- CA governor launches first-in-nation initiative to develop free digital textbooks for high school students
- Two dozen publishers partner with Bookshare to provide digital content to individuals with disabilities
- CCC to release it's 100th podcast: 'Content Licensing & The Bottom Line'
- Call for Papers: 2009 Thought & Action
- Three textbook publishers, five universities to pilot e-textbooks on Amazon's new Kindle DX
- Author self-publishes three math texts online
- Google Search settlement agreement extended
- TAA Headquarters staff will be away June 24-27
- Busy TAA People: Mary Kay Switzer
- TAA Foundation seeking mentors to participate in Governor's Summer Program
- New book on writing textbook supplements added to TAA's Books For Purchase section
- TAA thanks Sustaining Members
- Davis awarded two TAA Publication Grants
- Early TAA Conference registrants will receive two free books
- Two authors to be inducted into TAA Council of Fellows
- New TAA Council members announced
- Busy TAA People: Nick Sciullo
CA governor launches first-in-nation initiative to develop free digital textbooks for high school students
On May 6, 2009, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger launched an initiative to make California the first state in the nation to offer schools free, open-source digital textbooks for high school students. The Governor directed his Secretary of Education Glen Thomas to ensure these resources are available for use in high school math and science classes by fall 2009, a critical first step in helping ensure digital textbooks are widely available to all California students.
“As California’s budget crisis continues we must find such innovative ways to save money and improve services,” said Governor Schwarzenegger. “California was built on innovation and I’m proud of our state’s continued leadership in developing education technology. This first-in-the-nation initiative will reduce education costs, help encourage collaboration among school districts and help ensure every California student has access to a world-class education.”
At the Governor’s request, Secretary Thomas will work with State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell and State Board of Education President Ted Mitchell to develop a state approved list of standards-aligned, open-source digital textbooks for high school math and science. This list will be compiled after content developers across the country are asked to and have submitted digital material for review.
“Under Governor Schwarzenegger’s leadership, California’s classrooms will have access to a wider range of online teaching materials that best serve the unique needs of our students, parents, teachers and schools,” Secretary Thomas said. “I look forward to working with Superintendent O’Connell and President Mitchell to make these free digital resources available to California high schools for the coming school year.”
Two dozen publishers partner with Bookshare to provide digital content to individuals with disabilities
In an effort to improve the availability and quantity of digital accessible educational books, textbooks and trade books, Bookshare (www.bookshare.org), the world's largest online accessible library for individuals with print disabilities, announced partnerships with leading U.S. trade and K-12 publishers.
Two dozen publishers have signed agreements with Bookshare to provide digital content, which over time will add tens of thousands of books in accessible formats to the Bookshare collection. These publishers include Brookings Institution Press, De Capo Press, HarperCollins, Modern Language Association of America, O'Reilly Media, Random House, Scholastic, The Hachette Book Group, and Townsend Press.
Fewer than five percent of books are available in accessible formats today. Working directly with book publishers, we have an extraordinary opportunity to knock down the barriers and raise the floor of access to ensure all individuals have access to print publications at the same time.
Contributions of high-quality digital books from U.S. publishers will reduce the burden of scanning and proofreading traditionally done by volunteers nationwide as one of the few means of making printed material available for individuals with disabilities. Agreements with publishers, many of which include permissions to distribute worldwide, will add a wealth of accessible books to Bookshare, including children's books; general trade fiction and nonfiction; national bestsellers; academic, scientific and technical books; and textbooks for students in grades K-12, higher education, graduate school, and continuing education. By providing Bookshare with digital files, publishers can rely on the organization to distribute books to qualified individuals and fulfill their compliance obligations under the Chafee Amendment of the U.S. Copyright Law (17 U.S.C. § 121). One publisher has already turned to Bookshare to respond to the numerous ad hoc requests for accessible books from U.S. schools, universities, organizations and private citizens.
