Report for 19 August 2002 Meeting - College of Education

Department of Educational Psychology 

Chair’s Report 

19 August 2002 

Welcome to the 2002 – 2003 school year. I hope that every faculty member is returning 

from a restful summer ready to contribute to a productive and successful school year. I 

know that many of you were busy this summer with summer school, accreditation 

reports, research, grant writing, and other tasks, but I hope that you also enjoyed some 

well-earned rest. 

My report for this meeting will be both a report and a prompt for some discussion of how 

to best address the tasks and issues that are facing us. Although I do not expect this to be 

a long meeting, I would like to allow some time for discussion of some of the key issues 

that we must address this year. 

New Faculty Member 

I want to formally welcome Ji-Yeon Lee to the Department. Ji-Yeon will be teaching for 

the new Educational Technology degree program. She comes to us from Indiana 

University where she graduated this summer with a Ph.D. in Instructional Systems 

Technology. If you have not already met Ji-Yeon, please take some time to stop by her 

office in Wardlaw 145 and introduce yourself. She has recently been busy preparing for 

our first two-way audio-video course that will be held simultaneously on the Columbia 

and Aiken campuses. This degree program and the heavy use that it will make of the 

University’s two-way audio-video system have prompted the University to consider 

moving the system to the ETC. There are a few logistical hurdles, but it appears as 

though the equipment will be moved in the near future, probably in December between 

semesters. 

New Staff Member 

Most of you are probably aware that Cheryl Cobb had to leave our Department after 

providing many years of excellent service to the Programs in Special Education. This 

spring we hired Kathy Johnson as the new Administrative Assistant. You may have 

already seen Kathy around Wardlaw, but I wanted to have an opportunity to formally 

introduce her to the Department. Kathy worked for a number of years in Parking Services 

for the University and most recently worked at the South Carolina Department of 

Archives. As you might expect, Kathy is already very busy dealing with the 

administrative tasks of the Program. The reports I receive from the Program faculty 

indicate that she is doing a terrific job. If you stop by to see Kathy, her office is now on 

the north side of the Special Education wing, directly across from where the 

administrative assistant’s office used to be. 

Research and Evaluation 

One task that keeps me busy during the summer is supporting the research efforts of our 

faculty, primarily attempts to generate external funding for research. Here is a list of the

esearch and evaluation projects in the Department that have been funded for next year. 

These projects total $1,096,980. Note that this does not represent the total support for the 

projects, but only the support for this year. This is indeed a terrific accomplishment that 

demonstrates the hard work of the faculty. 

Project: Social Background and Career Patterns of Elementary/Secondary School 

Teachers 

Investigator: Steven Liu 

Agency: Research & Productive Scholarship 

Amount: $4,000 

Project: Cross-cultural Study of Centralized Teaching Practices 

Investigator: Louise Jennings 



Project: Teachers Fighting Apartheid: Conflicting Constructions of Pedagogy and 

Politics 

Investigator: Alan Wieder 



Project: Project ANSER: Addressing the Needs and Supports of Educational 

Reform for Students with Disabilities 

Investigator: Mitch Yell & Michael Seaman 

Agency: U.S. Department of Education 

Amount: $40,000 

Project: Project ReSpecT: Retaining Special Education Teachers 

Investigator: Mitch Yell, Erik Drasgow, & Kathleen Marshall 


Amount: $198,983 

Project: Project RESPOND: Responsive Ecological Services for Maltreated 

Preschool Children with Behavioral Problems or Developmental Delays 

Investigator: Bill Brown 



Project: Early Childhood Special Education Training Grant 

Investigator: Bill Brown 


Amount: $21,000 

Project: Improving the Preparation of Personnel to Serve Children with High- 

Incidence Disabilities 

Investigator: Mitch Yell, Erik Drasgow, Kathleen Marshall, & Todd Busch 

Agency: U.S. Department of Education

Amount: $197,687 

Project: Preparation of Leadership Personnel 

Investigator: Bill Brown, Kathleen Marshall, & Mitch Yell 


Amount: $200,000 

Project: Elementary School Counseling Demonstration Program 

Investigator: Joe Rotter 



Project: Evaluation of SC Four-Year-Old Children’s Program 

Investigator: Bill Brown & Ellen Potter 

Agency: SC Education Oversight Committee 

Amount: $55,850 

Project: SCRA Technical Documentation 

Investigator: Huynh Huynh 

Agency: SC Department of Education 

Amount: $36,238 

Project: Investigating Inquiry Based Pedagogies in the Context of Standards Based 

