How Many Faculty Does It Take to Change a University?

Colleges and universities today are facing the kinds of challenges that make words like “downsizing,” “program elimination,” and “closure” part of our everyday vocabulary. Some days, reading the Chronicle of Higher Education or Inside Higher Ed is like watching a slow-motion train wreck, horrifying but impossible to look away.

It’s pretty clear that the old way of doing things in higher ed simply isn’t going to cut it anymore.

Despite what college and university presidents hawk in town halls and campus-wide meetings, what we are facing isn't the kind of problem that can be fixed with a new building or more robust endowments, invested wisely. What we are facing is an existential challenge to our industry. Sadly, the conservatism (small c) of the faculty—holding onto the pre-pandemic ways of academic life despite all that’s happening around them—doesn’t inspire much confidence that many institutions will survive, at least not in their current form.

In my recent article in Inside Higher Ed, I argued that faculty need to take a considerably more proactive approach to their own professional development. I want to argue here that faculty need to lean heavily into an entrepreneurial frame of mind if they hope to remain relevant three or even five years from now.

Let me use chemistry as a case study to illustrate what I have in mind. During the global pandemic in 2020, most of us in higher education shifted into some form of online learning. Chemistry was a noteworthy hold-out. As a dean, I attended 19 separate meetings online, each one focused on ways to deliver chemistry labs to students trapped at home. Deans across the United States flooded these Zoom meetings, listening to vendor after vendor make their pitches.

But none of the solutions those vendors offered us adequately addressed a basic, but significant, challenge: how to replicate the hands-on, experiential learning of the chemistry lab in a digital, at-home format.

This wasn't just some academic exercise. It was a matter of equity and access.

The risks associated with sending lab materials to students' homes and the prohibitive costs for some highlighted glaring disparities in our educational and social systems.

The question wasn't just about how to teach chemistry in an online learning environment, but how to make it accessible and safe for all while imparting experience in skill development.

I believed then, as now, that the chemistry faculty members who devised a solution would make a mint in patent rights.

?With the technological advances made in the last four years, I wonder what would happen if chemistry faculty leveraged technology such as virtual reality (VR) to offer chemistry labs. VR offers a way to simulate the lab experience, allowing students to engage in experiments without the associated risks or costs.

What’s more, students are natural gamers. Using gamification would only enhance the experience, allowing students to level up in experience points the more virtual tasks they completed. And failure wouldn’t be fatal or final. They could just restart the level and keep going until they “beat” it.

Embracing an entrepreneurial mindset in academia doesn't mean diluting our scholarly ambitions or compromising on academic rigor. It means becoming agile, responding to the changing needs of our students, who increasingly come from first-generation, low-income households. It also means becoming far more proactive in using technology to break down barriers to learning.

The path forward will not be smooth. Many faculty will be skeptical and resist. Yet, the potential rewards are incredible. Imagine making higher education more accessible, more engaging, and more relevant to students in the 21st century.

The faculty who embrace this spirit of exploration and innovation will be the ones who thrive. The teaching of chemistry labs, through virtual reality or other innovations yet to be imagined, serves as a kind of beacon, showing us what's possible when we're willing to take a step into the unknown, driven by creativity, equity, excellence…and necessity.

c. 2024, Alfred G. Mueller II