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Expect the Unexpected:
2014 CPS Commencement
Over a thousand family, friends and loved ones cheered as more than 300 graduates from thirteen programs received their diplomas at the 2014 College of Professional Studies and Graduate School of Political Management commencement celebration at the Smith Center
on May 17.
In the keynote address, Dennis W. Johnson, professor of political management and legislative affairs and former acting executive director of GSPM, urged graduates to expect the unexpected. He advised them to plan their paths but remain open to opportunities as they arise. Quoting author Joseph Campbell, he said, "If you can see your path laid out in front of you step by step, you know it's not your path." Then, in a totally unexpected move he pulled out a large bag containing his extensive bow tie collection and citing his wife's mandate to "get rid of the bow ties" gave one to each graduate.
 | | Professor Johnson advises graduates to expect the unexpected |
The inspirational highlight of the evening came when Captain Larkin O'Hern rose to thunderous applause and a sustained standing ovation to receive the Henry D. Paley Award for Academic Excellence. A 2008 West Point graduate, Captain O'Hern served with the 101st Airborne Division in Afghanistan where he lost two legs and a hand in the service of his country. Captain O'Hern's decorations include the Bronze Star Medal, the Purple Heart, and the Afghanistan Campaign Medal.
Megumi Joslin Voight, a graduate of the Strategic Public Relations online program, delivered the student address and noted how exciting it was to finally meet in person the classmates with whom she had worked so closely over the years. She lauded the college for creating an environment where students can connect and reminded the new graduates to maintain their ties with one another.
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Captain O'Hern
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The following award winners were recognized and received their awards:
* Colin Corbett Ruffner (Police Science): Dr. Richard Southby Police Science Prize
* Lewis Larkin O'Hern III (Legislative Affairs): Henry D. Paley Award
* Cohort of 10 Law Firm Management graduates: Stephen R. Chitwood Law Firm Management Prize
* Megan E. Selva (Publishing): The GW Alumni Association Prize
* Andrew Solberg (Police Science): CPS Faculty Excellence Award
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Adventure at Sea:
GW Crew Onboard USS Theodore Roosevelt
Associate Provost Williams and Dean Eskandarian watch planes launch from the aircraft carrier's control tower
A dozen GW faculty and staff spent two days aboard the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt to learn how this 20-story high, 1000-foot long city on the water operates and translate the experience to the classroom. This beautiful ship with a crew of nearly 6000 boasts a 4½-acre flight deck, four bronze propellers each weighing more than 30 tons, an operating room, a dentist's office, a bank, a machine shop, a hangar, a Theodore Roosevelt museum, and a stuffed bull moose.
The GW group, which included Provost Steven Lerman, CPS and VSTC Dean Ali Eskandarian, Associate Dean Toni Marsh and GSEHD Dean Michael Feuer, was transported by a cargo plane to the carrier about 130 miles off the coast of North Carolina. They did a trap landing, where the plane hits the deck at full speed and its tail hook grabs a cable and a catapult takeoff, where the plane shoots into the air at full speed.
Vice Admiral (retired) Mel Williams, Jr, Associate Provost for Military and Veteran Affairs, arranged the visit as part of the Veterans Accelerate Learning Opportunities and Rewards (VALOR) faculty and staff military awareness program.
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The GW crew with fighter jets on the flight deck of the
USS Theodore Roosevelt
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The group met with many of the sailors - including five GW NROTC students - who perform highly complex tasks and have great responsibilities, and who are also working on their university degrees in the evenings and during their free time.
"It was enlightening to see how these sailor/students live and operate every day - the confines under which they work, the unpredictability of their schedules, and the multiple demands on their time and energy. It totally changed the way I view online education for this population. My next task will be to reassess and redesign how we deliver online content to active duty military. There will definitely be some changes, " said Marsh.
Associate Provost Williams said the visit was a confirmation of GW's leadership as a military friendly institution.
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Two Gentlemen Scholars
of Foggy Bottom:
Chris Arterton and Dennis Johnson Retire
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F. Chrisopher Arterton
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Two GSPM pioneers and stalwarts, F. Christopher Arterton and Dennis W. Johnson, retired from CPS in May. Both played key roles in establishing and nurturing the Graduate School of Political Management. Their research, teaching, and administrative contributions were instrumental in making GSPM the "West Point of the political wars" and the country's premier school of professional politics that it is today.