"Digital media is the future for learners and individuals with print disabilities," said Jim Fruchterman, CEO of Benetech, the Silicon Valley nonprofit organization that operates Bookshare. "Fewer than five percent of books are available in accessible formats today. Working directly with book publishers, we have an extraordinary opportunity to knock down the barriers and raise the floor of access to ensure all individuals have access to print publications at the same time."
Using proprietary conversion tools, Bookshare can easily convert EPUB (e-book standard) files and other formats received from publishers into accessible formats such as DAISY 3.0 (Digital Accessible Information System) and BRF (Braille Ready File), saving publishers the time and expense of producing accessible formats. A further benefit of partnering with Bookshare is the Digital Rights Management (DRM) technology that Bookshare adds to every book downloaded by a member to protect publishers' copyright interests and guard against illegal sharing.
Thanks to a $32 million award from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP), Bookshare is now free for all qualified U.S. students who are blind, have low vision or who have a physical or reading disability. Bookshare's collection includes more than 46,000 titles and is growing at a rate of over 1,000 books per month from contributions from publishers, universities, downloads processed from the NIMAC (National Instructional Materials Accessibility Center), and scanned books contributed by volunteers. The Bookshare library is expected to increase to over 100,000 books by 2012 with publisher and university contributions augmenting the books from the extended volunteer and nonprofit network.
To download books from Bookshare, a qualified professional must certify that the member has a print disability. U.S. K-12 schools, organizations, universities, colleges and individuals with print disabilities around the world can become Bookshare members. Members may download two free accessible ebook readers, READ:OutLoud from Don Johnston, Volo, IL and Victor Reader Soft from HumanWare, Quebec, Canada.
Publishers interested in contributing to the Bookshare library should contact Ms. Robin Seaman, Publisher Liaison, through http://www.bookshare.org/contactUs.
View a complete list of partnering publishers at: http://bookshare.org/about/communityPublishers#PublishingPartners
Bookshare is the world's largest accessible online library for people with print disabilities. Through its technology initiatives and partnerships, Bookshare seeks to raise the floor on accessibility issues so that individuals with print disabilities have the same ease of access to print materials as people without disabilities. In 2007, Bookshare received a $32 million five-year award from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education (OSEP), to provide free access for all U.S. students with a qualified print disability. The Bookshare library now has more than 52,000 members. Bookshare is an initiative of Benetech, www.benetech.org, a Palo Alto, CA-based nonprofit that creates sustainable technology to solve pressing social needs.
CCC to release it's 100th podcast: 'Content Licensing & The Bottom Line'
Speaking on “Content Licensing & The Bottom Line: Up the Down Spreadsheet,” Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) CEO Tracey Armstrong will lead off the “Big Ideas” Conference for Book Expo America at New York City’s Jacob K. Javits Center on May 28. In a discussion with Ned May, Outsell Inc. Lead Analyst, she will examine why managing rights and content with the highest-possible efficiency and customer value remains a challenge for leading players and independents alike. The podcast will be available for free downloading by noon the same day. This podcast marks the 100th release from the "Beyond the Book" podcast series from the Copyright Clearance Center.
Call for Papers: 2009 Thought & Action
The National Education Association's (www.nea.org) Thought & Action Review Panel invites submissions for a Special Focus section in the 2009 Thought & Action: A New Progressive Era in Higher Education. Deadline for submissions is June 1, 2009.
"We would like to publish a range of articles from authors in a wide spectrum of disciplines and areas of knowledge explaining how the academy might contribute to a new era of progress if given sufficient opportunity and resources," said Con Lehane, editor. "We invite contributions from the full range of academic disciplines—the hard sciences, the social sciences, the humanities, and the creative arts. How might we persuade the nation to focus on higher education as a public good rather than a private good? How do we ensure that the intellectual capital of the nation is invested to promote human progress rather than individual greed? And perhaps most importantly, how do we best educate our students in the New Progressive Era?"
