitative methods since both must go together and both disciplines need to understand the importance of both techniques. Prof. Drew also followed agreeing with the two pointing out how the department emphasizes statistical numbers while most of the students write combining both qualitative and quantitative methodologies. He also mentioned how some of the articles of processes of learning mathematics have been written in qualitative methods.
Interestingly, Prof. Brodie has mentioned about how such separation happens with the shift of emphasis from teaching to publishing as well as the commute of the professors. It is hard to teach especially when professors are pressured to publish. There must be more time for the professors to write while the time provided for the students will be reduced. Since I’ve known how Prof. Brodie has been working hard on facilitating students’ gatherings, other than such people like Prof. Shaw and Prof. Horan, the Claremont Graduate University may still allow more interactions between colleagues from different kinds of academic departments than many other universities.
Regarding the nature of the “Claremont conversation”, it was interesting to note Teresa Shaw’s comment that, “It does not flow as naturally as anyone would like”. She commented on the lack of a structure of communication between the professors teaching a certain discipline at CGU and those teaching the same discipline in the undergraduate colleges. So, although their interests coincide; unless they themselves exert a conscious effort to cultivate inter-collegiate relations, in most cases, there is no forum to support such conversation.
Also on the nature of the “Claremont conversation”, Dean McHenry spoke of the ongoing dialogue in the Department of Politics and Policy between those who believe that formal mathematical models and statistical techniques are the only way to produce reliable, “scientific” research and those, like himself, who believe in the great value added of qualitative research. Such intra-departmental conversation is healthy because it challenges set assumptions and encourages creative thinking.
With regards to the issue of the “life of the mind at CGU”, Wendy Martin’s comment on the committee-intensive nature of governance at CGU was interesting. She complained that the administrative duties that professors need to partake in are time-consuming and infringe upon, rather than add to, the life of the mind. David Drew agreed with her and remarked that faculty meetings were the exact opposite of “life of the mind”. Much of the “Claremont conversation” appears to be organizational rather than academic.
Concerning the nature of work at CGU, Dale Berger explained that it was an institutional policy to encourage faculty to undertake joint research and to publish with graduate students. I am sure this stimulates new ideas and increases the eclecticism of Professors’ interests.
Focus Group Discussion: I was very pleased with the roundtable discussion; the selected scholars demonstrated why they were selected. Their candid answers certainly made for a good conversation (a Claremont Conversation that is!). It was really hard to pick which reply as being the most significant for any question. Each uniquely portrayed his/her command of his/her field. Most importantly the perspective that I wanted to highlight, is how closely related to the aim of Claremont Conversation, and to the degree of collaborating, sharing, and crossing the boundaries of the silos as have been represented. For each of the three questions, I will highlight the replies that I thought to be the most significant.
Q1. What does the Claremont Conversation mean to you? How would you describe your 'scholarly' interaction within CGU and the other colleges?
Both Drs. David Drew’s and Dale Berger, had indicated that they have been often contacted and have collaborated with colleagues across the schools of CGU and other colleges. However, the number of interactions with other Claremont colleges seems to be limited. Dr. Drew’s comment “the colleges, while established on the principle of inter-collegial communication, often operate independently as business silos,” which I found surprising that at small private schools is still the case. This was also seconded by Dr. Teresa Shaw’s comment that “faculty members are becoming more like free agents, identify less with their school, but …having allegiances outside Claremont Gradute University.”
Q2. Please describe the scholarly "life of the mind" at CGU?
I thought Dr. Lorne Olfman addressed this well; he highlighted several points:
i. “We are all researchers, and have that stimulation.”
ii. “We have the luxury of having diverse doctoral students: inexperienced in some ways, brilliant in
others.”
iii. “We constantly have conversations that range from administrative matters to “intellectual pursuits.”
iv. Perhaps the time limitations due various activities: conferences, symposiums, and workshops.
Q3. What are specific examples of the nature of your work? To what extent is it emblematic or not of the scholarly life at CGU?
