An annual publication of the Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education (POD), To Improve the Academy offers a resource for improvement in higher education to faculty and instructional development staff, department chairs, faculty, deans, student services staff, chief academic officers, and educational consultants.

Contents include:

• Professional development for geographically dispersed faculty
• Implementing a learning consortium for communication and change
• Faculty engagement in program-level outcomes assessment
• What educational developers need to know about faculty-artists
• Exploring the spiritual roots of midcareer faculty
• Raising funds from faculty for faculty development centers
• Mentoring in higher education
• Tough-love consulting in order to effect change
• Research on the impact of educational development
• Examining effective faculty practice
• Insights on millennial students
• Contemplative pedagogy of teaching and learning centers
• Faculty and student perspectives on course evaluation terminology
• Questions about student ratings
• Small-group individual diagnosis to improve online instruction
• Supporting international faculty
• Complex ecologies of diversity, identity, teaching, and learning
• Organizational strategies for fostering faculty racial inclusion
• The truth about students' capacity for multitasking
• Tweeting: the 2011 POD HBCUFDN Conference Twitter backchannel
• Designing active learning with flexible technology

THE EDITORS
James E. Groccia, former president of POD, is director of the Biggio Center for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning and associate professor of higher education at Auburn University.

Laura Cruz is director of the Coulter Faculty Commons and associate professor of history at Western Carolina University.