In addition to Special Focus submissions, Thought & Action welcomes compelling articles on all aspects of life in the academy, especially teaching and learning, professional development, higher education policy, and union issues.
Authors should send submission to Con Lehane, Editor, NEA Higher Education Publications, 1201 16th Street, N.W. Washington, DC 20036-3290. Guidelines are available at www.nea.org/he/taguid.html or contact: pubint3@nea.org or clehane@nea.org.
Three textbook publishers, five universities to pilot e-textbooks on Amazon’s new Kindle DX
By Kim Seidel
Three of the largest textbook publishers, Cengage Learning, Pearson PLC and John Wiley & Sons, have partnered with Amazon to sell their textbooks on the company's new Kindle DX wireless reading device.
The new Kindle, which will sell for $489, has a 9.78-inch screen, 2.5 times larger than the original Kindle. It holds up to 3,500 books, periodicals, and documents, 2,000 more than Kindle 2. It is 3G wireless and requires no monthly fee, so books can be downloaded anywhere, anytime.
In addition Kindle DX has a built-in PDF reader and dictionary. Users can use the keyboard to add annotations to the text; edit, delete and export notes; highlight and clip key passages; and bookmark pages.
Pearson has agreed to provide Amazon with higher education textbook content for delivery on the Kindle DX. “We welcome the opportunity to give college students another option of accessing digital textbooks,” said Wendy Spiegel, spokesperson for the education business of Pearson. “At this time, we have not made a decision about which titles in which disciplines or at what price points these will be offered on the Kindle DX.”
Pearson has pointed to a number of enhancements that make the Kindle DX more suitable for textbooks than the previous Kindles. The use of the A4 letter-sized format means that textbooks don’t need to be reformatted to fit the screen and the screen size can be maximized by turning the device to the left or right.
In addition, the device has options for changing text size and line length. The new display presents like paper and now boasts 16 shades of gray for clear text and even crisper images, Spiegel said.
Five universities have also partnered with Amazon to replace the Kindle DX with textbooks for some students when it becomes available next year. They are Arizona State University, Case Western Reserve University, Princeton University, Reed College, and the University of Virginia Darden School of Business. Pilots will begin in the fall.
“The opportunity to pilot a device that has the potential to improve the students’ educational experience by lowering their textbook costs and eliminating their need to carry around heavy textbooks, while moving to a environmentally-friendly solution, is exactly the type of exploration in which ASU wants to be involved,” says Kari Barlow, ASU’s assistant vice president, Strategic Alliances &Special Initiatives, University Technology Office.
At ASU, one section of the Human Event course, approximately 65 students, will be involved in the pilot. It’s a two-semester trans-disciplinary honors course that introduces students to honors studies at ASU. The students will receive their textbooks not as bound books but on a brand new Kindle DX. The Kindle’s performance will be evaluated against a control group of students that work with traditional paper-based texts.
“How the Kindle will compete and whether students are willing to carry a Kindle and a laptop remains to be seen,” Spiegel said. “However, I suspect that most students already carry multiple devices.”
At Case University, 40 incoming freshman will pilot the Kindle DX in the fall. Computer science and chemistry courses and a first-year seminar course will be targeted. “We will continue to conduct our investigation in the spring semester, but have not yet identified these courses,” said Wendy Shapiro, Case’s senior academic technology officer and director of Information Technology and Academic Computing department.
Along with the textbooks, some of the materials used in these classes will be in a pdf format, Shapiro said. These files will be “pushed” directly to the students’ Kindles. “It is believed this process will make finding and keeping course materials more convenient. We also will be looking to see if this type of delivery helps keep students more organized.”
The purpose of the pilot study at Case, Shapiro said, is to determine what effect the Kindle DX has on learning. Case will look at the following components during the pilot: organization; time on task; navigation; usefulness of embedding notes and annotations; efficiency; ease of use; study skills; and portability.
Princeton is using Kindle DX in a small number of classes during the upcoming fall term. A major aim of the pilot is to help determine if e-readers can cut down on the use of paper at Princeton, without adversely affecting the classroom experience.