Again I found the comments by Dr. Lorne Olfman to be very interesting. Perhaps this was the first time that I heard in which that the school of ISAT is shifting toward “stringent research themes.” We have been observing the creations of labs within the school that have emphases on different areas of research, that do not seem to conform to the standard IS research. Dr. Olfman comments in this regard: “we said to ourselves, we do not have to publish in the key IS journals, no, we will publish in journals that like the things we like, conferences we find interesting, …, we want to do things that are exciting and stimulating for our students, rather than staying in a tight silo.” He further elaborated about the teams and conversations model.
First, thanks to Daniel for the only person posting their notes (mine were all mental notes and also very sloppy). But thanks to Daniel I was able to reconstruct last week from the data he transcribed.
Second, I believe that last week’s meeting of the minds was a success. I, for one, found it highly beneficial to hear from such a diverse and seasoned set of educators and researchers. I think together the veteran group topped the century mark in years of service at CGU.
Making my way into the list of questions, it was important for me to hear that each professor was a fervent supporter of the transdisciplinary course and what it hopes to achieve. I was skeptical at first, but their support was not from any obligatory duty, since each is already tenured at CGU, but because the world needs a more transdisciplinary set of scholars. Besides, each professor is already established and would have no fear of speaking his or her own mind if they felt an urge to do so.
And of all the topics discussed throughout the evening, it was the notion of transdisciplinary study and furthering high-level discourse at CGU that was continually revisited. On the negative side, our focus group felt that the biggest threat to the conversation was an overburden of administrative duties. Laurie Martin specifically mentioned that a major problem is that although CGU is a small university (in terms of population), administratively it is run like a big university. This results in a lot of red tape that handcuffs faculty and to some degree thwarts creativity.
This is not to say the Conversation doesn’t exist. Many in our focus group do in fact communicate regularly with colleagues from other schools. It was also a surprising discovery that many CGU faculty hold degrees from different fields. For example, David Drew is Professor in the School of Education Studies, however his background is in Sociology and Lorne received his degree from the Business School at Indiana. However, each feels that the conversation can and should expand and that the Presidents Coffee is a step in the days of old when the faculty would converse over tea.
In response to question two and the “life of the mind” at CGU, Lorne’s comment spoke volumes for me. Lorne, Dean of the School of Information Systems and Technology, talked about how CGU, being the only stand-alone graduate university in the country, is unique in that all faculty interact exclusively with graduate students. And because of the close relationships faculty have with students (and vice versa) learning at CGU is two ways and students are able to bounce ideas off faculty just as faculty are able to feed from the experience and inquiries of their students. This concept not only provides fuel for the “life of the mind” but it also adds to the conversation as well.
Lastly, I found the high level approach to our questions difficult in discovering the insights for each professor’s individual research. In fact, Dale Berger was the only professor, whom I can recall, that talked about his own work. He mentioned that ‘ideas’ are always floating around. He then talked about his trip to the UK and what brought him to research on the topic of drunk driving. But discussion quickly returned to the important aspect of collaboration when he talked about his trip to Australia. While a visiting scholar in Australia, one of Dale’s colleagues remarked that he was surprised to see [Dale] eating with the larger group of faculty, stating that most Americans prefer to eat alone (after witnessing a previous American scholar spending lunchtime tucked away in his office throughout the duration of his stay).
Apparently, the rest of the world has been focusing on collaboration for some time…
In reflecting back on the focus group, I wish that there would have been more focus on individual creativity. I think the creative individuality of our focus group members got a bit lost in the ruminations about lack of “conversation” at CGU and the Claremont Colleges in general. Looking at the structure of the Colleges and how it does or does not support interactions and “conversation’ between faculty and students from different colleges is a central theme, but I feel that this theme became the main focus of the focus group instead of a theme alongside the examination of our faculty’s personal and professional creativity. Just a thought…
I did find Wendy’s comments about the tension between faculty loyalties between their institution and their professional organizations interesting. I never really ascertained a tension, but now that it has been brought up, I can see where this might be the case. Faculty, like most people now a days, have a limited amount of time to get things done, and with both their institution and professional or outside affiliations vying for their precious time, I can see a possible point of contention.
Dr. Drew’s comments about the extraordinariness of our faculty (with Dr. Horan as a notable mention) and how they are transdisciplinary themselves, I felt, was a very relevant comment – who know Peter Drucker taught courses in Japanese Art or that Dr. Horan is writing a novel? I think this comment is a great contender for a “soundbite” type of thing.
