GLCA New Directions Initiative

The Great Lakes Colleges Association has received a generous grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to launch the New Directions Initiative. The program's focus is to support the renewal and continued professional growth of liberal arts faculty members in `mid-career' - the extensive professional period between receiving tenure and thinking seriously about retirement.

A particular emphasis of this program is to encourage faculty members to think outside traditional boundaries and divisions of their discipline and of typical faculty work. Three themes within the initiative capture this emphasis; however, a proposal need not be directed at a particular theme:

• To Broaden Intellectual Perspectives, helping mid-career faculty to expand their horizons and understand issues beyond the context of their own disciplines
• To Stimulate Innovation in Pedagogy, providing opportunities for faculty to sharpen pedagogy, based on expanding knowledge and best practices for teaching both within and beyond particular fields of study;
• To Consider Career Options, which accord individual faculty members the time required to explore a new career direction.

Proposals will be reviewed three times in the fall and the spring.

Fall 2011 review dates: September 19, October 31, and December 12.

Spring 2012 review dates: February 6, April 2, and June 4.

A call for proposals, program description and forms can be found at:  http://www.glca.org/images/stories/New_Directions/New_Directions_CFP_2011-12.pdf

Albion Informational Meetings: Tuesday, August 30, 2011.

• Individual meetings with Program Officers Greg Wegner and Simon Gray are available throughout the day. 

• Lunch from noon to 1:00

• Faculty Social in the Wendell Will Room, 4:00-5:30

To sign up for an individual meeting or for lunch, please email or call (0776) Beth Lincoln, Albion Campus Facilitator.

GLCA Faculty Contact and Collaborator Form Please fill out and email a copy to Beth Lincoln if you are interested in finding collaborators (or having potential collaborators find you) within the GLCA.