According to Princeton’s website, Princeton last year printed 50 million sheets of paper at the cost of $5 million. More than 10 million sheets were printed in student computing clusters, much of that generated by printing digitized text. If, through the use of e-readers, the university can cut down that printing by even 1 percent, they will have more than made up for what was spent on the pilot.
“Princeton’s focus in this pilot is to determine to what extent e-readers can substitute for paper, both from a sustainability and a pedagogical perspective. At the end of the pilot, we will assess what affect, positive or negative, the readers have had both with respect to printing and with respect to the pedagogical goals of the participating faculty and students.
“That assessment will be made available publicly. Our hope is that Amazon, and others, will be able to use those results to design e-readers that can help Princeton and other institutions with respect to sustainability and pedagogy. Although Princeton does not, and will not, endorse any specific device, we hope that the pilot will help companies develop e-readers that are attractive to our students and faculty.”
Kim Seidel is a professional writer in Onalaska, Wis.
Author self-publishes three math texts online
By Kim Seidel
 Pat McKeague |
Math textbook author Pat McKeague recently published three mathematics textbooks online as a way to have more control over the content, marketing and price of the books. He also wanted to try some new techniques, such as integrating video with the text material.
The books, Basic Mathematics, Elementary Algebra and Intermediate Algebra can be found on his website: www.MathTV.com.
McKeague, a part-time college instructor and a national speaker, has authored math textbooks for more than 30 years. He has had 16 other textbooks published by traditional publishers. He said his experiences with publishers have been positive and he maintains good relationships with publishers today. He wanted to self-publish to move his projects along more quickly than he could with traditional publishers, and to see if it would be possible to lower the price of his textbooks, he said.
McKeague is funding his new MathTV project himself. “If you just look at equipment, wages, software, programming, and rent, the start-up costs are around $100,000,” he said. “If you add in production on the print books, it is a lot more than that.
“There is a myth that some really good material on the Internet is free. It’s not. It all costs money, sometimes lots of money. Just because you can get it for free on the Internet, does not mean it is actually free. Someone is paying for it.”
McKeague’s first priority with the textbooks is to offer a low cost alternative to the materials currently available to students. “At the same time, I want the site to be profitable,” he said. “That way it can serve as a model for other people to do something similar.”
Another objective with the textbooks is to remove the video decision from the textbook adoption decision. “Our videos are free to anyone coming to the site, regardless of whether they are using one of my books, or someone else’s book,” McKeague said. “In the long run, I am hoping that publishers will follow my lead and do the same thing with online homework systems.”
Currently in developmental math, he said, people make decisions about which book to use based on the software that accompanies the book. “I am hoping to change that,” McKeague said.
“Most of all, I want to enjoy my working life and this project allows me to do that. I like making videos and writing books. And working with my crew and the student instructors is a joy.”
The first chapter of each online book is free. “That way a student can start the course without purchasing anything right away,” McKeague said. “They have some time to decide if they want to purchase the online version of the book, or the print version.”
McKeague is looking to charge $20 for a six-month subscription to the online books, and around $50 for a print book. The videos that accompany the books will be free regardless of which version of the book they purchase.
McKeague wants the project to be profitable, and at the same time, he wants the videos to be free. To meet those objectives, he needs to generate income from the free videos. They are testing out whether Google ads can help meet those goals.
“Google ads are an easy way to generate income,” he said. “They can be implemented so that they are unobtrusive; we don’t want the ads to get in the way of viewing the videos, or to detract from the attractiveness of our site. We don’t yet know whether Google ads are a good idea or not.”
The main www.MathTV.com website is simple but has many interesting features. It contains problems from basic mathematics and algebra through trigonometry and calculus. Below each problem are pictures of instructors. Users can choose the instructor they want to work the problem for them.
In addition, the site allows users to arrange the problems by topic, or according to the table of contents of one of McKeague’s books.
