Category: News

Seventeen George Mason Faculty Awarded 4-VA Grants

Through 4-VA@Mason, faculty from schools across George Mason University have embarked on new pilot research projects in collaboration with higher education institutions throughout Virginia. The 4-VA Collaborative Research Grants, first launched in the 2013-2014 academic year, are designed to forge relationships in Virginia higher education to leverage the strengths of each school, decrease working in silos, and launch novel research projects that can provide a springboard for future external funding. Other schools in the 4-VA system are the College of William and Mary, James Madison University, Old Dominion University, University of Virginia, Virginia Commonwealth University, Virginia Military Institute, and Virginia Tech. Christopher Newport University is also participating in Collaborative Research Grants.

During the 2024-25 year, nine of the Collaborative Research Grants are being led at George Mason and 11 faculty members will serve as co-PIs for research spearheaded at partner institutions. Janette Kenner Muir, Vice Provost, Academic Affairs and Campus Coordinator of 4-VA@Mason, notes that the 24-25 proposals were especially strong, “Each year, we are more and more impressed with the breadth and depth of the proposals providing our faculty this unique opportunity.”

The 4-VA@Mason 2024-25 Collaborative Research Grant awardees, proposal title and partner schools (in parentheses) are:

Christova, Rosalina; College of Science, Department of Environmental Science and Policy and Potomac Environmental Research and Education Center – Integrative Characterization of the Anatoxin-a-Producing Benthic Cyanobacterial Genus Microcoleus in the Shenandoah River (UVA/Wise)

Croitoru, Arie; College of Science, Department of Computational and Data Sciences & Center for Social Complexity – Quantum-Inspired Modeling for Understanding Social Complexity (ODU)

Kabbani, Nadine; College of Science, School of Systems Biology – Proteomic profiling of molecular changes associated with chemotherapy induced neuropathy (VCU)
Lee, Myeong; College of Engineering and Computing, Department of Information Sciences and Technology – Understanding Multidimensional Measures of Social Capital: Impacts of Ethnic Heterogeneity, Social Classes, and Historical Legacies of Urban Policy (VCU)
Luke, Rayanne; College of Science, Department of Mathematical Sciences – Data-Driven Modeling of the Time-Dependent Immune Response to Infection and Vaccination (UVA)
Madden, Amanda; College of Humanities and Social Sciences, Department of History – Historical Mapathons: Team-Based GIS Training and Transformation of Seventeenth Century Maps (VT)
Nam, Sang; College of Visual and Performing Arts, Computer Game Design Program – Developing A Multimodal LLM AI Agent for the XR, Extended Reality Platform for Personalized and Highly Immersive Trauma Training (UVA)
Zhang, Xiaokuan; College of Engineering and Computing, Department of Computer Science – Uncovering Secrets from Virtual Reality Headsets via Electromagnetic Side Channels (VT)
Zhang, Xijin (Emma); College of Engineering and Computing, Department of Civil, Environmental and Structural Engineering – Multifunctional Fungi-Based Biosurfactants for Durable Concrete Structures (UVA)

The following Mason faculty received funding as Co-PIs for the 24-25 academic year collaborating with other 4-VA institutions (in parentheses):

Bagheri, Shaghayegh; Mechanical Engineering – MOMENTUM: Assessing the Merits of Personalized Feedback with Generative AI for Foundational Engineering Mechanics Courses (VT)
Bloom, Michael S.; Global and Community Health – A new green space exposure index utilizing AI methods and an eye-tracking device (VT)
Bray, Harrison and Lukyanenko, Anton; Mathematical Sciences – Collaborative workshops in topology (UVA)
Dong, Pei; Mechanical Engineering – Printing of Ultrathin Conductive Films on Liquid for 3D Wearable Electronic (UVA)
Otis, Jessica; History and Lawrence, Heidi; English/Medical Rhetoric – Human Dimensions of Infectious Diseases (VT)
Yang, Jingyuan; Costello College of Business – Building Machine Learning Resilience During Disasters (UVA)

NEH Award Expands 4-VA Piloted Project

The National Endowment for the Humanities recently awarded $220,000 to a project originally funded by 4VA@Mason to focus on a deeper approach to teaching the history of higher education in the United States. Thanks to 4-VA’s seed funding, this research developed at the state level will now be propelled onto a national platform.

“Reimagining the History of Higher Education in the Digital Age,” was awarded a 4-VA@Mason Collaborative Research Grant in 2020, proposed by professor of higher education Kelly Schrum. Virginia Tech assistant professor Chase Catalano also received a 4-VA Complementary Grant at that time to launch the project in Blacksburg.

Once off the ground in 2021, colleagues at William and Mary, James Madison, and Old Dominion were interested in joining the endeavor, with Ben Boone, Art Dean, and Kim Bullington and Bill Nuckols, respectively, at the helm. WM, JMU, and ODU faculty also received 4-VA support for their contribution to the research.

Collaborating with Schrum at Mason is Nate Sleeter, Director of Educational Projects at the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media.

