Fall 2014 – Semester in Review – Dustin Kidd

Fall 2014 – Semester in Review – Dustin Kidd

Research

I began work on a new book project entitled Social Media Freaks, under preparation for Westview Press. I completed two chapters of the book—a history of social media and an analysis of the relationship between sexuality and social media.

I published a review of the book Comic Book Crime: Truth, Justice, and the American Way by Nickie Phillips and Staci Strobl in the journal Men & Masculinities.

I was invited to undertake two encyclopedia entries related to my field. The Cambridge Handbook of Sociology invited me to write the entry for “Popular Culture.” At my request, two of my graduate students were added as co-authors: Jennifer Kim and Amanda Turner. The entry is due March 1, 2015. The Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia of Gender and Sexuality Studies invited me to complete the entry for “Women as Producers of Culture.” This is due on March 23, 2015. 

I spent much of the semester promoting my last book, including a lecture at Philadelphia Magazine’s ThinkFest; guest lectures via Skype with classes at the University of Michigan, Pennsylvania State University and Chestnut Hill College; and interviews with The List (Australian radio program), and the International Business Times. I actively engaged and grew my audience using Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Academia.edu, Pinterest, Spotify, Last.fm, Goodreads, Google +, Prezi, and SlideShare.

I attended the American Sociological Association 2014 meetings in San Francisco, as well as the Media Sociology pre-conference. At the ASA meetings, I presented the paper “Popular Culture and Inequality.” At the pre-conference, I presented a workshop called “Social Media for Social Research.”

Teaching

I taught two classes this past semester: Sociology of Popular Culture and Development of Sociological Thought.

Sociology of Popular Culture is a large lecture class. I had 95 students and worked with one TA (Amanda Turner). The evaluations for this course were very good and I received a 4.9 out of 5 on the item “the instructor taught this course well.”

Development of Sociological Thought is a small writing-intensive seminar. I had 19 students. The evaluations for this course were very good and I received a 4.7 out of 5 on the item “the instructor taught this course well.”

I supervised one independent study in the summer of 2014, for a graduate student named Ryan Murphy. Ryan is a part time student and the independent study allowed him speed up his studies so that he could complete preliminary exams in the spring of 2015.

I supervised one independent study in the fall of 2014, for an undergraduate named Nicholena Honors. Nicholena completed readings in the Sociology of Culture and the Sociology of Music. She wrote a significant research paper on the impact of digitization on the music industry.

I attended three training programs related to teaching:

·      WebEx: Getting Started with Online Presentation and Collaboration, Temple Instructional Support Center, September 2014

·      Using Wikipedia Writing Assignments in Graduate and Undergraduate Courses, American Sociological Association Academic and Professional Affairs Webinar Series, December 2014.

·      Digital Learning, Temple College of Liberal Arts, December 2014.

Service

SERVICE TO TEMPLE UNIVERSITY

Center for the Humanities at Temple (CHAT) Advisory Board. The CHAT board met once during the Fall of 2014, and I was present at the meeting. We discussed long term funding concerns and the organization of the fellowships, as well as possible programming for undergraduates.

Honors Program, Truman Fellowship Selection Committee. I spent three hours on the afternoon of December 9^th interviewing potential candidates for the Truman Fellowship and reviewing the candidates with the other committee members.

SERVICE TO THE COLLEGE OF LIBERAL ARTS

CLA Graduate Committee Chair. This was my second year on the CLA graduate committee and my first year as chair. Me met three times during the semester (9/2, 10/8, and 11/10). We reviewed 35 proposals across the course of the semester. As chair, I followed up with each proposer to let them know the outcome of the review and how to proceed further. I coordinated the first ever (in recent memory) meeting of graduate directors in CLA. I also had 2 additional meetings with faculty members related to issues tied to my work as chair, and multiple meetings and phone calls with the Assistant Dean of Graduate Affairs.

CLA Open House Speaker. I was one of two faculty speakers at the CLA Open House event on Saturday November 8^th. I delivered a talk about Temple alumnus Robert Merton and how his theories can be applied to contemporary popular culture.

SERVICE TO THE DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY

Director of Graduate Studies. This is the role that occupied the most time and activities for me this semester.  My activities in this role included:

·      Planning and running new graduate student orientation.

·      Holding one meeting with all of the students in the graduate program, to discuss how the program was going and how we can improve.

·      Soliciting and supporting nominations for the Dissertation Completion Grant for Spring 2015. Two students were awarded the grant: Jessica Brathwaite and Christina Stewart.

