Daniel Willingham--Science & Education
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A Grade for UVa's Board of Visitors

6/21/2012

 
The President of the University of Virginia was forced to resign on June 10. The UVa student newspaper, the Cavalier Daily, used a Freedom of Information request to obtain emails between the Rector (i.e., chair) and Vice Rector of the the University Board of Visitors. The emails from Rector Helen Dragas and Vice Rector Mark Kington expressed great concern that a digital revolution was mounting in higher education, and UVa might be left behind. Their perception that the President was not moving aggressively enough into digital learning was apparently important in their decision to oust Ms. Sullivan.

Here I grade Ms. Dragas and Mr. Kington on their project.

Dear Ms. Dragas & Mr. Kington:

I'm writing to let you know your grade for the Digital Learning Project, as part of your larger grade as Rector and Vice Rector. I wish I brought better news.

On the bright side, let me complement you on your font choice and the formatting of your emails. Further, they feature some unusual words, and a spirit of verve throughout.

But I'm afraid these bright spots pale in comparison to the problems: an immature analysis brought on by terribly shallow research.

On the analysis:

You are right that digital media and especially communication via the Internet will change higher education, and, indeed, has already done so. Unfortunately, your thinking, far from being forward-looking, is at least five years out of date.

Thus, your conclusion that President Sullivan was moving in the wrong direction or at the wrong pace is inaccurate.

Students may flock to online learning providers, but if they do UVa is very much a late-comer to this game. You cite Stanford, MIT, and Harvard, and indeed, all are far ahead of UVa in one aspect of distance education.

But more important, they are engaged in what we might call on-line education 1.0; stick a camera in a traditional lecture, and offer multiple-choice questions later.

This doesn't really fully exploit the power of the Web, does it? How will UVa be better off chasing leaders in this one area, rather than leveraging areas in which we are already a leader? (More on that in a moment.)

I'm not surprised you drew this conclusion, give the sources you cite. Wall Street Journal editorials and New York Times op-eds are not considered primary sources in this context, Ms. Dragas and Mr. Kington. These are non-experts pulling together the opinions of experts as best they can. That's what you are supposed to do, rather than parrot the opinions of others, however highly regarded they may be.

This casual disregard for good research is especially surprising given the rich resources that surround you.

Did you know that the University of Virginia is a leader in digital scholarship, having established the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities in 1992?

Did you know that the University has offered fellowships in digital scholarships to faculty for the last two decades, spawning countless faculty-initated innovations in digital learning. Have you seen the digital model of ancient Rome, or the transcription project of the Salem Witch trials, for example?

Did you know that the Curry School of education has a strong program of Instructional Technology?

Did you know that the Center for the Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning at UVa has several ongoing projects in distance learning for teachers that are being replicated throughout the country?

I could go on and on, but you get the idea. You had tremendous intellectual capital on this subject ready and available. All you had to do was make a few phone calls, but it didn't occur to you to ask.

Now, I can just hear your protests: "You can't judge my views on this matter from a few emails! And they were not based solely on a few New York Times columns!"

In other words, the project submitted does not reflect your best thinking on the subject.

I hear that a lot from students.

But I can only grade you on what you submitted, not based on my best guess as to what you were thinking. And maybe that's part of the problem. If you had let me know what you were thinking, I might have been able to help make this project better. I'm not entirely ignorant on the subject of learning myself.

You have earned a grade of F for this project.

Ms. Dragas, given your performance in the remainder of the Rector's job, I'm afraid I don't see how you're going to pass. Perhaps you should, as Mr. Kington has already done, drop the course.
 

Jessica Connelly
6/21/2012 01:38:45 am

DROP THE COURSE! Well said, thanks for the excellent post

Susanna Nicholson
6/21/2012 01:47:40 am

great post

Robert Geraci
6/21/2012 02:04:14 am

I like this a lot. I do wish we had e-mails going back further. It's still not clear to me whether the flurry of excitement about online education came after a decision that this might become the smoke screen (i.e. the reason given to the public) for Sullivan's ouster. Given how weak the online education "term paper" is, one wonders whether the hostility toward Sullivan came from some earlier, maybe more personal or political difference. Or the demands of one of the rich alumni donors like P. T. Jones. Any thoughts? Does anyone know of Cav Daily attempts to get any old e-mail?

Robert Geraci
6/21/2012 02:15:56 am

FYI: I have just written to the Cav Daily editors asking whether they are expecting to get any older e-mails. One of the sources said that the plot to oust Sullivan was hatched as far back as last October. RG

Tom Hall
6/21/2012 09:24:06 am

I have the same question Robert Geraci asks. I remember a meeting involving Goldman Sachs back in October. OWS folks (including some Faculty and myself) marched up to the President's house to protest. We ended up speaking with a spokesman and not much came of it, but at the time, we were all very suspicious of this activity.