Since the outset of the project, participating faculty, students, and student researchers have curated more than 100 primary sources, created asynchronous learning activities for the course, collected input from history of higher education instructors, and developed an extremely well-received database of resources for the project website, the History of Higher Education: An Open Educational Resource — higheredhistory.gmu.edu.

In addition to primary and secondary sources, the website contains an invaluable database of institutional archives with digitized historical content, including yearbooks. Seven hundred institutional archives are cataloged on the site, including 48 Hispanic-Serving Institutions, 24 Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and 15 women’s colleges. Additionally, the list includes 63 community colleges — especially important given the historic lack of attention to these institutions.

Recognizing the value of this new approach to more fully understand the history of higher education, the NEH grant will allow the 4-VA collaborators to expand the project https://unpacking.chss.gmu.edu/ and to conduct a Summer 2024 four-week institute, “Unpacking the History of Higher Education in the United States,” designed to improve the history of higher education courses nationally and to deepen humanities engagement among future higher education leaders.

“This project has been a wonderful exercise in collaboration and research,” concludes Schrum. “Working together and leveraging the resources at each university through 4-VA made this effort a success.”

4-VA@Mason Funding Smartphone App to Support Transfer Students

Over the past 10 years, 4-VA@Mason has bolstered efforts to smooth the transition for first-generation transfer students from NOVA to Mason via roles in ADVANCE, developing the Bachelor of Applied Science program, and aligning course subject content and objectives between NOVA and Mason. It was natural, then, for 4-VA@Mason to step in to fund a proposal for a novel smartphone-based augmented reality campus tour of Mason to help traditionally underserved transfer students.

The concept is being led by Kelly Schrum, a professor in Mason’s Higher Education Program in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. Schrum has brought together a group of faculty members, undergraduate, and graduate students to put the plan into action. In addition, representatives from ADVANCE, the Office of Undergraduate Admissions, and the First-Gen+ Center will also play a role in the project.

After reviewing the considerable research on common challenges facing transfer students, including the need to feel connected and find community, the group is developing a prototype of the app for prospective students to download. “After much research, we believe that an app of this type can go a long way to help make our transfer students more comfortable in the new Mason environment,” explains Schrum. “We are so pleased with the initial enthusiastic reception from students as well as our partners in this effort.”

Through the app, students will ‘meet’ a virtual character — wearing a First Gen Mason T-shirt — who welcomes them to Mason. Students will see a virtual panel where they will find questions and answers from current students and be invited to add their voice to the conversation. Encouraging words from the First Gen+ Center will appear on the screen, such as “You are the first, but you won’t be the last.”

The virtual character will encourage the student to walk toward the Johnson Center where a simulated First Gen+ table is set up for an ice cream social. The student will create a sundae — with Mason colors — while interacting with the character who will share fun facts about Mason regarding first gen transfer students and provide an overview of events and activities hosted by the First Gen+ Center. The student can ask questions, powered by a chatbot, and can also submit more personalized or in-depth questions that will be directed to the right department, such as Admissions or Success Coaching, all designed to make the students more comfortable with campus and their fellow students.

The prototype is being tested this winter with prospective students in coordination with ADVANCE. The Admissions office will distribute flyers about the app, place them in bags for transfer students, and highlight the app on transfer student tours.

“This is a great opportunity to help our new transfer students feel more comfortable with their transition to Mason, and get them off to the right start,” says Janette Muir, Vice Provost, Academic Affairs and 4-VA@Mason Campus Coordinator.

Following the beta testing, Schrum’s team will collect and analyze data with the goal of improving and expanding the prototype, contributing to scholarly research on using technology to improve student success, and applying for external funding.

4-VA@Mason Awards Funding for 12 Promising Investigations Led by Mason Faculty plus Eight Additional Collaborations for Mason Co-PIs

4-VA@Mason, announces the Collaborative Research Awards for the 23-24 academic year — with 12 projects spearheaded by Mason faculty, and eight for Mason faculty acting as Co-PIs. “These 4-VA@Mason Collaborative Research Grants are the core of what our state program is all about — providing seed funding to encourage faculty from our eight partner schools to launch novel research efforts and build critical relationships among the institutions,” said Janette Kenner Muir, Vice Provost, Academic Affairs and Campus Coordinator of 4-VA@Mason.

Approved proposals were from a range of colleges at Mason including the College of Visual and Performing Arts, Computer Game Design/Virginia Serious Game Institute; the College of Humanities and Social Sciences; the College of Engineering and Computing; and the College of Science.

