Handbook for Department Chairs

Community

The ideal chairperson of a department/program:

  • knows the current and future scholarship interests of each individual faculty member, and makes investments so faculty can explore and exploit their interests
  • remembers the importance of collegiality and consensus-building, that colleagues are peers and professionals, and that leading can be done from behind and below as well as from in front and above
  • does not take disagreements personally (knows there will also be at least one person who disagrees [and probably who it will be on specific issues]); and understands that true consensus may not be possible, but that having opportunity for all perspectives to be respected is, enfranchising those who hold minority views
  • celebrates achievements of colleagues (uses food as an attraction).
Creating Something New: A Leader's Perspective
Jeanne L. Narum
Undergraduate Natural Science Communities, 1995. It is not individuals who determine curriculum or the institutional structure, it is the faculty and administrators as a whole community. When reforms are one-person projects, change is not sustainable.
Departmental self-study at Allegheny College
How the process of a departmental self-study results in a better sense of "who we are, who our students are, and where we fit into the liberal arts college."
Linking departmental & institutional mission: The Morehouse experience
Building a strong department from the foundation of a solid vision that drives all planning and assessment is the key to the success of the biology department at Morehouse College.
The department chair as linchpin of institutional transformation
This set of essays from Southwest Minnesota State University reflects ideas and insights from one of PKAL's Leadership Initiative teams about the crucial role of a chairperson within the department and the institution as a whole.