Chris Arteron is a professor of political management and is retiring from his full-time post but is remaining on faculty as research professor and Director of the GSPM's Global Center for Political Management. Dr. Arterton was a professor at Yale University for ten years before joining GW in 1987 as the founding dean of GSPM. He also played an active role at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.
Dr. Arterton is an expert on news media and communications technology, political strategy and tactics, public opinion, and ethics and leadership in politics. He has produced many articles, studies and reports and has authored four books and is currently working on a fifth one on the intersection of leadership and strategy in politics.
Read the Congressional Record statement about Dr. Arterton
See his complete bio and list of publications
 | | Dennis W. Johnson |
Dennis Johnson has held multiple leadership roles at GSPM in his more than twenty years of service. He is professor of political management and legislative affairs and has been GSPM's director of the legislative affairs program (1993-2000), associate dean (1995-2006), and acting executive director (2011-2012). Dr. Johnson was a Fulbright Distinguished Lecturer at Jinan University in Guangzhou, China during the 2010-2011 academic year.
Dennis Johnson's academic and scholarly interests include campaigns and elections, the profession of political consulting and the history of American public policy. Dr. Johnson's most recent book published earlier this year is Campaigning for President 2012: Strategy and Tactics (Routledge).
Read the Congressional Record statement about Dr. Johnson
See his complete bio and list of publications
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Principled Booksellers of the World Unite! :
Ethics & Publishing Conference
What does a $100,000 textbook have to do with Vladimir Putin, the conflict between Amazon and publisher Hachette, and the future of publishing?
All were topics of discussion at this year's Ethics and Publishing Conference, hosted by CPS and the Publishing Program. The Ethics and Publishing Conference, now in its seventh year, brings together a diverse set of professionals from across the publishing industry for serious discussion about ethical issues in publishing.
Marvin Kalb, of Brookings Institute and Harvard, provided a personal view of the power and responsibilities of publishers, calling on his experiences as television reporter, book author, researcher and educator. Attendees learned about the challenges and alarming costs in producing high quality Braille textbooks from Julia Myers of the American Printing House for the Blind.
Erik Bertin of the US Copyright Office provided a detailed update on initiatives to harmonize copyright law, drafted in an era of print publishing, with the realities of digital publishing. Bob Stein, from the Institute for the Future of the Book, presented a vision of the future of social reading and recently developed tools for building interactive communities around publications.
The audience learned from Mike Shatzkin of Idea Logical how the DoJ suit against the Big 5 publishers for collusion has strengthened Amazon's chokehold on the book market, threatening the independence of publishers and bookstores. Barbara Kline Pope of the National Academies Press reviewed the history of NAP's radical price experimentation, which led to a fully open access model for NAP publications.
Arnie Grossblatt, director of the MPS in publishing, notes, "The ethics and publishing conference is a unique publishing conference. Other conferences may discuss media ethics or journalism ethics, but the GW CPS conference is the only regular forum for discussion of ethics across the whole of publishing. We are the home for important discussions of censorship, readers' rights, environmental responsibilities of publishers, copyright policy and much more. And through the sponsorship of GW and CPS we've been able to bring together leading figures in publishing, education, and business to engage with our students on critical, real-world problems."
Dean Eskandarian observed, "The Ethics and Publishing Conference is important to the educational mission of College and the Publishing Program. The opportunity to see industry leaders grappling with ethical issues in their professional roles helps students know that professional ethics is not merely the stuff of classroom discussions but an important part of their professional careers."
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For more information or to submit a story for an upcoming issue, please contact:
Karla Jones
CPS Manager, Marketing & Production
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Sara Hooshangi, PI:
CPS Professor Awarded $600K NSF Grant
Dr. Sara Hooshangi, director of the Integrated Information, Science & Technology Program has won a five-year, $611,191 grant from the National Science Foundation for her project "Pathway for Adult-learners, Community College and Non-Traditional Students (PACTS)". Professor Hooshangi is the designated principal investigator for the grant; Professor Mark Reeves of the GW department of physics is the co-PI.
The PACTS scholarship program will support cohorts of talented non-traditional students, community college graduates, and adult learners with financial need as they complete bachelor's degrees in IIST. The program aims to recruit and retain undergraduate transfer students and provide them with mentoring and targeted student support, including career advising, workshops and seminars, industry tours and a chance to participate in service-learning courses. By enhancing the education, mentoring, and employment opportunities of such students, the program will create a STEM workforce that is more diverse and inclusive.
