By Any Other Nerd

Internet Archive Artifact - 0002

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Wed, 21 Jan 2026 10:00:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes

Title: Dr. Neesen's book on wheeling by Victor Neesen, M.D.

From: New Amsterdam Book Company, 1899

What is it?

A book about riding bicycles that addresses the debate about whether bicycling is healthy, for whom, and under what conditions. The author, Victor Neesen, M. D., was a gynecologist who decided to step into the debate of the times about the health concerns regarding bicycles. He largely argues that there are great medical benefits from "wheeling" but it can cause problems if not done right. It may also aggravate other existing ailments. Still, he believes it is a virtue to "wheel" so long as a woman is of right moral character or as he puts it on page 90: "To sum up the morality of wheeling it may be tersely said that 'a lady is a lady wherever she is.'" Chapters cover essential topics like: Hygiene, Diseases and Ailments, The Bicycle for Women, Morality of the Bicycle, and an Appendix. It clocks in at about 130 pages and yes, includes photos of people on bicycles with an almost equal pairing.

Thoughts

I feel like I struck gold with this one. If you want a sense of what this book is writing against, take a look at the Pessimists Archive page on the bicycle. That it's written by a gynecologist means that I definitely had to look to see what was said about "hysteria." For those who want to learn about hysteria and technology in the 19th century, please check out Rachel Maine's The Technology of the Orgasm, and you may be as amused by the role of bikes in the hysteria "health" issue. Sure enough, bicycle riding can also benefit women diagnosed with hysteria (smirk). There are a good deal of "diseases peculiar to women" that wheeling can benefit, in fact. Neesen explains how here on page 75-76:

"Hysteria is this nerve manifestation accentuated. The name itself is derived from the Greek Hyster " meaning uterus, and applied by the ancients to that profound disturbance of the nervous equilibrium emanating from the uterus.

Wheeling helps these nervous disorders by relieving the nerve tension in much the same manner as a locomotive ''blows off " its accumulated steam, when it is at a standstill. If the steam was retained an explosion would result. Hysteria is an explosion of the nervous system and bicycling is a newly invented safety-valve."

There is, of course, this suggestive passage that I think would raise some eyebrows, maybe even today, about its subtext:

"The most grievous and lamentable charge that the anti-bicyclists make against the fair name of the female riders is unfortunately not advisable to take up for discussion in a book of this kind. It has been discussed and argued and refuted in the medical journals throughout the country, but in spite of the fact that it has been proven to be impossible, some people still think it a logical sequence to riding the wheel."

In exploring this text, my mind goes in two directions. The first is seeing this text as a prime example of how social norms and conventions were woven into the medicalization of bodies that were taking place in the 1800s. Neesen is tying together ailments, morality, and expertise, and through that, casting more control of women, even when he endorses the idea that women should ride bicycles. There's a particular context, and that context is not entirely medical as he says here on page 80:

"The moral side of bicycling has almost as much to do with the physician as the physical side, for morality is closely related to health. But aside from this, a physician, by reason of his learning and favorable opportunities for observation, has a vantage ground from which he is a powerful factor in molding public opinion."

Just by wading into the debate with his credentials to claim that it's medically and morally sound, there's still a paternalistic reasoning that permeates the text.

The second direction reminds me so much of the health fads of the last 50 years, including self-help. That also includes all the experts (some legit, some self-proclaimed) on Reels or TikTok that replicate these practices. Mark Twain, alive at the time of this book, said it best (assuming it was him) that history doesn't repeat but it sure does rhyme.

About This Series: I started this because I love the random oddities of the Internet Archive. Read more about how and why I did this here. To view all the posts in the collection, select this link. You can also download this program from my GitHub page.

Did you enjoy this read? Let me know your thoughts down below or feel free to browse around and check out some of my other posts!. You might also want to keep up to date with my blog by signing up for them via email.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Internet Archive Artifact - 0001

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Tue, 13 Jan 2026 10:30:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

Title: Adam Watters, importer of, & wholesale & retail dealer

From: microfiche, originally from 1800s.

What is it?

This is an advertisement for Adam Watters, an importer, wholesale, retail dealer in Upper Town, Quebec City. The brochure identifies a range of imported goods, including meats, soups, fish, and hams, and notes relationships with suppliers from Portland, Boston, and Guelph. This type of advertisement was typical in 19th-century newspapers, serving both as promotion and public notice of commercial credibility.

Thoughts

There's two layers of interesting elements to this artifact. The first is that it is microfiche that has been then added to the archive. This makes me wonder how much of the archive is microfiche which is something I hadn't considered before. Also, we know this because the first few pages are essentially meta-data related to the microfiche, which also tells us it is from Quebec, Canada with its use of both English and French. The work was done by the Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions which is now Canadiana.ca, a historical organization interested in preserving and making Canadian history accessible.

Then, there's the advertisement itself. What structure me first--and such things usually don't--is the number of fonts (at least 5 I think). I just find that curious as it is layered well enough to grab attention and organize information. It's interesting to consider that level of graphic design was deployed at the time. The variety of products and distinctions within products also catches my attention. Again, maybe because I live in the world where grocery stores are exercises in decision fatigue, it's still interesting to see that even Mustard has a number of choices. And that sauce list--just makes me hungry, if not curious (King of Oude Sauce?). They even have 8 versions of soap to offer.

Internet Archive Artifact #000

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 10:30:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes

Welcome to this new series where I explore random artifacts from one of my favorite places on the Internet, the Internet Archive. Its biggest claim to fame is the Wayback Machine, where you can look at what a website looked like at some point in the past. So you could go look at what the USA.gov website looked like in December, 1999 or see what this blog looked like in 2015! But the amount of artifacts deeply stored within the Internet Archive is endless!

Why do this?

Well, I'm a big fan of the public domain and open access. I wrote an entire dissertation about making things more widely available and I spend a good part of January the last few years putting up new public domain films on my YouTube channel, which includes having to submit appeals to YouTube because companies are still claiming copyright. I like the idea of reminding folks of what's already out there to play with.

I also needed a new challenge or focus for this blog. Something that keeps me coming back to share, think, and explore about things that aren't about AI!

Another thing that inspired this new series is that I like the Internet Archive but exploring it can be a challenge. There's a lot of content, and it's not easy to find thing or rather find things at random. I feel like I have to dig in and that feels a little less serendipitous for how I might like to engage with it. With the help of AI, I built a small web program that would send me to a random detail page on the Internet Archive.

Once I had a mechanism for random encounters, I realize that this would be a fun series for me to blog about. One thing I've missed about blogging that was hard to do with the dissertation was committing to some longer term project. Now, with that out of the way, I feel like I can pursue something like this more consistently. And thought I'd like to commit to it as a 365 project like I have done with short stories and photos (while having good starts and failing with others, such as my poem a day), I'm hoping that I can do this one on a weekly basis.

So what can you expect? Well, I think the format will be pretty straightforward. I'll share what I was sent to, what sense I could make out of it (sometimes with the help of AI, particularly if it's in another language), and what are my thoughts about encountering such an artifact. I hope it provides enough strange and curious things to keep readers interested and even if it doesn't, I'm sure I'll enjoy it.

Screenshot of the browser extension

You can do it too!

And, of course, I encourage folks at home to play along. If it's useful, here is the prompt that I used with Claude to get the app that I have:

My prompt:

"I want to build a browser extension that will randomly pull a resources from the depths of the internet archive. I would like some features to put parameters around it (e.g. image, sound, video, software, book, newspaper, etc and when the item is from and other tagged features)...interview me to get more details about how the extension should look and feel... also, I have no real coding skills so also help me build the best extension in the cleanest code possible"

Claude's response (Note: I have my Claude personalized so that it asks questions--see this post for more insight):

"How do you envision triggering and viewing random finds?

Popup window. Click the extension icon, see a random item preview in a small overlay, click through to the Archive if interested.
New tab experience. Each activation opens a full new tab with the random resource, more immersive and visual.
Browser sidebar. A persistent or toggleable panel that refreshes with new items, allowing browsing while you work.
New tab replacement. Every time you open a blank new tab, it shows a random Archive item instead of your default page.
Hybrid (1+3). Popup for quick discovery, with an option to pin it as a sidebar for longer exploration sessions.

Question 2: Filter Persistence and Complexity

How should the filtering system behave?

Set-and-forget profiles. Create named filter profiles (e.g., "1920s newspapers," "80s software") and switch between them.
Quick toggles. Simple on/off buttons for major categories visible in the interface, adjusted on the fly.
Advanced query builder. A more powerful interface letting you combine media type, date range, collection, language, and other Archive metadata fields.
Randomize the randomness. Minimal filtering. You want maximum surprise, with perhaps only a single broad category toggle.
Hybrid (6+8). Saved profiles for frequent use, but with access to an advanced mode when you want precision.

Question 3: Visual and Emotional Tone

What aesthetic should the extension convey?

Retro/archival. Sepia tones, typewriter fonts, aged paper textures. Feels like opening a dusty box in an attic.
Clean minimalist. White space, modern sans-serif, the content is the star. Think museum gallery.
Playful/whimsical. Bright colors, animations, a slot-machine or "spin the wheel" energy for the randomization.
Dark mode scholarly. Muted dark interface, subtle accents, feels like a research tool for late-night exploration.
Hybrid (11+14). Retro visual elements but in a dark, muted palette. Scholarly nostalgia."

My response was: "2 7, 8, 9 11"

It asked me a few more questions, and again, I chose selections. The whole interaction took less than 3 minutes back and forth. I did other tasks as it built the actual program. The result is a Chrome browser extension that executes whenever I open a new tab, it presents the Archive Roulette and shares something new.

If you want to see all the posts in the collection, check out this link. You can also download this program from my GitHub page.

The PhD Chronicles: Creating a Media Kit for Data Collection

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Mon, 24 Nov 2025 10:00:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 12 minutes

"Sounds like you created a media kit." My partner said as I explained all the strategies that I had used to reach out and spread the word to get participants in my study. I hadn't thought of it that way, but yes, that's pretty much what I did. I had meant to write this post much earlier (my data collection as in Fall of 2022) but here where are. I think it's still a useful approach for folks who are recruiting participants in the online spaces.

For my study, it was tricky because I couldn't interview anyone I know and also, I was interviewing folks about their participation on academic pirate platforms. I had to find a way to connect with people I don't know about a thing that is illicit and hope they would be open to me recording our conversation. And I had to find a good amount of participants (ideally 20).

I approached it in several stages.

Gather

I had some time while I waited for approval from my dissertation committee and also my Institutional Review Board. I took this time to gather the places that I thought would be ideal places to find people who might be interested in participating in my study. I created a spreadsheet with several sheets:

Email contacts
Listservs
Online spaces (e.g. Facebook groups, LinkedIn Groups, Sub-Reddits, etc)

For each sheet, I had a column for the the name, the emails (or links) and three columns for "Contacted On".

I then did the tedious part. I collected emails, listserv emails, and sites. I scrolled through all of my email contacts and also, went onto my social media platforms to see who I was in regular enough contact with and see if I could get their email (if I didn't have it already). Given that I've had this email for more than 15 years and been on social media just as long, if not longer--it was a lot. But I looked for anyone I knew that was in academia or academia-adjacent. I also searched my email for .edu addresses. I Similarly, I looked for any academic-oriented list-servs and a range of online groups that felt relevant to my work. I did try to contact the operators and owners of academic pirate platforms but did not hear back from them (no surprise).

This process yielded over 350 emails of individuals and over 50 online spaces, listservs, etc. I felt that was a good haul and would get the results I was hoping for.

Craft

Next, I had to create the messaging for emails, my own social media, listservs and online groups. To do that, I needed different forms of messaging. To people I knew, I had to encourage them to share my message and make it as easy and clear as possible on how to help me. To people I didn't know, I had to capture interest and establish trust. For people I I needed to You can see much of that messaging in the space below contained in the two emails that I sent out to my contacts.

For my second round of communication on social media platforms, I realize I had forgotten to include a visual. I knew that such things get more attention on social media, so I used Google Slides to create an image communicated the essentials of who I was looking for. At this point, the second round of calls, I could also see where it was better to target certain populations that didn't have as much representation.

The image that I used to go along with social media post.

I also created a webpage on my own website that interested participants could go to for signing up for the study and finding out more. I'm linking to the Internet Archive version of this because the current page has been changed because, of course, I'm no longer looking for participants.

Additionally, I adapted my email that I planned to send into a blog post for this blog as well.

Deliver

After crafting my different messages, I proceeded to deliver the messages. I had to stack the deliveries so they maximized sharing possibilities. First, I posted to my social media platforms so that I could then include links to those posts in the emails I was sending out (see below).

To avoid people seeing large email lists of others, I knew I had to do BCC, but also, I had to chunk out how many BCCs I do because I would inevitably end up in people's spam. I used a MailMerge plugin in the Google tools that integrated my email list in the Google sheet I created with the email I had composed. However, the free version only allowed a certain amount (100?) a day. Therefore, the initial email was sent out over the course of a few days to the people I knew.

I also went ahead and posted to all the groups that I had, but again, to avoid being considered as SPAM, I posted to these different places over days. In fact, every time I set up a new mail-merge, I posted to a few more online groups and listservs.

In the second round on social media I also included an image to improve shareability (which also got me to share on Instagram)

I did 2 email rounds that went like this:

Here's the challenge
Here's how you can help
Here are materials to make it easier to help

That last part was essential. Maybe it's the educator or designer in me, but if I'm going to ask people to do things, I want to make the barrier as low as possible. In the second round, I further elaborated by explaining the amount of time each task would take and the different levels of engagement.

The result is that I had about 60 folks start the survey (and about 55 or so completed it). Out of that, there was 25 strong candidates that I interviewed.

Here is the templates that I used in case you want to borrow or adapt for your needs.

Templates

Initial Email to Colleagues

Greetings friends,

As many of you know, I've been in a doctoral program (maybe forever?!?!?!) and I'm finally at the point where I am starting to look for participants. No, no, I'm not going to ask you–in fact, if I know you, I can’t interview you for this study. But, I do need your help.

What I am hoping all of you will do (yes, even you!) is to reach out to your email, listservs, and social media networks to your friends and colleagues in academia in the US.

See, there is a real challenge with my study in that I'm trying to reach scholars who are making use of certain networks (namely, SciHub, LibGen, ICanHazPDF, and r/Scholar--no worries if that list doesn't make sense to you). Because engaging on these networks is often not discussed openly, it's really hard to find out who is using them and ask them to participate in this valuable study which explores their experience as scholars on such platforms. If you would like to know more about the study, please check out the study page or reach out and I am happy to share more!

So, the ask: Can you please help me spread the word by sharing the call for participants in at least one of the following ways on my behalf (and if so, let me know)?

I have included some copy that you are welcome to adapt/adjust to your own voice or just copy/paste in total. If those are too much, would you at least consider sharing these posts (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn) that I’ve already created?

**LinkedIn

Fellow scholars! Do you use #SciHub, #LibGen, #ICanHazPDF on Twitter or r/Scholar on Reddit? Would you be willing to help my friend (Lance Eaton) in his study? His dissertation focuses on how scholars understand their experiences on these platforms and their scholarly identities.

Find out more on the Research Study page

http://www.lanceeaton.com/research-study/

or complete the Intake Survey

https://umassboston.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_8dIzyfNte9HdsTY

**Twitter

Are you a #scholar who uses #SciHub, #LibGen, #ICanHazPDF, #rScholar on #Reddit? Please consider participating in (@leaton01) important research study?

Find out more about the Research Study: http://www.lanceeaton.com/research-study/

OR complete the Intake Survey: https://umassboston.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_8dIzyfNte9HdsTY

**Facebook

Find out more about the Research Study: http://www.lanceeaton.com/research-study/

OR complete the Intake Survey: https://umassboston.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_8dIzyfNte9HdsTY

**Email to Friends/Colleagues

Hi all,

I'm sharing this on behalf of my friend and colleague, Lance Eaton. He is working on his dissertation research which focuses on scholars who use SciHub, LibGen, #ICanHazPDF on Twitter or r/Scholar on Twitter. Do you use any of these platforms in pursuit of research literature for scholarly activities? If so, please consider visiting the link below, learning more about the study, and potentially participating in the study.

Find out more about the Research Study: http://www.lanceeaton.com/research-study/

Thank you for this assistance at this time!

Second Email to Friends & Colleagues

Greetings!

Many of you have been wonderfully kind in sharing out my call for participants for my doctoral study. I am so very grateful & appreciate your support; I know others may not have because they didn’t have time, my email ended up in spam, or they don’t think they know anyone that could be in my study (but, trust me, you do!).

So I still need help with getting the word out. My first outreach helped me to find half of my participants–this means, I’m halfway to collecting all my data–THIS IS HUGE and I am so grateful for those who have shared and reached out on my behalf.

I’m going to ask just a little bit more of folks but make it super easy for you and break it down by the amount of time you might commit to helping me out. This can range from 5 seconds of help to 10 minutes of help–all of it will be appreciated!

**5-15 Seconds to Help

GREAT! Thank you for doing this! In this situation, please re-share & Like/Favorite one (or more, if you have 15-20 seconds) of the following posts on your networks:

Upvote one or more of these Reddit posts about my call for participants (listed in order of preference)

How this helps: The more other people like/reshare, the more it shows up on people’s feeds–people that I’m not directly connected to. I can almost guarantee that if you are getting this email from me, it means someone (or more than one person) in your network use these platforms. I may not be connected to them but if you are, then this is a chance fro them to see it. Remember, you won’t necessarily know if they use these platforms because folks don’t often talk about them.

**1-5 Minutes to help

Not just reshare one of the posts above but provide some content about the study using your own words or the copy provided below:

Can you help out my friend here? He’s looking for folks who live in or work in US institutions that use #SciHub, #LibGen, or #ICanHazPDF for their work to interview for his dissertation.

Find out more & possible sign up at: http://www.lanceeaton.com/research-study/

How this helps: Similar to above, the more you share it and even add your own language, the more it will show up and be seen across the platform you are using. It adds further endorsement and gets it in front of more eyes.

**5-10 Minutes to Help

It would be great if you took this time to copy/paste the email below and sent it to as many folks as you think it might be relevant to. Additionally, consider sharing it out on any professional/academic listservs that you are a part of.

Who might those people be? Any folks that are doing research or teaching; affiliated with a higher education institution, research center/lab, hospital, law office, or anywhere that they might need regular access to research literature to do their work meaningfully.

One of the challenges with this study is that because folks do not often talk about using these platforms, it’s really hard to know if anyone in your network does (that is, they may not be sharing their usage openly). So sharing with anyone in those categories above could be really helpful.

**Email to Share (feel free to edit)

Hi all,

I'm sharing this on behalf of my friend and colleague, Lance Eaton. He is working on his dissertation research which focuses on how folks in the US or at a US institution may be using platforms like SciHub, LibGen, #ICanHazPDF on Twitter or r/Scholar to acquire research literature for their work.

Do you use any of these platforms in pursuit of research literature for your work researching, writing, teaching, or in professional settings where access to such research is essential? If so, please consider visiting the link below, learning more about the study, and potentially participating in the study.

Find out more about the Research Study: http://www.lanceeaton.com/research-study/

Thank you for this assistance at this time!

**Other Ways to Help

If you’re still here and considering ways to help, it’s mostly about getting out the word to folks. So if you know someone who does a blog, newsletter, podcast, youtube show, or other types of publication that you think would be interested in talking about my research, please let me know OR reach out to them and recommend me to them.

As this first half has shown me quick clearly, every little bit helps and I’m so very grateful for your support in all of this. Thank you so much!