One proposal funded this year is Dr. Chris Jones’ work, Using Taxonomic, Pigment, and Molecular Analysis to Characterize Algal Blooms in the Shenandoah River. Professor Jones, a member of the Environmental Science & Policy Department and Director of the Potomac Environmental Research and Education Center, has already seen the benefit of 4-VA support with growing research projects focused on harmful algal blooms that threaten Virginia’s Shenandoah River and also plague waters throughout the world. In the Shenandoah, these blooms originally consisted of green algae, which while troublesome for recreational activities, did not present a danger to humans and wildlife. In the past two years, however, the blooms have included cyanobacteria that contain toxins. Environmental engineers recognize that it is critical to identify the toxic bacteria quickly and definitively, but current methodologies are inadequate. Jones’ team of Mason faculty and students, together with their partners at Old Dominion University, will tackle this important challenge.

The following are the 4-VA@Mason 2023-24 Collaborative Research Grant winners, with partner schools in parentheses.

Akerlof, Karen Bridging Science and Policy in the States: A Study of Emerging Mechanisms to Train Scientists and Engineers (VT)
Enfield, Jacob MySQL Murder Mystery (VMI)
Furst, Kirin Emlet The role of the air-water interface in breakthrough of PFAS and phthalate esters during wastewater treatment (VT)
Jones, R Christian Using Taxonomic, Pigment and Molecular Analysis to Characterize Algal Blooms in the Shenandoah River (ODU)
Kang, Pilgyu Machine learning assisted laser manufacturing of alloy nanoparticle graphene hybrid materials for high performance hydrogen sensing (UVA)
LaFrance, Michelle The Virginia Community and Public Writing Collaborative (JMU, VCU, VT, UVA)
Lawrence, Heidi A Rhetorical Approach to Challenges in Blood Donation (VT)
Raffegeau, Tiphanie Using Virtual Reality to Study Cognitive and Affective Risk Factors for Falls in Older Adults (ODU)
Straus, David The Role of Diabatic Heating in Determining Atlantic Storm Paths (UVA)
Van Aken, Benoit Protection of RNA by Association with Macromolecules Implications for Wastewater Based Epidemiology (VT)
Yu, Yun Nanoscale Visualization of Electrocatalytic Carbon Dioxide Reduction Activity at Cu Nanocatalysts (UVA)
Zhu, Ziwei Towards Consolidated and Dynamic Debiasing for Online Search and Recommendation (VT)

The following Mason faculty received funding as Co-PIs collaborating with other 4-VA institutions in parentheses:

Chowdhury, Ahsan The Commonwealth Proofs Project Collaborative: Promoting Students’ Understanding of Logical Implications and their Transformations (VT)
Dromgold-Sermen, Michelle New American Resources: Partnerships and Initiatives at Virginia Higher Education Institutions to Strengthen Virginia’s Migration Support (VT)
Jing, Hao Acoustics-enabled Noncontact Manipulation, Patterning, and Assembly of Complex-shaped Micro/nanoparticles for Advance Manufacturing (VT)
LaToza, Thomas Visualizing Code Changes to Understand Students’ Mental Models in Programming Education at Scale (VT)
Stone, Victoria Increasing Mental Health Services in K-12 Settings by Helping Provisionally Licensed School Counselors Meet the Requirements for Full Licensure as Professional School Counselors in Virginia (JMU)
Stone, Victoria Supporting K-12 Students after Psychiatric Hospitalizations: Piloting Mixed Reality Simulation Training for School Mental Health Professionals (UVA)
Van Aken, Benoit Hyperspectral imaging for the real-time detection of microplastic particles in seafoods (VT)
Zhu, Ziwei Break the Dilemmas between Model Performance and Fairness: A Holistic Solution for Fairness Learning on Graphs (VT)

“We are looking forward to the new discoveries we will find with these 4-VA collaborative projects,” comments Vice Provost Muir, “Our faculty, students, and the Commonwealth of Virginia will benefit from these partnerships as the schools approach the work from their own perspectives and strengths, building solid partnerships for future initiatives.”

Best Practices for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Identified and Shared Statewide

Effective teaching is a cornerstone of Virginia higher education. To attain that critical bar, it is essential that successful teaching strategies are created and maintained, and that they meet students’ needs. This necessitates classroom-based research — known as the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL). Faculty-focused SoTL research achieves multiple objectives including identifying best practices in educational strategies for a specific field and promoting a university’s overall teaching excellence.

While SoTL is crucial to gain a greater understanding of what works and what doesn’t work in the classroom, very few faculty are prepared to conduct such research independently. Thus, support for SoTL frequently falls to campus Centers for Teaching and Learning (CTLs). CTLs are generally small and tasked with a wide range of faculty assistance, so identifying appropriate SoTL strategies presents a time and resource challenge.

This dilemma faced the Stearns Center at Mason as well as three other 4-VA schools — Virginia Commonwealth University, Virginia Tech, and the University of Virginia. Each wanted to address the SoTL gap. The solution was recognized via a 4-VA Collaborative Research Grant, allowing the schools to work together to create sustainable SoTL programming. The goal was to create or refine plans for engaging and supporting faculty in SoTL at their specific institutions, to develop and investigate the impact of cross-institutional support programming for faculty developers, and ultimately improve the research competitiveness of faculty at each institution. Although not part of the 4-VA partnership, the prospect of such work also attracted the attention of faculty at Mary Washington University who were interested in joining the effort.