“We also have a playlist feature that lets instructors select the problems they want their students to watch,” McKeague said. “For example, if they are giving a test on quadratic equations, they can make a playlist of the problems on MathTV that they want their students to review.”
The main site branches off to the online book site. McKeague said he wants this area to be as close to being in the classroom as possible. “Even though our users may be working alone, we want them to feel like they are part of a community,” he said.
Users choose the book they’re interested in, and then the site displays a window with the text part of the book on one side, and the corresponding videos on the other side. Users have the option with both the videos and the text of going to a full-screen view. Along with instructional videos, videos on study skills, enrichment problems, common mistakes and success skills are offered.
Some booklets on how to study for the SAT exam and other topics also will be put online. “The website is very flexible and allows us to add features as we discover them,” he said.
McKeague lives on the central coast of California in San Luis Obispo. He and his wife have two children. Their son has worked with him full time for 15 years with both the print books and the website. His son keeps the company current on technology and created the website. His daughter, a former textbook sales rep, works part-time with the student instructors. She assists McKeague with sales and marketing.
“We have seven grandchildren that live in town, and I have a variety of friends with varied interests, so life is exciting and diverse,” he said. McKeague offers advice to new authors: “Contact experienced authors when you have questions, join TAA and use TAA’s resources so you can start out with good contracts.”
For example, McKeague has a clause in his contracts with traditional publishers which states he has to approve custom versions of his books. “That clause has saved me from all kinds of difficult situations. We never discuss things like royalty rate on custom projects because my publisher knows that I will only approve them if the royalty rate is the same as my regular royalty rate. I have never said no to a custom project. The difficulties never come up because of that clause. Was that clause easy to get? No, but that is true of most of the important clauses in a contract.”
Kim Seidel is a freelance writer, based in Onalaska, Wis.
Google Search settlement agreement extended
The opt-out/objection deadline in the Google Book Search case has been extended to September 4, 2009. The final fairness hearing has been changed to October 7, 2009. All other key dates in the case remain the same.
For more information:
Frequently Asked Questions About the Extension (PDF)
Updated Notice and Summary Notice (PDF)
TAA Headquarters staff will be away June 24-27
TAA Headquarters staff will be away at the 2009 TAA Conference in San Antonio, Wednesday, June 24 to Sunday, June 27. If you need to reach someone during that time please email TAA Associate Executive Director Kim Pawlak at kim.pawlak@taaonline.net or call (507) 459-1363..
Busy TAA People: Mary Kay Switzer
TAA Council member Mary Kay Switzer, an associate professor in the communications department at California Polytechnical State University in Pomona, directed her adaption of "Harvey" for the Pass Area Performing Artists (PAPA) in April 2009.
TAA Foundation seeking mentors to participate in Governor's Summer Program
The Text and Academic Authors Association Foundation (TAAF) is seeking a select number of college/university faculty and/or advanced graduate students to participate as mentors in the Governor’s Summer Program (GSP). GSP is a prestigious grant award designed to advance the cause of Diversity in Education for newly developing scholars.
"GSP is a short term commitment providing mentors with an ideal opportunity to receive knowledge in the practice of the authorship process as conceptualized by mentors and protégés working in a collegial co-constructive way via the Internet," said Jay Matteson, TAAF executive director. "Overall, remember, those who teach others teach themselves as well."