This Is 46

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Sat, 13 Sep 2025 19:06:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 10 minutes

So it's that time again. For those tuning in, each year on my birthday, I do a bit of account and reflecting on the year. This is year #8. You can check out previous years below:

As always, the details:

Home: Cranston, RI

Relationship status: Married (11+ years)

Cats Owned: 1 (Bear)

Other Pets: 1 mud turtle (MJ, 38'ish years old)

Degrees earned: 6 (1 PhD, 3 masters, 1 bachelor, 1 associate)

Reading since September 13, 2024: 253 (Latest reads can always be found on Goodreads)

Work:

Senior Associate Director or AI in Teaching & Learning at Northeastern University (full-time)
Teaching courses at College Unbound & North Shore Community College
Consultant Facilitator, Speaker

Weight: 218 pounds

Longest Distance Run This Year: 13.53 miles

Fastest Pace This Year: 9:14 minutes (for 5 miles)

Runs in the last year: 233

Miles run in the last year: 1058 miles

Miles on the bicycle in the last year: 737 miles

Blog Posts on Blogger in the last year: 16

Blog Posts on my Substack: 24

Blog Pageviews: 127,935 (est between this blog and the substack)

Blog Subscribers: 170 here; 8637 on the substack

Blog Visitors: 52,203

Facebook Friends: 821

LinkedIn Connections: 2703

Twitter Followers: 1180

BlueSky Followers: 1740

YouTube Channel Subscribers: 5391

Website Domains owned: 4

Favorite Blog Posts of the Year

Why Fugitive Pedagogy Is a Book All Educators Should Be Reading Right Now
Dialogs on Teaching (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3)
PhD Chronicles: The Defense Text

Looking Back

While the world has felt incredibly unstable and fragile in the past year, year 45 for me was an incredibly powerful year filled with transitions, adventures, new opportunities, and milestones. I'm still in awe of all the things that have happened and hesitate to share them. But this is where I capture how the year has been (now in its 9th year!).

The big accomplishment is that I have (finally) completed my dissertation. I can't describe how much this means to me. I've had a variety of posts about it and it's been a long time coming (10 years). But I accomplished it and feel the weight off the shoulders.

Professional Changes

A big change in the past year was leaving College Unbound and becoming the Senior Associate Director of AI in Teaching and Learning at Northeastern University. It was quite the transition. The role was right; the team has been great; and the time had come. There are so many wonderful things that happened to me as being part of College Unbound--and it was also time to move on. I'm still teaching there and who knows what the future holds.

Taking on this role at Northeastern has been a really great opportunity to learn more on lots of different levels. I work with a highly collaborative team, thoughtful leadership, and in a situation where I'm getting to do a whole lot of learning about AI in teaching and learning. It was a big shift--moving from a college of 500 students to a university with over 30,000. It has also been interesting to be at an institution that can just buy AI licenses for all students, faculty, and staff. Most importantly, I'm working with a team of faculty developers and it's been too long since I've been in a role where I've had other collaborators who knew the work that I did as deep (if not deeper). It's mean collaboration and learning have been happening all the time.

The talks and workshops continue to be an activity I'm doing regularly; I'm closing in on nearly 100 talks and workshops over the past 3 years around AI and education. The Substack has over 10,000 followers (8,600 subscribers), and continues to be a place for me to share my insights and learning as I go along.

And because of the work I've been doing around AI in higher ed and the experiences my partner has with operations and change management, we started a new venture in the spring and summer. We opened up a consultancy agency to work with middle and lower-resourced institutions to support their work as they navigate AI not just in the classroom but institutionally. You can find out more about us at Anchor Insights Consulting.

I've also had some things published. Obviously, there's the dissertation which you can read (or upload to an AI chatbot to get the gist of it): Elbow Patches To Eye Patches: A Phenomenographic Study Of Scholarly Practices, Research Literature Access, And Academic Piracy. I also co-authored another piece for EDUCAUSE Review (#4 for those counting): “In the Room Where It Happens: Generative AI Policy Creation in Higher Education” with Esther Brandon, Dana Gavin and Allison Papini. I got to share my own hot-take about AI and copyright on the LSE Impact Blog: “Does AI have a copyright problem?”. And last but not least, I got to work on this piece with two friends and colleagues, JT Torres & Deborah Kronenberg for Inside Higher Ed: “Growing Orchids Amid Dandelions”.

So, yeah. This past year was a banner year for me professionally. I know some of it is the compound interest of many different strands of work I've been weaving together for the past 5, 10, 15, or 20 years or so. In that way, it makes a certain sense why it has happened. But also, it continues to feel strange about the range of professional growth. It's that weird dynamic wherein I know that one part of this is a variety of intentional and thoughtful moves I've made over the years; another part is just luck; and yet another part is privilege. And it's not always clear which one is strongest at any given moment.

Home life

Personally, the year has been all right overall with some ups and some downs.

We lost Pumpkin, our beloved 14-year-old cat in May. That was heartbreaking. She was diagnosed with cancer in March but was largely functional until May. One night, her back leg stopped working and we found out it was either a blood clot or the tumor had grown so big it was blocking a nerve. There were no good options at that point and so we had to put her to rest. We had time to say all our goodbyes and tell her how amazing she was and will continue to be. She was my first cat and had been with me from before I started this whole career trajectory and was still doing the full-time adjunct shuffle. She was the epitome of sweetness and I still think about her daily.

My partner and I celebrated our 10-year wedding anniversary and got to do some traveling in the past year, including to Alaska as part of a family trip and Paris as our anniversary adventure. We did a Rick Steves Tour, which we found to be really helpful, both for learning to navigate the city and for having a community of folks to connect and talk with.

The garden this year was not too successful. I got produce, but there was a lot of failure. I started off with doing the square foot method and breaking up the garden into a grid. I then proceeded with what I called the "Order and Chaos" garden method; where I took a bunch of lingering seeds from the last 3-4 years and mixed them altogether into one container. Then, I took handfuls of those seeds and sprinkled them into the squares and covered with dirt. Lots of stuff grew but some things grew and dominated more than others. So I got plenty of radishes and turnips. Also, the squashes, cucumbers, and greens--they got destroyed by a groundhog that I was quite ready to go full Caddyshack on. But my partner did not find that acceptable, so next year, I will be doing raised beds, apparently, or building a trench and fence. I got a good share of tomatoes, herbs, potatoes, peppers, and the chard is finally coming in; I may also get a watermelon or two.

Another exciting thing (for me) was that we finally got a Little Library. I actually talked about this in a previous annual reflection (42). It's real now and stacked with books. I'm not sure how much traffic I'll get. Still, if anyone knows me, they know my love of libraries is strong and having one is definitely peak excitement for me.

Health

It's been a good year overall for my health. I've maintained the weight loss from last year and found new ways to care for my body (a bit more stretching, some weights and other anaerobic activities).

I did my first half-marathon in a while and came in at about 2 hours and two minutes, which was great given that I hadn't been pushing for speed. That was early in the season (May) and I worked on building up speed and better lung capacity. Then, I strained my calf in June, and it took till August to recover. So I spent the summer doing a lot more cycling. But I found for the first time in a long time, I was able to still do higher cardio on the bike than normal and maintain some of that speed as I returned to running. I'm back up to running 12-15 miles regularly and hoping to add more speed in the next month or so.

I don't know that I would say I'm in the best shape that I've ever been, but I'm definitely in that realm and appreciate what my body is capable of doing at this stage of my life.

Looking ahead

With the PhD done, there is definitely something to be said about coasting along for a while and relaxing a bit. And, for those who know me, know that probably isn't likely. I would say there are a few goals that I'm hoping to get started or make progress on in this next year.

The first is pretty straightforward, and I've already applied. I'm hoping to complete University of Rhode Island's Master Gardener program to learn and do more with my garden in the ensuing years. Chris may also take this, which means it will be even cooler to work together with her on gardening plans!

The other two goals I anticipate starting but not necessarily finishing in the next year are running a double-marathon (52.4 miles) and writing a memoir. I've been a runner for nearly 15 years--in fact, next summer will be 15 years of running. I'd love to commemorate it by doing a doube-marathon. To be clear, that's the longest distance I'd want to do before going back to my favorite distance, the half-marathon. There's something powerful for me in going from a person who couldn't run for 5 minutes to someone who can run for 50 miles in the last 15 years. But that's an intensive investment of time, energy, and planning. So, I have to figure out a way to fit it in with...well, everything else.

I have already started the other goal. It has been sitting with me nearly as long. In fact, I had a name for it well before I had a sense of what it was going to be. But yes, writing a memoir is something that feels important for me. If you've been reading long enough on this blog, you know that I navigated my teenage years grappling with bulemia, depression, self-harm, suicidal ideation, and several attempts. I'm also in a place so far on the other end of that spectrum. There's a lot that has happen to move from one end to the other and through lots of writing, reflecting, conversations, and learning, I think I can speak to something distinct and thoughtful about it. So, let's find out!

Beyond that, there are other projects, ideas, and small hopes for the year to come but think I'll hold off on a list for fear of overwhelming y'all.

See you next year!

The PhD Chronicles: The Dissertation In the Wild

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Wed, 11 Jun 2025 13:52:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

Since graduation, two things have happened. The first is that the dissertation itself has been published on ScholarWorks at UMASS Boston. You can look, download, read, enjoy(?) the full text here.

I am particularly happy that I could make it open-access and ready for everyone to freely access. One of the running jokes I had with the participants in the study was explaining the process of the next steps. I would say something to the effect that, "Once I defend the dissertation, I will be putting it up on my website for a reasonable fee of $99.99." It got a chuckle because, well, it still strikes me how many articles and books are about open-access research and are prohibitively expensive.

Now that it was available, I did my best to return to some of the communities on Reddit and elsewhere to let folks know that it had been published. Because of the levels of anonymity with participants I maintained, I have no direct contacts or names of them at this juncture. So I wanted to make sure that I went back to the places that I found them and let them know it is now available.

I'm also glad that it was published with ScholarWorks. One benefit of having been in the program for a decade is that the institution switched to ScholarWorks from ProQuest for its repository. ProQuest was charging students to pay $95 to publish their dissertation as open-access. Talk about a ridiculous money grab! All it entailed was ProQuest giving it a right that the author inherently had.

I was ready to fight that if it became an issue (I had started emailing) to look for some justification for that to happen, but well, I didn't have to.

What also came this week, was the printed and bound version of the dissertation. This was something I chose to do and pay for. I have physical copies of all the major works that I've done in my education from my Honor's thesis (on the misunderstandings of the medieval Russian witchhunt) and Master's thesis (on trans history and representation in media through the lens of Nip/Tuck season 2). And well, while I did all of my work digitally for the dissertation (reading, annotating, writing, editing, etc), I still wanted the physical copy.

UMB directed students to a few different sites to bind and print their dissertations and I found PhD Book Binding to have the best prices and cleanest process.

Anyway, if you get the chance to take a look, briefly or more in-depth--I'd love to hear your thoughts. You can share them there or reach out to me directly.

The PhD Chronicles: Graduating...

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Thu, 05 Jun 2025 10:00:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes

The day began in an unfamiliar bed, in a rented space. We had arrived the night before so that we could avoid the typical chaos of Boston commutes and just give us some breathing space before and after the graduation.

It was an early start like many of the early starts throughout my time at UMASS Boston. Rising around 5am (though I do this normally) and driving into the city to avoid tedious traffic and white-knuckling my steering wheel (audiobooks only help so much). I did that trek for 3 years--during the 3-week intensives in June and Fridays for the Fall and Spring semesters. When I arrived at campus, I often went for a run along the Harbor Walk, a beautiful vista of the harbor and surrounding city and islands. Some really great sunrises to capture as well.

This morning, I would also get up and go for a run along that path to take in the morning, exercise the demons, get a hit or two of nostalgia, and sit with a profound sense of closure. For the better part of 20 years, I've been coming to UMASS Boston with my first class at UMass Boston taking place in Fall of 2004. Now, I was (likely) visiting the last time as a student.

The run allowed me to further see how the area has changed over the past two decades including the campus. I even glimpsed the commencement stage being set up, a preview of the culmination of a decade's work. The six-mile run, a mix of pushing myself and taking my time, felt like a perfect metaphor for the doctoral program itself. Returning, I showered and prepared for the day.

Arriving on campus, I walked around a little bit. It had been a few years since I had been on the campus for a prolonged amount of time. More changes awaited me around many corners and also, some familiar spaces. I made my way to the Clark Athletic Center to prepare for the hooding ceremony. I settled into the designated graduate space, checked in, and grabbed some coffee.

Because it was drilled into me by my parents that if I'm not 5 minutes early, then I'm 15 minutes late, I was there well before I had to be. And well, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. I looked up at one point and sure enough, saw my mom entering the arena where the doctorate graduates were hanging out. I couldn't help but smile and feel my heart warm.

She had arrived with her friend and wanted to make sure she got good seats. I went over to them, greeted them and chatted with them for a bit. I also smuggled them some coffee and breakfast. As it got closer to start, they headed over to the hall where the doctoral hooding was taking place and made it first in line, saving seats for Chris, and my brother-, mother-, and father-in-law.

Unexpectedly, I ran into Gus, someone from my cohort who I hadn't realized was also walking. It was such a delight and affirmation to see Gus and get to not just catch up but to celebrate this work of 10 years for both of us. Spending a significant part of the day with someone who started this journey with me ten years ago was truly appreciated.

We settled in, preparing for the procession. Smiles, laughter, and wonderful conversations flowed as we ran into other people from the program including other graduates as well as faculty before lining up for the hooding ceremony.

I'm not a fan of ceremonies and of the 6 degrees I've accumulated this is only the second ceremony I've attended (the first was undergrad in 2001). Yet, I really enjoyed the hooding ceremony. The speeches were short and sweet, but the opportunity to be hooded by your chair and have a moment on stage--brief though it was, still felt meaningful, especially as I could see my mom, my partner, and other family members in the front row.

There were several moments during this ceremony when I was on the brink of tears. The pomp and circumstance, coupled with the recognition that this was the final step in the process, made it a big moment after working so long on it.

After the hooding ceremony concluded, many of us from the leadership education program gathered outside, taking photos as a group and with different faculty and our family. There was about an hour of "free time" before I had to be back for Commencement and so we tried to go to where they were offering snacks and such but it was a bit too packed. Luckily, Chris packed a peanut butter sandwich. At this point, folks split up, some to go back to the apartment we were renting and others to get food in the food court.

I took a little time by myself to just reflect a bit and relax; to recognize that I was half through the day. I had one more thing to get through (Commencement) and it was starting to get warmer and the overcast was disappearing. I worried that it was going to get a little warmer than I would prefer. But I put that thought aside and just sat with the feelings of the moment: I was done; I had my diploma; I did it.

That made me smile and carried me far enough to go back to the meeting spot for graduates for commencement. Much like earlier for the doctoral hooding, I got there early and was largely standing around. Gus and others showed up, so we chatted and entertained ourselves until we were instructed to get in line. We walked across the campus, I imagine intentionally as a symbolic passage of our time here, and were lined up for the actual entry into Commencement.

Once again, my mom had some of the best seats in the house and I could easily see her as we walked the aisle. We were seated across the front and the ceremony began. After a series of speakers, we did another walk across the stage—my final walk.

Because they were trying to get some 800 people across the stage in an orderly fashion, it was all a bit rushed and felt less significant than the hooding. Still, I'm glad I did it as it felt like the finale to a long long process that started with acceptance.

Once the ceremony was over, I found my family and we walked back to my car and headed over to the apartment. There, Chris had set up decorations and had ordered food to celebrate the day. She even had a beautiful toast. There was no better way to end the day.

The day was filled with many emotions; many of which are still hovering a week later. I felt supported by my family and Chris's family for showing up. I felt part of the community of UMass Boston. I felt the fullness of completion and recognition of the work that I had done to get there. I was also flooded with the sense of it being finally done and crossing a major milestone in my life.

I look forward to a few more posts in this series about additional things from along the way that have been relevant or useful in this journey. I'm also glad that this post can finally be put out into the world!

Recent Publication: Does AI have a copyright problem?

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Tue, 13 May 2025 11:00:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

Here is another exploration of a different set of questions about AI and copyright that I recently wrote and had published on the London School of Economics and Political Science Impact Blog (LSE Impact for short). It continues the conversation that I have had here in some previous posts including this one on academic fracking and the question of whether copyright has been violated, as well as connected to my own research and previous work on the commons.

LSE Impact reached out to me to see if I would write this and funny enough, I was already several paragraphs in when I got the email because, surprise, I had some thoughts. I like how this piece turned out because it captures a tension that I don't hear in all of this and that is the reasonable return of copyrighted work back to the commons; something that is impossible to happen for any work that arrives in our lifetime, which just seems disappointing. I keep thinking about how the literary record would look if copyright law existed in the past as it does today (something I cover with this talk).

Image Source: ChatGPT

A recent analysis by Alex Reisner shows that major AI companies have sourced training data from platforms like LibGen (Library Genesis) that contain copyrighted material. The suggestion is they have done this knowingly, perhaps reasoning that it is better to simply beg for forgiveness later rather than ask for permission. Reisner has also published a searchable database of copyrighted content on LibGen to help identify what has been used.

The anger that has since been directed toward AI companies is understandable. Many authors took to social media to decry the extent to which their work is being used to train AI tools. But the issue also raises some difficult questions about copyright. Chief among them is whether we should be concerned about using material in this way if it ultimately makes information more accessible.

People vs profits

Reisner argues that while “LibGen and other such pirated libraries make information more accessible”, AI companies go further as “their goal is to absorb the work into profitable technology products that compete with the originals”. In essence, it is acceptable for people to benefit from resources like LibGen, but not companies.

The problem with this argument is that both individuals and companies are essentially doing the same thing: benefitting from illegally acquired copyrighted material. In both cases, they have decided that illegal means are more affordable and accessible than legal ones. They are both “ingesting” content that can be used for future creative, experiential or monetary purposes.

It is easier to criticise faceless companies than the countless individuals who illegally download millions of titles each month. Yet in essence, they are both using the work of authors without offering compensation. Indeed, the recent revelations have similarities to the outrage last year about “academic fracking”, where publishers sell access to material to AI companies. They represent yet another example of an industry built on exploiting the work of authors.

While Reisner states that society is still grappling with “how to manage the flow of knowledge and creative work in a way that benefits society most”, the truth is that this has already been decided. The “flow” goes to those who can control, afford, or steal material and very rarely do society’s interests enter the equation.

You can read the rest of the post either on the LSE Impact Blog or over on my Substack.

Recent Publication: Growing Orchids Among Dandelions

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Thu, 08 May 2025 10:09:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

Last month, a work that I was collaborating on with two amazing colleagues and friends (Deborah Kronenberg and JT Torres) got published. It was a piece for Inside Higher Ed called, Growing Orchids Among Dandelions and I appreciate the sentiment we put forward in it.

I know that we didn't necessarily solve anything but I do find metaphors and analogies help me put things into perspective. What I enjoyed about this was not just it was a collaborative effort with two people whom I deeply appreciate as human beings but are also have such rich insights and provocations to my own thinking that it pushes me to see things differently.

We wrote this piece last fall as we were all navigating new and different work contexts and realized there was something to be said about the overlapping experience we were encountering and had experienced over our collective years in higher education.

You can read the excerpt below or the full piece over on Inside Higher Ed.

Growing Orchids Among Dandelions

Many of us working in higher education, including those of us in teaching and learning centers, might find that our work is dramatically accelerated by rapid technological change and increasing pressures to be more efficient and productive. Technology adoptions such as smartphones and Slack, video communication, and now generative AI all contribute to the acceleration of the organizational culture.

In her recent essay “Teaching Centers Aren’t Dumping Grounds,” Kerry O’Grady argues that many academic leaders “focus on more instead of on effectiveness and efficiency.” O’Grady recounts continued calls to “create more workshops, more one-pagers or more training when attendance was dismal for initial sessions, or when the original documents went untouched.” She argues that educational developers are in a constant state of emergency response, in which they are tasked with “retroactive cleanup” as opposed to “the work of proactive planning for teaching and learning success.” O’Grady calls for a much-needed reset—something that feels wonderfully exciting—and institutionally unrealistic.

Our collective teaching and working in higher education at more than 20 institutions over 50 years tells us that we are always working with limited agency to significantly change how our centers align with our strategic vision and the changing needs of the institution. Amid the dizzying pace of constant disruption, we feel a need to find a more sustainable and pragmatic approach. O’Grady’s essay inspired us to reflect on our strategic plans and how we support our respective communities. While the “dumping ground” metaphor importantly calls attention to current challenges, we consider a different metaphor that has guided our decisions as we direct centers and support educators.

To read the rest of it, check it out on Inside Higher Ed.

The PhD Chronicles: It. Is. Submitted!

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Tue, 22 Apr 2025 09:28:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes

Last week, it finally happened. I submitted my dissertation to the institution for publication on their scholar work site. I believe a round of formatting edits is probably in order, but I've done the thing that will allow me to participate in the late May graduation. To say that it's a tremendous relief is an understatement.