Led by the Stearns Center for Teaching and Learning Director, Shelley Reid, with key support from Mason graduate assistant Sophia Abbot, the team represented a state-wide effort, including Ed Brantmeier, Interim Executive Director/Assistant Director of the Center for Faculty Innovation (JMU); Dayna Henry Assistant Director of the Scholarship Area at the Center for Faculty Innovation (JMU); Kim Case, Director of Faculty Success (VCU); Kim Filer, Associate Vice Provost for Faculty Development/Director of the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (VT); Lindsay Wheeler, Assistant Director of STEM Education Initiatives at the Center for Teaching Excellence and Jessica Taggart, Postdoctoral Research Associate (UVA); and Melissa Wells, Assistant Professor/Faculty Fellow of the Center for Teaching (Mary Washington). “Through our 4-VA@Mason grant, as well as the Complementary Grants at our 4-VA partner schools, we saw an opportunity to help CTLs avoid ‘reinventing the wheel’ in a key area of faculty support,” explained Reid. “SoTL is a growth area for CTLs, and this grant provided an opportunity to design that growth intentionally and collaboratively—and then to share the model with other CTLs nationally.”

Together, the group researched and built effective support structures for SoTL training. As a “community of practice,” the group met regularly to exchange strategies already in use and constructed additional strategies and resources for both CTL leaders and faculty. Next, they developed and presented workshops for national and local audiences to guide other CTL leaders in building collaborative structures. At these workshops, attendees learned about evidence-based models, common SoTL support programming across institution types, and received peer feedback on their plans. Presentations were made at the Professional & Organizational Development in Higher Education Network Conference, the International Consortium for Educational Development, the Innovations in Teaching and Learning Conference (Mason), the International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Conference on Higher Education Pedagogy (VT), and an online workshop for SCHEV (VCU).

Next, the team created online resources, an open access trove of tools for SoTL developers, including a Taxonomy of common language and organizational structure for understanding a variety of SoTL program models — organized by program type with a detailed description of each model. It also includes examples to further support readers’ envisioning of program possibilities. Further, visitors can access a strategic plan worksheet, which guides SoTL developers through the details of their aspirational and future plans in the context of their institution and provides a venue to receive peer feedback on specific aspects of their plan.

The group continues to spread the word about effective SoTL practices through the following publications:

International Journal of Academic Development Impact of a Regional Community of Practice for Academic Developers Engaged in Institution-Level Support for SoTL (Lukes, Abbot, Henry, Wells, Baum, Case, Brantmeier, & Wheeler)
To Improve the Academy Strategic Planning Tools for Educational Developers Supporting SoTL Cultures and Programs at their Institutions (Lukes, Abbot, Wheeler, Henry, Case, Wells, Brantmeier)
New Directions for Teaching and Learning Examining a Regional Educational Developer Community of Practice for Advancing Institutional Cultures of SoTL Engagement (Abbot, Lukes, Baum, Case, Henry, Brantmeier, Wheeler)

“Our team members have been particularly excited about the positive reception of the collaborative model through the well-attended national workshops. We’re looking forward to the conversations that are made possible through the multiple publications that will increase our audience and enable other CTLs to build their own collaborations.” concludes Reid.

Communication Across the Curriculum: Developing Faculty Resources to Enhance Student Success

Communication competency is recognized as one of the most important skills for a successful college and professional career. To support this outcome, writing courses have long been a requirement in higher education to bolster communication proficiency. More recently, additional efforts have been developed to provide students with a larger framework, including the creation of Communication Centers on college campuses — rising from a grassroots movement in the 1980s to a more defined role in the early 2000s.

Today, colleges recognize the need for further multiple, scaffolded opportunities to practice language and presentation skills throughout a student’s academic lifespan. This includes learning oral and written skills found within their chosen career track. Such an approach, known as communication across the curriculum (CxC), enhances opportunities for students to both strengthen their communication abilities and to employ in-depth content area specifics. Regrettably, however, many subject matter faculty feel ill-equipped and unsupported in their efforts to integrate communication into course curricula, expressing a need for more teaching assistance to provide student feedback on a range of communication skills — presentations, team projects, interpersonal skills — within the course framework.

Mason’s Melissa Broeckelman-Post, Professor and the Basic Course Director in the Department of Communication saw a need to intervene. This thinking was shared by Broeckelman-Post’s colleagues at two other 4-VA partner schools — Virginia Tech’s Director of Undergraduate Programs and Senior Instructor in the School of Communication Brandi Quesenberry, and JMU’s Associate Professor in the School of Communication Studies and Basic Course Director Timothy Ball. They had connected at previous conferences and were sharing ideas on CxC but saw a 4-VA grant as an opportunity to concretely collaborate on scholarship that would be helpful for all institutions.

Together, they wanted to look more closely at what would be needed to develop a CxC program at each of their schools. It was the 4-VA Collaborative Research Grant that allowed them to begin this important work.

