Editor's Note, June/July 2007

Summer is upon us—finally! 

Academic Exchange Extra would like to take this opportunity to formally welcome aboard our new Web Editor, Zach Varner.  We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with Zach as he takes on this his first issue of the journal. 

We hope you enjoy our combined summer issue of Academic Exchange Extra.  We invite your continued perusal and encourage you to submit articles, poetry, and fiction for consideration in future issues of AEE.  Please review our Call for Papers on this site for more details on submission requirements.  If you are unsure whether your contribution would be suitable under the terms of our Call for Papers, please send along an inquiry, and I will be happy to respond forthwith.  As always, do not forget to check out Grist for the Mill for possible submission ideas.

Columnist Lynne Fukuda returns with the second in a series of articles on her life lessons in travel.  The current installment is titled: “Life Lessons in Traveling Part 2:  Seeing Asia”
If you haven’t already done so, please read the introduction to this series (“Life Lessons in Air-Travel: What I Learned”) in the May 2007 issue of Academic Exchange Extra (AEE). 

Dan Lukiv starts off AEE’s feature articles with the continuation of his Haiku series in “Chapter Eleven”.  Familiarize yourself with this series by referring to the March 2006 issue for both the “Introduction” and the “Forward” to this collection as well as the April 2006 through December 2006 issues for Chapters One through Eight and the April 2007 and May 2007 issues for Chapters Nine and Ten.

The second feature of this issue,“Mixed Methods Research and Action Research: A Framework for the Development of Preservice and Inservice Teachers”, comes to us from Anthony J. Onwuegbuzie and Wendy B. Dickinson.  According to the authors:

The purpose of this article is to demonstrate the utility to the teaching profession of mixed action research studies (MARS)—which involves conducting action research studies using mixed methods approaches. First, we summarize the MARS research process. This involves an 8-step process. Next, we introduce the concept of participatory mixed action research studies (PMARS) that involve the inclusion of stakeholders in the action research process (e.g., general education teachers, special education teachers, resource teachers, school site administrators, related services personnel, paraprofessionals, target students, parents of target students) for the purpose of analyzing both program processes and outcomes. Specifically, we outline our 10-step model for conducting PMARS. We contend that our MARS and PMARS frameworks will enable both preservice and inservice teachers to become teacher-researchers and enhance their teaching effectiveness.

The third feature for this issue is titled “Deadly Silence: Postsecondary Students Diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder” authored by J. Karen Reynolds.  This is Reynolds’ second appearance in AEE.  Her article titled “Postsecondary Students and Bipolar Disorder: Final Frontier or Lethal Cocktail” appeared in the January 2004 issue. Reynolds’ current article reviews two studies conducted by the author and “explores issues and concerns of postsecondary students diagnosed with bipolar disorder. . . . In particular [she] explore[s] issues and concerns of [study] participants consisting of two groups of postsecondary students diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Students regarded stigma associated with mental illness as a sinister and debilitating problem. Recommendations made by participants promise a reduction in stigma and increased access to educational opportunity.”

The final feature of this issue, “Reflections on First-Year Teaching in the College Classroom” is an entry I wrote in a teaching journal kept during the first two years of my teaching experience.  I shared this and another entry with an officemate, hoping to allay some of her first-year teaching fears.  I am sharing both entries with you.  The first appears in this issue, and the second will appear in the August 2007 issue of AEE.

The first of this month’s Poet’s Corner contributions, “Differential”, comes to us from Noel Sloboda, who states: “Back when I was a student, I never enjoyed math.   Then, last year I conducted a formal observation of a colleague who made math come alive in a way I hadn’t previously imagined possible.  This poem was composed right after my classroom visit.”

S. Purcell Woodard provides the final contribution to this issues Poet’s Corner titled “The UW Sales Pitch”.  According to Woodard, this set of poems, along with another poem that appears in the April 2007 issue of AEE, “written/spoken at separate times, represent my interpretation of the playful and instructive sides of university life.  In both cases, I was speaking to a room full of undergraduates and their parents, encouraging them to join our community of scholars.”

You are invited to join AE Extra staff!
Send your ideas and/or writing sample to the Editor-in-chief:
Elizabeth Haller
Kent State University (e-mail: editoraee@hotmail.com)

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Academic Exchange Extra invites reader response to any writings in this issue--especially articles advancing the scholarly debate of issues raised.