In consideration of becoming a mentor for the GSP project please take note of the following:
- GSP students are Gifted and high-achieving 11th and 12th grade students working for college credit at the Math and Science Institute of Palm Beach Community College (PBCC), Florida
- GSP student participants are recruited from underserved, high-need schools
- TAAF’s mentors will participate in only that part of the grant known as the "Mentor Academic Author Project" or MAAP (see attachment for details: “PBCC & TAAF RFP GSP Grant Award” with specific attention to pages 1, 12, 18, 29, 31-32, 36, and 38. Download PDF attachment)
- TAAF mentors will be supported by the guidance and instructional talents of PBCC faculty and Library Sciences professional support personnel. In other words, TAAF mentors will focus only on academic authorship training and practices; their teachers will handle the rest
- TAAF mentors will be assigned to mentor four students
- The time period for mentoring will be approximately four to five weeks (late June – July 2009)
- Estimated time commitment is two hours per week
- All mentor communications with GSP students will be performed via the Internet using a simplified Blackboard Learning Platform to allow for 24/7 review and feedback of students’ work
- The research design employs the “blind method” to control for potential cultural, racial and gender biases to learning; hence, neither the mentor nor the mentee will have knowledge of each other’s personal identity throughout the mentoring experience
- The research plan utilizes a novel system of metrics to produce "ground breaking" outcomes to advance the cause of Diversity in education; for example, custom designed Academic Authorship Rubrics will be applied to evaluate the authorship skills of the students; this evaluation will be performed by a panel of expert judges independent of the TAAF mentors
- At the end-of-the project, MAAP Principal Investigators (Drs. Dannielle Joy Davis of the University of Texas at Arlington and Jay Matteson, Executive Director of TAAF) will work with assistance from the Text and Academic Authors Association to publish the GSP students academic products as a collective body of works representative of what can be achieved when mentors and their protégé engage as co-constructive partners for teaching & learning of academic authorship
Accordingly, TAAF Mentors may want to consider working as a collaborative partner with TAAF and their institution in pursuit of other grant awards important to serving the educational academic authorship needs of our increasingly diverse population.
New book on writing textbook supplements added to TAA's Books For Purchase section
A new e-book on writing textbook supplements has been added to TAA's Books for Purchase section. Writing College Textbook Supplements: The Definitive Guide to Winning High-Paying Assignments in the College Textbook Publishing Market by John Soares, explains how Soares makes $25-$100 per hour writing instructor’s manuals, student study guides, test questions, lecture outlines, Internet exercises and many other types of supplements for college textbooks. Learn more: Click here
TAA thanks Sustaining Members
TAA thanks Sustaining Members Allyn J. Washington, Michael J. Timmons, and David I. Schneider.
Davis awarded two TAA Publication Grants
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Dr. Dannielle Joy Davis, an assistant professor of education at The University of Texas at Arlington, has been awarded two TAA Publication Grants totaling $699. The first grant, for $529, will cover the cost of transcription work that led to the publication of a book chapter, "The Mentorship of a Sharecropper’s Daughter: Being Young, Gifted, and Black in Academe," which will be published in The Handbook of Formal Mentoring in Higher Education: A Case Study Approach, edited by Carol A. Mullen, and published by Christopher-Gordon Publishers, Inc.
The second grant, for $170, will cover the computer and printing costs of moving another article to publication, "Mentorship and the socialization of underrepresented minorities into the professoriate: Examining various influences," which will be published in Mentoring and Tutoring: Partnership in Learning.
"I am grateful for this support and happy to have my work acknowledged by other academic authors," says Davis. "Receipt of the grant has introduced my work on mentoring outside of the field of education."
Davis's book chapter features a mentoring program in the early phases of its development. This case study uses content analysis of program documents, interview data and participant observation to understand the program's effectiveness. The work concludes with suggestions for future faculty mentoring programs, particularly establishing clear expectations amongst mentors and proteges.
Her article examines the mentoring component of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation’s (CIC) Summer Research Opportunity Program (SROP), a national initiative, implemented on various campuses throughout the United States, that seeks to establish a diverse faculty by encouraging the enrollment and completion rates of minority doctoral candidates. "Results from interviews with former and current undergraduate student participants suggest that mentorship influences the individual, interpersonal, extra-programmatic, and to a lesser extent, collective realms of protégé experiences," said Davis. "Study results emphasize the importance of faculty-directed mentorship in preparing students of color for both graduate education and entrance into the professoriate."
