2010 Site Visitors - John Newell
| Email: | newellj@cofc.edu |
| Institution: | College of Charleston |
| Address: | Honors College |
| Phone: | (843) 953-7154 |
| Fax: | (843) 953-7135 |
| Institution Type: | Public |
| Program Type: | Institution-wide |
| Program Enrollment: | 697 |
| Present Position: | Dean of the Honors College (since 2005) |
| Previous Honors Positions: | Director of the Honors Program, 1999-2005 |
| NCHC Membership Dates: | 1999-present |
NCHC Activities Related to Honors Program Assessment: In addition to attending the Site Visitor Training in 2006 and 2008, I have attended every NCHC conference since 1999. In addition to the programs on Developing in Honors, I have attended many of the sessions and workshops on assessment and evaluation. I attended this summer's workshop in Portland, OR on assessmetn and evaluation as well as the Site Visitor Training Institute.
Activities in other areas or organizations related to honors assessment or site visits, workshops, etc. regarding honors programs/colleges and/or other academic areas: In additon to NCHC, I have attended the majority of the SRHC conferences since 1999. At these meetings I have participated in workshops on assessment and evlauation and have engaged in conversations with colleagues from other colleges and universities about what works or does not work at their campuses and why. I was also a member of the Assessment and Evaluation Board at the College of Charleston in the late eighties and ealry nineties.
Other activities relevant to those seeking honors program/college site visitors: Prior to becoming Director of the Honors Program at the College of Charleston, I was very actively involved in faculty development both at the College of Charleston and in the Southern Regional Faculty and instructional Development Consortium, in which I served as an officer. I served as Co-director of the College's Center for Effective Teaching and Learning. In that position, I led faculty development workshops; brought in outside speaker like Maryellen Weimer, John Zubizaretta, and Barbara Millis; and instituted an annual workshops for creating teaching portfolios.
On the Role of the Site Visitor as Consultants & Program Reviewers: Having graduated from an Honors Program as an undergraduate in the 60’s, taught regularly in Honors classes since 1980, and been the director of an Honors Program, now Honors College, since 1999, I have a strong sense of both the value of an Honors education and the diversity of Honors. I perceive the job of site visitors as to help Honors Programs and Honors Colleges to know their own programs better. As outsiders, we can look at programs and policies with a fresh and unbiased eye; we can ask apparently stupid questions that may sometimes provide revealing answers; and we can make an informed evaluation of what is working well for Honors at this institution and what is not. If we do all of those things well, we can make suggestion for ways of maintaining and improving Honors at the visited college and we can serve as advocates for the value and benefits of a strong Honors program or college with the administrators at this institution.
What is perhaps just as important is what we should not do as site visitors. First we should not go in with the view of recreating our program at this institution. As NCHC repeatedly says, “no one model of an Honors Program can be superimposed on all types of institutions.” What is Honors varies from one institution to another, and what works for Honors varies from one institution to another. Our task as site reviewers is to identify as far as we are able what will work best for Honors at this particular institution. Second, we must not come in with preconceptions about what is right or wrong at an institution. Yes, the files and materials that we receive beforehand should help us formulate the right questions to ask, but we should not think we know the answers until we have asked those questions and thought about the answers we have received. Finally we should not be necessarily advocates for either change or continuity. Where there are programs and policies that are working well and seem the right fit for the institution, we should applaud them and urge that they continue. Where there are programs and policies that are not working well or do not seem the right fit for the institution, we should question them and ask whether change should be considered.
John H. Newell
Dean of the Honors College
College of Charleston