“We knew that faculty members would greatly benefit with tools and techniques to provide their students feedback on the range of communication skills within their disciplines, including oral, written, team building, intercultural, and leadership,” explains Broeckelman-Post. “The first step in our plan was to reach out to Stephanie Norander, Executive Director of one of the nation’s leading CxC programs at University of North Carolina at Charlotte, to ensure that we utilize the best practices in building resources that will be effective for faculty on our campuses.”

From there, Broeckelman-Post, Quesenberry and Ball, assembled a team of graduate students at Mason, (Adebanke Adebayo, Aayushi Hingle, Lane Schwager, Shannon Taylor Heflin, Briana Stewart, and Sammi Tuckerman Munson) Virginia Tech (Emma Baumgardner) and JMU (Selim Njeim). Their goal was to create a robust set of flexible tools to support faculty and student learning, including online resources, individual and small group faculty curriculum consultations, and in-class workshops to help faculty embed communication skills development within their disciplinary courses that can be shared across the institutions.

Before they began, the CxC team needed a greater understanding of just what faculty in a variety of disciplines perceived as important communication skills and what they believed to be helpful for their courses. Three research question were developed:

RQ1: How do faculty across disciplines perceive and value communication?
RQ2: What types of support do faculty across disciplines need to incorporate communication assignments in their classes?
RQ3: What are the most important communication skills employers across disciplines are seeking?

Faculty at all three universities were invited to join in an online study, with 232 accepting the offer. Participants represented a wide range of departments, including the social sciences, engineering and computing, health and human services, business and interdisciplinary or unspecified areas. Through the survey, a greater insight as to what aspects of communication that were important to faculty and for student’s careers was established. Notes Quesenberry, “While the results pointed us to the development of concrete communications packages, we were struck by the fact that 93.2% of all faculty identified communication as “extremely important” or “very important” to their major’s discipline.” The CxC team knew that their work was needed.

A comprehensive overview of the faculty research survey was recently published in Communication Education, with all team members who contributed to the research component of the project receiving authorship credit. Another goal of the project was to create a website with communication resources for faculty across disciplines. This robust site is now populated with a broad variety of tools to assist faculty to aid students with a range of projects including designing oral presentations, presentation performance and delivery, adapting presentations for audiences, and interviews: https://4va.gmu.edu/communication-across-the-curriculum-resources/.

The findings were shared at two different presentations at the National Communication Association annual convention. They now plan presentations at additional local conferences including Mason’s Innovations in Teaching and Learning.

“Thanks to this collaboration, we were able to develop some important tools to build effective CxC programs at all three of our universities,” notes Ball. “That’s a win for Virginia’s faculty and students.”

Five 4-VA Schools Collaborate to Better Understand the History of Higher Education

The Council for the Advancement of Standards in Higher Education lists the History of Higher Education as an important core course that provides students the opportunity to bridge practice and theory. However, the class is rarely taught by historians and often lacks a focus on the historical thinking, research, and digital literacy skills necessary for a clear-eyed understanding of the higher education landscape.

This dilemma was on the mind of historian Kelly Schrum, Professor, Higher Education Program, and Affiliated Faculty in the Department of History and Art History at Mason. It also concerned her colleague in the Higher Education Program at Virginia Tech, Assistant Professor, Chase Catalano. Together, via an initial 4-VA Collaborative Research Grant in 2020-2021, they wanted to integrate those missing skills into the class with the hope of increasing research opportunities and creating a valuable open educational resource (OER).

The project, launched during the pandemic, consisted of students at Mason and VT working together and in parallel to learn about the history of higher education while developing historical thinking and research skills.

The project was a great success. “The student-created asynchronous learning activity assignment worked very well, and fostered a true collaboration across our institutions,” said Schrum. In addition to the learning activity assignments, students and faculty contributed to a website, higheredhistory.gmu.edu; piloted a primary source learning activity in two different higher education graduate courses during Fall 2020; and expanded the project to a third course in Spring 2021.

Schrum, Catalano, and Sophia Abbot, a doctoral student at Mason, grew this work into a larger research project on teaching and learning the history of higher education. Thirty-five students agreed to share their work for analysis and 24 were interviewed after completing the course. The survey and interview data made clear that students appreciated the value and relevance of studying the history of higher education for both their curricular and professional goals. One student explained, “We were able to take what we learned in the course and apply it to the project in a way that was very effortless, and that really helped me think about history in a different way.”

The group presented their initial findings at the Conference on Higher Education Pedagogy in February 2021 which were very well received. They then began talking with colleagues around the commonwealth at William & Mary, James Madison University, and Old Dominion University. Their shared interest in improving history of higher education courses prompted Schrum to apply for an extension and expansion of the Collaborative Research Grant. Schrum’s co-PIs at the partner schools requested 4-VA Complementary Grants at their institutions allowing continued work together with a wider lens.