Davis is a tenure-track, Assistant Professor at the University of Texas at Arlington. She earned her Ph.D. at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Education Policy Studies, as well as two master’s degrees in Higher Education Administration and Public Administration with an individualized program in Comparative Education from the University of Missouri at Kansas City. She holds experience in the classroom at both the K-12 and postsecondary levels. As an international scholar, she has studied and conducted research in Ghana, South Africa, Egypt, Germany, the Netherlands, and Belgium. Her interdisciplinary research examines the experiences of marginalized groups in educational settings. She has published over 20 refereed journal articles, book chapters, academic commentaries, and reviews.
TAA members can apply for publication grants of up to $750 to cover expenses incurred in publishing already accepted print academic journal and book and textbooks including academic journal page costs or university press subventions; the cost of preparing artwork or other charts, diagrams, or images to be included in accepted journal articles or academic books or textbooks; and journal reprint costs. Grants are also available for expenses incurred as a direct result of research leading to publication of a book or article, including:
- Interlibrary loan costs, or computer time costs incurred in the analysis of data, leading to publication of academic print materials.
- Costs of single photocopies of source materials for research related to the publication of an article or book.
- Costs of secretarial (copying and/or delivery) services incurred in the preparation of academic print materials.
- Cost of permissions incurred in the preparation of academic print materials for reprinting images, quoted material.
How to Apply: Download a PDF form and mail to: TAA Executive Director Richard Hull, 3241 Heather Hill Lane, Tallahassee, FL 32309-2307.
TAA has up to $7,500 available for making TAA Publication Grants in 2008-2009. Grants will be awarded on a first-come, first-served basis. The grant period runs from July 1, 2008 to June 30, 2009. Members who joined TAA through a workshop and received a gift membership are not eligible to apply until they have renewed their membership for a second year.
Early TAA Conference registrants will receive two free books
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The first 30 conference registrants will receive a copy of Robert Boice's Professors as Writers: A Self-Help Guide to Productive Writing (read review) donated by the publisher, New Forums Press, and Self-Publishing Textbooks and Instructional Materials by Franklin H. Silverman, donated by the publisher, Atlantic Path Publishing, at the 2009 TAA Conference in San Antonio in June. If you would like to know if you were one of the first 30 conference registrants, email kim.pawlak@taaonline.net
Register for the 2009 TAA Conference
Two authors to be inducted into TAA Council of Fellows
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Two TAA members, Fred Kleiner and Robert Christopherson, will be inducted into the TAA Council of Fellows, which honors distinguished authors who have a long record of successful publishing, during an Awards Ceremony at the 2009 TAA Conference in San Antonio on June 27.
Fred Kleiner is a professor of art history at Boston University and author of Gardner's Art Through the Ages and A History of Roman Art. The author of more than a hundred articles, reviews, and monographs on Greek and Roman art, architecture, and numismatics, Kleiner's research has been supported by the American Council of Learned Societies, American Philosophical Society, and John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. A History of Roman Art won a 2007 Textbook Excellence Award and Art Through the Ages won a 2001 Textbook Excellence Award and a McGuffey Longevity Award. From 1985 to 1998, he served as editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Archaeology. He has won Boston University's Metcalf Award for Excellence in Teaching as well as the College Prize for Excellence in Undergraduate Advising.
"Fred Kleiner is an internationally renowned scholar and teacher in the field of art history, the winner of numerous prestigious awards, and the author of scores of scholarly articles and book chapters, and of textbooks going into editions beyond a dozen. A long-standing and active member of TAA to boot, Fred is an ideal new member of the Council of Fellows," said Paul Siegel, TAA president.