Reforms 

Investigator: Louise Jennings 

Agency: National Academy of Education 

Amount: $25,000 

Project: A Study of Professional Development Schools: Student Achievement; 

Teacher Quality and Teacher Recruitment and Retention 

Investigator: Bud Hult 

Agency: National Education Association 

Amount: $17,000 

Project: College of Education Course Evaluations 

Investigator: Steven Liu 

Agency: College of Education 

Amount: $12,000 

Project: Evaluation of the South Carolina State Improvement Project 

Investigator: Peggy Gredler & Todd Busch 


Amount: $126,370 

Project: Evaluation of the Title II Teacher Quality Enhancement Project 

Investigator: Michael Seaman 


Amount: $51,765

Project: Evaluation of the Engineering-Education Bridges Planning Project 

Investigator: Chris Ebert & Jed Lyons 

Agency: National Science Foundation 


Project: Evaluation of the Engineering Fellows Program 

Investigator: Jed Lyons & Chris Ebert 


Amount: $10,700 

Project: Evaluation of the Engineering Communication Studio Project 

Investigator: Robert Johnson 


Amount: $51,598 

Project: Project SCALE: Youth Empowerment 

Investigator: Deborah Parra-Medina, Deanne Messias, & Louise Jennings 

Agency: American Legacy 

Amount: $20,000 

In addition to this list, we have a number of proposals pending that we are all but certain 

will be awarded contracts. I have listed the projects below that fit into this category. 

These are not formally funded yet, but they soon will be and will then be added to the list 

above. These total another $319,140, for a grand total of $1,416,120. 

Project: Preschool Children’s Physical Activity 

Investigator: Russell Pate, Bill Brown, & Cheryl Addy 

Agency: National Institute of Health 

Amount: $18,000 

Project: South Carolina Arts Assessment Development 



Amount: $75,000 

Project: South Carolina Reading Initiative 


Agency: US Department of Education 

Amount: $15,000 

Project: Evaluation of the Participation in the Arts Project 


Agency: Wallace Foundation 

Amount: $20,000

Project: Evaluation of Arts Education Reform 


Agency: SC Department of Education & SC Arts Commission 

Amount: $23,580 

Project: Evaluation of the National Center for Ocean Science Education 

Excellence 

Investigator: Chris Ebert & Michael Seaman 


Amount: $82,010 

Project: Evaluation of the Southeastern Regional Center for Ocean Science 

Education Excellence 

Investigator: Chris Ebert & Michael Seaman 


Amount: $48,000 

Project: Evaluation of the NOAA’s Ocean Explorer Project 

Investigator: Jon Singer & Bob Feller 

Agency: National Oceanic & Atmospheric Association 

Amount: $27,550 

Project: Assistance for College of Education Accreditation Preparation 

Investigator: Irma Van Scoy 


Amount: $10,000 

I am pleased to announce that Robert Johnson is now the Director of the Office of 

Program Evaluation. Robert will be coordinating the 20 students that we have hired in the 

OPE. We will need both Robert’s experience and every one of these graduate students 

because we wrote $700,000 in contract proposals for this year, and we anticipate that at 

least $500,000 of these proposals will be funded. 

The growth of the OPE has necessitated a change of location. I expect to sign a lease 

either today or tomorrow for space in the building on the corner of Blossom and Main 

Streets, directly across Blossom Street from Adam’s Bookstore. 