[On behalf of Group 1, including Tomomi, Nathan, Nicole, Daniel, Gudiel, Jung Sook Lee-French, Fred Clarke, and Sam Andress]
There were three main points the focus group highlighted on the scholarly interaction and the status of the Claremont Conversation:
• Logistics
• Time Constraints
• Narrow Interests
Logistics concerned the physical barriers that hindered the transdisciplinary communication, such as the physical placement of the offices and departments on campus, and the physical distance between them. Physical distance hindered the conversation whether it was between the different building and departments on campus, or whether it was to and from campus. Concerning on-campus physical distance, the professors noted how transdisciplinary conversations are harder to maintain between departments located on opposite sides of campus: It is much easier to communicate and collaborate between people when they walk by each other in the halls of the same building on a daily basis. Some professors lamented that too many professors spend all their time in their offices and don’t get out enough to communicate with the other faculty. Janet Brodie offered up an anecdote in the meeting about how perhaps the faculty should switch offices every now and then, just to see and interact with different faces. The other professors brought up similar anecdotes, such as an Australian university that had “tea time,” in which all the faculty would just get together and have tea, while talking about their current research. Another issue brought up on physical distance was the long commute to and from campus many students have to take. Some students have to take two or three hour commutes to reach campus, and are only available one day a week, hindering their ability to communicate and collaborate with others even within their own department. There was mention of a sense that if you do not live near Claremont, you’re not a real part of the community or conversation. Also mentioned were the barriers to living in Claremont, such as the cost and quality of the housing. Concerning this issue, Janet Brodie brought up how it used to be a requirement that all Claremont students actually live in Claremont. She mentioned how back then, there was a professor who would invite students over to his home for get-togethers, where they would have a meal and just talk about whatever they’re doing research on at the moment.
Another issue brought up was the time constraints that hindered the Claremont Conversation. The professors expressed that there are too many committees and administrative tasks eating up their time, and that they do not have much time for their own projects, let alone interdisciplinary communication. They pointed out that while they do meet and interact often, it’s only for administrative tasks and not actual interdisciplinary work. All the professors acknowledge that interdisciplinary communication is important, but by stating that they do not have time for it on top of everything else they’re doing, it is implied that it is not as important as their other tasks. Part of this is due to the reward structure: There is no structure and no incentives to promote conversation between departments and schools. It was pointed out that all the professors who showed up to the focus group were tenured. Concerning this, it was suggested that non-tenured faculty would not have bothered showing up, and that if tenured faculty are having trouble finding the time for interdisciplinary communication and collaboration, it does not bode well or the Claremont Conversation.
Another issue is the narrow interests of such a small school. An example is the School of Information Science and Technology, which only has five professors. These professors all have different complementary interests. If the students have a certain interest, they know which professor to go to. With only five professors, there’s no room for overlap. The different narrow subfields within the school have to be addressed. The point of the example is that with such a small number of professors, it is hard to find any two professors with similar interests. The incentive structure is another issue. Here at Claremont, there is a strong focus on publishing over communication. Faculty is more encouraged to publish with students rather than other faculty. There is essentially little reward for faculty interaction. The way the reward structure is set up encourages the same conservative type of work, and not communication across departments.
In respond to CGU activities, I noticed that many faculty talked about their frustration towards administrative meetings and tasks. I have the feeling though they are very encouraging on research interaction and collaboration point of view and they mentioned about clinic projects they have involved in with faculty from other undergraduate Claremont colleges. They asked for more "structures" to promote this kind of "Claremont conversation", including various conferences, research projects, committees, and exchanging professors to teach courses at alias colleges or departments. Also i feel a strong confidence in these faculty that both CGU faculty and students (especially phd students like us) have the quality and potential to work together on carrying on quality research studies. Also most of these faculty are more satisfied towards conversations within their own department compared to outside environment.
Another couple CGU students and I were once invited by Professor Chatterjee at CGU School of IS to a Boeing clinic project at Harvey Mudd College. I found the experience very valuable and enjoyable, not only it provided me knowledge and hands-on practice in GPS systems and Opnet modeling tool, but also get to know different research methods, analytic patterns, and working styles from undergrad students and faculty. I certainly suggest that we initiate more projects like this.