Robert Christopherson, professor emeritus of geography at American River College, and author of the leading physical geography textbooks in the US and Canada. He and his nature photographer wife Bobbe have completed nine expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctic regions since 2003 gathering information and photos for his books, Geosystems, 7/e, a 1998 TAA Textbook Excellence Award winner; Elemental Geosystems, 5/e, a 2006 TAA Textbook Excellence Award winner; Geosystems Canadian Edition, 2/e; and Applied Geography, 7/e. He attended Cal State University-Chico, and Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. His first textbook was published in 1992. His textbooks have received several national textbook awards. Also, he was recognized for excellence in teaching with the 1999 Distinguished Teaching Achievement Award from the National Council for Geographic Education and the Outstanding Educator Award from the California Geographical Society in 1997. He was selected by American River College students as "Teacher of the Year" and received the ARC Patrons Award. TAA presented him with its Presidents' Award in 2005.
"Robert Christopherson is a TAA fixture, in the very best sense of the word," said Paul Siegel, TAA president. "In the sense that we could not imagine associational life without him. His co-presentations with wife Bobbe of our almost annual 'geo-physical orientations' to our conference cities are always highlights of our limited time shared together. His numerous textbooks, most of which are in at least the fifth or sixth editions, are unsurprisingly the market leaders in their fields."
TAA initiated its Council of Fellows program in June 1998 to honor distinguished authors who have a long record of successful publishing. Any author whose textbook or other instructional materials have established his/her presence in the market place over time, who has been innovative in the presentation of material, is qualified for nomination into the TAA Council of Fellows. Induction into the Council of Fellows is the premier honor bestowed by TAA.
TAA's other Council of Fellows member include: Michael Sullivan, 1999; Lee Mountain, 1999; Everette E. Dennis, 1999; Mike Keedy, 1999; Franklin H. Silverman, 1999; Karl J. Smith, 1999; Thomas L. Wheelen, 2000; William R. Pasewark, 2000; Karen Hess, 2001; D. Stanley Eitzen, 2001; J. David Hunger, 2001; Charles D. Holland, 2002; Patrick G. McKeown, 2003; Karen C. Timberlake, 2005; Marilyn T. "Winkie" Fordney, 2005.
New TAA Council members announced
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The TAA Council has announced the result of the 2009 TAA elections. They are: Fred Kleiner, Secretary; and Claudia Sanchez and Michael Spiegler Council members. All will serve three-year terms starting July 1, 2009.
Fred Kleiner is the author of the 2007 Texty Award-winning A History of Roman Art and co-author of the 2001 Texty and McGuffey Award-winning Art through the Ages, and was elected to TAA's Council of Fellows this year. He is professor of art history and archaeology and chair of the art history department of Boston University, where he has taught since 1978.
Claudia Sanchez is an assistant professor in the department of teacher education at Texas Woman’s University. Her academic interests include grant writing, mentorship in teacher education programs, multicultural teacher competency, Spanish-English biliteracy, and English as a Second Language (ESL) teaching methods. She is director and co-director of three federal grants totaling over $4 million dollars, which focus on the preparation of teachers in critical need areas.
Michael Spiegler is a professor of psychology at Providence College and previously taught at the University of Texas, Austin. He has been a successful textbook and academic author for more than 40 years with several leading textbooks, including Contemporary Behavior Therapy (5th ed.) and Personality: Strategies and Issues (8th ed.). For the past 13 years, Spiegler has worked to promote quality college textbooks by giving workshops and presentations on textbook writing at universities and professional conferences (he is a TAA Workshop presenter). He also teaches a 3-day intensive course on all phases of textbook writing in the national Chautauqua program. He regularly reviews manuscripts for publishers and serves as a consultant/mentor to college textbook authors in diverse disciplines. Spiegler is currently writing a comprehensive Handbook for College Textbook Writing.
Busy TAA People: Nick Sciullo
TAA member Nick Sciullo published "Atlantean Prose and the Search for Democracy" in the crit: a critical legal studies journal run by the University of Idaho School of Law. Sciullo also spoke at a conference entitled "The Evolution of Street Knowledge: Hip Hop's Influence on Law and Culture" at the West Virginia University College of Law. The keynote speakers for the two-day conference were Dr. Cornel West and hip hop artist Talib Kweli. The conference proceedings are being submitted as a book proposal.
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