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UCEA Executive Leadership Academy Alumni Forum

July 10-11, 2008  —  San Francisco, CA

Thursday – July 10, 2008

8:00 – 8:30 a.m.

Continental breakfast

8:00 – 1:00 p.m.

“Personal and Organizational Change Leadership: Enhancing Your Effectiveness”
Presenter:  Ric Giardina, author, and executive coach

• Clarifying a leadership vision
• Promoting innovation in the workplace
• Building your own leadership abilities by developing others
• Creating a healthy work/life balance
• Integrating spirituality and the workplace.

Leadership theories and principles abound.  Some of these work optimally for some leaders and their organizations; others work less well.  The biggest questions for those in leadership positions – particularly those in organizations such as universities responsible for developing new leaders and new styles of leadership are: Which theory or principles apply and, moreover, How to make any application of a leadership theory or set of principles work for both the leader and the organization? In this interactive session, Giardina will discuss practices that leaders can use to create a more authentic workplace and become more effective leaders.

Alumni Forum participants will receive a copy of his latest book.

Ric Giardina is the founder and president of Spirit Employed, a management consulting firm located in Silicon Valley.  Giardina’s clients include corporations, public agencies, universities, and non-profits whom he assists with strategic planning, leadership development, executive coaching, and team building.  Prior to starting his firm, Giardina worked in corporate America for 20 years.  He was Director of Business Relationships for Intel Corporation for nine years, and before that Chief Operating Officer for MIPS Computer Systems, and VP and General Counsel for WordStar, Inc. Early in his career, Giardina worked for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration as a biomedical research scientist. Giardina was an officer in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, serving in the Active Reserve.  He holds degrees from Georgetown University and the Catholic University of America.

LUNCH

2:30 – 5:30 p.m.

“Gaining Leadership Insights from Gaining an Understanding of the Demanding Challenges of another Sector”

Reflecting upon the morning’s discussion and newly gained insights, Alumni Forum participants will engage in a collaborative on-site exploration of the challenges encountered by leaders in another sector – the huge and growing culinary sector.  Forum participants will visit a leading San Francisco restaurant.  They will learn about business trends such as culinary tourism, discuss values associated with effective leadership in the culinary sector, and obtain insights to their own challenges in today’s very dynamic university professional and continuing education environment.

6:00 – 7:30 p.m.

Reception and Discussion

“Building a Successful Campaign: The 2008 Presidential Candidates as Leaders of Fast-Paced, Far-Flung Campaign Organizations”

Discussion Leader:  Chuck Cushman, George Washington University Graduate School of Political Management

For the first time since the election of John F. Kennedy, it appears that the United States will have a sitting Senator elected as President. What that means is that in addition to fulfilling Senatorial responsibilities, the 2008 candidates for the White House are also leading large campaign organizations.  In this role, the candidates must wrestle with issues common to leaders of organizations in other sectors – determining strategy, raising capital, and recruiting talent.  Unlike other organization leaders, however, presidential candidates lead organizations that came into existence only a year or so ago and that will cease to exist after November 4th.  How do they do it….especially with 24/7 news media trailing their every step? How do they work with campaign professionals and volunteers, fundraisers and media consultants, policy advisers and would-be office seekers, and convince the rest of us to vote for them, too?  

Friday – July 11, 2008

7:30 – 8:00 a.m.

8:00 – 9:30 a.m.

Presenter:  Marc Freedman, Civic Ventures 

Marc Freedman is the founder and CEO of Civic Ventures, a think tank helping society achieve the greatest return on experience. Freedman was described by The New York Times earlier this year as "the voice of aging baby boomers who are eschewing retirement," while The Wall Street Journal stated in 2007: "In the past decade, Mr. Freedman has emerged as a leading voice in discussions nationwide about the changing face of retirement." He is author of Encore: Finding Work That Matters in the Second Half of Life; Prime Time: How Baby Boomers Will Revolutionize Retirement and Transform America; and The Kindness of Strangers. His new book, On Purpose: Boomers, Work, and the Search for a Calling, will be published in 2009.

BREAK

On the Horizon:
Technologies Changing Professional and Continuing Education

10:00 – 11:00 a.m.

Session I – The Rise of Mobile Learning

Presenter: Michael Rouen, Stanford University School of Engineering

The Stanford University School of Engineering’s Center for Professional Development is partnering with Nokia on its first mobile learning project.  Students in Engineering 40 – Introduction to Electronics – receive a Nokia n800 tablet computing device (pictured) pre-loaded with the complete video lectures of the course as well as PDF versions of the handouts and support materials.

The pilot involves students on the main Palo Alto campus as well as Stanford students participating in the Overseas Studies program in Berlin, Paris and Kyoto.  Students view the recorded lectures in advance and use the scheduled class time for discussion, team activities and laboratory work.  Using a built-in camera and Wi-Fi, students are able to directly engage in live two-way video dialogue with the teaching staff at Stanford as well as with other students on campus and at international sites.
This pilot will gauge the usefulness, usability and impact of mobile devices for the delivery of courses on campus and abroad.

Session II – Open Source
Open Distribution of Video Engineering Courses and Course Materials
Presenter:  Ray Saray, Stanford University School of Engineering

In alignment with Stanford University’s educational and public service missions, the Computer Science Department, Electrical Engineering Department and the Stanford Center for Professional Development (SCPD) will make available at no cost three sequences of video-based instruction (10 online courses) for use by educators, students and self-learners worldwide. The intent of this pilot project is to offer a broadly distributed educational experience by making online courses available without the constraints associated with costs or delivery platforms. The results will assist the School of Engineering and its academic departments in determining:

• what additional video-based courses and materials it should offer online at no cost to meet its public service mission
• what new pedagogical approaches, distance education applications and e-learning tools it should encourage and support with its faculty
• what type of business model is required to sustain and expand its online course offerings available at no cost. 

The online course sequences--consisting of 10 graduate and undergraduate courses in the computer science and electrical engineering curriculum—represent over 300 hours of classroom video presentations. These courses and support materials are being added to the online educational programs, seminars, conferences, symposia and special events currently offered by the School of Engineering at no cost through the Stanford Center for Professional Development.

Users will have anywhere/anytime access to the course videos via browser-based streaming media as well as downloadable media in multiple formats. The intent is to allow for the delivery of the videos and support materials such as syllabi, lecture notes, slides, assignments, exams, etc. to traditional media platforms as well as to new mobile technologies. The course videos and materials will be released under a Creative Commons license allowing for free and open use, reuse, adaptation and redistribution.

A collective intelligence environment is being integrated to enable end-users to engage and build upon the courses by adding complimentary materials such as transcriptions, media-based simulations, translations into a foreign language, etc. Additionally, both synchronous and asynchronous interaction will be encouraged through the use of popular social networking tools. 

The pilot project includes evaluation and measurement on the usefulness, usability and impact of the free courses and course materials.

11:30 – 12:30 p.m.

Sessions Repeat

All sessions will be held at the Forum hotel, the Serrano, a boutique hotel in downtown San Francisco.

Alumni Forum Planning Committee

Jennifer Stine, M.I.T. (’06)
Chuck Cushman, George Washington University (’06)
Mark Novak, San Jose State University (’05)
Kathleen Moore, University of South Florida (’05)
Dirk Messelaar, University of Massachusetts-Boston (’05)
Gerald S. Rhead, Michigan State University (’07)