I hope that more of you will consider adding an evaluation project of interest to your 

research agenda. We continue to need faculty team leaders to help provide direction for 

these projects. There is good parking at the new OPE location, so don’t let the fact that 

we have moved out of Wardlaw dissuade you from participating. In addition to the 

intrinsic benefits of conducting research and supporting students both professionally and 

financially, externally-funded research continues to be a financial imperative for the 

Department as well as a way to increase your professional fund. The baseline 

professional fund this year will again be $500 per faculty member, but you will receive 

half of the salary relief dollars that the Department receives (i.e. one quarter of the total 

salary relief dollars).

Graduate Student Support 

As you might expect, the research and evaluation projects listed above have generated 

support for our students. Your efforts have provided 63 graduate assistantships for this 

academic year at a cost of $489,050. The graphs below illustrate that we have 

consistently been increasing our support for at least the past six years. 

We have talked in the past about our recruitment efforts and we typically arrive at the 

conclusion that we need to provide more support for students in order to recruit them. I 

am of the opinion that we can financially support strong national recruits at a competitive 

level, so I believe that future discussions of recruitment should focus on how we 

disseminate information about the quality of our programs and the level of our support. 

Amount (dollars) 

Amount (dollars) 

600000 

500000 

400000 

300000 

200000 

100000 

9000 

8000 

7000 

6000 

5000 

4000 

3000 

2000 

1000 

0 

0 

Total GA Dollars 

1996-97 1997-98 1998-99 1999-00 2000-01 2001-02 2002-03 

Year 

Average GA Award 

1996-97 1997-98 1998-99 1999-00 2000-01 2001-02 2002-03 

Report to the College Faculty 

Year

My report to the College Faculty this afternoon will consist of (1) the introduction of Ji- 

Yeon and the Educational Technology degree program, (2) a summary of our externally 

funded research success, (3) a summary of our success in supporting graduate students, 

and (4) any other Departmental or personal successes that you deem important for 

dissemination at that meeting. 

Department Initiatives 

For the remainder of the meeting I would like to discuss ongoing and new Department 

initiatives that we should address this year. These initiatives include old business that we 

have not concluded, ongoing initiatives to address the College Strategic Plan, and new 

charges for Committees based on current Department needs. As I go through this list, I 

want to pause, where appropriate, to discuss whether any of these initiatives need to be 

revised or eliminated. Some of this work has been lingering for quite some time now. We 

need to decide if the work is important. If so, it needs to be done. If it is not important, 

let’s not waste our time with it. 

Academic Affairs Committee Chair 

The Academic Affairs Committee has not yet selected a chair of the Committee. I am 

asking this Committee to meet immediately after the Department meeting to take care of 

this item of business. 

Review of Annual Performance Procedures 

As we ended last semester, I presented a list of reasons why I believe that the annual 

performance process needs to be reviewed. I also presented a list of recommendations for 

the APR Committee to consider. I ask that the APR Committee spend part of this year 

addressing the problems by considering my recommendations or others that the members 

of the Committee deem appropriate. 

Total Quality Assurance 

Last year Robert Johnson completed a survey of our students. He is currently editing this 

before we make it available to everyone. The take-home message from the survey is that 

our students believe that we are offering quality degree programs that properly prepare 

them for their professions and provide them reasonable support during the process. In our 

strategic planning we had also proposed conducting focus groups with our students. To 

my knowledge, that has not been completed. 

The second TQA initiative was to develop an administrative policy and procedures 

manual that would enhance consistency and fairness in Department operations. I was to 

take the lead role in preparing a first draft that I was then going to give to the Steering 

Committee for review. I still believe that a manual is much needed, so I plan on 

completing this task, even though I am now behind schedule.

Community and State Needs 

The faculty proposed identifying and planning to address state needs in counselor and 

special education. To date I have had no feedback about these initiatives, so I do not 

know if they are in progress. 