Take notes at the focus group. In particular, write what you believe to be the most significant finding from each of the three questions asked in the focus group discussion. Post your answer as a comment to this blog entry.
1. What does the Claremont Conversation mean to you? How would you describe your 'scholarly' interaction within CGU and the other colleges?
Pretty much amount of talks from professors in the focus group discussion was about two major research methodologies: quantitative and qualitative. I am not sure about that personal inclination decides a researcher’s favorite research methodology. Usually, it is said that quantitative people are familiar with numbers and statistics, and they tend to consider qualitative researches not rigorous because in many cases those researches cannot be proved using numbers. However, qualitative people who are more familiar with stories tend to think that quantitative researches cannot describe details and express some humanistic things, which might be more important than numbers. Therefore, usually researchers in both sides have not interacted much with each other. However, as professors said, there are needs for researchers to combine two methodologies together to do a more valuable research. CGU is a small university and has a potential capability to combine those two things effectively.
2. Please describe the scholarly "life of the mind" at CGU?
There might be many obstacles for the “life of the mind” at CGU such as admin work load, teaching load, or research load. As Dr. David Drew said in his experience of visiting the Uni. of Arkansas, in a big university even faculties who are in the same field cannot know each other. In this situation, it might be even more difficult for faculties in different disciplines to get to know each other. However, as Dr. Olfman and Dr. McHenry said, CGU have many possibilities to cooperate with each other because it is small and provides more opportunities to meet each other.
The talks about the interaction between faculties and Ph. D students were quite interesting to me. According to their talks, there can be two approaches. One approach is that faculties wait Ph. D students to choose and do their own researches, and the other is that faculties give them research topics. In my opinion, as Dr. Olfman said, the half-way approach can bring more benefits for both students and faculties. Faculties can sometimes do the “stringent” researches for funds with students by giving research topics and sometimes make students to do independently motivation. Students also can obtain some ideas for their dissertation from the given research topic or develop them to new ideas. Practically speaking, student can even finish their degree sooner through these kinds of collaborative works.
3. What are specific examples of the nature of your work? To what extent is it emblematic or not of the scholarly life at CGU?
Professors talked about some examples of the nature of their works from their own experiences. Among these examples, there were interesting two different points of view. Dr. Drew said that talking to other scholars is more enhancing than attending conferences. However, Dr. McHenry said that it is refreshing to attend some conferences since he meets new faces and listens to the different people presenting different views. I think that these two views show well what the strengths and weaknesses of Claremont conversation are. A small, closely related society may have benefits in terms of seamless and costless interaction between members. But the premise of these benefits are the fact that new perspectives and information should inflow continuously from outside to make the closely related society sustain refreshed.
Question 1) I was suprised to discover the immediate response of how little "conversation" happens among the faculty at CGU. Obviously, there is conversation that happens yet mostly it is comprised of "administrative" tasks according to the faculty. They seemed discuss the lack of time dedicated towards engaging in scholarly dialogue and how little they know of it happening around campus currently. The faculty did point to the fact that there is the structure in place for conversations, for example the President's Coffee, however is this meeting time genuinely dedicated to discuss scholarship or merely administrative and/or departmental business with the president?
Question 2) I liked Dr. Drew's genuine statements about learning from his doctoral students. He said it is a mutual learning process in which he teaches but also learns from a diverse community of students in his class. At times, his ideas are generated from the interaction with his students. Teresa Shaw also included her sparks of inspiration happen, at times, when talking with her colleagues. Either faculty at CGU or faculty within her professional groups, she has moments in which she learns of new research. I thought maybe someone would talk about how to nurture the mind, keep their research techniques fresh, or how they recharge their committment to research however no one spoke to this specifically. I would have accepted devices such as playing pool for an hour daily, or hiking, cooking, reading comics, anything... but the faculty did not reveal any such details.
Question 3) I did find it interesting that most faculty recruited to CGU, according to Drew and Olfman, have the ability to teach interdisciplinary courses. Most of the faculty have been trained in a different discipline than they are currently teaching... it does not hinder the curriculum but enhances the work and insights the students obtain. I thought this was a unique element about CGU. In any event, it does speak to the conversation we refer to. It may take a different approach and not readily apparent, but it is representative of a dialogue the university is participating in.