As this website tag shows, I have been in this program for a decade, and during that time, I’ve written close to 100 posts. And now, I am done.

I think readers of this blog will find a few more posts forthcoming in this series. I have been meaning to write these and took notes on them, but never finished. I think they would be additionally helpful as other insights gathered in this journey.

For instance, I want to do a post about the media kit I created when I was looking for participants because it proved successful and I had some templated material that others might benefit from. There’s definitely a post where I talk about what's next and what I want to do with the dissertation (e.g. publishing) and other tangetially informed projects. There's definitely a post-PhD bucket list entry that I want to share or discuss, probably even a post about the time it took to do it. So, I've got a few more things in this series before it fully concludes.

Meanwhile, I've taken everything that I've written and exported it into a Google doc, which looks is over 150 single-spaced pages. Perhaps, I'll get two books out of my dissertation: the study itself and this other piece about the journey and what others can learn from it.

Over on my substack, I'll probably do a series about where and how I would use generative AI usefully if I had to start my dissertation today. I want to consider ways that wouldn't disrupt or undermine my work, but just support it better. I've been thinking about that a lot since it came out on the tail end of my work. By and large, I stayed away from it. I mentioned in a previous post how I used it to help shape the outline of chapters four and five, but I didn't use it in any more integrated ways than that. Now that I'm done, I want to highlight what I think the path would have been.

That's forward looking but if I'm thinking about this moment--the moment of submission, I still got all the feels. When I submitted it this week, I was teary-eyed. It was a solemn moment between me and the computer, to think about the work this represented and the ways it made me think and appreciate what I and lots of people do when they're doing the dissertation.

I know everybody's journey is different and has different complications and challenges, but I really appreciate sitting with the numerous ways this pushed and frustrated me; I feel like they were things I needed and valuable to experience in this process. Also, I am definitely looking forward to not having it frustrate me anymore.

I'm so appreciative of the work it has led me toward. Even now, it's fascinating to see how the work connects or intertwines with generative AI and this idea of academic fracking that I've talked about elsewhere. It makes me think about what methodologies I use to explore and make sense of the world, the variety of experience of scholars, and the known and unknown challenges harming higher education. I also think about how some aspects of learning and research are often unrealized, unacknowledged, and not thoroughly understood, even by people deep within academia.

I can't say that I will miss the work. Though it has helped me create my own sense of work ethic and evolve in how I do my work and find workflows that make sense to me.

This was such a solitary experience, and I continued to try to find ways to make it social, like hosting an 8:00 A.M. working group for people working on big projects. Most mornings, it was just me, but a couple of folks regularly joined me in the co-working and navigating our way through things. I also leaned heavily on FocusMate (so much so that it was in my acknowledgements).

What's really fascinating is that when I look at all my current academic and educational projects, they're almost all collaborative. I find that really fun, and there's another post—I don't know if it's a PhD Chronicles post or not—about the power of collaboration and how compelling, moving, and insightful it is and how enriched I am by it. In some ways, collaboration is akin to what one does when working on a dissertation and bringing in different voices to talk about their views and whatnot. But this is more of a live version where I'm collaborating directly with other people to make it happen. I find it much more rewarding, particularly in the context of also working on a very solitary dissertation.

But, I have to say again, it feels incredibly wonderful to be done with it. I think I'll probably print it, so I have that version. I don't know if I'm going to publish it; I'm going to give it a few months and get a little breathing room, so I don't know if publishing is in my future.

But there are other pieces I plan on writing. In fact, the piece I really want to write as an addendum is about the sources I have access to. So much of my dissertation was about access: what people can and can't access and how it impacts their work as scholars.

During my time in my doctoral program, I was at five different institutions with very different levels of access. I’d love to take my dissertation's reference list and code it for what I had access to depending on the institution. I'd like to calculate that as a thoughtful exploration of where and when I could have done this work seamlessly. I want to use that as an interesting reflection and exploration of this invisible structure of knowledge and information. It really matters what you can get access to.

I think there's something really powerful about explicitly doing that with my dissertation to show, for example, that I've been in institutions that have no library and then an Ivy League institution where you can get pretty much anything. It really demonstrates that tangibly for folks to understand.

As I said, there's more to say but this is definitely one of the highwater maters. Given that I've been blogging about this for almost 10 years, I know that some of y'all have been here for most or some of the journey. Thanks for continuing to read as well as share your support and insight.

Did you enjoy this read? Let me know your thoughts down below or feel free to browse around and check out some of my other posts!. You might also want to keep up to date with my blog by signing up for them via email.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

On Receiving the Mark Berman Community Outreach Award from NERCOMP

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Tue, 08 Apr 2025 09:00:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes

I hit one of those deep and meaningful career moments last week at the annual NERCOMP conference. I was incredibly honored to receive the Mark Berman Community Outreach Award at NERCOMP; it’s one of those career moments that you pause, look back, and appreciate how far you’ve come, but also are even more energized to look forward and consider how much more you want to do for supporting and connecting with folks in the teaching, learning, and technology spaces in higher ed.

For some of you, it might be helpful to know more about both the organization and award. NERCOMP is a regional organization in the northeastern of the US that focuses on technology in higher education with a focus on leadership, teaching & learning, and technological systems in higher ed. There are hundreds of institutional members and they do lots of professional development and also consortium discounts for different services. The Mark Berman Community Outreach Award is an award named after Mark Berman, a leader within NERCOMP who fostered community, built connections, and helped make NERCOMP be a place where folks felt welcome.

I like to think that in the work that I've done over the years, this is the kind of work and care that I bring. Getting an award like this, tells me I'm on the right track.

Below is the brief speech I have (slightly edited) upon accepting it:

"I'll make it brief, I was told I only have 3 hours. I just want to thank everyone. I want to thank the folks that nominated me. I want to thank the committee for saying, 'hey, this is a good idea." I appreciate that NERCOMP because of what they do and their work--that's why I continue to show up every year. And I want to thank Mark Berman, for leading the way in showing how we give back, bring present with others, and community.

I was at my first NERCOMP in 2012 and probably, like many others I was brought here by other people and those people introduced me to new people. And now, thirteen years later--to insert a dated reference--it feels like Cheers in a very wonderful way. There's less alcohol but more swag and food, so there's a kind of "NERCOMP 15" that happens. But it's just awesome to both and feel so much fulfillment from this community.

In receiving this award, I've realized that it's both an award and a mandate. It's not just reflecting what I've done but what I will keep on doing.

If this is your first conference, make a connection; if you've been coming for a while, keep making connections. I think NERCOMP really embodies this community practice of coming here to share what you've learned, learn new things, and make new friends and colleagues. That is the cornerstone of NERCOMP and so I'm very grateful for the award and getting to continue in conversation with so many of you. Thank you!"

One regret that I have is that I did not name names. Of course, that list would have been long, but I wish I had remembered to thank Andrea Milligan for bringing me to my first NERCOMP conference and introducing me to the community as well as helping me with some of my earliest workshops and sessions.

I have some ambiguous feelings about awards as well as even talking about this one here in this way. In talking about the award here, I'm trying to not performatively humble-brag and also, do what I often do, which is use this blog to reflect on significant things in my life. It's one of my own ways of sense-making about the world I find myself in and also reflecting for my own process in a way that may also be helpful to others. But it feels at tension with sharing "hey, I got an award."

My ambiguity about awards is a little more complicated. I know why they exist and believe people should be recognized for their work; but still, they can have hints of elitism and competition. I know this isn't the case for all awards and none of this should reflect on this award or NERCOMP, it's just a tendency I feel and navigate.

Yet, receiving an award from a community that I'm deeply involved and committed to has definitely felt quite meaningful. It's a tangible way to know that I'm on the right track; that the values I espouse and believe to demonstrate are seen by others. It also serves to deepen my relationship with NERCOMP and pause to consider all the ways it has been a part of my professional life.

Additionally, as I indicated in the brief speech, it's a mandate. It does not say hat I've achieved the work but that I'm achieving the work. It's a call to keep doing this work; keep trying to be in community with others, supporting people earlier in their career, making new connections, learning and sharing my own learning, and making sure that I pay it forward. If I can think about the award in that light, then it sits with me more properly. I'm on the right track, but I'm still on the journey.

So that's where I find myself today as I think about this new milestone in my life. Thank you for everyone (and there are so many of you) who have helped me see the importance in doing this kind of the work--by showing, guiding, inviting, and encouraging me.

Why Fugitive Pedagogy Is a Book All Educators Should Be Reading Right Now

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Thu, 20 Mar 2025 12:47:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes

I mentioned in my last post that I'd be talking a bit more about something that is giving me hope and a way to think about how to navigate the next few years (or rest of my life--take your pick).

And while I don't usually make blog titles so explicit, I really needed to with this one. I listened to Fugitive Pedagogy: Carter G. Woodson and the Art of Black Teaching by Jarvis Givens a few years ago and it's all I can think about since the current administration decided it wanted to root out anything related to diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. I recently had to relisten to it and read sections of it as well. Since January 2025, I've mentioned the book dozens of times if I've mentioned it once.

The book explores the work of Carter G. Woodson and other Black educators in the 1900s. Carter G. Woodson's impact is significant. He earned a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1912 and would play an important role in shaping the study of Black history and education over the course of his life. He would become best known for Negro History Week which becomes Black History Month and his books, including The Mis-Education of the Negro.

In Fugitive Pedagogy, Givens explores the strategic and subversive practices of Black educators in the early half of the 20th century who worked against systemic oppression in education. He shows how Woodson and other Black educators navigated a curriculum they were expected to teach that did not actually serve Black students. In order to support Black students' surviving and thriving in a world hostile to their existence and actively telling them they were inferior, Black educators engaged in fugitive pedagogy--stealing away opportunities to teach students about Black history and culture as well as the way the world is. The parallel drew up how enslaved people had sought out opportunities to learn to read and write despite legal restrictions and the threat of mortal harm.

One of the most compelling aspects of the book is the way it reveals Carter G. Woodson’s understanding of education as both a site of oppression and a tool for liberation. How can you be in a system but not necessarily a part of that system? His work reminds us that education is never neutral. It can both reinforce existing power structures and challenge them. Educators today can apply Woodson’s insights by recognizing and countering systemic inequities within their own institutions, creating spaces where students of all backgrounds can see themselves reflected in their learning.

I've known for a while that teaching can be an act of resistance in lots of ways but in this moment, Givens' book has helped me rethink things about what it means to be in education at a time of book bannings, exclusion, and targeting by the Trump administration are rampant. It raises interesting questions about what it means to be in a system that is changing in harmful ways and still desire to create spaces and shelter that allow for the ideas and insights that we know are important for all our students to succeed.

There's definitely an argument to give up entirely and stop supporting or existing within a system. That's a reasonable response for some. For others, less so. And for some, there's a real worry that to abandon that system entirely, to leave, means that whoever is likely to replace you--will be less likely to care about those things.

For those who stay, reading Fugitive Pedagogy can remind us of the role of community and collective effort in resisting educational oppression. Historically, Black teachers, students, parents, and activists worked together to sustain liberatory education. This reminds us that change doesn’t happen in isolation—building networks and support systems remains a critical part of resisting oppressive policies and practices in education today. It's also what can make this work feel less overwhelming and help individuals reclaim agency.

Yet, how we go about our own version of or adaptation of fugitive pedagogy in the 21st century is the question. The contexts are different in many ways and what does it mean for white educators to also be involved and participating in this work. I don't know that I have an answer for any of that--or rather, we all need to find ways to answer those considerations in ways that are right for ourselves. Still, to find those ways, we need each other. We need our communities of practice where we can ask, share, make sense of things and try out things.

There is a need for educators to be intentional in their approach, recognizing the power dynamics at play and leveraging community-based strategies. It’s not just about what is taught, but how it is taught, and the relationships built within learning spaces. The book underscores that resistance isn’t always loud; sometimes it’s subtle, embedded in everyday actions that affirm students’ identities and push back against dominant narratives.

Ultimately, Fugitive Pedagogy teaches us that resistance in an education system is both possible and necessary. It’s a reminder that even within restrictive systems, educators have always found ways to ensure that students receive knowledge that affirms their identities and agency. My key takeaway for educators and readers is to see themselves as part of this long lineage of resistance—to recognize that their work matters, that the struggle for equitable education is ongoing, and that they have the power to continue shaping a more just future of education--even if it may be hard and not as bold as we sometimes hope it to be.

In that vein, I decided to create a reading guide for individuals and groups who are interested in exploring Fugitive Pedagogy with an eye towards how to apply the lessons to today.

Currently, I'm thinking about what it means to build communities and sharing across folks that are want to further consider Givens' work and what it means for their practice. If you are interested in further conversation, please feel free to reach out.

Navigating the Current Existential Malaise

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Thu, 06 Mar 2025 11:00:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 12 minutes

I've been reviewing books, audiobooks, and graphic novels for years. Currently, it's mostly been young adult graphic novels for Publishers Weekly. Recently, I was enjoying a really great graphic novel. One that had me smiling because it focused on a young teen coming into their sexuality. The story didn't talk down to its reader and yet was sweet, kind, and complex with everyone in the story. It sought to understand the tensions and elevate the love. It's the kind of book that was non-existent in my teenage years. And the thing is, the reoccurring thought going through my head as I read was this: this book is going to be banned in the very communities that it is needed.

The thought played into all the feels I've been navigating--for the last few years but more heightened in the last year, when it felt very evident that Trump would win re-election. And now, in the face of the first monrh of his administration, has left me in a challenging space.

I do understand the many reasons why he did win and why people would vote against the status quo; I've read and listened enough over the last few years to get the appeal. There's much that I disagree with it, but I see the allure as Tressie McMillan Cottom captures well.

Photo by Tom Jur on Unsplash

The Current Existential Malaise

But if I'm being honest, things can feel really bleak. I've been calling it the existential malaise and I feel it a lot these days. In fact, when in some conversations with folks, I fear that my typical more sunny disposition has come across more as a storm-cloud. For instance, at a breakfast recently a friend invited me to share some possible wisdom about getting through an administration that has made it absolutely clear it wants people like myself and others that I care and love to not exist or to exist in dehumanized states.

What I said focused on the fact that the current state of the country (and world) is not just about Trump; the status quo still wasn't great before this turn. We live in an incredibly complex world. A world with many invisible systems that allow us to live our lives without second thought. By and large, we never doubt that our toilets will flush, buildings won't collapse, lights will turn on (and not electrocute us) when we flip the switch, streetlights will work, roads and bridges won't collapse and the like. We're surprised when things don't work.

The disregard for human life and the environment, the degree to which we're made easily distracted with devices, content, and self-preservation, the unaffordability and instability of being adults navigating renting/owning, child-rearing, healthcare, parent-care, education, job availability/opportunity, stagnant wages, and a myriad of other daily challenges makes our lives feel so exhausting already.

We are deeply invested in a structure of economics focused on reproducing itself with or without the elements or experiences that allow humans to actively and meaningfully participate in life. And, in reality, we don't know how to think or act our way out of it. Because while we can choose different leaders--like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic--we aren't able to change boats. Many folks are deeply tied or deeply aspire to certain investments that come to have an outsized and complicated pathway to acquisition. We want houses (not homes), retirement plans, continued health, and stable jobs.

It all has me thinking about two books. The first, Michael Lewis's The Fifth Risk: Undoing Democracy explores the ways that the first Trump administration ineptitude left numerous vulnerabilities in safety and security of the country and its citizenry. But what was ineptitude and negligence in the first term appears to be intention and the goal in this second term. The second, Guru Madhavan's Wicked Problems: How to Engineer a Better World explores the complexity of different challenges that we have found ways to solve through a mixture of practices and frameworks. For instance, how we went from knowing we can fly in machines to how we actually create the structures and supports to train pilots and the systems needed to keep planes from routinely crashing. These books keep me thinking about how what we have is incredibly complex, easy to destroy, and terribly hard to rebuild.

All of that worries me and sits with me as we hear each new missive, directive, or order and to know that a lot of folks are ok with all of this. So those big things stir inside my head and I worry about our ability to sustain attention and focus on what is and isn't meaningful. Changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico is a distraction but damn, if we don't fall for it.

I feel all of that--and at times, it feels too heavy to lift. It pushes the fear and angst to feel numb, be distracted, or just lose hope. And, of course, that's the goal: to stun, to paralyze, to exhaust, to feel powerless, to do nothing. Muzzle velocity as they say.

And yet, I'm feeling more hopeful by the day. Not the naive hopefulness that this will all go away or that this will be an easy fix. It's a different kind of hope. It's been formed from conversations and tender moments of concern, care, and angst in the face of actual threat to people. It's shown up in the fact that none of this is new--that just as authoritarians have playbooks, so do those who resist or find meaningful ways to exist despite systems that openly desire them to not exist. A hope that has been formed from deeper bonds with people in my life and the building of new ones with people I'm encountering who are also grappling with all of this and believing it is so far beyond the pale of normal. People that can help normalize the fact that what is happening is perverse and there are different ways to live and thrive than what is being offered.

Finding My Our Way

So what is sustaining me in this? I'll share what's working for me--I hope others will share what's working for them.

I'm trying to stay informed but be thoughtful in filtering how much and what kind of information gets to me. Ever since reading Michael Parenti's Inventing Reality in the late 1990s, I've always been skeptical and hesitant to watch news. Generally speaking, I can't find a compelling reason to watch news that isn't better met with reading it. But I definitely regularly engaged in watching hot-takes on news (Daily Show, Stephen Colbert, Seth Myers, etc). That has drastically fallen off the radar. Nowadays, I limiting how much news I read and decreasing my social media consumption. I'm sticking to a few news newsletters and a few other sources that I've found give me solid perspective and insight but avoid the more sensational writing (and unfortunately, so much has become or is written for sensationalism--thanks, surveillance capitalism).

I doing a bit more writing. Not just this kind of writing but other writing projects. I'm finding I'm digging more into some fiction writing but also journaling. It's been helpful to both create as well as exorcise the concerns and worries. It also reminds me of several of the sound voices that I've heard say--that now is a time to create--that art itself can be resistance; that imagination and creation can be used to meet the destructive and unimaginative efforts of authoritative regimes. In this vein, I'm reminded of this talk by my friend, Lee-Sean Huang on Rehearsing Utopia: How to Practice Hope in a Dumpster Fire World (10:25 minutes) and remembering that creativity and putting things into the world is itself, an act of hope and also feeds hope.

I'm definitely reading more poetry. This includes books of poetry but also, three places that email poetry fairly regularly: Library of Congress, Poetry Foundation, and Poets.org (if you got other recs for this--leave them in the comments!). I've always struggled with poetry but do find that so long as I don't commit to the idea that I have to understand and make sense of every poem, it's a much smoother experience. Rather, I read and see if the poem speaks to me and if it does, I did in more, and if it doesn't, I move on. Still, the act of reading poetry sets me into a more contemplative and grounded space. In particular, I'm thinking a lot of about "Hope Is Not a Bird, Emily, It’s a Sewer Rat "by Caitlin Seida. You can read it in full here. Or you can find Caitlin's book of poetry on Bookshop or Amazon.

Talking with other people--not on social media but in person or virtually to learn how they are doing, what they are doing, and where they need support. Knowing that others are deeply grappling with how things have been has been really important. It reminds me that we're not alone in feeling or figuring this out; it's an inoculation against the virulent attempts to isolate and make us feel powerless. It's in these spaces that it feels important to acknowledge its hard and scary, to be vulnerable, and to recognize that connection and care is what always helps us in challenging times.

Engaging with others is also having me think about what it means to be in community with other people, particularly those around me. I think about how while I have a rich and wide range of friends in my life, many are not connected. So there is no group but lots of individual relationships. That I have so many rich relationships is truly wonderful but with all that's going on, it makes me think about how to create a tapestry rather than individual threads. And, of course, leaning into community and focusing locally is not new. It's something that is often chipped away at through this version of capitalism (take your pick of names for this version of capitalism: surveillance, late-stage, techno-feudalist, etc). So trying to get more grounded in the people around me is something I'm trying to explore how and what that looks like.

Priya Parker's latest newsletter also has me thinking about how to do this type of gathering and community gathering differently. As she notes later in the post:

"When the world is on fire, it can feel like the scale of action needed is simply beyond us. But authoritarian leaders know that gatherings have a way of catching, of shifting people’s sense of what’s possible, of revealing the next viable step."