One possible way to address this initiative is to turn it over to the Faculty Affairs 

Committee in the context of recommending faculty hiring priorities for next year. My 

preliminary priorities are to obtain approval for hiring one faculty member for Counselor 

Education and one faculty member for Special Education. I had hoped to use the needs 

analyses from this initiative as one source of data for arguing for these positions. I would 

like to charge the Faculty Affairs Committee with considering what our hiring priorities 

should be and then making a recommendation to me in the near future. I welcome 

discussion on how to address two issues: (1) the fact that we currently do not have a state 

needs analysis and (2) the fact that there is no Counselor Education representation on the 

Faculty Affairs Committee. 

National Stature 

Our emphasis here is on recruiting top graduate students and subsequently placing our 

graduate students in top institutions throughout the country. Our initiatives included an 

identification of predominant strengths and a revision of our Department and program 

webs. The Student Affairs Committee completed their work to identify strengths. I will 

put their report on the documents section of our web. The core of the Department web 

was revised this summer to be consistent with the University web. Now there are several 

questions that remain. (1) Should we coordinate the web structures and look of the 

programs with that of the Department? (2) How do we highlight our identified program 

strengths on the web? (3) What information should we all agree to put on the web in 

order to enhance our recruiting? So far I have solicited short biographies from each of 

you, but what more should we do? Should we include pictures on with your biographies? 

How about an exhaustive list of courses and syllabi? What about short personal “userfriendly 

descriptions” of courses written by instructors? 

Since going live with the revised Department web pages about two weeks ago, we have 

been receiving several hits per day on our request for a contact and information page. 

This is both exciting and problematic. It is connecting us to more potential applicants 

than ever before. It has also, however, created an excessive workload for a number of 

individuals. We need to discuss how to deal with these requests. 

Support Base 

We stated that our emphasis here would be on developing a grant support network 

composed of faculty members who are successful in this area. The purpose of this 

network would be to mentor those who are inexperienced in grant writing. Additionally, 

we stated that we would conduct a study to examine graduate student financial aid at 

AAU institutions because we suspect that in spite of the recent improvement in graduate 

student stipends, we still lag behind AAU institutions. I have not received any report on

these initiatives. Should we pursue these initiatives? If not, how do we provide help for 

faculty members who want to be involved in external funding initiatives? 

Diversity 

We stated that we would place an emphasis on minority recruiting at historically black 

universities in South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia. Initiatives were to focus on 

developing rapport with education departments and arranging visits to meet with students 

and faculty at these institutions. Our two targeted initiatives included the development of 

a committee to investigate minority faculty and student recruitment and the establishment 

of a visitation calendar for visiting historically black institutions. I have heard that the 

committee will meet in the near future. The importance of this endeavor compels us to 

move forward on these initiatives. 

Technology 

We are doing well with addressing this area. The Department proposed three initiatives: 

(1) the recruitment of our first cohort for the M.Ed. in Educational Technology, (2) hiring 

a webmaster, and (3) a review of Departmental course offerings to determine appropriate 

delivery modes. The first task is ongoing. We now have approximately 12 students 

enrolled as our first cohort for the new degree. The second task, the hiring of a 

webmaster, should be completed soon, hopefully this week. We have been advertising for 

this position and have a number of applications to review. I will establish a system so that 

this person can be utilized to assist programs and individual faculty members with their 

web pages. The review of course offerings has also been completed by the Academic 

Affairs Committee. I would now like to discuss steps to see that we follow-up on this 

initiative and begin offering identified courses using alternative delivery modes. 

Department Meeting Schedule 

As you know, I call for Department meetings on an as-needed basis. I have had several 

requests to schedule meetings at the beginning of the academic year so that members of 

the faculty can put these on their calendars. This is a reasonable request, so I will set 

dates for one more Department meeting this semester and two for next semester. If there 

is no business to attend to, we can always cancel the meeting. I will let you know the 

dates in a week or so, as soon as we’ve had a chance to check with program coordinators 

about major conference schedules.

Report for 19 August 2002 Meeting - College of Education

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