Departmental Change: Engaging in a Change Initiative
Joel Corbo, University of Colorado Boulder; Courtney Ngai, Colorado State University; Gina Quan, San José State University; Sarah Wise, University of Colorado Boulder
The Departmental Action Team (DAT) Project supports departments as they make changes to their undergraduate programs. In previous posts, we described the principles that underlie the DAT Project and the initial stages of DAT formation. In this post, we'll share some of what DATs and facilitators do as they engage in a change initiative together. If you are interested in learning more, we are leading a free interactive webinar (Tuesday, March 30, 12-1:30pm EST) about facilitating change using the DAT model. Register for the webinar.

2023 Transforming Institutions Conference Takeaways
Casey Wright, Western Michigan University
The 2023 Transforming Institutions Conference was held June 12-13, 2023, in Minneapolis, MN. With this most recent convening, we are proud to have brought together change researchers and change agents for 12 years. The meeting was made possible by the efforts of a conference planning committee consisting of 10 change agents convened by NSEC (Network of STEM Education Centers) and ASCN (Accelerating Systemic Change Network), supported by 40 reviewers from the systemic change community. Now that the dust has settled, we would like to share some key takeaways, attendee feedback, and future conference plans to continue to build momentum for our community to thrive with change.

Increasing Student Success in STEM: A Guide to systemic institutional change
Increasing Student Success in STEM: A Guide to systemic institutional change From AAC&U and PKAL, authored by Elrod and Kezar is aimed at campus leaders and administrators who are leading comprehensive ...

Responding to Racism
Inese Berzina-Pitcher, Western Michigan University
In response to the events that took place in Charlottesville, we sent ASCN members an email with a subject line – "How shall we respond to racism?" in which we condemned these appalling displays of racism, violence, and ignorance, and discussed how they brought to light the importance of education in fighting racism and promoting equity and inclusion. We also reaffirmed that fighting racism and promoting equity and inclusion are a daily responsibility, and an important priority in our work.

Communities of Transformation and their work scaling STEM reform
Communities of Transformation and their work scaling STEM reform A. Kezar and S. Gehrke, Pullias Center for Higher Education. A mixed-methods study of four STEM communities (BioQUEST, PKAL, POGIL and SENCER) to ...

Happy National Mentoring Month!
Patricia Marsteller, Emory University
Since Odysseus left Mentor in charge of his family, estates, and his son, the art and science of mentoring has been critical to guiding career and educational development. Like Mentor, I aim to be a wise and trusted counselor, guide, guardian, and teacher or as the title of a widely read book indicates, an Adviser, Teacher, Role Model, Friend (National Academies of Sciences, 1997). I have learned that mentoring is an alliance between people and that both mentors and mentees benefit from agreements about how the relationship will evolve and how to include social support, career development, and growth. With faculty, graduate students, and undergraduates, mentoring often involves getting to know the whole person, their aims and aspirations, and their qualms about the future. Connecting students to the right resources or empowering them to bring up difficult questions with their faculty or research mentors requires that you be open, listen carefully, and know them as persons.

The Science Education Initiative Handbook
Stephanie Chasteen and Warren Code
× The Science Education Initiative Handbook This book offers advice on implementing a department-level changes to curricula and instructional practices facilitated by Discipline-Based Educational Specialists ...

Learning from Evaluation of Effective Teaching Event: Change Leaders Perspectives
Madhura Kulkarni, Northern Kentucky University; Rachel Renbarger, Western Michigan University
At the end of August, three ASCN working groups came together to put on an event called, "Evaluation of effective and inclusive teaching: How can teaching and learning center professionals be involved in change for social justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion?" (We will refer to social justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion as JEDI for ease throughout this post.) We recommend that people interested in the event watch the recording and access the resources on the event page, but the purpose of this blog post is to highlight what we learned from this event so that other change agents can implement the findings into their work immediately. Big questions that we wanted to focus on included the who, what, and how of transforming teaching. To understand how change happens, and how we might help create teaching evaluation change on our campuses, we asked Dr. Susan Elrod to describe her work modeling institutional change.

Join an ASCN working group!
Kate White Temple University Kate White (Western Michigan University), ASCN Research Director
Have you been considering joining one of our working groups, but aren't sure where to start? Here you'll find updates on what each of our groups is working on and more information on how to get involved in 2020. You can join any of our working groups by filling out this short form. Keep reading to learn more about how we're exploring theories of change; the costs, benefits, and impact of change; change leadership; equity and inclusion in systemic change; aligning faculty work with change; and learning spaces.

Transforming Institutions Takeaways
Rachel Renbarger, Western Michigan University
Last week concluded the 2021 Transforming Institutions Conference that marked the 10th year of convening like-minded change leaders. The event was a rousing success; we had over 250 participants from at least 3 continents with over 40 concurrent presentations, 60+ posters, and 4 workshops containing research-based strategies for improving higher education. What did we learn from such an amazing event?