Whitepapers

Whitepapers Offer In-Depth Dives

Are you looking to get up-to-speed on a higher education topic of interest? Whitepapers are often the way to go. Although frequently written by vendors, whitepapers offer very good research and analysis on topics ranging from accessibility to retention and everything in between. Did you recently get access to an interesting higher education whitepaper? Send us the link or file and we will include it here.

Accessibility

• "The State of Digital Accessibility 2022: The Education Sector,"  LevelAccess, G3ict, and IAAP, 2022.
  • General survey of accessibility programs in the educational sector.
• "Digital Accessibility Toolkit,"  Center for Technology and Disability, 2017.
  • This publication is filled with resources and tips as well as compliance information, and it is grant funded by the Department of Education.

Equity and Inclusion

• "Diversity and Inclusion in the Modern Workplace: Facilitator Guide," Everyfi, no date.
  • This is a handy reference with an exercise about identity exploration.
• "Equity Review Tool: A Process Guide for Equity-Centered Instructional Materials," Every Learner, Everywhere, April, 2022.
  • This tool was designed to be used by individuals and teams who are either creating original material or revising existing material.
• "Strategies for Implementing Digital Learning Infrastructure to Support Equitable Outcomes," Every Learner, Everywhere, December, 2021.
  • This report focuses on building the core infrastructure needed for high-quality digital learning and is designed primarily for a mid- to senior-level academic administrators (in- cluding department chairs, leaders of centers of teaching and learning, technology leaders, and academic leadership).

Preparing Students for the Job Market

• "Credential Clout: How Higher Education Can Prepare for an Evolving Job Market: A Survey of Students and Recruiters," Ellucian, 2019.
  • Many interesting infographics addressing student and employer attitudes about how well college prepares people for the job market.

Retention

• "Retention and Student Sucess: Implementing Strategies that Make a Difference," Chrissy Coley, tim Coley, and Katie Lynch-Holmes, 2016.
  • Retention isn't easy, but there are ways to significantly improve program success through encouraging the behaviors that successful students have, intervening appropriately, and using data in decision making
• "Caring for Students Playbook: Six Recommendations for Caring for Students," Every Learner, Everywhere, June, 2021.
  • Designed for instructors, this playbook focuses on course-level choices that improve the student experience

Pedagogy

• "Project Based Learning in Graduate Education," Kimberly LeChasseur and the Center for Project Based Learning, PBL Brief #4, July 2020.
  • This document gives a brief definition of PBL, gives examples of it in the context of graduate education, and provides a matrix of case studies in PBL at various institutions.
• "Anti-Racist Discussion Pedagogy," Selfa Chew, Akil Houseton, Alisa Cooper, and funded by Payback (discussion platform), undated but promoted initially in March, 2021.
  • Very useful and practical advice including specific guidelines and general goals. 
• "STEM Education in the Time of COVID," Jeff Seaman (Bay View Analytics), Elaine Allen (UCSF), Nate Ralph (Bay View Analytics), 2021.
  • This is a good review of what happened nationally during the "COVID retreat to online" in 2020.  The paper talks about the need for additional research into the effectiveness in online STEM education, and would be useful to anyone looking for topics in this area.
• "The Student Engagement Exercise Handbook," Cengage, n.d.
  • This handbook is chockfull of useful tips to help with classroom engagement as well as for teaching politically controversial topics.

Leadership

• "Leading from the Middle: Insight and Advice for Department Chairs," Chronicle of Higher Education, 2021.

Data

• "Connecting the Dots and Data to Improve Student Success," Tom Green (Funded by Salesforce). 
  • This whitepaper provides a model for thinking about how to present data in the context of student experiences to help institutions gain insights into what causes student persistence behaviors.