Faculty Affairs Newsletter
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Call for ApplicationsCAFE Fellows for 2023-24
Using funds allocated through the UMKC Forward initiative, the UMKC Center for Advancing Faculty Excellence (CAFE) was created in the summer of 2020. Over the past 2.5 years, together with the CAFE Faculty Fellows, we have launched a number of exciting new programs to support UMKC faculty. We are grateful to this year’s group of CAFE Faculty Fellows, and to all of the UMKC faculty members who participated in these programs.
Highlights from the past year
Teaching and Learning Pillar: - Launched a new peer teaching observation program to provide personal and in-depth feedback to instructors in a peer-to-peer format;
- Developed and implemented methods for conducting gap analyses on student outcomes data.
Research and Creativity Pillar: - Facilitated an online course in Art of Grantsmanship and offered small grants to support proposal development;
- Created program for established researchers to conduct internal review and participate in pitch sessions for UMKC proposals;
- Facilitated a peer mentoring program for established researchers to work together with interdisciplinary teams on a significant proposal;
- Hosted the Third Thursday @ Three research speaker series.
Service and Engagement Pillar: - Presented a series of workshops on community-engaged teaching and research;
- Created CAFEglobal site to support faculty in internationalization;
- Initiated plans for a faculty engagement initiative with UMKC Athletics.
Faculty Life and Leadership Pillar: - Created programming to support newly hired faculty, mid-career faculty, and adjunct faculty;
- Launched a new year-long program for department chairs;
- Expanded campus faculty awards and supported faculty nominations for national awards.
What’s Next?
As we prepare for CAFE’s third year, we are excited to keep the momentum growing.
CAFE seeks applications to fill 4-6 new CAFE Faculty Fellows positions to work with us in the 2023-2024 academic year in the priority areas below in addition to one or possibly two applicant-proposed initiatives. If you are interested in joining the CAFE team to work in one of these focus areas, please fill out a short application and upload your CV. The application will ask you to identify which focus area you are interested in and why, what experiences you would bring to our work, and what aspects of the project you are particularly excited about. You will have the opportunity to identify up to two focus areas of interest.
Priority Focus Areas for AY2023-2024: - Public-facing scholarship strategies for UMKC Scholars and dissemination of UMKC faculty scholarship beyond journals, book chapters, and books, with the goal of amplifying impact.
- Incorporating new AI tools into our teaching. Develop a set of UMKC best practices for teaching and learning with these new tools. Engage in conversations with faculty about these tools.
- Developing a Campus Mentoring Program based on best practices and campus needs for mentoring students, interns, and faculty colleagues.
- Supporting faculty in their Community-Engaged Teaching and Scholarship. This CAFE Fellow will work in collaboration with the office of External Relations and Constituent Engagement to design and deliver faculty workshops and other resources to support faculty in their community engagement activities.
- FUN. This is not an acronym! We are seeking a CAFE Fellow to help develop programming focused on faculty vitality and well-being, including programs and activities to be held in the new faculty lounge and CAFE space opening in Newcomb Hall next fall.
- Other: If there is another topic area that supports faculty success that you would like to
propose a CAFE Fellow position and related programming for, please provide the
information below.
Eligibility:
CAFE Fellows must hold a full-time tenured, tenure-track, or ranked non tenure-track title. Compensation is a stipend of $1,000 per month from September through May, with an option to explore the possibility a teaching reduction in lieu of the stipend in Spring 2024, contingent on chair and dean approval.
Deadline:
Applications are due May 15, 2023
Best wishes from the CAFE Leadership Team. Feel free to contact us if you have questions.
Lorie Holt, Molly Mead, and Alexis Petri
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Three Faculty Chosen for Faculty Success Program this summer
UMKC Faculty applied for the summer Faculty Success Program offered by the National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity (NCFDD). This 12-week online program helps non-tenure track, tenure-track, and tenured faculty with the skills necessary to increase research and writing productivity while maintaining a healthy work-life balance. Congratulations!
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Zahra Niroobakhsh, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering in the Division of Energy, Matter, and Systems at the School of Science and Engineering. She received her Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering at the Pennsylvania State University in 2017. Her research interests involve soft materials focusing on the interfacial liquid–liquid systems by exploring phase diagrams, structure-property relation, bottom-up self-assembly, and 3D printing approaches. Zahra has received several awards and grants, including ACS-PRF 2020 and NSF.
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Karen Brown spent 22 years traveling around the world as a principal ballerina, featured artist, master teacher and lecturer with the Dance Theatre of Harlem (DTH) under the direction of legendary founder, Arthur Mitchell. From the inception DTH’s Kennedy Center Community Outreach Residency in Washington, D.C., she was a master teacher and adjudicator for the groundbreaking and innovative community-focused program. Ms. Brown’s immediate transition from active performer with DTH was to the Director of Education at the Atlanta Ballet Centre for Dance Education (ABCDE). Her background as a master teacher includes teaching classes and workshops at colleges, universities and dance schools throughout Eastern and Western Europe, North and Central America, the Pacific Rim, Egypt, and South Africa. Ms. Brown has been certified as an ABT® Teacher in Pre-Primary through Level 7. She is certified in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd years of the Vaganova Syllabus with John White in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. She is also certified in Reinforced Motor Function for Ballet Application (RMF) founded by Sean McLeod and has recently founded the En Pointe Plus Dance Mastery Institute (EPP), a division of Karenina, Inc. (founded in 1997) offering coaching sessions for dancers utilizing new computerized motion analysis technology and accelerated learning techniques. Prior to joining the University of the Arts (UARTS) in Philadelphia as Assistant Professor of Dance (2007 – 2013), Brown served for six years as Artistic Director of Oakland Ballet Company in California (2000 – 2006). Throughout her career, Ms. Brown has received numerous awards, including New York Institute of Dance and Education Harriet Tubman Freedom Award in 2010 and the New York Dance and Performance Award or the “New York Dance and Performance Award or The Bessie; for Sustained Achievement in Performance” as a company member with Paradigm, Dance Legends in Concert (NYC) in 2018. She has been an Executive Director for Garth Fagan Dance in Rochester, New York and a Guest Artistic Director of Ballet Wichita in Wichita, Kansas where she and black choreographer Sean McLeod set a new Nutcracker Ballet on the company. In celebration of Juneteenth 2020, Ms. Brown opened the Karen Brown Coaching Studio dedicated to renowned ballet dancer, close friend, former dance colleague and benefactor, the late Mel A. Tomlinson and the studio also honors the legacy of the late DTH founder Arthur Mitchell. In fall 2020, she was hired as a new Assistant Professor of Ballet at the University of Missouri Kansas City Conservatory.