The expansion grant enlarged the initial team to include Assistant Dean for Undergraduate Education Ben Boone of W&M; Art Dean, Executive Director for Access and Inclusion, JMU; Kim Bullington, ODU’s Adjunct Assistant Professor, Educational Foundations and Leadership; and ODU’s Director of Community Outreach & Engagement, Bill Nuckols.

In addition to Abbot, key Mason student scholars on the project included graduate students Allison Loughry and Alicia Ellis, and undergrads Sodaba Azamy and Kelly Tcheou. These students contributed to research, website development, and publications.

The 4-VA extension grant had four key components: 1) collaborate with 4-VA institutions to improve teaching and learning about the history of higher education, and to teach a shared digital assignment;2) expand OER resources on the history of higher education in the United States to provide primary sources, secondary sources, and a database of college and university archives; 3) conduct research on how the history of higher education is taught nationally; and 4) conduct Scholarship of Teaching and Learning research on how students learn historical thinking skills and digital skills as they create asynchronous learning activities on this subject.

With the expansion grant in hand, the Mason, Tech, W&M, and JMU faculty members taught the shared assignment in Fall 2021. Students also explored asynchronous primary source learning activities created by students at all four institutions. ODU taught the shared assignment in Summer 2022. Students at ODU explored primary source learning activities created by students at the other institutions and then developed additional resources which will be shared across institutions in future semesters. Between the five institutions, more than 100 students built individual asynchronous primary source learning activities. Selected activities are publicly available at https://sites.google.com/view/history-of-higher-ed/learning-activities-examples.

Explains Abbot, “I developed countless skills while collaborating on this project: from deepening my own understanding of the history of higher education and the value of primary sources, to engaging students in authentic, student-driven, project-based assignments. I’ve been inspired by the historical research students have done through this cross-institutional assignment, especially on Virginia institutions—uncovering stories that are rarely told in commonly assigned texts and expanding their understanding of the colleges and universities within which they operate,”

Each school contributed OER materials for the website. In addition to primary and secondary sources, the website now contains a database of institutional archives with digitized content, including yearbooks. Thanks to the two undergraduate research assistants, Azamy and Tcheo, over 700 institutional archives were cataloged on the site, including 48 Hispanic-serving institutions (HSIs), 24 historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), and 15 women’s colleges. Additionally, the list includes 63 community colleges which is especially important given the lack of attention to these institutions historically.

Azamy and Tcheo have also reviewed and analyzed 70 course syllabi submitted by History of Higher Education instructors across the U.S. They prepared a summary report of common readings and course topics. Their findings supported several academic articles now underway addressing how these courses are typically structured and taught. Their work, along with that of Loughry, also supported a grant proposal submitted to the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) Institute for Higher Education Faculty program.

The team credits the 4-VA grant for allowing members to do the diligent research necessary to create these important resources.

“This 4-VA project fostered meaningful and lasting collaboration across five Virginia institutions. While each university approached the history of higher education course from its own perspective, we were able to work together on a shared assignment that allowed for a rich learning experience among faculty and students across campuses. The results speak for themselves!” – Kelly Schrum, Professor, Higher Education Program, Affiliated Faculty, History and Art History, Mason

“I sincerely appreciated having an opportunity to collaborate with colleagues across the state for this 4-VA project. Through our conversations and research, I developed new pedagogical approaches that benefited students and deepened my thinking about the history of higher education.”
– Chase Catalano, Assistant Professor, Higher Education, VT

“We really enjoyed being part of this effort to expand student research on the history of higher education. Everyone came away from this project with a deeper understanding of how important it is to develop critical thinking skills and to look beyond our own institutions.”
– Ben Boone, Assistant Dean for Undergraduate Education, W&M

“The website, which holds a treasure trove of student research and engagement from a wide range of institutions, will be invaluable as we move ahead in studying the complex and influential histories of American higher education.”
– Art Dean, Executive Director for Access, and Inclusion, JMU

“When this asynchronous learning project was first introduced to the students, they were thrilled at the thought of not having to write a 20-page paper, however in the end, they did more work doing research on their chosen subject. They enjoyed this project because it allowed them a space for research and reflection, and it taught them how to create an interactive learning environment in an asynchronous environment. Being able to evaluate and participate in the projects created by other students in other universities across Virginia also taught them about their peers’ projects, too.”
– Kim Bullington, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Educational Foundations and Leadership, ODU

Outcomes:

Scholarly Conference Presentations

Catalano, C. & Hernandez, R. (2022, March). Why do we teach history? Instructor and student perspectives. ACPA-College Student Educators Conference, St. Louis, MO, United States.

Schrum, K., Abbot, S., & Catalano, C. (2022, January 6-9). History of Higher Education: Students Making Sense of Primary Sources by Designing Asynchronous Learning Activities [Poster]. American Historical Association, New Orleans, LA, United States.

Abbot, S., Schrum, K., & Catalano, C. (2021, November 13-15). Teaching Historical Thinking to Higher Education Graduate Students [Poster]. Southern Association for College Student Affairs, Norfolk, VA, United States.