Sam Donelli
6/21/2012 02:34:47 am

Not to take away from this post and the utter failure of BoV but UVa's engineering distance learning is by far the most atrocious thing under the sun. It's a conglomeration of overpriced technology achieving absolutely nothing extraordinary. The courses are open to those who take them with proprietary protection (easily bypassed but engineering "stalwarts" are most likely oblivious to this fact) for the rest of us, peons. For all the smart people and great projects going on at UVa there is also plenty of waste. So unfortunate that Sullivan got ousted because I saw so much potential in her interdepartmental collaboration initiatives.

sherry lotan
6/21/2012 03:35:05 am

love this, thanks

Thomas Talhelm
6/21/2012 04:19:42 am

Couldn't agree more. Dragas claimed "Don't believe everything you read in the news." What else can we do when she refuses calls for transparency and instead holds secret, closed-door meetings?

Robert Geraci
6/21/2012 11:26:49 am

Indeed. Therefore the way I translate that comment is, "Don't believe everything you read in the news, because a lot of it is true, and if people know it I might not get my way." I'm sure that comes closer to what she meant.

Ellen Martin
6/21/2012 11:58:31 pm

Instead we should believe a PR statement authored by a firm which knows even less about the University than Dragas does. That statement, while having some valid points for the University to address moving forward, was a slap in the face for some areas of UVA on the leading edge of their fields, something to which the BOV has not chosen to pay attention.

chris binnig
6/21/2012 04:24:01 am

This may be the best synopsis of the failings of the BOV leadership that I have seen yet -- without even fully delving into the many procedural flaws in their decision-making process. I suggest you provide this directly to the BOV, the Alumni Association, the Governor, the legislature, and anyone else in a position to help fix the BOV leadership's costly mistake.

Kate Cullen
6/21/2012 04:28:57 am

Considering that Dragas et al used a Chronicle of Higher Education article in building support for push towards online education, interesting that they apparently never saw article on same site highlighting the explosion in student cheating to achieve credit for online "education" while never actually doing any of the work.
http://chronicle.com/article/Online-Courses-Can-Offer-Easy/132093/

Betsy Daniel
6/21/2012 09:38:50 am

I don't think any serious research on the subject was ever done by Dragas et al. They made a panicked decision without seeking collaboration from experts in the field.

Robert Geraci
6/21/2012 11:29:16 am

Yes, which is what makes me suspicious that the online education thing was really a red herring.

Paula Damgaard link
6/21/2012 05:12:36 am

Excellently written Dan!!

Frank
6/21/2012 05:25:04 am

While we're grading, it's spelled "compliment."

John Varela
6/21/2012 05:59:40 am

And it should be "giveN the sources you cite", though that might be a simple typo. Complement for compliment, however, does look like an error.

David
6/21/2012 06:04:11 am

You're a generous grader, Dr. Willingham.

Carol
6/21/2012 06:49:48 am

Bravo. Thank you.

Pamela Colby
6/21/2012 06:50:57 am

this is awesome

Dave Sbarra
6/21/2012 07:43:39 am

Great post, Dan! Really super... Very thoughtful, and I hope lots of ppl read it.

Elijah Meeks link
6/21/2012 08:32:33 am

This just highlights how absurd it is to claim that UVa needs dramatic action to catch up with digital innovation in higher education.

Chris Ripley link
6/21/2012 12:39:27 pm

After learning Goldman will screw their customers any chance they get, I can't understand why anyone would do business with them. It's irrational behavior. An imperfection in the market.

Stacia
6/21/2012 03:43:20 pm

Not really unprecedented, though. Studies show that people are attracted to the emotional content of words! Thus, some people who want to make money find an irresistible pull towards "Goldman," just as people who need to be told what to do are drawn to the "right"-wing.

Tanja Softic´ link
6/21/2012 11:56:30 pm

Bravo!

Lisa Guernsey link
6/22/2012 07:30:08 am

Dan, well done. As someone who graduated from UVA in 1995 with a master's degree in an English course that used and created online materials (I did my thesis in HTML before most people knew what that was), I am so glad to see someone cataloguing the ways that UVA has been ahead of the game.

Here's a piece I wrote for TIME that describes my take on the BOV's thought processes:

UVA’s Ouster: A Symptom of Our “Reboot” Culture

http://ideas.time.com/2012/06/22/uvas-ouster-a-symptom-of-our-reboot-culture/?iid=op-main-lede

-Lisa


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