Professonal Development Day

Keynote Address: "The Power of One: Rethinking our Role in the Transition, Retention, and Success of Students"

Stephanie M. Foote, Ph.D. is the Assistant Vice President for Teaching, Learning, and Evidence-Based Practices at the John N. Gardner Institute for Excellence in Undergraduate Education. Prior to joining the Institute staff in August 2017, Stephanie was a professor of education, the founding director of the Master of Science in First-Year Studies, and the faculty fellow for High-Impact Practices at Kennesaw State University (KSU). Her scholarship and consultative work span a variety of aspects of student development and transition, including: the role of first-year seminars and experiential pedagogy on student engagement in the early college experience, the community college transfer student transition, self-authorship development, engagement and learning in online environments, faculty development, metacognitive teaching and learning approaches, and high-impact educational practices. Stephanie is a recipient of the McGraw-Hill Excellence in Teaching First-Year Seminars award.

Keynote Address: "Journey to Success"

Jeffrey J. Selingo is a best-selling author and award-winning columnist who helps parents and higher-education leaders imagine the college and university of the future and how to succeed in a fast-changing economy. His latest book, There Is Life After College (HarperCollins), explores how today's young adults need to navigate school for the job market of tomorrow.

Jeff is also the author of College (Un)Bound: The Future of Higher Education and What It Means for Students, a New York Times bestselling education book in 2013, and MOOC U: Who Is Getting the Most Out of Online Education and Why.

A regular contributor to the Washington Post, Jeff is a special advisor and professor of practice at Arizona State University and a visiting scholar at Georgia Tech's Center for 21st Century Universities. He is the former top editor of the Chronicle of Higher Education, where he worked for 16 years in a variety of reporting and editing roles.

His writing has also appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Slate. He is a senior advisor and professor of practice at Arizona State University and a visiting scholar at the Center for 21st Century Universities at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Jeff received a bachelor's degree in journalism from Ithaca College and a master's degree in government from the Johns Hopkins University. He lives with his wife and two daughters in Chevy Chase, Maryland.

Keynote Address: "Maximizing Academic Advising to Promote Student Success''

Speaker: Dr. Charlie Nutt

Charlie L. Nutt was appointed as the Executive Director of the National Academic Advising Association in October 2007. Prior to this he served as the Associate Director of the Association for five years. Additionally, he was also Vice President for Student Development Services at Coastal Georgia Community College for nine years and Assistant Professor of English/Director of Advisement and Orientation for six years. He received his A.A. from Brunswick College, B.S.Ed. from the University of Georgia, M.Ed. and Ed.D. in Higher Educational Leadership from Georgia Southern University.

Dr. Nutt has had vast experience in education. In addition to his fifteen years as a teacher and administrator at Coastal Georgia Community College, he has taught English in grades 9-12, served as a department chair and assistant principal in a high school, served as Director of Development and Admission at a private K-12 institution. Presently, he teaches graduate courses in the College of Education in the Department of Counseling and Educational Psychology. He has also been instrumental in the development of the NACADA/K-State graduate certificate in academic advising and several other NACADA professional development initiatives, NACADA's Global Initiatives and the creation of the Center for Research and Excellence in Academic Advising and Student Success to open at Kansas State University in 2017.

Keynote Presentation:  "Promoting First-Year Student Success Across Campus: Seven Timeless & Universal Principles"

This workshop will make a research-based case that student success depends on both student effort and institutional effort, i.e., it involves an inescapable, reciprocal relationship between what the university does for its students and what students do for themselves. Research suggests that there are timeless, universal principles underlying student motivation, retention (persistence to degree completion) and academic achievement. In this interactive presentation, seven research-based principles of student learning, motivation, and persistence will be identified along with high-priority, high-impact practices for implementing each of them, inside and outside the classroom. These universal principles may be used as a foundation for building a student-centered campus culture unified by common language and common practices that promote student success across academic disciplines and organizational divisions of the university.

Speaker:  Dr. Joe Cuseo 

Joe Cuseo holds a doctoral degree in Educational Psychology and Assessment from the University of Iowa and a Professor Emeritus of Psychology. For more than 25 years, he directed the first-year seminar—a core college-success course required of all new students. 

Currently, Joe serves as an educational advisor and consultant for AVID—a non-profit organization whose mission is to promote the college access and success of underserved student populations. 

He's a 14-time recipient of the “faculty member of the year award” on his home campus—a student-driven award based on effective teaching and academic advising, a recipient of the “Outstanding First-Year Student Advocate Award” from the National Resource Center for The First-Year Experience and Students in Transition, and a recipient of the “Diamond Honoree Award” from the American College Personnel Association (ACPA) for contributions made to student development and the Student Affairs profession. 

Joe has authored articles and books on student learning and development, the most recent of which are:

• Thriving in College and Beyond: Research-Based Strategies for Academic Success & Personal Development
• Humanity, Diversity, & The Liberal Arts: The Foundation of a College Education
• Peer-to-Peer Leadership: Transforming Student Culture 

He has delivered hundreds of campus workshops and conference presentations across North America, as well as Europe, Asia, Australia, and the Middle East.