Abbot, S., Schrum, K., Hernandez, R., Fong, W. L., & Loughry, A. (2021, October 26-29). Designing Digital Activities for Authentic Learning [Panel, Virtual]. International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Conference.

Schrum, K. & Abbot, S. (2021, September 20-24). On-Demand: Engaging students online through a peer-to-peer asynchronous teaching assignment [On-Demand Presentation, Virtual]. Innovations in Teaching and Learning, Fairfax, VA, United States.

Abbot, S. (2021, September 20-24). SoTL Showcase [Panel, Virtual]. Innovations in Teaching and Learning, Fairfax, VA, United States.

Abbot, S., Schrum, K., & Catalano, C. (2021, February 3-5). Graduate Students Learning and Teaching History through Asynchronous Activities [Poster session, virtual]. Conference on Higher Education Pedagogy, Blacksburg, VA, United States.

Publications

Catalano, D., Schrum, K., Fay, E., & Abbot, S. (forthcoming, 2023). ‘I can learn from the past’: Making the history of higher education relevant through social justice education pedagogy. The History Teacher.

Loughry, A., Abbot, S., Schrum, K., & Catalano, D. (forthcoming 2023). Developing digital skills through a student-facilitated asynchronous learning activity. The Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy.

Schrum, K., Abbot, S., Loughry, A., & Catalano, D. (forthcoming 2024). “I wanted to know!”: Engaging learners in the history of higher education through an authentic digital assessment. The History Teacher.

Schrum, K, Abbot, S., Fay, E., Loughry, A., & Catalano, C. (in process). Teaching historical thinking through the history of higher education.

External Funding

“Unpacking the History of Higher Education in the United States.”
National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) Institute for Higher Education Faculty award.

Provost’s Graduate Student Travel Grant (January 2022)
American Historical Association Travel Grant (January 2022)
Southern Association of College Student Affairs Travel Grant (November 2021)

Mason’s Rosenthal Earns Acclaim for New Book

Dr. Aharona Rosenthal, an adjunct professor teaching Hebrew for 4-VA@Mason Shared Courses has recently released her third book and first historical fiction novel to much acclaim. Where the Lilacs Bloom Once Again has been lauded by the Literary Titans for Best Memoir, earned the Penn Craft Best Historical Fiction Award, was recognized by the International Firebird as the best book on the Holocaust, awarded five stars by The Readers Favorite, and nominated for an Outstanding Creator Award. Rosenthal’s recent interview by Romanian radio show Universul la feminin with Serena Adler generated listener praise for the book detailing her Jewish Romanian family and their lives prior to World War II.

Researched and written over a 12-year period by Rosenthal, Where the Lilacs Bloom Once Again is based on her family’s genealogical papers as well as exhaustive document examination from around the world. It follows the story of Rosenthal’s grandmother’s cousin Friddie Stoleru, who was falsely charged with treason and spent the 1930s in prison and forced labor camps. The book recounts the lives of her family members during a time in Europe when discrimination and the persecution of Jewish people was at its peak.

For Rosenthal, the book was a response to her father’s hand-penned request for his daughter to ‘tell the truth’ about the lives of their ancestors. “The response to the book has been tremendous — it has opened a floodgate of people sharing their own family stories,” says Rosenthal. “For years, these narratives were buried deep. It was not uncommon that families did not speak of the abuse for generations due to listening devices which were monitored by the Communist Party. Many atrocities have remained a secret. Where the Lilacs Bloom Once Again has prompted so many to reach out and tell their truth. I’m honored to have given a voice to so many that were silenced.” Rosenthal expects that sentiment to be heightened following the upcoming publication of her interview with reporter Livius Denis Grigorescu in the leading Romanian newspaper Adevarul.

Calls for Proposals: 4-VA@Mason 2023-24 Collaborative Research Grants

Mason faculty interested in piloting a novel research project in conjunction with colleagues at one of the seven other 4-VA schools in Virginia are encouraged to respond to the annual 4-VA@Mason Collaborative Research Grants (CRG) calls for proposals. These grants, of up to $20,000, are designed to facilitate and support alliances which leverage the strengths of each partner university to improve efficiencies in research and higher education, reduce working in silos, and provide hands-on experiential opportunities for students. The grants encourage the development of baseline research projects in the sciences and humanities which could help fuel future research and funding.

The application link for the proposals is posted on the 4-VA@Mason grants page, which includes associated policies and procedures, as well as examples previous successful proposals. Applications will be accepted through February 28, 2023, with funding available July 1, 2023.

“Although the 4-VA mission to identify and boost efficiencies in educational design and research was launched in 2010, it is our Collaborative Research Grants — introduced in 2013 — that have really made a difference for Mason and our partner schools,” explains Janette Kenner Muir, Vice Provost, Academic Affairs and Campus Coordinator of 4-VA@Mason. “So many of our awarded pilot research projects have provided a springboard for subsequent, major federal and private grants and boosted research competitiveness at Mason and throughout the collaborative.” Those schools are the College of William and Mary, James Madison University, Old Dominion University, University of Virginia, Virginia Commonwealth University, Virginia Military Institute and Virginia Tech. In some cases, additional modest funding is available to co-PIs at the partner schools.