I'm also trying to not get wrapped up in "not doing enough." It's a refrain I can often have in and around this work--that it's all or nothing; if I'm not willing to toss aside all the connective elements that I see contributing to the problem, then it's not worth doing. The purity test of it all as it were. But the all or nothing thinking is also what eats away at us and keeps us from doing the things we can.

So rather than not get bogged down and if it's too much or not, I'm trying to just focus on what I can do and when. Along those lines, I find that there are several organizations and newsletters that are helping me flex the muscles to do small work while I continue to figure out what is the bigger work to do.

Americans of Conscience has a great weekly newsletter that identifies specific actions each week with specific scripts and contacts. They also include opportunities not to just complain but to thank and appreciate the work that is being done. Similarly, 5 Calls highlights 5 calls one can take each week to address issues that are happening at the national level. Meanwhile, Showing Up for Racial Justice has many local entities that do not just focus on the national issues but target specific issues and concerns in one's community or state. They can be a range of actions from rallies to letter writing to supporting local individuals and entities navigating complex issues.

As challenging as these times are for folks both like me and very different from me is that it can feel very isolating or hard to figure out what to do. But the fact is, this isn't the first time this has happened--this kind of backlash domestically but also how individuals and communities respond to authoritative leadership. There's lots of playbooks and guidance out there that we can look to--some of them are even updated for us such as Indivisible's playbook.

Along those lines, I have another post coming after this--one that focuses specifically on higher education and what does it mean to navigate an administration that is not only hostile but seeks to undermine the foundations of democracy by doing away with any education that goes beyond training individuals (and yes, training is different than education are different approaches with different goals).

And, of course, I realize that I might look at this post in 10 years and realize that my whole sense of things was out of proportion. I can remember being concerns about what and how George W. Bush was going to behave in the final years of his administration. Still, there's enough going on in just the past month (but really the last 10 years), that I feel like it's worth noting where I am because I know a lot of others are equally struggling (and may not realize it's just them).

What about you, readers? How are you making your way through this storm?

The PhD Chronicles: Those Dang Edits!

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 10:45:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes

Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash

For those early on their doctorate journey or not on it all, after one defends their dissertation. there are often edits to be completed.

So for those just tuning in, I defended my dissertation on December 10, 2024. It went well but as is expected, there were edits that I need to work on. The edits recommended by the committee were not anything that I felt was unexpected. They all made sense and were things that once they mentioned them (in the defense itself or afterward), I could clearly see why they were needed. They're not that bad, but they do require time.

If I was a bit more focused, I could probably have done them within 1-2 weeks of when I defended, but instead, I passed them in early February.

Right after the dissertation, I decided to take most of December off. Between starting a new job and defending my dissertation in the first week and half of December, I was largely done for 2024. I did do a little bit of work between Christmas and New Years but not much. The rest of the month was a bit of catching up on so many things.

But as January started, I knew I had to get going--and also, the beginning of January was filled with a variety of talks and workshops that had been booked back in the fall cause that is a peak-request time in higher ed for me to do some of my AI work. So it wasn't until the middle of the month that I managed to get my rhythm with consistently working on the edits.

But I finally got into a rhythm and systematically worked through the list. I've heard lots of horror stories about edits, but everything in front of me made sense. The fact that the concerns and recommendations made sense allowed me to feel even more grounded the work that I did and the ability to fix them to the degree that I was satisfied. A feeling that I did not necessarily feel throughout much of the previous process. Still, they take thought and time.

And the edits have been submitted and it appears they are close to being accepted (heard back from most of the committee). This means that shortly, I'll be able to move forward with the final phase of the dissertation, formatting for dissertation publication. There is definitely a post coming about that because I can already see an issue arising (surprise, surprise, it has to do with open licensing).

Still, the edits are an interesting time to revisit my dissertation and see it more holistically and all the connected parts as a finished (or close-to-finished) work. So much of the project was done in parts that getting to see the whole is really powerful. Even the defense itself, I didn't see the whole but largely focused on the second half (clarifying how the research went, sharing findings, and insights from the findings). While I don't think what I wrote is great, I do think it is good work. One of my committee members said that she thought it could be a book right out of the gate in her feedback and so I'm chewing on that.

In other related news, during the break, I also took the time to take all of the posts in this series and put them into a Google doc. There are over 60 posts that I've done in this series (the PhD Chronicles) and it amounts to over 150 pages, single spaced. I'm wondering what I might do with that as a collection when all of this is done. Maybe there's another book in there to share out with the world.

But here we are, one more step accomplished--one more step closer to the fully-finished line.

The PhD Chronicles: The Defense Text

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Thu, 19 Dec 2024 09:50:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 25 minutes

Below is the text of the defense of my dissertation but you can also read the dissertation itself here on ScholarWorks.

As promised, here is the text of my defense for those that couldn't make it or were interested in revisiting it. You can also check out the slides here. If you haven't read about the experience, well, you can check it out here.

I'm incredibly thrilled to finally be here and so grateful for my committee: Dr. Dee, Dr. Akerlind, Dr. Eve, and Dr. Szelenyi. Thank you everyone for joining me here today and learning more about my dissertation, Elbow Patches to Eye Patches: A Phenomenographic Study of Scholarly Practices, Research Literature Access, and Academic Piracy.

I grew upon on the Internet–from Prodigy to AOL to website creation to social media. These were the places that I got to explore, learn, and grow. But I also grew up in a library down the street–a library I sometimes got kicked out of because I could be a punk–but frequented nonetheless. Accessing knowledge, ideas, other voices in the room–that’s been a cornerstone of nearly all transformations in my life. So when I started in this program, I focused on open educational resources and their role in education. But in moving from the classroom focus to the larger systematic focus of higher education, I realized that the very same thing that is a challenge for students everywhere–affordable and easy access to learning materials–was also being replicated at the knowledge production stage for scholars everywhere and that was a really interesting problem to explore.

Higher education finds itself in a quandary. Higher ed institutions pay scholars in part, to produce research literature. Scholars give that research literature away to publishers and publishers sell that back to higher ed at affordable rates.

In the digital age, academic publishers and libraries moved from physical to digital materials due increasing amounts of publications, cheaper means of production and distribution. At the same time, publishers switched from an ownership model to an access model. Libraries went from owning things to accessing them similar to how streaming services like Netflix replaced DVD ownership.

The result of this over the last 15 years has led to the creation and active use of academic pirate networks.

These networks facilitate academic piracy which is the active participation in the exchange of research literature, without direct financial compensation, that violates copyright law in order for the recipient of the copied research literature to perform knowledge-work.

Scholars can go to these platofrms to access research literature or even upload their own. These platforms such as SciHub and Library Genesis (or LibGen) violate laws in many countries pertaining to copyright and yet, witness millions of monthly downloads with the US.

This means that in order for scholars to be scholars, they find it relevant and/or necessary to break the law in order to do their work.

Therefore, this dissertation looks to explain how and why scholars seek and acquire research by illegal means and how such practices may illustrate the limitations and challenges in academia’s knowledge creation and dissemination mission.

The purpose of this study is to explore the scholarly practice of obtaining research literature in pursuit of research by scholars who participate on academic pirate networks (or APNs)

That purpose led me to this research question: “How scholars make sense of their experiences with participating on APNs?”

This research question led me to these following sub-questions.

How do scholars describe their use of APNs when they chose to engage with them?

This first question helped me to understand how and under what circumstances scholars actually use APNS, which lead me to ask:

What kinds of meanings do scholars attribute to their participation on APNs?

By examining their meaning-making, it can help us understand if there is something else happening besides just research literature acquisition. From that, the third question emerges:

How do scholars relate their experiences with academic piracy with their identities as scholars?

If there is more meaning to their experience then how might that impact who they are as scholars and what this means for academia.

Monthly, people in the US download millions of articles just from SciHub.

Access to research literature is essential for scholarly work but also, it is the cornerstone for a great range of societal needs and services. The prohibitive costs to access doesn’t just impact higher education. It impacts doctor’s offices, courtrooms, public health organizations, human services, and much more.

Therefore, this study draws out some of the experiences of those scholars who are downloading from APNs to better understand why these platforms exist in the current knowledge production regime.

For this qualitative study, I used phenomenography, which I’ll discuss after sharing the participant criteria and characteristics and study’s limitations.

My goal for this qualitative study was to interview 20-25 scholars who are using one or more academic pirate platform. I sought a diverse representation of scholars to gather a richer sense of perspectives.

This information was gathered through an intake survey that I used to determine if participants met the needed criteria for the study and gave me a diverse representation of participants.

So I used the following criteria:

First, I wanted some representation across general disciplinary categories such as humanities, social, natural, and applied sciences to understand how broadly scholars across academia engage with APNs.

I also wanted participants from with different institutional relationship and therefore, looked for tenured, tenure track, non-tenure track, parti-time, graduate, and independent scholars to better understand the relationship of status to the use of the platforms.

Participants’ degree of engagement and [NEXT] which platforms they used would help me understand the phenomenon more as well as guide my questions during the interview.

This study was composed of 25 participants who were interviewed about APNs. That includes this breakdown of general disciplinary category:

3 from Applied Sciences
10 from Humanities
3 from Natural Sciences
9 from Social Sciences

Among those 25 participants, it included

8 graduate students
4 Independent Scholars
6 Non-tenure-track Faculty
1 Part-time Faculty
1 Tenure-Track Faculty
5 Tenured Faculty

In terms of those participants engagement on APNs, it included:

4 who used it Frequently
15 who used it Regularly
4 who used it Occasionally
2 who used it Rarely

Finally, usage across these participants included

5 participants who used both LibGen & SciHub
10 who largely only used LibGen
10 who largely only used Sci-Hub

In additional to those categories that I was seeking out, the intake survey also captured several other elements of representation to include. For instance, there were was a mixture of institutional types

While I did not specifically ask for gender or sex, I did ask for pronouns which is at least indicative of the gender representation in this study.

Finally, one other characteristic worth mentioning was that six participant acknowledged they were currently or had been as some point engaging in scholarship outside of the US and brought that perspective in at times during their interviews.

Now that we have the characteristics of the study’s sample, I’d like to take a moment to acknowledge the study’s limitations.

The first is just that this study focused on academic piracy, a topic that required participants to discuss their activities on illegal platforms in pursuit of their scholarly work. I did my best to guarantee confidentiality. Still, the study only represents those who were participating on APNs and felt willing enough to participate in this study.

The second is that the study only focused on people who used APNs and therefore, missed an opportunity to consider and contrast those who knew about APNs but chose not to use them. This could have better helped assess at what point do scholars go from not using to using these platforms and why.

The third limitation is that the criteria for who to interview could have been more expansive–as shown, while I did discover institutional affiliation, it might have been better to put that into clearer focus from the beginning to consider questions about how institutional affiliation also impacts participant’s sense of pressure to use these platforms.

Now, let’s turn to the methodology used for this study.

Phenomenography was developed in the 1970s and 1980s by Ference Marton, Roger Säljö and Lennart Svensson among others and has been used predominantly in educational research. Phenomenography aims to explore the variations in meanings that participants develop and attribute to their experience with the phenomenon.

Phenomenography is interested in how people conceptualize the phenomenon to see what are the different ways people understand a phenomenon regardless of any objective sense of the phenomenon. Often this analysis is referred to as revealing second-order understandings.

Phenomenography rejects the idea that we are separate from the world in which we live.

Rather, we are part of it and inseparable from it.

Therefore, we cannot objectively or entirely observe a phenomenon nor reduce it to a singular experience through study.

Experiencing a phenomenon is not an object to dissect on a table.

Rather, phenomenography situates our experiences OF A phenomenon as A PART OF THE phenomenon but never the whole.

Phenomenography is interested in making sense of these experiences of the phenomenon by participants. This is what it refers to as second-order understanding. Its epistemological assumption is that while people can experience a phenomenon differently, there are still a limited number of ways a phenomenon may be experienced.

Therefore, phenomenographers look to explore the experience of participants to understand their own awareness of the phenomenon with their understanding of their relationship to the phenomenon.

Through interviewing a diverse pool of participations who engage with the phenomenon, the researcher can better understand different ways that people experience the phenomenon with different levels of awareness.

Those interviews are then pooled together, compared and contrasted for similarities of experience. In this process, the phenomenographer is trying to draw out distinct experiences that become the categories of description and distinct elements of awareness that are known as dimensions of variation.

The categories of description indicate the meaning-making by participants as related to the phenomenon. The dimensions of variation are the key elements that a participant must be aware of in order to be included in a category of description.

As one develops the categories of description, each category includes dimensions of variation. Through this process of surfacing categories and dimensions, an inclusive hierarchy emerges.

Some dimensions such as 1-3 here will be articulated by everyone in the data set. These may be understood as the essential elements one needs to be aware of in order to even be experiencing the phenomenon in any category.

Other dimensions will only be known by participants in higher categories. For instance, dimension 6 is only experienced by those in category 3. However, every participant in Category 3 will have been aware of all the dimensions in the hierarchy.

This hierarchy emerges from the fact that categories of description are exclusive: participants will only belong to a single category yet the dimensions are inclusive in that the further up the hierarchy a participant is, the more dimensions they’ve expressed awareness of.

The further up the category of description, the more dimensions of variation participants will indicate and therefore, the more complex description they can speak to about the phenomenon. So in this case, participants in category #3 include all dimensions of variation while participants in category #1 only identify three dimensions.

The development of the inclusive hierarchy is known as the outcome space in phenomenography where you can see that Category 3–the category at the top of the hierarchy includes all of the dimensions while the foundational category, Category 1, only included three.

This structure allows us to see the different layers of experience of a particular phenomenon by the participants and how they are interrelated yet distinct.

Now, this has been a bit abstract, but we’re going to jump into the findings now and demonstrate how this works.

For this study, three categories of description emerged from the data along with six dimensions of variation.

I’ll first highlight the overall findings to better clarify the difference between categories and dimensions and then move into explain each category and its emerging dimensions.

In this study, the data showed that participants exclusively fell into one of three categories of description.

Scholars experienced APNs in one of the following ways.

In the foundational category, the least-complex experience, 5 participants described APNs as a practical tool that they used to access research literature that they could not access through their own individual or institutional means.

In the second category, 8 participants provided a more complex understanding of their experience of APNs. They found APNs provided them with a sense of community through connecting with scholars through their discussions about the platform but also through a sense of connection about the people who help maintain and support these platforms.

Finally, in the third and most complex category in this study, 12 participants explained APNs as the place where scholarly practice was as much or even more meaningfully upheld than in traditional academic spaces.

By contrast, the dimensions of variation, start with three that were most inclusive. All participants in this study were aware of the following dimensions:

how efficient access was on APNs, how these networks expanded their intellectual understanding through introducing them to new or obscure research literature, and that there needed to be some ethical consideration about what to access and share on these platforms.

However, only participants in categories two and three were aware of how these platforms build social connection for them and their own sense of resistance to the current academic publishing regime.

Finally, the third category was the only category to be aware of how academic pirate networks were transformative in their own understanding of how scholarship should happen.

So we can see in this table, how the categories and dimensions align. It should be noted that the increasing number of participants with each category is coincidental.

However, with the dimensions, that is always the case in that the dimensions in the first category will be the most inclusive--indicated by nearly everyone. Dimensions that emerge from higher categories will only be indicated by participants in that category and any category higher up.

That's a very brief overview to help structure the next part of the conversation where we'll dive into each of the categories and their dimensions.

Let's dig into the each category and their accompanying dimensions.

Study participants who only experienced APNs as practical tools described their engagement with APNs largely in a transactional manner. APNs aided their work as a scholar but it was not essential to their work. Participants expressed that the loss of the tool might represent a change to their practice but would not substantially disrupt their work. In this way, they did not consider the tool as having a strong influence on their work as a scholar. APNs were often described as facilitating access to scholarly knowledge more quickly and directly. In its absence, they anticipated some inconvenience but did not feel challenged by its potential loss.

As this quote demonstrates when the participant was asked how they would navigate finding research literature if APNs went away, the participant recognized it would require more work but didn’t feel concerned.

Now three dimensions emerged for this foundational category

Across all categories, nearly all participants spoke to the efficiency of access that APNs provided, usually in contrast to traditional methods, be it searching library databases, interlibrary loans, emailing the author, or other legal means. Often, participants were aware of the amount of research they needed to access for any given work, the fact that each resource could take upwards of a few minutes to a few weeks to acquire, and how this chasing down research literature impeded their process. This dimension included a sense of just how much more research they could quickly access though APNs.

For this next dimension intellectual expansion, nearly all participants described how APNs offered them a level of intellectual expansion by aiding them in discovering new ideas, authors, and cross-connections relevant to their work. Participants were often aware of how these platforms provided them with a means to connect their ideas with other authors and works. Some participants explained that this intellectual expansion via APNs was in part liberating, given how they felt constricted by what limited and legitimate resources were available without APNs.

The final dimension for this category was ethical access. Nearly all participants also expressed awareness of an ethical balance around what they should be accessing through pirate networks and what they should not. They spoke about their concerns regarding the precarity of access to research literature and the fact that the current academic publishing model felt antithetical to what research is supposed to be, while simultaneously indicating that other forms of written work (novels) or creative work (music) did not meet the same ethical threshold. Some distinguished between for-profit and nonprofit publishers, while others contextualized the importance of whose work was being downloaded. Regardless, while not all participants were in agreement about where the ethical line should be placed, nearly all were aware of an ethical line about accessing content on these APNs.

As we build that inclusive hierarchy, we can see here, the foundational category of description: APNs as a practical tool for scholars, we have the three dimensions of variation that all participants will be aware of regardless of the category.

The second category to emerge was APNs as a proxy for scholar community. Here, participants engaged APNs as spaces for connection and community. Participants made sense of APNs as proxies for scholarly communities -- both in the sense that APNs acted as access points to their scholarly communities and also that the APN stands in for a community.

Furthermore, the loss of APNs represented a challenge as it reflected being disconnected from their intellectual communities; participants indicated that they cannot be part of the scholarly conversation if they were locked out behind a paywall. Essentially, in this category, participants described APNs as a conduit to some part of their scholarly community.

As a result of that sense of community and the impact on their work, participants in this category spoke about a desire to reciprocate to APNs--this might come in the form of sharing about the platforms, uploading works to them, or financially donating to the platforms.

One of the two dimensions to be identified starting with this category was Social Connection. Participants were aware that their usage of APNs contained some level of social connection. This sense of connection is one particular aspect of community discussed in the category, APNs as a Proxy for Scholarly Community. It came out distinctly in participants’ awareness of their experience of social connections as a result of participating on the platform. The APNs created possibilities for participants to recognize others directly and indirectly who were experiencing the same challenges as they were. The common ground of needing APNs created some level of social bond.

The second dimension identified within this category came from participants’ awareness that their usage of APNs represented a form of resistance against the current academic publishing regime. They connected the current regime to stratification and marginalization happening throughout higher education with particularly negative effects on scholars at lesser-resourced institutions, scholars outside the United States, and scholars without an institutional affiliation. They often spoke about a broken or exploitative system of academic publishing. Additionally, a common result from this awareness was a sense of obligation by participants to reciprocate support to these APNs. While not all participants in this category acted on this sense of obligation, most experienced a sense of this obligation.

Participants in the third category experienced APNs as a central part of their identity as a scholar to a degree that their praxis of scholarly communication was deeply interwoven with APNs. Participants noted that APNs strongly align with their understanding of what academia should be. This group also held strong beliefs that academia has failed to deliver an egalitarian structure that fosters the rise and exchange of ideas and to which APNs are much better suited. They indicated that the loss of access to APNs would be significant to their work as a scholar.

A driving element of this connection stemmed from a sense of the democratic or social justice aspect of the APNs, which allow scholars everywhere, regardless of institutional access, to meaningfully and freely engage with scholarship; this not only improves scholarship across the disciplines but also improves equity and opportunity for scholars everywhere. Another significant element in this focus on democratic or social justice goals is the frustration of exploitation that exists in the current academic publishing regime.

Scholars’ deep awareness of the traditional academic publishing regime as illegitimate also led participants to see APNs as a place to give back and uphold APN spaces in tangible ways, such as donating financially, encouraging widespread usage, or submitting their own works. Scholars saw APNs as important systems to invest in and uphold.