Keynote Presentation - "The Human Touch: Cocommunication and Online Education"

Speaker: Jill Schiefelbein

Combine an entrepreneurial thinker, a college professor, a professional speaker and a communication expert, and you get Jill Schiefelbein.

With eight years of business-building, ten years of university teaching, sixteen years of speaking experience and a desire to help businesses reach their goals, Jill is uniquely positioned to help you and your business utilize dynamic communication to accelerate results.

er first business, Impromptu Guru, received the 2012 “Rookie of the Year” award and the 2014 “Volunteer of the Year” award from the Gilbert Chamber of Commerce in Gilbert, Arizona—one of CNN/Money Magazine’s most livable cities. She went on to launch a national talk radio show, facilitate training and media coaching for the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury and the NFL’s Players Networking Event at SuperBowls XLVII and XLVIII, and launched an educational video campaign on public speaking and communication skills that continues to reach thousands of viewers around the world each week.

Prior to Impromptu Guru, Jill worked as the Communication Manager for a national franchise, was a faculty member at Arizona State University, and established a nationally-recognized presence in the online education community by starting up two major online education offices at the largest university in the country, increasing online tuition revenue by nearly a million dollars in her first eight months. She is still called on by universities and publishers to consult on the digitization of education and effective online communication practices.

She is the author of two books, Business and Professional Communication in the Global Workplace (Cengage-Wadsworth, 2009) and The Athlete’s Media Playbook (Impromptu Guru, 2013), is quoted in multiple articles and book chapters, and is no stranger to the physical and virtual speaking stage.

In August 2014, Jill relocated to New York City to expand her practice and, in November of 2014 launched The Dynamic Communicator.

Keynote Presentation - "Enhancing Student Learning"

Keynote Speaker - Dr. Michael Wesch

Dubbed “the prophet of an education revolution” by the Kansas City Star and 'the explainer' by Wired Magazine, Wesch is a recipient of the highly coveted “US Professor of the Year” Award from the Carnegie Foundation. After two years studying the implications of writing on a remote indigenous culture in the rain forest of Papua New Guinea, he turned his attention to the effects of social media and digital technology on global society and education. His videos on culture, technology, education, and information have been viewed over 20 million times, translated in over 20 languages, and are frequently featured at international film festivals and major academic conferences worldwide.

Wesch has won several major awards for his work, including a Wired Magazine Rave Award, the John Culkin Award for Outstanding Praxis in Media Ecology, and he was named an Emerging Explorer by National Geographic. After years of experimenting with social media and assessing the learning potential of these tools, Wesch argues that they don’t automatically foster significant learning or establish genuine empathy or meaningful bonds between professors and students. Using social media is but one of the many possible ways to connect, but the message that Wesch’s experimentation brings is that only genuine connections may restore the sense of joy and curiosity that we hope to instill in our students.

Keynote Speaker:  Dr. Temple Grandin

Our keynote speaker will be Dr. Temple Grandin, a professor at Colorado State University. Dr. Grandin is also a best-selling author, autism activist, and consultant to the livestock industry on animal behavior with relevant and cutting edge information on Autism and Asperger's for educators.

Dr. Grandin will bring inspiring stories of achievement from successful adults with autism, Asperger's, and ADHD in preparation for students with special needs at Pittsburg State University.

This keynote is open only to PSU faculty and staff who register for this event.

Dr. Grandin will also be speaking at Pittsburg's Memorial Auditorium, Wednesday, August 14th at 6:00pm. Everyone is welcome and there is no admission fee for this event.

Keynote Speakers:  Dr. Phillip Turner and Dr. Brenda McCoy

Dr. Philip Turner, author of “Next Generation Course Redesign,” and his colleague, Dr. Brenda McCoy, were the keynote speakers.

Dr. Phil Turner has been a classroom teacher, a librarian, a college professor, and the owner of an information company. He served simultaneously as an academic dean and the lead administrator for distance learning at two institutions: The University of Alabama and the University of North Texas. Dr. Turner is Professor Emeritus at the University of North Texas and serves as a consultant to their Next Generation Course Redesign Project. He has written extensively on the subject of the application of technology to the teaching and learning process and is currently researching and writing in the area of online training in public libraries. His latest book is Next Generation Course Redesign published by Peter Lang.

Dr. Brenda McCoy is the Director of Applied Professional Programs at the University of North Texas which includes Alternative Dispute Resolution, the Bachelor of Applied Arts & Sciences (BAAS) degree program, and Non-Profit Studies. Dr. McCoy’s academic background is in sociology. She has been actively involved in UNT’s Next Generation Course Redesign™ Project since 2008 and has redesigned and implemented an introductory sociology course, a cross-disciplinary course in research methods, and a course on civic engagement. She is currently developing a new BAAS program assessment model using data from required courses which have been redesigned. Her scholarly interests include pedagogy and engaged learning strategies. Dr. McCoy regularly conducts workshops and gives presentations on the need for new instructional approaches in higher education.