Notes from Educause 2007: On the Subject of Leadership
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/07419050710874179 |
| Published date | 30 October 2007 |
| Pages | 6-7 |
| Date | 30 October 2007 |
| Author | Barbara L. Cohen |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science |
Notes from Educause 2007:
On the Subject of Leadership
Barbara L. Cohen
6LIBRARY HITECH NEWS Number 9/10 2007, pp. 6-7, #Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 0741-9058, DOI 10.1108/07419050710874179
Both within and beyond the
traditional tracks in which the annual
Educause conference divides itself,
other sub-themes tend to emerge.
Several of the sessions I attended were
noteworthy to me for their focus on
leadership, each in different ways and
with varying aims.
The first session was the keynote
kick-off presentation, titled simply
``Leadership'', given by Doris Kearns
Goodwin, popular historian and friend
to recent presidents, particularly
Lyndon Baines Johnson and Bill
Clinton. For Educause, Goodwin was
an offbeat choice for keynote, as she
has no formal university affiliation and
is certainly not a part of the IT world.
But, with her talent for riveting
narrative and personal storytelling, she
knocked the socks off. She received a
standing ovation from a typically hard
to please audience, on the ready to
refocus on laptop screens, iPhones, and
the next session to catch in the event of
a ``ho-hum'' presentation. Imbedded in
her stories was a list of leadership
qualities that the presidents she has
known and, still more notably, the one
she had studied for more than a decade
± Abraham Lincoln ± either had or did
not have. In the case of Lincoln, he had
them all, and Goodwin described the
lessons of leadership we can all learn
from his style. To summarize, the
following are the qualities of leadership
that Lincoln applied in very real ways,
and often under extremely trying
circumstances:
.The capacity to listen to different
points of view and to provide the
climate for subordinates to express
a point of view without fear of
reprisal.
.The ability to learn on the job.
.A ready willingness to share credit
with success.
.The willingness to shoulder blame
for your subordinates.
.Acute awares of your own weak-
nesses.
.Control of your emotions.
.The strength to stick to your
original goals, which takes you
beyond personalities.
.The will to go out into the field.
.The ability to refresh, to take a
break from your work.
It is apparent that these leadership
qualities are universal, and as
applicable today, certainly in today's
academic and digital environments, as
they were in Lincoln's time.
In another very different session,
called ``The Pedagogy of Participation:
The Conjunction of Physical and
Virtual Learning Spaces'', leadership
was connoted as key to the launch and
development of a new program that
lives in both real and virtual space. The
Centre for Digital Media in Vancouver,
Canada, which confers a Masters of
Digital Media to its graduates, has
constructed a real world educational
center that lives in a parallel universe to
its Second Life campus. Two locations
± one vision, directed by four research
institutions: Simon Fraser University,
the University of British Vancouver, the
British Columbia Institute of
Technology, and the Emily Carr
Institute of Art + Design. There are
obvious challenges to leading and
teaching in a parallel real life and
Second Life environment, and the
ability to be flexible, to stick to original
goals, and to learn on the job are key. If
you'd like to find out more about this
unique new program, visit http://
mdm.gnwc.ca
There is no project in the academy,
whether in the library, the classroom, or
the administration, that does not need to
consider issues of intellectual property
and copyright. It has become a
necessity for a university to have a
copyright policy, as well as
understandable working guidelines.
Several librarians and attorneys at the
University of North Carolina and North
Carolina State University have opted to
take a leadership role in this arena by
changing the focus of their copyright
policy and guidelines from, in their
words, ``an outline of do's rather than
don'ts''. In the session, ``WhatCan You
Do? The Rest of the Copyright Story'',
speakers from both institutions spoke
about this program, which has been
launched by the Association of
Research Libraries, with which they are
affiliated. This initiative includes a very
user-friendly brochure that gives
faculty a quick tool for determining
their intellectual property rights,
including a unique one-page chart that
condenses complex fair use information
into 24 specific situations. (This is also
available for downloading at www.
knowyourcopyrights.org). With the
proliferation of copyright restrictions,
extension of length of copyright, and
the DMCA, leadership at the university
level on these issues will, in the end,
make a great difference to educators
and librarians. Initiatives such as this
one from the ARL are essential in
maintaining the tradition of information
sharing in the academy.
This year, my own program,
HumaniTech
1
, at the University of
California, Irvine, was the subject of
one of the Educause poster
presentations. Two colleagues, Beth
Pace, Manager of HumaniTech
1
, and
Stephen Franklin, Director of
Academic Outreach of UCI's Network
and Computer Services, and I had a
great experience sharing HumaniTech
1
's
mission with other Educause attendees.
The School of Humanities at UCI has
taken a leadership role in developing
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