This category did have two sub-categories; something that does happen on occasion in phenomenography. There were no distinguishing dimensions of variation to delineate the two groups but how they explained their experience differed enough to acknowledge.

The first sub-category framed APNs as important to participants’ work, including negative outcomes were they to lose access to such spaces. The importance of accessing these platforms was grounded in participants’ sense of professionalism and abilities to be the scholar they imagine themselves to be.

Participants in second sub-category experienced APNs as essential to their work, to the degree that its absence might challenge their ability to be a scholar. They used terms such as “devastating” to describe the idea of losing access to APNs.

In the final dimension, transformational scholarly piracy, all 12 participants spoke about their usage of APNs in relation to a sense of democratic or justice-oriented views and that APNs served as an alternative pathway or means to dismantle the current academic publishing system. Ultimately, they were aware that their usage of APNs had played a part in transforming their views toward seeing the academic publishing regime as illegitimate. Participants explained that APNs were aligned with their beliefs about how scholarly communication should occur.

So now we can see the outcome space in its entirety. The presence of the dimensions provides a clearer explanation for why the categories align hierarchically.

Efficient access, intellectual expansion, and ethical access were dimensions that appeared through all three categories; they were the essential elements of awareness that were needed to begin to engage with APNs for this sample. However, awareness of only these three dimensions led to experiencing APNs as a practical tool.

Meanwhile, social connection and resistance to the current system were discovered as dimensions that participants articulated clearly when their sense of meaning about APNs went beyond seeing these platforms as a practical tool and instead saw them as a proxy to the scholarly community.

Finally, transformational scholarly piracy served as the distinguishing dimension for the top of the hierarchy and was related to those who saw APNs as an ethos of scholarly praxis. For these participants, their scholarly identity was deeply intertwined with their usage of APNs to the point that the two were almost inseparable: to be a scholar in the 21st century meant to access and engage with these platforms.

With that, this discussion returns us to the main research question: “How scholars make sense of their experiences with participating on APNs” and then will draw out some conclusion based upon these findings.

Through the development of the categories of description, this phenomenogaphic study has demonstrated that participants understand APNs as a practical tool, a proxy to community, or an ethos of scholarly praxis.

Through these categories, they ascribed different meanings to their participation on these platforms and how it impacts their work as a scholar. Furthermore, while some do not see APNs as intertwined with their scholarly identity, many do.

Beyond developing a foundational understanding about scholars' sense-making of their usage of APNs, this study also has unique contributions that are not in the research to date about academic piracy.

A key conclusion of this study is that many scholars engaged with APNs through thoughtful consideration. Often, scholars were aware of the power that academic publishers had over scholars who were wholly dependent upon publishers in order to create or maintain legitimacy. Therefore, to participate on these platforms was not without some risk. Scholars also spoke of a recognition of different degrees of social acceptance about using these platforms. Sometimes, it was evident that others found commonality in using them, yet others worried about the knowledge of their usage or even encouraging others to use them might get them in trouble. Finally, many acknowledged the different costs involved in the process, not just for the scholars but for librarians, the institutions, the scholarly societies, and even the publishers.

A second significant conclusion is that many scholars discovered a deeper sense of social connection and even community. Finding other scholars in similar circumstances created meaning in light current institutional structures and systems that generated feelings of disenfranchisement, alienation, and inability to be the scholars they desire to be. The APNs operate as an alternative form of community that their immediate professional context had not been providing them. Eighty percent of the scholars in this study saw these platforms as something more–found connection and meaning through APNs and saw that connection contribute to their feeling a sense of resistance towards the traditional academic publishing regime.

The third conclusion to note is how some scholars increasingly saw the traditional academic publishing regime as illegitimate. Simultaneously, they saw the ways that APNs operate as the ideal access structure for the pursuit of knowledge and accessing research literature. APNs can become the real praxis of scholars where there is a community and a seamless way to explore knowledge for their intellectual expansion and research agendas. Given that many scholars (e.g. independent, non-tenure-track, part-time faculty) do not get paid for publishing or when they participate in the peer review process, the level of labor and profit extraction by academic publishers stood at odds with scholars who put in much of the work.

In particular, scholars articulating that APNs are a legitimate or transformational space of scholarly practice exists is a distinct finding of this study.

A fourth conclusion of this study is the sense of solidarity with APNs and their creators that arose in some scholars. Some participants understood that the people who founded and maintained these platforms were violating the law. Because those people were putting themselves at risk to maintain an APN the scholars so heavily relied upon, the scholars also spoke of ways they would be political in the face of such platforms disappearing. That sense of solidarity and willingness to act represents how scholars have found not just community and a space that reflects their vision for access to academic knowledge, but also means enough for them to act or foresee collective action to maintain what APNs have created for them.

This phenomenographic study set out to examine how scholars engage with and make sense of APNs as it relates to their scholarly work in the U.S. context. This study's participants experienced APNs as a practical tool, as a proxy for scholarly community, or as an ethos of scholarly practice. These categories of description and their supporting dimensions of variation can help academia better understand the real challenges, concerns, and obstacles to performing scholarship that have rarely been documented or considered in previous research.

Scholars need access to research literature if they wish to be active in their fields. The current academic publishing regime is deeply entangled with its role as gate-keeper turned profiteer.

This system has generated enough inequity that tens of millions of articles and books have been pirated and made available on these APNs. More importantly, tens of millions of articles and books are downloaded monthly from these platforms.

Participants in this study expressed an unwillingness to download non-scholarly material, but they saw academic literature as something different. Their views can be understood as far back as Robert Merton’s framing of research literature as giveaway literature, meant to be shared and not hidden. Unless publishers seek to understand and better align with the values of scholars such as these participants, large-scale piracy will become increasingly more common as higher education institutions continue to have fewer and fewer resources to support the current academic publishing regime.

It is my hope that this research has provided a more robust and deeper understanding about the strain and obstacles that scholars must navigate to stay relevant in the field; factors that have little to do with their ability and much more to do with the ways in which the current academic publishing regime has exploited the need for access to research literature within an already stratified structure across higher education in the United States. Their practices to hoard research literature contrast greatly with the scholarly ethos to make research readily available.

Thank you all!

The PhD Chronicles: Dissertation Defended

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 10:43:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 8 minutes

Source: ChatGPT

Well, it's done. I successfully defended my dissertation; I'm now just have edits to incorporate and getting it through the institutional process. Damn--I finally did it! After writing some 60+ posts on this subject (Started here and continues with this tag), I'm within a handful of posts to wrap up the (chronologically) longest series I've done on this blog.

So how was the defense? It was everything I needed it to be and more.

I spent the few weeks before trying to work to construct the presentation so that it would make sense both to my audience and my committee. I got a draft and recorded it for my chair. He provided rich feedback that told me I was on the right track and that I needed to refine a few parts to keep the focus forward going. I practiced a few more times and felt largely ready for the presentation part. After all, presenting complex ideas to folks that were likely to challenge me was something I've been working through over the last few years with all my work around generative AI.

While I was ready for that part of it, the thing I wasn't ready for was the emotional experience of presenting to a room composed largely of friends and family. I am used to presenting in Zoom and even gotten used to presenting with some people in the audience that I know. But I wasn't quite ready to see the Zoom room open and over 50 people--most of whom were family and friends--flood in. That took me back. Not because I didn't expect people to show up but because I didn't realize there would be that many.

Up until the Zoom opened, I was a little nervous but largely grounded and comfortable. I woke up earlier than usual (3am'ish) and once I realized I wasn't going to get back to bed, I started my morning. I wasn't tired so I didn't mind this so much. I even got in a 40 minute run on the treadmill just to work out nerves and clear the jitters. I knew the order of things; I was prepared as I was going to be. I had my coffee and water. But then I see all those people and well, I felt all the feels.

Dr. Dee did introductions and then handed it to me and as I started to talk and see the folks, that's when I began to lose it. I felt the emotions swell up; I could hear the cracks in my voice; the water welling in my eyes. I stumbled my way through the introductory slide and we were off.

Still, at the start of every slide, I felt that welling up--maybe because it was a moment I was moving my attention from my script to the screen and catching another name in the attendees or I was seeing the number of attendees rise. But for the first 5-8 minutes of the dissertation, I was delivering it while also trying to deeply breath and ground myself as I felt the waves of emotion hitting me.

It wasn't stress or anxiety or anything bad that kept welling up. It was love. 50 people in my life--some of whom I had only briefly interacted over decades showed up at 7am to see this thing I've been working through for over a decade. So, I was trying to balance feeling that love and the warmth it produced in me with the challenge of trying to actually get through the presentation.

Eventually, I found my stride and finished the presentation. Once on the other side of it, I felt relieved and then, of course, had to be ready for the actual hard part, the questioning. Now, to be clear, I have an amazing committee. They've been thoughtful, supportive, and insightful about different challenges and considerations for my study. I have not felt anything but absolute appreciation for them because they've played this role and played it for probably longer than they might have to for a typical doctoral student. Still, I was nervous about their questioning me in front of everyone in that room.

I didn't have real reasons to believe that they wouldn't be as thoughtful as in previous experiences, but grounded evidence and nerves do not necessarily overlap in a Venn diagram. So, the questioning began.

My chair, an effective and skillful master of ceremonies if there ever was one, recapped my presentation with accolades and explained that we would move into questioning from the different committee members with a particular order and time allotment. He would round out the group at the end.

The questions were all insightful engagements with my written dissertation, demonstrated deep thinking about what I wrote. The questions had nothing really to do with the methodology itself or the findings, but more about how I structured them in literature review, discussion, and the importance of carrying threads that I had started earlier into the final chapter. It all made sense--they caught the things I had dropped and in a few particular instances, helped me speak more clearly about things I needed to articulate better in the writing.

I had one area that I stumbled--an area that I told my partner I felt most unsteady the night before. I really like phenomenography as I've gotten to work through it and do this study. Yet, I can struggle a lot with theory and method. I often feel I still have training wheels when trying to talk about things like epistemology and ontology. So when I got questions that dug into my understanding about the the methodology--I definitely struggled. I think what was interested about this moment was that I was fine with struggling and navigating a weakness in front of everyone; but many folks weren't. In the conversation later and follow up messages, a good amount of folks felt like what the committee was doing was too much; but it didn't feel that way to me. It felt like an appropriate challenge about understanding what I was talking about by an expert in the field. And the stumbling--well, I knew it was a weak point and the clarity of the conversation during the dissertation helped me understand some of how the lack of clarity was showing up in the dissertation--the exact goal of a dissertation defense.

Still, overall the questioning felt empowering. I got asked questions and I felt entirely skilled at answering them. I could connect what was being asked with what I wrote and what I saw among the participants. They often say that being prepared for a defense is knowing that you are actually the expert in the room--and much of the time, I felt that way about the work I had done.

After the questioning, the committee went into a breakout room to converse and decide while I stayed in the room with folks who were still there (by this point it was 8:40am'ish--people had places to be!). This was a sweet moment where I got to just talk with and hear from people about what they had just witnessed. Many accolades were shared and some folks shared how they met me and why they showed up. If I wasn't already feeling all the feels, I was doubly-feeling it now.

Again, to see the different people from different walks of life engaging with me and one another was precious and appreciated. As my partner said in another one of her astute observations, in many ways, it was like the best part of a funeral--many people showed up and gave accolades but you didn't have to be in the casket.

The committee finally came back and announced that I had passed. There were (and always will be) edits but that that those would come along later in the day to review and integrate to the dissertation, but for all intents and purposes, I had successfully defended and would be graduating at the end of the (next term--too late for fall).

It's been a long trip...but because I started this out doing it for me, I am glad that I have completed and can wrap this up. I'll have a few more post in this series cause we're not quite done yet and I think there's likely to be some posts about the process from here to walking across the stage that would also be helpful to folks. Still, I also want to thank readers--some of y'all have been reading about this since my first post years ago and have regularly commented here about things. Others have signed up to the blog just to follow this series and others are probably reading this in the future. Thanks for joining me--it's been a lot and meant a lot!

Dialogs on Teaching #3: educators and instructors

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Tue, 03 Dec 2024 10:07:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 9 minutes

Welcome! This blog post is part 3 and the last installment of my side of an ongoing conversation between myself and Stacey M. Johnson. Since we met a few months ago, we’ve been in an ongoing dialog about some of our favorite issues in teaching and educational technology. We decided to take the dialog public on our blogs.

Image source: Chatgpt
Want to review past posts?

Stacey’s Part 1 – Dialogs on Teaching: We Need Less Innovation
Lance’s Part 1 – Dialogues on Teaching #1: innovation vs. Innovation
Stacey’s Part 2 – Dialogs on Teaching: We Need More Connection
Lance’s Part 2 – Dialogs on Teaching #2: transformational and transactional learning
Stacey's Part 3 – Dialogs on Teaching: We Need Room to Flourish

This is my response to Stacey's last post and my final post in this series...for now.

Stacey, you've done it again—you brought thoughtful and compelling considerations that elevated questions and thoughts to the next level. In particular, I loved how you engaged with and discussed transactional and transformational learning, as well as how you managed to dive deeply into the nuances of both approaches. Your ability to create space for these types of reflections allows for a richer and more meaningful dialogue that helps us grow as educators.

Your exploration of these transactional and transformational interactions and how they unfold—within the student, between the student and the instructor, and within the broader context of the student, instructor, and institution—is especially insightful. By carefully dissecting each layer of these interactions, you highlighted the importance of understanding how these elements (the types and the layers) are interconnected.

I definitely found myself reaffirming (though it took me a while to get there in my own development) that we are not, nor should we be, in control of students' disposition or approaches to their own transformational or transactional learning.

However, institutions and the society at large does put upon instructors the responsibility of both transformational and transactional learning–we are positioned as the gatekeepers of validated (or “credit-based”) learning. And so that brings me to another consideration that came through in your post–how do we balance being educators and instructors?

Educators vs. Instructors

It struck a chord with me when you said, "As an instructor, I am looking to nurture joy, wonder, connection, and, yes, transformational outcomes. Not enforce those things or exchange grades for those things, but I do hope my students find meaningful learning in my classroom."
Nurturing joy, wonder, connection and transformational outcomes is, indeed, our role as educators. It is the very essence of what we strive to achieve—a learning environment that serves as a fertile ground for these experiences to occur naturally, rather than being singularly understood as transactional exchanges. This emphasis on nurturing intrinsic value rather than transactional metrics speaks directly to the broader aspirations of our profession.
However, as instructors representing institutions, there's an inherent tension between our roles and the institutional expectations placed upon us. Institutions often promise transformations but deliver transactions.

To be clear, I'm not trying to undermine or imply anything about people who are labelled as instructors. I'm trying to consider if the role "instructor" as designated by higher education institutions is distinguishable from what we mean when we think about ourselves as educators. One feels like a role assigned (instructors) and one feels like an identity we take on (educator).

This raises a significant question: in education, can we reliably offer, capture, or measure only transactional learning? We promise transformational learning but that is so hard to capture because it is not something that we can consistently guarantee to happen in immediate and tangible ways. We can only offer possibility–a possibility that often requires both students and educator to be ready and willing to end the transformational space.

What happens when that promise isn't fulfilled? Who bears responsibility or accountability for the costs incurred? Is it the student, the educator, the institution, or the broader educational system that must answer for this gap? This gap between expectation and delivery has consequences not just for the students, but also for the educators who internalize the failure as their own. It makes me think about how many times educators like us have faced this impossible burden—trying to promise life-changing transformations without having all the tools or systemic support to make them happen consistently.

That's why I sometimes joke, "I owe those students their money back," because, as an educator, I want to nurture joy, wonder, connection, and transformational outcomes. However, as an instructor, I am caught in a bait-and-switch situation. Universities instill educator values in instructors like me but operate with institutional priorities that often lead to burnout and disconnection.

Your reflections on this dynamic, and how some transactional boundaries could be better curated, really hit home. This tension places an unrealistic burden on instructors, who are expected to deliver transformation while adhering to transactional measures. The disconnect between our educator values and institutional realities is a core driver of the burnout so prevalent in our profession. It is imperative that we look at how institutions can recalibrate expectations to bridge this gap in a more sustainable way.

The Three Laws of EdTech

I also loved your "three laws of edtech." I feel there's potential for further exploration there, whether by you, me, or others. Your three laws— (1) edtech should build on the internal capacity of institutional faculty, staff, and students rather than outsourcing expertise; (2) edtech should remove barriers to human connection; and (3) institutional policies must help instructors avoid compliance and surveillance, especially in the edtech space—are powerful and insightful. I could largely get behind them.

In fact, each of these laws speaks to a deeper issue within education today—the need to use technology in a way that humanizes rather than dehumanizes. The emphasis on leveraging internal capacity speaks to a fundamental belief in the potential of the people within the institution.

Removing barriers to human connection reminds us that technology should be an enabler, not a detractor, of the relationships that make education impactful. And, of course, avoiding compliance and surveillance resonates deeply, as surveillance measures threaten the trust and autonomy that are crucial in fostering authentic learning experiences.

That last one, about surveillance, reminded me of a piece I wrote a few years ago called The New LMS Rule. It resonates with concerns about the role of surveillance in edtech. At the same time, your rules sparked a broader question for me: are these rules about edtech itself or about the institutions that create the environment where edtech operates?

I know that technology is not neutral and yet, find the technology focuses misses how much of higher education is driven by broader market forces or a desire for control, that ends up being the real barrier. This is where we need to be vigilant and where it gets tiring—making sure that edtech is implemented in ways that align with our educational values, rather than undermining them for the sake of compliance or efficiency.

What Could I Learn from Early-Career Lance?

This conversation has me thinking about what my own edtech laws might be. I don't think I can formulate them here, but perhaps I'll write a follow-up post and tag you to continue this dialogue. It also brought me back to a question I've been asking lately: what would my younger self teach me about my current work and how I show up today?

Looking back, my younger self had a bit more magic—intentional or not. He taught across multiple classes and found threads that wove them together. This enabled him to present interconnected ideas in ways that suited different contexts. There's something in what he was doing then that set me up for much of what I do now, albeit in non-teaching contexts. I'd love to relearn that from him. There was an element of spontaneity and flexibility that allowed for a kind of teaching that was less constrained, a freedom to explore ideas that I sometimes find harder to access now. That younger self had fewer tools and thoughtfulness about teaching but a broader sense of connecting his teaching across different domains and classes that I admire and would want to think about how to do more actively in day-to-day work.

At the same time, I think my younger self would be curious about how I got from there to here. Lately, I've been mentoring others and reflecting on this journey. While I work in a field where backward design is a hallmark, I'm not sure I could backward-design my way to this point. Much of my work over the last 15 years has been emergent, shaped by standing in the present, seeing what the next step is with some faith that the next steps will reveal themselves to me as I find myself in new contexts with new and familiar people. My younger self would recognize and connect with that but be intrigued by where it has taken me.

As I wrap up this final post, I’m thinking about your three laws of edtech and also, the dualisms that I’ve found myself explore in this conversation:

innovation and Innovation
transformation and transactional
educator and instructor

First, I wonder about them as dualisms and more as continuums–or as frames that we inevitably have to take on because our roles as educators (or instructors) is never one dimensional. So, in order to move through teaching and learning effectively and with the thoughtfulness needed in the current age, they are frames that significantly make our work better–for ourselves and our students.

I don’t know–more to chew on there. Still, I’m grateful to have this exchange to help draw out these ideas that have been bouncing around in my head with a colleague and friend who can push, challenge, and expand my own thinking. Thank you for this conversation, Stacy!

And of course, if there is anyone else out there who wants to chime in about what they could learn from their early-career self, please join in the conversation! Please feel free to comment below, write up your ideas on your own blog or on social media and tag me or Lance to let us know about your contribution. You can find us on our blogs (Stacey, Lance) or on LinkedIn (Stacey, Lance).

The PhD Chronicles: And Now, We Defend

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Thu, 21 Nov 2024 10:10:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes

About 5 months ago, I let folks know that I had a completed draft of the dissertation. After working on it with my advisor and other committee members, I'm now set up to actually do the defense. Finally!

XKCD

It's been a long trek (Read all about it as I've documented it here at length) and I know it's not over yet. There's the defense, the edits from the defense, and then all the formatting BS for publication of the dissertation. But the key part--the part where I publicly say, "Hey all, I did this, I can justify what I did and why, and here is what I found"--that part is upon us.