This highly prestigious grant from the nation's premier science foundation is indicative of the quality of CPS's academic programs and the caliber of its faculty. As Dean Eskandarian observed, "This grant is an exemplar of cross-disciplinary collaboration and is aligned with our institutional direction, especially President Knapp's initiative through the task force on access and success."
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Leading by Example:
CEPL's Ina Gjikondi Receives Fairfax County Award
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Ina Gjikondi (left) receiving her award from Julie Ellis, Director of Hollin Hall Senior Center
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Fairfax County's Department of Neighborhood and Community Services honored Ina Gjikondi, manager of Leadership Development Programs and Global Initiatives at the Center for Excellence in Public Leadership at their annual staff awards and partner recognition ceremony on May 22.
The citation recognized Gjikondi as among those outstanding individuals and organizations who:
* Assist NCS in fulfilling our mission of bringing people and resources together to strengthen the well-being of individuals and communities; and
* Go above and beyond expectations for a traditional colleague, partner or contractor.
Ina was selected for the award for being a partner and instructor in an eight-week session entitled "How to Think Like Leonardo Da Vinci - Creativity 101" offered at Hollin Hall Senior Center which contributed to the well-being and lifelong learning of older adults in Fairfax County.
Learn more about Ina Gjikondi
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Paralegal Alumni Network
It's no secret that students and alumni like to share stories and connect. With this in mind, the paralegal studies program launched the Practicum Advisor Network in December 2013 so that alumni and students can connect, share experiences, provide mentorship, and share opportunities. The network affords alumni a meaningful way to give back to GW and helps students build their professional connections.
The program matches alumni advice volunteers with current students; the groups share contacts and discuss trends in the paralegal market and paralegal education, membership in professional organizations and associations, and upcoming conferences. Students in the master's of paralegal studies program hail from all over the nation and the world. They are required to complete a semester-long practicum where they apply the skills and knowledge they acquire in the classroom to a professional setting. The Practicum Advisor Network helps paralegal students identify practicum placements and develop professional relationships. To date, scores of paralegal alumni working in government, law firms, businesses, and non-profits have volunteered to serve as alumni advice volunteers.To learn more about this exciting new initiative, click here: Practicum Advice Network
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Let Me Tell Your Fortune:
Impact of Emerging Technologies on Higher Ed
Online learning is making content "dynamic, flexible and accessible to a larger number of students" and will have a "major impact on higher education around the globe," according to the 2014 New Media Consortium Horizons Report. The report is a joint publication of NMC, a not for-profit consortium of colleges, universities, museums and companies, and EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative, a vast network of more than 2,100 institutions and companies focusing on higher education IT.
An international panel of education and technology experts from 13 countries identified six key trends that will drive the course of higher education over the next several years:
1: Growing ubiquity of social media (likely impact: the next one - two years) The use of social media is growing rapidly worldwide and it is driving user engagement. "Educators are using them as professional communities of practice, as learning communities, and as a platform to share stories about topics students are studying in class," notes the report. 2: Integration of online, hybrid, and collaborative learning (likely impact: the next one - two years) Universities are incorporating online environments into classroom-based and hybrid courses, which is making the content more "dynamic, flexible and accessible to a larger number of students." Students in these courses are collaborating more and engaging with their peers more than they are in traditional classroom-based courses. 3: Data-driven learning and assessment (likely impact: the next three - five years) Universities are using data to create learning analytics that allow them to "recognize challenges early, improve student outcomes and personalize the learning experience." 4: Shift from students as consumers to students as creators (likely impact: the next three - five years) A significant shift is occurring on university campuses all across the world where students are learning by making and creating instead of being passive consumers of content. Institutions can improve their competitiveness by introducing learning-by-doing opportunities that allow students to build portfolios, acquire real-world experience, pursue entrepreneurial interests and connect with prospective employers. 5: Agile approaches to change (likely impact: the next five or more years)
Universities are refining and reinventing higher education business models in the long-term and must continue to engender greater connections to real-world learning. So, both the structure and operations of institutions of higher education and the society's structural economic and social challenges are at play here. 6: Evolution of online learning (likely impact: the next five or more years) The report notes a shift in the perception of online learning in the past several years to the point where it is a viable alternative to some forms of face-to-face learning. It adds that the advent of voice and video tools has had improved the interactive nature and quality of instructor and student activities. See ICEF Monitor for more information and a link to the original report
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