Extra Extra! Read All About It (these books)

There are always new books.

Several books have either come across my desk or caught my attention this year. Wish I (and all of you) had more time to get all the reading done that we would like to accomplish.

Today, I will share some of the new books that you might enjoy considering for your eBook reader or bedside table. We also invite you to participate in the following ways:

• Suggest other books that you have just read or have on your short list that you think would benefit others in the WCET community.
• Volunteer to write a short review of a book that you think would benefit others in the WCET community. Contact Lindsey Downs if you would like to do so. We have some complimentary books to send to the first few reviewers as a thank you!

Enjoy!

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Looking to the Future for Institutions and Instruction

Post Corona: From Crisis to Opportunity
Scott Galloway

In a review in this ZDNet article, the reviewers say that the author “outlines the real threats and opportunities that lie ahead. The book identifies some businesses that will grow and thrive post-pandemic and others that are currently on a slow death spiral. One of the industries that will struggle in the new normal will be higher education, an industry that may not be able to maintain a value proposition that makes sense in a decentralized and digital economy, where scale, speed, and personalization are the new relevant currencies.”

Long Life Learning: Preparing for Jobs that Don’t Even Exist Yet
Michelle R. Weise

From the Wiley site:

“Long Life Learning: Preparing for Jobs That Don’t Even Exist Yet offers readers a fascinating glimpse into a near-future where careers last 100 years, and education lasts a lifetime. The book makes the case that learners of the future are going to repeatedly seek out educational opportunities throughout the course of their working lives — which will no longer have a beginning, middle, and end. Long Life Learning focuses on the disruptive and burgeoning innovations that are laying the foundation for a new learning model that includes clear navigation, wraparound and funding supports, targeted education, and clear connections to more transparent hiring processes.”

Leading the eLearning Transformation of Higher Education: Leadership Strategies for the Next Generation
Gary E. Miller & Kathryn S. Ives

“eLearning has entered the mainstream of higher education as an agent of strategic change. This transformation requires eLearning leaders to develop the skills to innovate successfully at a time of heightened competition and rapid technological change. In this environment eLearning leaders must act within their institutions as much more than technology managers and assume the prime role of helping their institutions understand the opportunities that eLearning presents for faculty, for students, and for client organizations in the community.”

The Agile College: How Institutions Successfully Navigate Demographic Changes Kindle Edition
Nathan D. Graw

From the Johns Hopkins Press website:

“Demographic changes promise to reshape the market for higher education in the next 15 years. Colleges are already grappling with the consequences of declining family size due to low birth rates brought on by the Great Recession, as well as the continuing shift toward minority student populations…In this essential follow-up to Demographics and the Demand for Higher Education, Nathan D. Grawe explores how proactive institutions are preparing for the resulting challenges that lie ahead. While it isn’t possible to reverse the demographic tide, most institutions, he argues persuasively, can mitigate the effects.”

What Teacher Educators Should Have Learned From 2020
Richard E. Ferdig & Kristine E. Pytash

From the LearnTechLib site:
“This book begins the hard work of synthesizing what the experiences of 2020 can show us about how to remake education for the future. As we look back and look ahead, it’s clear that education is not going to return to anything like pre-pandemic schooling. Instead, a workable balance of in-person and digital learning must be found to motivate and educate all students. While many people yearn for a “return to normal,” the shift to emergency remote teaching, accompanied by a resurgence in the civil rights movement, made clear that “normal” really only worked for the privileged few. We must see 2020 as an opportunity for an educational revolution. There is great value in what we can learn, uncover, unpack, and change from education in 2020, and this book invites us to do just that.”

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

The Sum of Us: Why Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together
Heather McGhee

The Sum of Us is a brilliant analysis of how we arrived here: divided and self-destructing, materially rich but spiritually starved and vastly unequal. McGhee marshals economic and sociological research to paint an irrefutable story of racism’s costs, but at the heart of the book are the humble stories of people yearning to be part of a better America, including white supremacy’s collateral victims: white people themselves. With startling empathy, this heartfelt message from a Black woman to a multiracial America leaves us with a new vision for a future in which we finally realize that life can be more than a zero-sum game.

The Sum of Us is a brilliant analysis of how we arrived here: divided and self-destructing, materially rich but spiritually starved and vastly unequal. McGhee marshals economic and sociological research to paint an irrefutable story of racism’s costs, but at the heart of the book are the humble stories of people yearning to be part of a better America, including white supremacy’s collateral victims: white people themselves. With startling empathy, this heartfelt message from a Black woman to a multiracial America leaves us with a new vision for a future in which we finally realize that life can be more than a zero-sum game.From the Penguin/Random House site:

From Equity Talk to Equity Walk: Expanding Practitioner Knowledge for Racial Justice in Higher Education
Tia Brown McNair, Estela Maria Bensimon, Lindsey Malcolm-Piqueux

From the Wiley website:
“From Equity Talk to Equity Walk offers practical guidance on the design and application of campus change strategies for achieving equitable outcomes. Drawing from campus-based research projects sponsored by the Association of American Colleges and Universities and the Center for Urban Education at the University of Southern California, this invaluable resource provides real-world steps that reinforce primary elements for examining equity in student achievement, while challenging educators to specifically focus on racial equity as a critical lens for institutional and systemic change.”

Advancing Online Teaching: Creating Equity-Based Digital Learning Environments
Kevin Kelley & Todd Zakrajsek

From Stylus Publications:
“The goal of teaching online is fundamentally the same as teaching face-to-face: facilitating the learning of all students to the greatest extent possible. This book differs from other books on online teaching in that, in the process of offering guidance on course design and planning, developing outcomes and appropriate engaging activities, managing the workload and assessment, the authors pay explicit attention throughout to the distinct and diverse needs of students and offer effective strategies to accommodate them in a comprehensive and inclusive way by using the principles of Universal Design for Learning. By following those principles from the outset when planning a course, all students will benefit, and most particularly those whom the research shows have the greatest achievement gaps when taking online courses — males, first generation and low income students, those from underrepresented minority groups, the academically underprepared, students with disabilities, and those with limited online access or lacking readiness for online learning.” 

Promoting Inclusive Classroom Dynamics in Higher Education: A Research-Based Pedagogical Guide for Faculty
Kathryn C. Oleson

From Stylus Publications:

“This powerful, practical resource helps faculty create an inclusive dynamic in their classrooms, so that all students are set up to succeed. Grounded in research and theory (including educational psychology, scholarship of teaching and learning, intergroup dialogue, and social justice theory), this book provides practical solutions to help faculty create an inclusive learning environment in which all students can thrive.”

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Let us know if you have other books that have helped you.

Happy reading!