And I've been getting the "are you nervous?" and the truth is that I'm not, which I take as a good sign. I feel confident in my work and in my findings. I know that I am the expert on my dissertation and that I'm making a contribution to the literature. I also know I have a strong, thoughtful, and supportive dissertation committee who have been working with me and challenging me to be as best prepared for the defense.

I do think in this whole process, this is the easiest part. To be clear, I'm not saying it's "easy" but easiest stage for myself. First, of course, is what I just mentioned. I feel grounded in my work, supported by my committee, and clear in what I need to do for the defense. But also, because I have been doing a lot of talks, discussions, and workshops over the last two years around generative AI, I feel like I'm prepared fully to engage in thoughtful discourse.

My dissertation is not about generative artificial intelligence (for those tuning in for the first time, that might be surprising), but because I've spent a lot of hours engaged in discussing it as a topic, it has been incredibly helpful in preparing me for the defense. I've met lots of folks with lots of different thoughts and ideas about GenAI. To do the work that I've been doing at the level I've been doing it, I've had to be thoughtful, respectful, and present in how I respond and engage (and I'm not saying this has been a strain but rather just acknowledging what these conversations take). Some conversations have been more tense than others but they required me to deal with complex challenges and considerations in the moment that were new to me and meant I had to integrate those ideas and respond in kind.

Well, after 2 years of doing that, I feel like there's not much else that could prepare me for a dissertation defense. Even if the topic is different, the dynamic is the same. Listen and reflect on what's being asked of me in the moment. Integrate it into what I already know and think. Respond about how I reconcile those ideas with my own. Don't overpromise and be clear about what you can and can't say.

So, let's do this!

The defense of my dissertation (titled: Elbow Patches to Eye Patches: A Phenomenographic Study of Scholarly Practices, Research Literature Access, and Academic Piracy) is Tuesday, December 10 at 7am (Eastern Time) (sorry, but given that the committee is international and spanning from here to Australia, that's how it shook out). The event will take about 2 hours. The first 30 minutes will be my dissertation defense presentation, followed by about 30-40 minutes of questioning from the committee and attendees. The committee will then have a conversation and then call everybody back and share their determination. It is virtual and open to the public. If you are interested in attending, please email me and I'll send along the link.

Dialogs on Teaching #2: transformational and transactional learning

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Thu, 10 Oct 2024 10:26:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 15 minutes

The Story So Far: Welcome! This blog post is part 2 in an ongoing conversation between myself and Stacey M. Johnson on her blog. Since we met a few months ago, we’ve been in an ongoing dialog about some of our favorite issues in teaching and educational technology. We decided to take the dialog public on our blogs.

I thoroughly enjoy these conversations. So, thank you for continuing this.

I appreciate your guiding frame: "Does a policy or practice increase our internal capacity and build on the professionalism of our faculty and staff, or does it outsource key functions and fail to consult experts already on campus, devaluing and demoralizing the experience for all of those left behind?"

Applying this to a technology is a thoughtful practice given that many in the ed-tech space push tools that replace community experiences with individual experiences.

Wresting Technology for Our Innovation

I'm thinking about what you said regarding how education is truly made more accessible and inclusive. It's not just because of innovative technologies, but rather innovations that have been applied in ways that bring us together or ensure that being all together in a learning experience benefits students rather than being an obstacle.

This statement reminds me of Cory Doctorow and the idea of how we critically wrest away technology for our purposes, not the controlled versions that are put upon us. It reminds me of playing with GI Joes as a kid - it was a great space for imaginative play, especially for those of us who were particularly nerdy. You could actually take them apart, switch out arms, chests, heads, and legs, and essentially make up your own thing. There was something very liberating about that, allowing for creative play beyond the prescribed characters.

I think that's something really important for us to consider - not just looking at the technologies themselves, but the ways we bring our own usage to them. It's crucial for us as educators and for our students to learn and think about this.

Transformational vs Transactional Learning

Something that's sitting with me is related to what we talk about in the classroom. A lot of what we feel and dig into is the value and power of transformational learning. The idea is that in this space together, there's a magic that happens. I see it time and again in so many classrooms.

While transformational, community-oriented learning is important, how do we balance or make room for, or just acknowledge that transactional learning is okay too?

I do understand that the push for transformational learning is part of what higher ed does to justify itself and to push back against the transactional nature of late-stage capitalism and hyper-individualism. But we exist in that milieu, not a part from it and so when institutions and educators demand transformational–it too can feel like one more demand put upon students.

What has me thinking about this is a recent framing from Karen Costa. She made the point that the non-traditional student is no longer non-traditional. Her explanation of the non-traditional student really stuck with me. When we talk about the non-traditional learner, they are largely richly contextualized in a variety of roles that the previous "traditional" learner often is not. The student identity is not their primary identity. In fact, it may be much further down the list of their identities. Other things like being a parent, employee, community member, etc., take precedence.

This has me thinking: for some students all or part of their learning may be entirely transactional. Can we acknowledge that transactional learning can be important and valuable, too?

I say this as someone who, in my own head, often has noticed this bias towards transformational learning: this sense that if there's not true transformational learning, then it's somehow less valuable and meaningful.

But I’ve been questioning that notion the last few years. The idea that learning can only be "real" if it's experienced in these transformational ways is something I'm questioning now. I see a lot of this elitism in education (it shows up in the arts as much as the sciences), where if you don’t see, experience, perform, appreciate, in this or these particular ways, it doesn’t count. You’re less than.

I wonder about this as a challenge: Is there room for both transformational and transactional learning? And what do we do when the same tools that we're critically uncomfortable with - the ones we feel are demoralizing or contribute to distancing - may actually be really helpful for some students?

For these students, not being fully immersed and being able to just take what is needed now might be beneficial. I get it - that's where we lean into more individual experiences versus community experiences. It doesn't feel entirely comfortable or right, and I understand those students are potentially enacting an individual lens or experience of learning. But what if this transactional experience is allowing for more transformational experiences elsewhere (e.g. in their communities)? I worry about that paternalistic lens that we in higher ed can bring to how we view students’ values, contexts, and meaning-making and think it can show up in this valuation of in-person, transformational, relational importance of teaching and learning.

(Again–I don’t wholly believe this is the case but I do feel the need to investigate it thoroughly).

We've also seen over the last three decades that these tools have allowed people to access education in ways that weren't available to them before. Yet, there's a real tension there about where to draw the line, if there should be a line at all, and who's drawing the line, or supplying the ink (or graphite) to draw the line.

To some degree, even with all the critiques I have of them, those massive online institutions do facilitate transformational learning in some portion of their students, even if it may not be as community-based or feel counter to how we traditionally understand teaching and learning. There's no easy solution for that tension.

“There are no mistakes, just happy accidents.”

You mentioned:

“I enjoy figuring things out on my own, even if I get a little turned around in the process. I also tend to see most things as low stakes; mistakes are not the end of the world. All that to say that, in my early days as faculty, it never even occurred to me to seek out help.”

That has often been my experience. I wonder about how that changes our understanding of learning. It brings me back to privileging transformational over transactional learning. We want to encourage this idea that failure is okay, or we can rethink how we think about failure (at my current institution, we have an entire course on “Reframing Failure”). I wholeheartedly agree with that. My failures have been my greatest learning opportunities, and I feel lucky to have had them (often more so in hindsight than in the moment, of course).

Even though failure is at the center of learning, there's always this edge to it. Failure is a luxury, or being able to work through failure is a luxury. I agree, I see most mistakes in my life as low stakes. I just don't know that it feels as accurate for students in more precarious situations. Financially, socially, politically, for many folks, is it actually low stakes? Is there an ability to feel low stakes? There's something there that I don't feel, but I do see it in so many people, students and adults alike.

Yet failures and mistakes are not equal in their experiences and abilities to recover. It’s why we balk at Facebook’s “move fast and break things.” They can break things because it's other people who feel the effect of their mistakes; if it’s a significant mistake, they can throw billions of dollars at it. On a smaller level, that’s true for us as educators. Our failures and mistakes may cost us something, but not as much as it may cost our students.

What Did My Former Self Need to Hear

Which brings me to the question: What would you say to your younger self about looking for and asking for support in teaching and learning, and how public and open they were about it?

Gosh, I would say to my younger self that, just like we often say in teaching, we plant the seeds of trees we'll never see fully grown. So much of the work we do manifests years later, and we experience this in our own lives when we realize that a lesson from that person has actually stuck with us or has made us do something.

Of course, we have to consider the other side of that seed planting. I would want myself to know that I may also not get to fully see or realize the bountiful land that I spoiled, salted, or corrupted. Think quite deliberately about that. My mistakes and failures to be a mindful and intentional educator has become some student’s “reason”. To be thinking about how to be a steward of learning.

Because I know there were students I did not do justice by, students whose educational experience was made worse because of me and my sense of what it meant to be an educator or to perpetuate bad teaching habits or ego-centric practices.

Given that, I would push myself to get insight from others and figure out what it out better. I think an initial action would be to direct my younger self to get onto platforms like Reddit, Twitter, and other spaces to really hear the stories of students about the impact of poor educators–the kind of raw honesty and clarity of impact by students that exist on those platforms–to help glean some sense of my impact.

From there, I would move him to find a colleague or two that he trusted both to witness but also to be critical to review the course content as well as do an observation. I would have put some of the pedagogical books in his hands sooner (Friere, hooks, Giroux).

My former students deserved better, they deserved more nuance, and they deserved a way to really be who they are and find their way through the subject matter. For myself, there wasn't space to do that. That's something I would really try to draw out in my younger self and help him understand.

I think I would also help him understand that part of the way I approached that classroom was that we so often fill it up with content, but not necessarily relationships. He filled it up with the thing he thought he could control the most, that he had the most say over. I'd encourage him to learn to lean a bit more into things that feel a little less tangible or manageable. I would have liked to encourage that, particularly in his first five years. I think he was some interesting things, but I think his sense about who students are should have sat with him more and should have been discussed more thoughtfully and curiosity with others.

I go back to Karen Costa and her point that being a student is one part of their identity, and the younger me demanded it be all. That just wasn't true. It wasn't true for me as an educator or student. It wasn't true for them. It's not really true for any of us. So more leaning into all that.

Beginning With What?

You ask, if I have any programs you have designed or imagine designing for new faculty that would provide our colleagues with the support I wish I’d had?

Early on in my adjuncting (i.e. first or second year back in 2006), I was already in a support space. I lucked into a moment at one of my institutions where they were launching a professional development program for adjunct faculty, and that actually helped build the bridge to my current work.

Dr. Laurie Messina, a mentor and friend, was piloting this program and pulled me into participating in it. That led me to become involved in that program and doing what I've been doing since. In stepping into that space, I would have encouraged myself to be a little more vulnerable about the challenges of teaching and learning. To stay in that space, even as I grew to facilitate it, to maintain a beginner's mind–to recognize that I was still a learner and had much to learn from colleagues (a lesson I’ve learned amply since!).

I do think back about that professional development program which I was involved in for nearly a decade, and I would love to recreate it and have it ongoing. It was a Saturday program for many years. It really did build some relationships and provide guidance. There are definitely folks from that program that I'm still friends with today, colleagues I connect with regularly.

I've often worked at places where we can't get two wooden nickels to rub together to support the work that we do. So, the idea of doing anything that is beneficial but also asks more of faculty feels challenging, especially for adjunct faculty. They're already going to be often underpaid. They are already going to be asked to do lots of things (administrata and the like) that we just kind of slip into the work. To add in more training or more programming that they're expected to do as part of the onboarding or development - yeah, it just feels hard. It feels like it's a challenge to meet or rise to. And it’s more than “training” but no matter what, it’s going to feel like that to some (again, transactional vs transformational).

That said, I think what I do bring - my work that I am offering and have carved out in the last few years - is just an attempt to be honest about the institution and how power works there. Institutions wield their power in a way that reinforces the difference or the power between the institution and the faculty member. Particularly in working with adjunct faculty, their precarious situation shows up in institutions in how disposable and absence of care and support for adjunct faculty.

That's something that I do my best to raise up. I do my best to be candid and caring about how power works and what I can do to help them with that. It's to name the disempowering effect an institution can have on faculty and also, where they can resist.

That earnestness builds a report with faculty that I believe creates trust. It’s grounded in the idea that if I can be honest about what the institution is, and the ways it can be challenging, it might also open up an opportunity for them to feel like they can ask for help, they can reach out, they can look for guidance, and either I can support them directly or find the right people to do that.

I think to me, just clarifying the lines of power is important because it is so easy to step into, especially if you don't have a rich background of understanding higher ed, to be like, "Oh, I'm a faculty member now, like that means something." That comes with certain power and certain emphasis–for sure, but also, many institutions don’t care. And as you learn that, you also feel the fragility of your situation. So I think I just try to name and clarify that a bit more in my own work with faculty to help them feel supported.

All right, so continuing with the questions for one another–I’ve got one for you, Stacey (or anyone else who wants to join us :::stares with wide-eyed hopefulness into his (turned off) webcam:::).

We’ve been talking about what we would want to help our younger selves with.

But let’s flip it. What do we think our younger selves would tell us, teach us, or ask us about our current work and how we show up to it?

And of course, if there is anyone else out there who wants to chime in about the successful supports they had as early-career faculty or about the supports they would love to create for new faculty now, please join in the conversation! Please feel free to comment below, write up your ideas on your own blog or on social media and tag me or Stacey to let us know about your contribution. You can find us on our blogs (Stacey, Lance) or on LinkedIn (Stacey, Lance).

Dialogs on Teaching #1: innovation vs Innovation

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Wed, 25 Sep 2024 14:40:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 10 minutes

Welcome! This blog post is part 1 in an ongoing conversation between myself and Stacey M. Johnson on her blog. Since we met a few months ago, we’ve been in an ongoing dialog about some of our favorite issues in teaching and educational technology. We decided to take the dialog public on our blogs. You can see her first post in the conversation here and she will be posting the next within a week or so of this post.

I’ve very excited for this dialogue and public reflection. There’s some delightful, whimsical, and slightly risky in participating in a conversation like this. It’s the kind of thing you read about but not necessarily do. Shout out to Derek Bruff and his Take It or Leave It episode on his podcast, Intentional Teaching, that brought us into conversation!

In reading your post, I had a lot of thoughts and lots of “hmmmm” moments, which I think is part of why we started and continue our dialogue! Like you, I share concern and a distaste for the term "innovation." Of course, this is coming from somebody who has innovation in their current title. It is a word that has been overused, much like so many other terms: best practices, creative disruption/destruction, high impact practices. All of these buzz terms from overly simplified research that is touted everywhere but rarely understood, Silicon Valley, or from spaces that more often privilege profit than they do actual solutions–spaces that are never satisfied with enough efficiency.

Photo by Aron Visuals on Unsplash

Innovation is a clunky, unuseful word, and I appreciate the way you raise it up as another form of deskilling and decoupling. Innovation as it is used can often mean taking out the nuance of a context. Innovation as technology is the proverbial hammer to which all problems become nails: throw more tech at it, invest in tools, not people.

In many ways, it’s the toxic and most leveraged brand of innovation that we have– an overly capitalistic, productivity-oriented understanding of innovation and technology and its roles in teaching and learning. These have entered into higher education in many different facets and ways: the classroom, faculty lives, staff lives, all of that. It’s hard not to hear the I word and instantly want to eye-roll or be prepared for the ONE SOLUTION TO RULE THEM ALL (something, of course, AI is currently being offered as).

I'm skeptical of capital "I" “Innovation”, the kind of innovation that is touted, the kind of innovation that is the metonymic stand-in for so many other practices, views, and alienating practices that creep into learning spaces.

And yet, I know “Innovation” has been transformational in my own life-long learning journey. I think about how one of the major reasons I'm able to do the work that I do and be the professional that I am is technology and “Innovation.” I would not be as knowledgeable, I would not be as thoughtful, I would not be as capable of understanding a variety of complex ideas without digital technology. I would not be able to key into the more complex aspects of teaching, learning, care, and nuance without Innovation.

Here is where I get on my soapbox about audiobooks (yet again) as one of several examples of how Innovation has made me better at all my work. Audiobooks in the 21st century are a different technology than in the 20th century. We aren't lugging around tapes and cassettes, making it unbearably unaffordable and unportable. Instead, I have literally a whole library on my phone, and I'm able to read two to four books a week on a variety of subjects. I can listen to them in ways that make them more comprehensible to me (e.g. at a faster speed cause it keeps my focus better) and access a variety of more texts and ideas because scale and digital platforms (Audible, namely) made it possible. Audiobooks witnessed a big “I” Innovation and it has made a world of difference for me and many others who thrive with this format for learning and experiencing new ideas.

Having access to a computer in middle school also played a role in my educational trajectory. Being able to type instead of write opened up my desire to put ideas into text after a long history of poor penmanship that impacted my grades. The ability to type and the encouragement by my teachers who realized that I had a computer at home and could type has led me to write millions of words (including a really crappy 400-page novel in high school but that’s a story for another day).

O f course, there’s all Innovation that has occurred in digital communications–allowing for us to meet one another (podcast), dialogue synchronously (Zoom), and now asynchronously (email and blogging). I know I’m speaking to specific technologies–many of which feel less innovative today and yet, were still part of the Innovative machine and were the gateways to learning and changing that has significantly contributed to my learning and growth as an educator–as a human being–over the decades.

So I feel a tension with Innovation. Over the years, it feels pushy, overly productive-focused, and dehumanizing in many ways. But so does the higher ed, even if we take out the Innovation. Creating classrooms that are never comfortable or inviting (uncomfortable chairs, inconsistent room temperature, etc) for everyone; it’s basically who has the body and minds to endure 50, 75, 90, or 180 minutes at a go of being in that space. These are spaces we tolerate. Similarly, how we structure learning time as a set amount of times spread across a week, over a (somewhat) arbitrary amount of weeks (1, 4, 8, 10, 15, 18-week semesters) makes little sense for what we actually know about how learning happens. So even before we step into the Innovation being crammed into our headspace, there’s a need to acknowledge that all higher education (K-12 probably as well) is a construct and set of practices we do that are a result of scaling costs but not necessarily conducive to learning.

Much learning and relationships have come from this artifice (or despite it?). Innovation feels like just another part in a series of inconveniences that make up the entire higher educational construct. Something as useful as it is insufficient.

Where possible, I think it’s important to bring even the big “I” innovation to learners. I want them to be critical of it and also know that this Innovation also has some transformational possibilities.

I appreciate your framing of innovation. “The innovation I want is not scalable and won’t replace well-paid, professional human teachers who have the time and funding to pursue their own professional development.” It makes me think about the importance and power of small "i" innovation. Tools and practices that don’t “scale” but still change what can be done, how, and for who.

My passion for audiobooks (again!!!) has also shown up in my literature courses. Particularly when I teach literature from before 1930, I am also providing both the free text from Project Gutenberg, Internet Archive, etc as well as the audiobook version from Librivox. Librivox is a website of volunteers who have put up nearly 20,000 audiobook narrations that are in the public domain for others to download and use. For final projects, students can do a narration of a text or related text that ends up on the Librivox. I’ve framed it often under the concept of digital service-learning.

To me, there is a small “i” innovation in having students sit with American literature and not just read it, but speak it, and perform it. One theme we play within the course (particularly American literature) is examining "what and who is the American voice?”. That's a false question, but it's a good question to get started thinking about who gets to be read, who gets to speak, who gets spoken to, whose voices are preserved in the “canon” and whose voices are silenced or forgotten.

But this assignment raises lots of other questions like what does it mean to take a text that's 100, 150, 200 years old, and voice it, give life to it?

How did it sound?
How should it sound?
What do with do with the speaking parts?
What do we do with pacing?
How emotive should we be? What the text suggests in a modern context or what feels appropriate for the time it was publsiehd based upon what we know?

And many more questions. It’s an interesting challenge and proves to be a powerful contemplation that goes more than just reading and recording.

Now, this could be done without technology. Students can just come up and read it in aloud in class. Live performance is also meaningful, yet there's also something powerful in the editing, in taking the finished product, getting feedback from a community of listeners, and putting it up onto a website for other future students and listeners to benefit from for years to come. In a very (dare I say) innovative way, students of my past get to speak to future students because they have chosen texts that we are likely to read and listen to in the future.