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Jess is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication and Journalism and an Affiliate Faculty member in the Department of Race, Ethnic, and Gender Studies. She studies media and technology, organizing and social change, health communication and stigma, dialogue and difference, and neoliberalism. In particular, Jess’s ongoing project explores how reproductive justice organizers and volunteers directly aid individuals seeking care, communicate with various publics, and help create a more equitable society. In her free time, Jess likes to read novels, walk her beagle, Clark, and spend time with her husband, Jye (an advisor in the UMKC School of Science and Engineering!).
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The Rules of Engagement Faculty Development Sessions
UMKC Faculty are invited to gather for casual conversations over lunch to discuss issues related to the best practices of Community Engaged Scholarship. These gatherings are cosponsored by CAFE and UMKC's Division of External Relations and Constituent Engagement.
Have a conversation you'd like to host or a best practice with a community partner that you'd like to highlight? Contact Julie Sutton and Nate Addington.
Mark your calendars now for:
Community Partnerships: How to Find Them, Start Them, and Keep Them
April 28 | 12:00-1:00
Featuring: Dina Newman, Director, UMKC Center for Neighborhoods and Jake Wagner, Associate Professor, Urban Planning and Design and Faculty Founder of the Center for Neighborhoods
Register Now!
Upcoming Topics Include:
The Ins and Outs of Partnering with Local Governmental Offices and Officials
Date/Time TBD
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Dissemination 2.0
Where: Office of Research Development -4747 Troost 207
When: 4/28/2023 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM
Presenter(s): Rebecca Best
Looking for new way to increase the impact and reach of your research? These workshops are for you! The Office of Research Development & CAFE Research Pillar is sponsoring a two-part workshop led by our very own Dr. Rebecca Best that will take you through the quick and straightforward process of promoting your latest research through a post on an edited academic blog or media outlet, such as the blog associated with a journal you publish in or something more general.
*This workshop has 2-parts. Attendees must attend 4/28 and choose to join either 5/4/23 or 5/10/23.
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Intramural Funding Announcement
FY2022-2023 Funding For Excellence Program:
Pool 2 - Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences
The Office of Research & Economic Development at UMKC is pleased to accept applications for the
FY2022-2023 Funding For Excellence grants program in the fields of Arts, Humanities and Social
Sciences. The deadline for submission is Friday, April 21st at 5 p.m. CST.
FFE is an institutionally-funded awards program to support the highest level of research, scholarship, and creativity by UMKC faculty. Click to access the entire announcement with all of the application tiers.
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How do we teach writing and reading in the ChatGPT era?
How are you using generative AI and large language models in your classes? What are your concerns about how students use ChatGPT and other forms of generative AI? How do you teach writing and reading in your UMKC classroom? What writing and reading topics would you like to know more about and teach more effectively in your classes? Where can you turn for more guidance?
These are some of the questions the University Writing and Reading Board will explore during a discussion from 11 a.m. to noon Monday, May 1, in Zoom. Please join representatives of units across our campus as we share ideas and brainstorm UWRB programming for next year. For more information, contact UWRB Co-Chairperson Thomas Ferrel (ferrelt@umkc.edu) or UWRB Co-Chairperson Henrietta Rix Wood (woodhr@umkc.edu).
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Encourage your students to
submit to Lucerna!
Lucerna, the UMKC undergraduate research journal, seeks submissions from students in all programs for the next volume to be published in March 2024.
Undergraduates whose scholarship is accepted by Lucerna benefit from the opportunity for publication in a periodical accessible through EBSCO and the UM System repository, MOspace. Authors also gain presentation experience by participating in the annual Lucerna Symposium in the spring semester.
The submission deadline is May 12, 2023.
To access the latest volume of Lucerna, see submission guidelines, and watch our video, please go to the Lucerna website at https://honors.umkc.edu/get-involved/lucerna/
Lucerna is produced annually by the UMKC Honors Program. For more information, please contact the faculty advisor, Dr. Henrietta Rix Wood, at woodhr@umkc.edu.
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Get Your Course(s) Ready for Fall
A day long conference full of resources for fall course preparation
When: Tuesday, July 18th, 2023
Where: Virtual Conference
Topics will include course design and planning, syllabus construction and overviews from: Missouri Online, desktop support and classroom technologies, student disability services, student support, the Library and more! Watch future issues of FAN for more information on the program. Tune in for the whole day or just drop into the sessions you need. All of the sessions will be recorded and posted for those who cannot attend live.
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