·      Responding to inquiries about the MA and PhD programs (several per week).

·      Updating and posting the Graduate Handbook for the year.

·      Devising and implementing a new system for handling all program applications online and through email.

·      Updating and posting the graduate program pages on the department website.

·      Updating and posting the Sociology MA and PhD pages for the Temple Graduate Bulletin.

·      Advising the first year students.

·      Convening and chairing two meetings of the 5-member graduate committee for the Department of Sociology.

o   The committee passed a proposal to change the MA application deadline from March 15 to March, effective immediately, and to change the PhD application deadline from January 15 to December 1, effective next academic year (Fall 2015).

o   The committee began a review of graduate syllabi, looking to assess the level of training for empirical research.

·      Drafting and submitting a proposal to restructure the PhD program by changing the credits for two core courses (statistics and data analysis) from3 credits to 4.

·      Drafting and submitting a proposal to restructure the MA program by reducing the number of theory requirements and electives, and by increasing he credits for two core courses (statistics and data analysis) from3 credits to 4.

·      Attending two meetings of the Collegial Assembly to speak on behalf of proposed changes to the graduate programs in sociology that were being voted on at those meetings.

·      Drafting (but not yet submitting) a proposal to create a new sub-program within the MA that would allow MA students to receive GIS certification as part of their degree.

·      Creating and maintaining the graduate calendar for the year, and publishing it through the online department calendar.

·      Soliciting and reviewing Preliminary Exam Application forms to determine the necessary composition of preliminary exam committees.

·      Working with the Department Chair to determine the composition of the preliminary exam committees.

·      Working with Preliminary Exam Committee Chairs to solicit and finalize reading lists and distribute them to students.

·      Working with the Admissions Chair to plan for 2015 admissions, including planning for university fellowship and other deadlines.

·      Working with the Department Chair to schedule graduate course offerings for Fall 2015 and Spring 2016. For this, I maintain a spreadsheet of course offerings and desired course rotations that is updated each semester.

·      Working with the Department Chair to determine TA and adjunct assignments for funded graduate students.

·      Working with the graduate coordinator to maintain the Student Status Sheet, which tracks graduate student GPAs, advisors, and progress through the program.

·      Reviewing and signing off on all dissertation defenses, proposal defenses, advisor changes, requests for independent studies, requests for outside courses, request for extra employment, etc.

Executive Committee. As Director of Graduate Studies, I am also a de facto member of the department’s executive committee. The executive committee met 3 times this semester (10/1, 11/5, and 12/10) to review sabbatical applications, tenure-line faculty merit nominations, and teaching-instructional faculty merit nominations, respectively.  Approved some spending decisions via email discussion.

Idea Incubator (ad hoc funding) Committee. This committee has been charged with finding new ways to increase the financial support for the Department of Sociology. We met 4 times this semester (9/3, 10/1, 10/22, and 11/12). We discussed enrollments, summer session, grants, fundraising from alumnae, and workshops. My specific focus was on fundraising from alumnae and I investigated and proposed a fundraising plan that will be implemented in Fall 2015.

Reappointment Committee Chair for Tom Waidzunas. I chaired Professor Waidzunas’s reappointment committee. The committee was tasked with reviewing his research, teaching, and service. I authored the portion of the report that focused on research and I edited the entire report. I presented the report to the faculty promotions committee (all tenured faculty). He was swiftly reappointed.

Web and Social Media Service. Although we do not have officially defined roles for maintaining our website or social media, I played a significant role in these areas for the department. I worked with a colleague and an administrative coordinator to update the website and then to migrate the website to a new server (while also preparing to shift from a Contribute administered site to a Wordpress administered site). I launched the department LinkedIn account, which now has about 400 connections. I took over the Twitter account for the department, which has grown from 20 followers to 200.

Advising. I serve as dissertation chair to Jennifer Kim, who is nearing completion of her dissertation on racial discourse in sketch comedy. I serve as advisor (and anticipated chair) to two students who are preparing dissertation proposals. Amanda Turner is studying gender and video games and AJ Young is studying organizations and politics focusing on the Philadelphia Trans Health Conference. I serve as advisor to two students who are preparing for preliminary exams in the area of gender: Colin Hammar and Ryan Murphy. Finally, I served as advisor to all seven first year graduate students, as part of my role as graduate director.

SERVICE TO THE DISCIPLINE

I was a book manuscript reviewer for Routledge and for Rowman & Littlefield and an article reviewer for Sociological Forum and Sexuality & Culture.