It feels like small “i” innovation because I do see how it transforms some students ideas of what it means to learn about, think about, and engage with literature. However, it’s also not scalable for many different reasons (accessibility being one of them) and does require me to be more in relation with students to support them through a new process..

So if I am talking to the Lance of 2006-2009 (the first few years of teaching--the period in which I would like to issue refunds to all my students), I would want to highlight this (possibly false but helpful) dichotomy of big "I" and little "i" innovation to help me think about what I deploy, why, and how. I think I'm at my best when I'm finding the middle path between small "i" innovation and big "I" Innovation. I want Educator Lance 1.0 to more fully understand this and use it to better support students to also figure out what their middle path looks like, how to walk it for their own benefit and learning as well as while helping students also understand what that middle path looks like and how to as well as the hazards of having to walk it.

One thought that arose from reading your first post about deskilling to the “subject matter expert” is this interesting question about whether classrooms themselves are already scaled endeavors and in reality, insufficient for the kind of learning and change that higher ed often promises.

Do we need a village to teach a course to do it well? I have more to unpack there, but I wonder it did spark an interesting question that I would love to hear you engage with–particularly for advice to your younger self:

What would you say to your younger self about looking for and asking for support in teaching and learning and how public and open they were about it?

Maybe the answer is easy because you already did that in your own past. But if there was hesitancy to get help in any capacity, I guess I’m curious to read what would have been the right message that your younger self needed to hear to act on it?

This Is 45!

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Fri, 13 Sep 2024 12:08:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 15 minutes

So it's that time again. For those tuning in, each year on my birthday, I do a bit of account and reflecting on the year. This is year #8. You can check out previous years below:

Let's start with some of the miscellaneous details I've collected over the years here, shall we?

Home: Cranston, RI

Relationship status: Married (10+ years)

Cats Owned: 2 (Bear and Pumpkin)

Other Pets: 1 mud turtle (MJ, 38'ish years old)

Degrees earned: 5 (3 masters, 1 bachelor, 1 associate)

Degree working on: PhD in Higher Education

Credits Completed Toward Dissertation: 72 out of 72.

Reading since September 13, 2023: 320 (Latest reads can always be found on Goodreads)

Work:

Director of Faculty Development & Innovation at College Unbound (full-time)
Teaching courses at North Shore Community College
Consulting, Facilitator, Speaker

Weight: 225 pounds

Longest Distance Run This Year: 7.5 miles

Fastest Pace This Year: 9:23 minutes

Runs in the last year: 161

Miles run in the last year: 540

Miles on the bicycle in the last year: 823

Blog Posts on Blogger in the last year: 13

Blog Posts on my Substack: 59

Blog Pageviews: 369,000 (est between this blog and the substack)

Blog Subscribers: 157 here; 3230 on the substack

Blog Visitors: 115,000

Facebook Friends: 815

LinkedIn Connections: 2,250

Twitter Followers: 1840

YouTube Channel Subscribers: 4346 on my personal channel; 622 on my work channel

Website Domains owned: 3

Favorite Blog Posts of the Year

Looking Back

Intense, rewarding, challenging, emotional, transformative...it's been a year. Where do I even begin? I don't think there has been a year--at least since I've been doing this--that rivals these past 365 days. There's been laughter, tears, dread, raw uninhibited enthusiasm, confrontations, resolutions, acceptance, surprise, and delight. I can't easily convey just how much has transpired this year in a post. But let's get into it!

A year ago, I hadn't yet gotten COVID (for the first of 2 times in the year). I was just beginning to step into a whirlwind of talks, workshops, podcasts, and other experiences around generative artificial intelligence and gaining a national profile that has led me to over 50 speaking engagements over the last 22 months. I had yet to start Chapter 4 of my dissertation. And well, today?

Professional Changes

Work has pushed, stretched, and challenged me in both productive and less productive ways. I have found myself appreciating the personal growth I've had to figure out on this year and step into. Through this process, I am surprised and intrigued about what all this means for my life's work. There were challenges that made me think deeply about what was the right way(s) forward not just for me but for a larger community of people in a different way than I have had the opportunity to do previously.

I had to address issues that may not have been of my own creation, but in the absence of doing so, they would have remained unresolved for a significant group of folks. This is all a bit vague, and there's definitely a post or two about it in the future. Needless to say, I feel like a very different person in the world of work now—in the ways that I show up, in how I think about my actions, how I interact with others, and what the right thing to do is for different layers or circles of people.

I wonder how much of this also has to do with the fact that, at this time last year, I was mentoring a single person. Now, I'm formally mentoring about four people and informally mentoring a couple of others. I have found this to be incredibly rewarding and enlightening for myself, as I hope it is for the folks I'm mentoring. Having been in the field for about 15 years, I feel that my insights have the ability to help others while also being able to be a sounding board to the folks I mentor and look for opportunities to support their growth.

Through these mentoring sessions, I also have to think about my own work—both big picture and small picture. I have to provide a window into how I make sense of the things I'm doing for these amazing human beings with whom I get to have rich conversations regularly. It's been a powerful and meaningful experience to still be going through a lot of growth and challenges, and to be able to share them with others. I can say, "Here are things that could happen. Here's how I made it through it. How about you? How will you make it through it?" I'm digging that and from that, what I get to learn from them.

In other great news, if you've been following this blog or you're just stepping in for the first time, I have a finished draft of my dissertation. Since finishing the draft, I have done some revising of chapters four and five. While I'd hoped to have a defense date by today, I'm still waiting for my advisor to get second round feedback on these chapters. And there is no shade in that comment towards my advisor—he has done an amazing job of providing rich and thoughtful feedback and also has a lot to do at the institution where they're down a few faculty.

I'm just excited that I have a finished draft, and know I'll be defending soon, sometime in the next month or two. I'm ready for it. I think what I've written is something I'm proud of in terms of the work and the problem I explored. I look forward to the formal defense and whatever comes after. So, not done yet, but done soon. The fact that in this past year I was able to write up chapters four and five while doing all these other things—I'll take that as a win.

Of course, that brings me to all of the AI stuff, and gosh--SO MANY THINGS! To give you a sense, you can see this post from June on my Substack about what I did in the first 6 months of 2024, and this post that looks at what I did in 2023. Yes, I started a Substack--which has over 3000 readers and been a source of exploring AI in education--I've even gotten a handful of paying subscribers.

I thought the AI stuff might start to slow down, and yet in the past 6 months and looking at my schedule for the next 4 months—it hasn't. While there's still a chance it will, I do find that the work I'm providing in this space appears to be valuable, helpful, and meaningful. And also, while it is focused on AI, it's is like all instructional designers focus on any educational technology--how do we understand it in relation to the real goals of teaching and learning.

The collaborations that are coming out of this have been fantastic. I've worked with dozens of folks at various institutions, individuals, and groups, both to help them think about how we navigate, discuss, and engage with these tools, but also to learn from them and consider new perspectives because we end up in these rich conversations.

I suspect that in the next three to six months, there'll be more things in this space that I'm doing and more things coming out from longer-term projects. But to just look at where I was a year ago to today—it's felt like what I thought was a flash in the pan is becoming much more substantial. I imagine this time next year, I'll have even more to say. Or--it have all disappeared. Not sure there's middle here.

Along with mentoring, I've also been involved in a couple of different collaborations. I've gotten to work with colleagues I've respected or wanted to build stronger bonds with, or just have been working with in some capacity, to create produce some thoughtful pieces. These are all in different stages of completion but will probably be finalized soon and off to be published sometime in the next year.

These are collaborations with really talented, thoughtful folks. While it's very clear I like to do my own writing (says the person with two blogs), it's also so cool to write with other people, learning with them, learning through them, and being challenged in my own thinking to enrich the outputs that we're producing.

A powerful year with lots to learn, share, and appreciate. I'll take it!

Home life

On the home front, I almost didn't do a garden this year, but I'm glad that I did. It wasn't my best garden ever, but I did get plants in the ground and food from the earth. I grew a mixture of tomatoes, potatoes, pumpkins, beans, eggplants, peppers, cucumbers, and a variety of herbs. There were a few other things that I'm now forgetting, but it was enough for me to feel grounded in the earth while everything else was going on. I look forward to or hope for a fantastic, robust garden next year. Gardening challenges me in ways that all of this other stuff doesn't; and I just enjoy have my hands in the earth and working with it.

There continues to be a slow expansion of making friends in the area. I'm starting to build a set of people that I'm regularly in communication and friendship with in Rhode Island. I appreciate that and the fact that there are more people I can talk with who are within a 15-minute drive. So, I'm settling into that and building more connections locally while also still holding my ties to the folks that are a bit more geographically distant.

A good chunk of my learning, exploration, and nerding out around generative AI has also been in collaboration with my partner, from whom I learn a lot. I've been enjoying our jam sessions where we show one another the cool things we're doing, seeing, or playing around with.

More importantly, it's been amazing to watch my partner build two businesses at once, which I think says something about the kind of person she is. It's been fascinating to watch her think about, figure out, and launch a business around mindfulness. She's focusing on how to do it in everyday life, how to demystify it, and how to make it feel grounded and not something ethereal. She's so skilled at helping folks tap into everyday moments, instead of just focusing on traditional meditation practices. This approach is valuable, as it makes mindfulness accessible to more people, not just those who have the means to find a quiet place, sit on a pad, and listen to their breath. You can see some of her work here: Website; Instagram; YouTube; Facebook.

At the same time, she's gotten into sewing and crafting, building cute and adorable bags, pouches, and other items. I'm sure she'll continue to work on and expand this business. It's fascinating to watch her work both in the mind and in the body, doing these really cool things. They are impressive feats to set one's mind to, and I find it all just awesome. If you want to see some of her products and markets she sells at, keep an eye on this Instagram account and if you want to purchase her adorable items, then check out her Etsy shop.

Health

When I look at my health, it's been a strange kind of year. I had COVID last year right after my birthday, and it knocked me on my ass. The recovery was hard, taking two months and contributed to other hard experiences. In fact, two health challenges prevented me from working out for about 3 or so months out of the past year. Consequently, all my exercise stats are down, but that's totally fine. Those stats are there as markers, things to observe. I don't feel I've got to beat them each year.

That first round of COVID taught me a lot. It helped me understand the importance of exercise for me as a way to regulate my emotions, my mind, and my thoughts about the world. So when something similar happened in late May, when I started to have a hip issue while running, I was much more prepared for it.

Within the midst of that hip problem, I somehow ended up pinching a nerve in my lower back. If you ask what I did, well, I was doing a wonderfully tricky maneuver that some people have referred to as "putting on boxer shorts." Obviously, I had no business at my age trying such a tricky activity, but here we are. The pinched nerve made it hard to even get up, lie down, or sit.

When it happened in early June, I realized there was a possibility that I might not be able to work out for months. That was scary and concerning. I had to keep myself from grounded. The thing that worked for me in this moment to navigate that challenge was to start Weight Watchers.

We've done Weight Watchers in this household in the past, starting and stopping at different times, finding it useful to a point. In this context, it was something I needed as a guardrail because I didn't have exercise. Without exercise, my emotions had less space to be observed, processed, and released, which in the past often meant that I would end up stress and emotional eating. I didn't want to go that route this time and wanted to do what I could to reduce that tendency.

Having something that gave me very clear parameters to work with was exactly what I needed. It helped me renegotiate eating and hunger in a body that wasn't working out for a significant period of time. I found that tremendously relieving, and it has been particularly successful, as I've lost over 25 pounds and am just a pound shy of having lost 30 pounds.

To me, both getting COVID and navigating it the first time around (not so well), and then navigating this recent health challenge in a way that feels quite right and grounded, has been powerful in increasing my own self-awareness of my body, its movement, and how to support it better in how, what, and when I eat. Obviously, with 30 pounds less, I feel different in my body, but I also feel more tuned to what I'm doing, how I'm feeling, and just how I eat. I think that's been really big for me – I feel I've used this time to improve that aspect of my life.

I will also add, of course, that it wasn't just me alone, because it never is. I also went back to therapy in January to help me work through some of this and other issues. And of course, I've had a really supportive partner to help figure things out and ask good questions at the right times.

Looking ahead

What does it mean to be 45, and what do I expect and anticipate over this next journey around the sun? I have every reason to believe that by this time next year, I will have my doctorate, and that will be quite the change. After nine years, I'll finally not have that thing there. It will be quite a change in terms of what that opens up for me to do. It will also be a mental shift, not having that take up mental and emotional room in my head. As much as I'm comfortable with it taking as long as it has, it still has the ability to stir emotions about where I am or where I'm not.

I anticipate, given just what's on the docket for the next three months and beyond, an ever-more expanding public profile. This is something I'm still navigating and trying to figure out. It continues to makes sense and feels strange or surreal. So, I'd expect more of that, more of trying to figure those things out. Through that, I expect there to be new opportunities and changes that take me professionally to places I may not have been before. I'm excited to see or discover what that looks like.

I also expect that this blog will continue to reflect and represent newer ways of just engaging and thinking about the world or sharing things. Now that I am posting less than I used to, I'm considering what are the ways that I would really want to use this space creatively. I think you'll see some of that coming up in the next few weeks.

So yeah, that's been 45 - a fascinating, powerful, transformative year. I guess I could say that I'm really proud of where I am and what I've accomplished. Looking ahead, this next year promises to be one of additional significant change, especially with the completion of my doctorate on the horizon. It's a time of transition, both professionally and personally, as I navigate an expanding public profile and explore new ways to engage with my audience through this blog. There's a sense of anticipation, a mix of excitement and perhaps a touch of apprehension, as I prepare to step into new roles and face new challenges. But overall, there's a feeling of readiness, of having grown into myself and being prepared for whatever comes next.

See you next year!

What's In a Name? What's In a Life?

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Wed, 21 Aug 2024 09:00:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes

I've never met someone else named Lance before or maybe just once. I've met a Lane but not a Lance. I used to hate my name growing up: Lance Eaton. It was mana for the folks who wanted to tease and make fun of others (to be clear; I certainly also participated in this because many who are bullied, bully, alas). But there were many refranes that I heard throughout my childhood: Lance does a dance in his underpants all the way to France. And of course, I get sent this meme at least once every other month:

However, one thing that's interesting in the digital age is the overwhelming awareness of the uniqueness of my name. There are only a few Lance Eatons out there. I've come across Lance Eatons who are a financial account, a realtor, someone serving time, a supposed chiropractor (the only evidence is his Instagram account--hmmm?) and a mayor. There's also apparently an actor who was in like 4 thing s. So it's often very easy for me to keep an accurate update of my name on what the web with a Google Alert for "Lance Eaton". I have had that one for at least a decade, probably longer.

But a few weeks, a new thing showed up on my Google Alerts--and showed up repeatedly for about 3 weeks. A new Lance Eaton appeared...in an obituary, that was republished in different venues so I kept getting the obituary every day or two now. If I were given to superstitions or omens, it would feel a little Kafkaesque or something out of a Jorge Luis Borges story--as if the obituary is haunting me.

Generally, an obituary wouldn't feel haunting but when I read it, the absence of substance makes it a bit haunting. The obituary reads:

Lance Eaton Obituary

Lance Eaton, 79, departed this life Friday morning July 12, 2024, at North Mississippi Center in Tupelo, Ms.

Arrangements are incomplete at this time. Ripley Funeral Home will be handling all arrrangements.

To send flowers

to the family or plant a tree

in memory of Lance Eaton, please visit our floral store.

So a few things draw my attention here.

1. North Mississippi Center is a hospital. So he died in a hospital and that's pretty much the only detail we get.

2. No arrangements have been made.

3. The second arrangement is misspelled (still was on 8/20/2024). Adding the extra "r" makes it sound like pirate speak: "ARRRangements!"

4. Arrangements are incomplete and the funeral home is handling them. That seems confusing since it's the funeral home that appears to have put out the obituary.

5. Whose floral store is "our floral store"? It can't be the funeral home because on the website, they explain they don't have a store but connect folks with a local florist depending on location. The hospital does have a gift and floral shop but it's unclear how if they take arrangements to be connected with the funeral home.

It looks like something hastily put the obituary together for someone who did not necessarily have anyone in their life. It reads as a sad obituary. Realistically, we're all going to be forgotten with time, but this obituary reads as a Lance Eaton forgotten in this time. I'm sure I'm not the only one imagining that this is someone who died alone in a hospital. And, we know that happens a lot--in hospitals, in homes, in the streets. We know that life is precarious, many people are alone, and dying alone is likely for some portion of us--something that deeply scares many of us.

I've certainly talked about death regularly on this blog for years. Over a decade ago, I reflected on the death of a student, I've regularly tried to unpack my own attempts at suicide (here and here), and I wrote an 8,000+ word essay about the death of my father. So it's no surprise, I'm exploring it now yet again.

The easiest interpretation of me thinking about this obituary, of course, is that I'm contemplating my own mortality (in the sense of life and being middle-aged) and even my legacy. After all, I'm seeing someone with my namesake not just passing away but with so little to be said of him. Sure, those thoughts are somewhere swarming in my head. And of course, I may feel that more so because I chose not to have children and there is very limited extended family with children for the next generation.

But I think I'm just wondering about this Lance Eaton's dash. "The Dash" is a poem by Linda Ellis that celebrates the dash on one's tombstone. The dash represents the vastness of human experience which inevitably gets reduced to a dash or a vague obituary. The absence of anything but a dash raises questions about who he was and what life he lived. It turns him into a mystery--one that won't provide any answers and to which I must refrain from making assumptions or drawing conclusions.

Like many posts, starting this was easy, but finding the right ending is a little more challenging. The other side of the dash for this post is a bit harder to figure. I've raised attention to someone that I know so very little about and used him and his death as a means of reflecting on my own life and ponderings. In doing so, some readers might find this unsettling (either contemplating their own mortality or wanting to make sure I'm ok--yes, I am). But I think something like this is more of a practice than a clearly captured experience.

I've long believed the looking at my own mortality is a necessary means to both accepting its inevitability and also reminding me that if I'm contemplating that reality, it means I'm still on this side of the equation or rather, I'm still in the dash. Thinking about the thing that I have no control over (as my history teacher, Mr. Metropolis would say, "We all going there; some are just getting there sooner than others"), reminds me and moves me to be thoughtful about the things I can currently control or do. And that feels right for me.

So I don't know anything about the Lance Eaton in the obituary above--I don't know what's in his dash, but it can still be a palpable reminder that I'm the only one who will fully know my dash. And I not only have to be ok with that, but I have to make sure I make that dash as long, exciting, and thrilling for me and do my best to share that dash with others.

The PhD Chronicles: On the Dissertation Beard and Other Means of Getting It Done

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Fri, 28 Jun 2024 09:35:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 10 minutes

Not as wise as Gandalf, but dang,
the beard feels like this at times!
Photo by Elisabeth Pieringer
on Unsplash

So I've been shaving my head since around 2002. But on January 1, 2024, I shaved my head and beard and pledged that I would not shave again until I had a dissertation defense date. I knew it was something that would be help motivate me to get it done. This week, I shaved. I do have a finished draft of my dissertation and while I do not have a date just yet, it's much more likely than not that I will be defending in September (couldn't happen earlier because faculty are off during the summer). Let's talk about how I got here and why.

Over the years, I've read about motivation and building habits. there are some great books out there that have been so helpful for me. Some of them include:

Atomic Habits: Tiny Changes, Remarkable Results by James Clear
Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything by BJ Fogg
The Willpower Instinct by Kelly McGonigal
SuperBetter: The Power of Living Gamefully: McGonigal by Jane McGonigal

I've learned a few things about building habits that are really powerful in getting me to this point. First, we actually misunderstand motivation. We think of it as needing the motivation to do the thing, whereas actually, you start to build the practice, and that actually builds the motivation. Even if you have something big (like a dissertation), you have to actually start with small parts and create the habits to support the process, step by step. As you do more, that's when the motivation sets in. Action begets motivation if you want something to be sustainable--particularly something you are unsure of, confused about, or not sure how to get there (often the case with folks working on dissertations or other big challenges in their lives).

Figuring out that small chunk is a challenge. BJ Fogg's idea of needing to create small recipes of habits to build them and meld them is a really useful approach. When it comes to creative or taking on big projects that require deep thought, we have a myth that we need large canvases of time in order to produce such work. But that's not true for most of us but we never commit to a smaller practice.

