Ann Austin

Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education

Michigan State University

Ann E. Austin is a University Distinguished Professor of Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education at Michigan State University, and will be the Interim Dean of the College of Education, effective July 1, 2021. She currently serves as Associate Dean for Research in the College of Education, and Assistant Provost for Faculty and Academic Staff Development-Career Paths. Her research concerns faculty careers and professional development, organizational change in higher education, the academic workplace, teaching and learning in higher education, doctoral education, reform in science, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education, and equity and inclusion in academe. She currently serves as Co-Chair of the National Academies' Roundtable on Systemic Change in Undergraduate STEM Education. In recognition of the scholarly quality and impact of her research, she was elected a Fellow of the American Educational Research Association (AERA).  

Dr. Austin is Past-President of the Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE). She also was a Fulbright Fellow in South Africa (1998), and she has continued for more than two decades to work closely with the senior leadership team at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University in South Africa on organizational change and faculty issues as well as strategies for strengthening teaching and learning. She also was a co-founder and has served for almost 20 years as a Co-PI and now as a senior leader of the Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching, and Learning (CIRTL), a collaboration supported by the National Science Foundation to prepare doctoral students as effective teachers and now involving approximately 40 research universities Recently, she and Sandra Laursen have led a multi-year National Science Foundation-funded grant to study organizational change strategies to create more inclusive campus environments and to support the success of women scholars in STEM fields. This project resulted in a recently published book, co-authored by Sandra Laursen and Ann Austin, called Building Gender Equity in the Academy: Institutional Strategies for Change, (2020). Ann Austin is also PI of an NSF-funded project on networks that foster change in higher education, and one of the PIs on a collaborative project on reform of teaching evaluation.

Her work is widely published, including Promoting Evidence-Based Change in Undergraduate Science Education (Board on Science Education, 2011), Rethinking Faculty Work: Higher Education's Strategic Imperative (2007), Educating Integrated Professionals: Theory and Practice on Preparation for the Professoriate (2008), and, as well as other books, articles, chapters, and monographs concerning higher education issues in the United States and in international contexts. She has served as a consultant for higher education institutions and national associations and agencies within the United States and a number of other countries, including Australia, Canada, China, Egypt, Finland, India, Malaysia, Oman, Thailand, the Philippines, South Africa, the United Arab Emirates, and Vietnam.

 

<a>Ann E. Austin     
University Distinguished Professor, Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education</a>

Associate Dean for Research, College of Education 

419A Erickson Hall

Michigan State University

620 Farm Lane

East Lansing, MI 48824

aaustin@msu.edu

Webinar Leader, Workshop Participant, Website Contributor

Website Content Contributions

Essay (1)

Themes in the National Discussion on Reforming STEM Teaching Evaluation part of Accelerating Systemic Change Network:Perspectives on Evaluating Effective Teaching
The January 2021 National Dialogue on Reforming Stem Teaching Evaluation in Higher Education, hosted by the National Academies of Sciences Roundtable on Systemic Reform in Undergraduate Stem Education, in ...

Conference Presentation (1)

The StratEGIC Toolkit: Strategies to Support Gender Equity in Geoscience Faculties part of Rendezvous 2015:Program:Abstracts
The percentage of women earning geoscience degrees has increased in recent decades, but women's representation in geoscience faculty positions still lags well behind degree completion. Increasing women's ...

Other Contributions (8)

Organization-focused Change Networks as Levers for Systemic Change: Highlights of Research on their Nature, Functioning, and Lifecycles part of Transforming Institutions Conference 2023:Program:Poster Presentations
Transforming higher education institutions to fulfill more effectively their missions to learners and the broader society involves fostering change in several complex and interrelated issues. These areas for change ...