Leadership Development through Role-Play

There is much conversation nationally about declining faculty engagement in shared governance and leadership. At the same time there is a clear need for a stronger faculty voice as higher education faces increasing constraints and calls for accountability from external stakeholders. An interview study with new faculty on our campus revealed their sense of unpreparedness to engage in broader issues affecting higher education and, potentially, their careers, beyond their research and teaching. Addressing this disengagement through faculty development efforts with new faculty offered us the opportunity to begin steps intended to reverse those trends and to help develop our campus’s future faculty leaders.