I always looked at my dissertation as needing large chunks of time, like 2, 4, or 6 hours, so I could get the inspiration, get in the right mental space, and go and do it. Of course, those chunks of time never happened, or by the time I got to them, I thought, "Do I really need six hours? I could probably do it in three." So, I did other things, and when I got to three hours, I still did other things, and it just didn't happen. Now, I would have been smarter to break these big chunks of time into smaller pieces but also, I had to realize big chunks--particularly early on might not have been that helpful.

After the first few unsuccessful years of progress on my dissertation, I moved into a smaller practice of 20 or 30 minutes a day. This is often known as the Pomodoro method of 25 minutes on and 5 minutes off and doing a few cycles. I used a pomodora timer and app for a while. In particular, I got fond of Forest which actually plants trees when you do a number of successful sessions! I've used different platforms for this.

Early on as I worked on my Chapter 2 (which is the literature review), I used this time to read (skim) the articles that I had found, take notes and quotes, and do a short 3-4 sentence write up of what I might be taking from it for my dissertation. If I managed to do a pomodoro a day (just 25 minutes), it meant that I would finish at least 7 articles a week. Not vast progress but in a month, I read 30 articles. And THAT is where the motivation started to build.

However, the game-changer for me and my favorite tool in the world is Focusmate. I've talked at length about how amazing Focusmate is. But the short-hand of it is that it is an online platform where you get paired up with another person who is also working for the same duration (25, 50, or 75 minutes). You meet in a video-conferencing room (that the platform provides). You share what you're working on, put yourself on mute, work for the amount of time, and then share your outcome.

The social interaction and appointment structure are really helpful for me. First, there are lots of folks working on big projects on FocusMate so there is much bonding and commiseration. Second, the accountability to someone else--even if I've only known them for 10 seconds--was helpful for me to keep focus and commit to the specific action I was identifying during the session. Third, the control of 25-75 minute session that can be scheduled whenever is helpful because it feels possible to work with my own schedule and flows. Fourth, calendar holds and reminders make it just easier to keep in my mind.

The thing about building motivation and doing it through small increments and habits, you find new spaces and ways to push you further. Last year, I started a morning writing group that's been meeting for about a year from 8am-9am on Monday-Friday. It started with two and now we're at about 4 folks who show up at least once a week. It's drop in, not formal, and yet, folks find a rhythm for showing up that works for them. This further created community as well as a group of folks that were working through different parts of their dissertation that we could celebrate progress (big and small) with.

But as I started 2024--the 9th year of being in a doctoral program, I knew I had to do something more. I had to do something that pushed me further to get me to the finish line.

As I got into this year and had chapters 4 and 5 left to write for my dissertation, I wondered how to make sure I was constantly committing to it or getting to it as many days as possible. What is the reminder that's going to help? I realized, "What am I going to do every day to advance this?"

A lot of people talk about building habits and motivation by finding an anchor. Something that is already a habit or practice that you can attach it to. I look in the mirror every day, so what would be a good reminder? Obviously, tattoos or writing with Sharpie on my face didn’t seem like good ideas. I thought, "Well, my hair... that’s something I see every day." As I said, I've been shaving my head for most of my life. So, what if I let it grow out? Then I thought, "What if I let my facial hair grow out?" I've let it grow for three months before, and it really bothers me. It gets into my food and stuff. I had this click: if I shave it and then let it grow every day, I’m going to see a reminder as it gets longer and longer. As it got to three months and six months, it produced even more motivation because I just wanted it gone. I'm not good company to eat food with; it just goes everywhere. I can’t stand it. I get crumbs, I get sticky...

There was this very visceral and tangible aspect to this experience. Every day, I couldn't turn away from it. I had to face it. It reminded me all the time--"not done yet."

I think the practice also worked to induce guilt but not shame. Shame's very easy to fall into, and I wanted to be careful about what kinds of structures I created. I knew that I could look in the mirror and it would be a reminder and it might create a bit of guilt—the guilt of knowing I could find 30 minutes somewhere. That meant the next day, I needed to remember that more to find the time and do the work. Like growing the facial hair was a choice, I had the choice to work on my dissertation each day for whatever small amount.

I wasn't interested in shaming myself and didn't want to feed that. Distinguishing shame and guilt is a challenge. Shame is something we internalize as part of who we are, whereas guilt is about actions we could have done differently. Shame makes us dislike who we are, while guilt gives us agency to make better decisions next time. This practice didn’t trigger shame but used guilt as motivation, giving me more agency.

Another helpful aspect of this is the social accountability. As the facial hair got longer, I had more conversations about it and why it looked that way--I had to explain that it was my guide to my dissertation. That social component had people regularly checking in. "Is it done yet?" Even people I might not run into had to ask about it, reinforcing my commitment. Both internal and external ways of checking in helped propel me forward.

Finally, one last mechanism I've done time and again throughout this process is keep track of progress in ways that feel tangible. Often, this has been by doing word count it was the most visible way I could see progress (You

Photos of me from
January 2024-June 2024

can see the chart I used for Chapter 4 & 5 here). And it's was valuable as a marker. It's not that the amount of words are particularly important but it is a clear way you can mark progress. Even if you only add 10 words (1 sentence) in a given day--that's progress, that's momentum, that's getting you closer to the goal. That's what I had to keep reminding myself. So often it was counting words but at other times, it was reading articles, or the number of pages revised. Don't confuse these small metrics for big achievements but they are what helped me get to the big achievements.

So do I have a dissertation date yet?

I'll be shaving today. Do I have a dissertation defense date yet? No. And that's ok. I have a full draft of the dissertation along with a revised chapter 4 and soon a revised chapter 5. I'm ok letting go of the beard now as I work on that and work with my advisor to get a date for September, the earliest I can currently plan for since faculty are off during the summer. I'm not done but I'm to a place of consistent work and the hardest part is behind me. Now, it's just fixing things up and actually defending--which I am way more comfortable with than having to do the whole writing part of it.

Dissertation Update: We Have a Draft!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Mon, 20 May 2024 09:40:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 8.5 minutes

Hey folks--we...ok, I have a draft of my dissertation.

No cheering yet! It's a draft, it needs work--hell, it needs cleaned-up citations and some places to update, tighten, rearrange, and all the things. But, I have a draft, finally that includes all 5 chapters and that's a big milestone.

When last I shared, I was working away at Chapter 4. It was going smoothly--as I said, it was one of the easiest chapters to write (not "easy" but easiest compared to the others). Chapter 5, doubly so. In fact, it took me about a month to write a 8000+ word draft.

So let's dig into these drafts a little bit.

I used this whiteboard to
capture daily tallies of writing

On Writing Chapter 4

In writing, Chapter 4 took about four months; in reality, the chapter took 10 months. Summer and fall of 2023, I worked on the analysis. I did a lot of deep diving into the data to create the categories of description and dimensions of variation (these are the means you organize and orient the data in relation to the phenomenon in phenomenography). This process took time and required a lot of re-angling. The metaphor that guided me was parallel a giant ass car in a tiny spot that just may fit. It required backing out and pulling in until the alignment was perfect.

That work was not just necessary for the doctorate but it was a process that helped me get so deeply connected with the data that when it came time to write, it came quickly (enough).

In fact, for Chapter 4 (and Chapter 5), I don't think I was ever at a loss of what to write. Just coming up with the words, quotes, and organization of the writing. That certainly wasn't true with the first three chapters. Those first three chapters were such a slow and process of trying to figure out not only what I was going to say, but how I was going to say it and in what order.

It was also hard for me to fully know when I was done with Chapter 4. I had to lean on my (amazing) methodologist to check my assumptions about this. In fact, when I thought I was half done with the process, she assured me that I was not only largely done but could have finished earlier but by going on the way I did, I had just made it more rigorous. I cried after that meeting thinking about the fact that she said I was pretty much done with the chapter and could move on. There's been a lot of times I've felt inadequate in this process, so to know I had gone beyond the essential was clearly something I needed to hear.

I wasn't entirely done chapter 4 at that point--I also had a section about other findings beyond the phenomenographic aspects of the study. Still, I finished it within two weeks of talking with her.

On Writing Chapter 5

If Chapter 4 was smooth, Chapter 5 was lightning. I wrote over 8000 words in a month and much of it came easy and clear. I would say that means I was doing it right as whole; that if I was really deep into the conversation in the research and findings, then conclusions would flow smoothly from that.

Like Chapter 4, I did use a prompt with ChatGPT to help me derive a structural outline of what Chapter 5 generally looks like for a phenomenogrpahic dissertation. In particular, I used this prompt:

"You are an expert phenomenographic researcher who is working on chapter 5 of your dissertation.

Write out a detailed outline of the key parts and sections of chapter 5 along with a description and recommended length of each (in word count) for each part or section.

The dissertation is focused on phenomenography as its method and therefore recommendations for chapter 5 must keep that in mind."

ChatGPT 4 produced an outline that--just like Chapter 4--gave me a good sense of where to go and I inevitably drifted from where it made sense but was still useful as a starting point. I have a future post on reflecting about the role fo AI and where I would and wouldn't have used it were it available when I was starting my dissertation. But for now, here's the results from that prompt:

ChatGPT 4 Created Outline

Chapter 5: Discussion, Conclusions, and Recommendations

1. Introduction to Chapter 5

Description: This section provides an overview of what Chapter 5 will cover, summarizing the key points of the dissertation and how they lead to the discussion, conclusions, and recommendations.
Recommended Length: 300-500 words

2. Summary of Findings

Description: A concise recapitulation of the critical findings from the research, focusing on the variation in experiences or understandings revealed through the phenomenographic analysis.
Recommended Length: 600-800 words

3. Discussion of Findings

Description: This core section interprets the findings in the context of existing literature. It discusses the outcome spaces and categories of description identified in the phenomenographic analysis, comparing and contrasting these with previous studies. This section also explores the implications of these findings for theory, practice, and future research.
Recommended Length: 2000-3000 words

3.1 Interpretation of Findings

Subsection Description: Detailed examination of the meanings and implications of the findings, linking back to the research questions and objectives.
Recommended Length: 1000-1500 words

3.2 Comparison with Existing Literature

Subsection Description: Critical analysis of how the findings align or diverge from existing research, discussing possible reasons for these patterns.
Recommended Length: 800-1000 words

3.3 Theoretical Implications

Subsection Description: Examination of the findings' implications for theoretical frameworks and constructs within the field.
Recommended Length: 500-700 words

3.4 Practical Implications

Subsection Description: Discussion on how the findings can be applied in practice, especially in educational, organizational, or other relevant contexts.
Recommended Length: 500-700 words

4. Limitations of the Study

Description: An honest appraisal of the limitations encountered during the research process, including methodological constraints, sample size, and the scope of the study.
Recommended Length: 500-700 words

5. Recommendations for Future Research

Description: Suggestions for future studies based on the findings and limitations of the current research, proposing new research questions or methods.
Recommended Length: 600-800 words

6. Conclusions

Description: This section synthesizes the entire research project, emphasizing the contribution to knowledge made by the findings. It should reconnect with the study's objectives, asserting how they have been addressed.
Recommended Length: 800-1000 words

7. Personal Reflections (Optional)

Description: A reflective section where the researcher shares their personal journey, insights gained, and the research's impact on their understanding or perspective. This is more common in qualitative research like phenomenography.
Recommended Length: 300-500 words

8. Closing Remarks

Description: Final thoughts and closure for the dissertation, providing a succinct ending that reinforces the study's significance and contributions.
Recommended Length: 200-300 words

References

Description: A comprehensive list of all scholarly works cited in the chapter, formatted according to the chosen citation style.

Appendices (If applicable)

Description: Additional material supporting the chapter's content, such as extended data tables, interview guides, or additional analyses.

This outline ensures a thorough and structured presentation of the dissertation's final chapter, emphasizing the synthesis and implications of the phenomenographic research conducted.

By contrast, here is the outline as it (currently) appears in Chapter 5:

Final Outline Through Writing

Introduction

Discussion of Findings
Current Research and This Study
Further Discussion of This Study

The Outcome Space
The Structural Map of Academic Piracy
Invisible Academic Labor

Implications

Graduate Students
Scholars
Librarians
Scholarly Societies
Publishers
Higher Education Administrators

Limitations of the Study
Recommendations for Future Research

Considerations for the Study of APNs
Considerations for the Study of Scholarly Practice
Considerations for Higher Education as Discipline

Conclusion

As you can see, there is definitely some overlap here but there was also clear discernment in what was kept and wasn't. It was helpful to give me a sense of the chapter's arc but I also felt comfortable straying from it as needed. I'll also be curious what the final draft of Chapter 5 will look like when all is said and done.

I was shocked and surprised that everything came out so quickly. There were a few places where I slowed down and needed to deliberate more. Yet most of the time (as seen in the chart above), I grew by 300-500 word leaps each time I documented my progress.

Again, I know that this will need revision and clarity, but I know that it's really close and I feel grounded in what I'm saying. It makes sense, I've been working deeply on this the last 4 years, particularly since I defended my dissertation proposal in February 2022. Still, it feels good to be able to make such strong progress and see the end in sight.

What's Next?

Currently, I'm waiting on feedback from Chapter 4 from my chair. I will then give him Chapter 5 while I work on revisions from Chapter 4. I'll also work to revise and update chapters 1-3.

I had strong hopes of a defense before the end of June but the stars aren't going to align so I will have to wait until early September. Given that, I want to get my draft into really good shape before the end of June and then step away from it for the entirety of July. In August, I would return to it, review it once more and start working on my dissertation defense, which I'm hoping to in mid-September.

In the meantime, I'm just celebrating that I have a draft after all these years and feel good about it.

Dissertation Update: Getting Through Chapter 4

noreply@blogger.com (Lance Eaton) — Fri, 23 Feb 2024 10:43:00 +0000

Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes

It's been a while--both since I posted (just under 2 months--yikes!) and since my last update on my dissertation progress (for newer readers, you can check out the full series on my PhD here).

In the six months since I last wrote about this, things continued to progress--though, of course, never at the speed I want them to. But such is the case both because life happens and other decisions I make. Still, I'm excited about where I am.

Image Source: Karsten Würth

Let's recap 2023! The first half of 2023 was digging into the data, exploring it and getting the contours of the data after collecting the interviews and transcribing them in late 2022. In my methodology, phenomenography, there is a bit of reading through the transcripts holistically to get a full sense of what's in the data and then moving into finding differences in the experiences of participants (relating to the research questions). What I'm doing is building out what are called "categories of description"--the different ways that participants might experience or make sense of the phenomenon of study (in this case, how they understand their scholarly identity in relation to their use of academic pirate networks).

Once (or at the same time, depending upon who you ask) I establish the categories of description, then I look to figure out what the dimensions of variation are. In phenomenogrpahy, the categories of description operate as the different ways people experience a phenomenon and the dimensions of variation are distinct elements that those in each category are aware of that make it a different level of awareness and experience. However, the dimensions of awareness help to create the categories of description into an inclusive hierarchy so that the category of description at the top of the hierarchy actually has its own distinct dimension of variation as well as the other dimensions from the lower categories. That is, the methodology is ultimately showing how these categories are related and move from less sophisticated to more sophisticated in their awareness.

Re-reading that I'm still laughing because while I understood that (mostly) going into this methodology and study, it has still been a trip to find the pathway through it.

Hence for the better part of 2023, I've been working at building these categories and the accompanying dimensions. The best analogy I can surface around it is parallel parking a giant vehicle in a tiny spot. I'd start to build out the categories and it seemed right but then it didn't and I'd have to pull out and re-angle myself. Or I'd start to get into the spot and feel like half my car was sticking out into the street (i.e. the dimensions of variation didn't properly align).

So that's been the process for a few months making my way through data analysis. Challenging and sometimes frustrating but also about right for the process. More important, I haven't felt as loss at this junction as I have in previous parts of the process. Part of that reason is that I've been incredibly supported and guided by the methodogist on my committee, Gerlese Åkerlind. She is a patient and thoughtful member on the committee able to help me better understand the methodology, deeply understand its philosophical underpinnings, and determine practical considerations as I work through the data.

Over the Christmas break, I made a commitment to finish the data analysis--which I largely did and got the go-ahead to move into the process of starting to write chapter 4. This felt exciting and important becuase it is the home stretch.

For point of reference, this is a 5 chapter dissertation that approaches the study in this way. Chapter 1 identifies a problem to study. Chapter 2 systemically explores all the literature relevant to the problem. Chapter 3 identifies a methodology and conceptual framework (in my case, my methodology comes with its own conceptual framework). Chapter 4 is exploring results. Chapter 5 is discussion of those results in relation to current literature and future considerations.

If you've been reading along about my dissertation journey over the years, you know that Chapters 1-3 were quite hard to write. To get to my Dissertation Proposal Defence two years ago--well, it took a lot. Developing the full landscape of the dissertation's focus I needed in order to propose how to study my research problem was a real intellectual challenge for me. I wasn't entirely sure what I was doing and it wasn't until late in the game that I found a scholar who could help me around the content (my department and dissertation chair are incredibly helpful and also, they knew so very little about the problem I chose to study--that one's on me I suppose for choosing it).

But now, I'm writing chapter 4. And here's the thing about writing chapter 4--at least for me--is that it's the easiest chapter to write. That's not me saying it's easy to write but it's the chapter that is coming the easiest to produce. In January, I had a very deep and powerful realization: there is no one else on Earth who can write my chapter 4. That is, I'm the most equipped and knowledgeable to write this chapter.

Now, I know on one level, it's like "well, duh!"--but in the moment of realizing and feeling this, it's incredibly awesome to feel and experience. In many ways, that is the pay off of this whole process. I'm creating some level of knowledge that no one can or has done. That despite all the problems with the process and structures that do or don't support it, I still have gotten to a point where I can see that I have something significant to contribute to this discourse that I've been involved in for nearly a decade.

In sharing this with my partner, she made the astute observation, "It's in that moment that you earned your PhD. Sure, you still gotta finish the dissertation and all that. But that's the moment internally that you completed this."

Since then, I've been making my way through Chapter 4. I don't know how long it will take but at this clip, I do think I might have something in place by early March. Once I do, I can hand it off for feedback while starting to work on Chapter 5. If I can get chapter 5 done by early April, we can start talking defense date. So while I won't be able to walk this year, I still will likely be done by late spring and that is something to look forward to.

All right...back to chapter 4 and thanks for reading.

By Any Other Nerd

Internet Archive Artifact - 0002

Internet Archive Artifact - 0001

Internet Archive Artifact #000

The PhD Chronicles: Creating a Media Kit for Data Collection

Gather

Craft

Deliver

Templates

Initial Email to Colleagues

**LinkedIn

**Twitter

**Facebook

**Email to Friends/Colleagues

Second Email to Friends & Colleagues

This Is 46

Favorite Blog Posts of the Year

Looking Back

Professional Changes

Home life

Health

Looking ahead

The PhD Chronicles: The Dissertation In the Wild

The PhD Chronicles: Graduating...

Recent Publication: Does AI have a copyright problem?

People vs profits

Recent Publication: Growing Orchids Among Dandelions

Growing Orchids Among Dandelions

The PhD Chronicles: It. Is. Submitted!

On Receiving the Mark Berman Community Outreach Award from NERCOMP

Why Fugitive Pedagogy Is a Book All Educators Should Be Reading Right Now

Navigating the Current Existential Malaise

The Current Existential Malaise

Finding My Our Way

The PhD Chronicles: Those Dang Edits!

The PhD Chronicles: The Defense Text

The PhD Chronicles: Dissertation Defended

Dialogs on Teaching #3: educators and instructors

Image source: ChatgptWant to review past posts?

Educators vs. Instructors

The Three Laws of EdTech

What Could I Learn from Early-Career Lance?

The PhD Chronicles: And Now, We Defend

Dialogs on Teaching #2: transformational and transactional learning

Dialogs on Teaching #1: innovation vs Innovation

This Is 45!

Favorite Blog Posts of the Year

Looking Back

Professional Changes

Home life

Health

Looking ahead

What's In a Name? What's In a Life?

The PhD Chronicles: On the Dissertation Beard and Other Means of Getting It Done

Dissertation Update: We Have a Draft!!!

On Writing Chapter 4

On Writing Chapter 5

What's Next?

Dissertation Update: Getting Through Chapter 4

Image source: Chatgpt
Want to review past posts?