1. What does the Claremont Conversation mean to you? How would you describe your 'scholarly' interaction within CGU and the other colleges?
I really emphasized with Dr. Shaw in the focus group. As a part-timer myself at CGU, and a full-time staff member at another university, I can empathize about trying to get research done without a lot of time or institutional support.
2. Please describe the scholarly "life of the mind" at CGU?
In many ways, the group of faculty was rather pessimistic. They constantly pointed out ways in which their primary roles at CGU prevented them from the casual contact needed to really build relationships. However, I have to slightly feel that they could probably do something about it. As Dr. Martin said, it is possible to decrease the amount of committee work, and there have been some very successful people that started informal discussion groups on campus.
3. What are specific examples of the nature of your work? To what extent is it emblematic or not of the scholarly life at CGU?
Most of the faculty, when pushed to specifics, had some very positive stories. Whether they were Dr. Shaw’s informal religious group, or collaborations between the SISAT & Economics department, most of the professors had some encouraging stories.
1. It seems as though a fair amount of scholarly conversation goes on within a University, but not in the way in which many on the panel wished that it would. For example, Professor McHenry indicated that he had plenty of opportunity to discuss research with other PP faculty (and criticize their datasets). The chance to have a more open discourse outside of departmental or subdepartmental field lines, however, isn't readily available, and is sorely missed.
2. I believe that holding these interviews so soon after strategic planning sessions, or some other sort of faculty meeting biased the results. Coming so close on the heels of such a non-scholastic type of discussion, of course the focus group members would feel less inclined to comment on the more positive aspects of CGU's "life of the mind" environment, and more inclined to vent frustration. I believe that with different timing, we might get quite different results.
3. Although opportunities to consult with other faculty members in an open, transdisciplinary manner tend not to be readily available, it appears as though most faculty spend a fair amount of their time working with students. This is extremely positive in terms of providing benefit for the students at CGU, and can be very good for the faculty as well, provided a sufficient level of student quality.
The Claremont conversation to me meant that the faculty and graduate students here were supposed to interact on a casual and scholarly level. Ranging from symposium to seeing each other at lunch and coffee breaks, or at afternoon concerts or CGU art exhibits. Unfortunately due to the commuting culture it is impossible to have this interaction. The traffic, lack of time and energy, and demands of daily life have taken this treasure away from us. When Janet Brodie mentioned that the faculty at one point had to live in Claremont to teach at Claremont it really struck me with an idea about how nice that must have been. You would see these role models not just in the classroom but in the day to day setting. Even for the graduate students, it would be a much tighter knit community if the school provided first class housing with the latest technology and methods of comfort! This has been proven essential in the learning process. Many great relationships could potentially be formed between students that in the past would lead to long-term relationships and marriage which is an essential part of living life. Spending 2-3 hours by yourself in your car commuting does not foster any kind of social skills and you can’t talk in class more than 5 or 10 ten minutes before or after a lecture. Therefore there are virtually no opportunities to talk, maybe we need CGU Myspace?
2. Please describe the scholarly "life of the mind" at CGU?
I like Dr. David Drew’s explanation of “life of the mind” at CGU. He talked about how everyone at one point or another was the dean of there different departments and that this perspective and chance to be in charge of the program is beneficial. It helps to bring about new ways of thought and approach to teaching which may have never happened if you just had one stubborn old dean that was set in his ways and comfortable not changing anything because of the hassle and personal laziness! That’s no excuse especially since they happen to make so much money!
3. What are specific examples of the nature of your work? To what extent is it emblematic or not of the scholarly life at CGU?
I was surprised to hear from the Professor that mentioned the excessive amount of bureaucracy and meetings we have at CGU. That is such a colossal waste of valuable time and energy. Communication is essential but checking your email 10 times an hour is not good, and it seemed like this was the trend at CGU. Why are the other schools at CGU so obsessed with building walls around the different campuses to show their “turf”. Why is there no centralized student center like at UCLA where they have the Kerkoff Hall coffee shop where the entire school meets not just Graduates, or the Ackerman Union Center where you have another meeting place for the entire campus. If anything lets put a huge fence around CGU and keep out the homeless and transients that are annoying our students and security!