“Through the hundreds of 4-VA Collaborative Research Grants awarded throughout the state in the last ten years, 4-VA has truly made a difference for faculty, students and citizens statewide and beyond,” adds Muir.

4-VA@Mason and BAS: Getting to the Finish Line

For some students who begin their college career at Northern Virginia Community College (NOVA) — especially adult learners, first generation students and veterans — taking the leap to a four-year degree requires much more than negotiating transfer credits, selecting a class schedule, attending class, and doing homework. For these students, sometimes finding time in the day for education is itself a challenge. Life gets in the way. However, thanks to 4-VA@Mason and the Bachelor of Applied Science (BAS) program, there is a path for a smooth transition from that two-year experience to a four-year diploma.

BAS offers a unique curriculum which has grown from two specializations to eight concentrations with four in technology-rich fields. Many BAS concentrations can be completed entirely online, or via a hybrid format. Importantly, BAS ensures that all credits are transferred from NOVA to Mason.

Although the BAS program has experienced growth over the years, with its humble start of 1 student in 2012, the BAS program has ballooned to an expected 170 new students in Fall 2020. While enrollment rates have accelerated as the program has grown in size and strength, the COVID – 19 pandemic is thought to be the reason for the explosion of registrations in the Fall class.

“Because of our extensive online offerings, BAS has attracted a surge of students since in-person learning was discontinued in March,” explains BAS Academic Program Coordinator and Adjunct Professor Krystal Dains. “We recently held a virtual transfer orientation for our Fall transfers which was an absolute success.”

What’s more, Dains says, those students already in the BAS program experienced a seamless shift to the virtual learning world. “Overall, I would say that BAS students were perfectly positioned to adapt to the sudden changes in their education. Since many of our concentrations can be completed entirely online, the abrupt move to online classes in the Spring did not seem to have a huge impact on our students,” explains Dains. “Although some students have previously chosen in-person courses, all of them have had at least some experience with online learning, so it wasn’t totally new territory.”

Through 4-VA@Mason, the BAS program has changed exponentially, including removing various barriers — such as age restrictions — which allowed more students access to the opportunity. Additionally, the program has expanded the degree pathways, and is now offering degree completion programs in the following areas:

Cloud Computing
Cyber Security
Technology & Innovation
Managerial Leadership
Legal Studies
Health, Wellness, and Social Services
Human Development and Family Sciences
Applied Conflict Analysis and Resolution

Dains also notes that the Mason BAS program is built on flexibility. Even the approach to constructing the degree pathway is nimble. “The benefit of this model we’ve created is, it’s really quick. We get the correct people around the table. We decide the learning outcomes and which classes support them. We develop the curriculum and submit it to Undergraduate Council (UC). For BAS, once UC approves it, we are good to go,” says Dains. “We are perfectly positioned to put a new program in place quickly so we can be on the cutting edge.”

While Dains is enthusiastic about the future of BAS at Mason, she points to the already realized success of graduates who are flourishing in their careers (See “BAS Program Opens New Doors”).

“We have so much potential for future growth,” says Dains. “For me, it’s an exciting program to work with and a great opportunity to be a part of something new and growing — and growing fast. Our technology offerings are the right degrees at the right time.”

BAS Program Opens New Doors for Army Veteran

After seven years in the Army, including deployments to both Afghanistan and Iraq, Gavin Amy returned to Northern Virginia to begin the next chapter in his life. Studying his options, he decided to take advantage of his GI benefits and enroll at Northern Virginia Community College (NOVA).

His time at NOVA moved quickly thanks to several Russian language classes he had under his belt which were applied to his general studies courses. He then began classes specific to an Associate of Applied Science degree in Cybersecurity. Soon after, Amy learned about Mason’s Bachelor of Applied Science program which could help him see that next goal – a four-year degree. “When I looked at the cybersecurity option in the BAS program, it offered a more practical and focused group of classes that could lead me to a job,” he recalls.

At the BAS orientation at Mason, Amy met his future counselor, Krystal Dains. “Krystal answered all my questions that day” and, as Amy also credits, from that day forward. “She was my first exposure to the BAS program. The transition to BAS was seamless and painless. But probably what helped more than anything was Krystal.”

In 2019 Amy graduated from Mason with an Applied Science degree with a concentration in Cybersecurity. “In my second to last semester of undergraduate, I applied to the graduate program to get a Master of Science in Digital Forensics.” The graduate degree allowed Amy even more opportunities in the job market.

Reaching his goal has resulted in a successful outcome for Amy. He is beginning a new job in Incidence Response, which combines his academic experience in cybersecurity and forensics. “I’m happy with what my academic career has led me to.”