Beyond Boyer: The UniSCOPE Model of Scholarship for the 21st Century

The current system for recognizing and rewarding faculty scholarship shows preference for rewarding basic research and teaching over other forms of scholarship. Faculty and administrators need to develop a creative understanding of other forms of scholarship and how they can be effectively integrated into the promotion and tenure process. Scholarship must be understood broadly enough to adequately address the needs of the professions and the public. U is a multidimensional model that conceptualizes each of the three missions of higher education—teaching, research, and service—as a continuum of scholarship. The UniSCOPE model suggests that Boyer’s functions of discovery, integration, application, and education are inherent in the three missions, and views outreach scholarship as an integral component of each. The three types of scholarship, with the media for delivery and their audiences, constitute a five-dimensional model of scholarship that can provide the foundation of a structure for identifying, recognizing, and rewarding the specific types of scholarship that apply in all disciplines and professions. The public expects more from higher education now than ever before to satisfy the growing demands of living in an increasingly complex global society. The information age with its rapidly evolving technology demands a highly knowledgeable workforce and a civic culture of involvement and creativity. The twenty-first century presents major challenges and increased opportunities for academic scholarship. We need to address the need for disseminating and applying state-of-the-art knowledge throughout society. We need to promote integration across disciplines and between the academy and the field. Applications of knowledge to real-world issues need to be addressed in a rapid-response mode. Creativity and flexibility are required in responding to the public’s need for lifelong learning. 42 Journal of Higher Education Outreach and Engagement At the same time, the current system for recognizing and rewarding faculty scholarship is characterized by an academic culture that shows preference for rewarding basic research and resident teaching over other forms of scholarship. This creates a challenge to the academy as we move into the twenty-first century. We believe that many faculty and administrators need to develop a creative understanding of other forms of scholarship and how they can be effectively integrated into the promotion and tenure process. Others need to expand their perspective to recognize the value of outreach scholarship to the academy and to society. If the academy is to continue to provide intellectual and professional leadership, the faculty must have a clearer understanding of the value of outreach as scholarship. Academic scholarship must be understood broadly enough to adequately address the needs of the professions and public. Criteria and methods of evaluation must be defined to recognize and reward all forms of scholarship equitably. The importance of addressing these issues is well documented. The reports of the Kellogg Commission on the Future of State and Land-Grant Universities (1999) and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching (Boyer 1990) are two of the most notable works in this regard. The Kellogg Commission report, Returning to Our Roots: The Engaged Institution, recognizes the knowledge, creativity, and capability of our colleges and universities and challenges them to become engaged in addressing community, national, and global issues. One challenge we face is growing public frustration with what is seen to be our unresponsiveness. At the root of the criticism is a perception that we are out of touch and out of date. Another part of the issue is that although society has problems, our institutions have “disciplines.” In the end, what these complaints add up to is a perception that, despite the resources and expertise available on our campuses, our institutions are not well organized to bring them to bear on local problems in a coherent way. (Kellogg Commission 1999, vii) “If the academy is to continue to provide intellectual and professional leadership, the faculty must have a clearer understanding of the value of outreach as scholarship.” The UniSCOPE Model of Scholarship 43 Themes for addressing unresponsiveness highlighted in the commission’s report include the need for a clear commitment to engagement, strong support for infusing engagement into the mission of the institution, diversity and creativity in approaches and efforts, leadership and funding as necessary elements, and accountability “lodged in the right place.” The Carnegie Foundation report, Scholarship Reconsidered: Priorities of the Professoriate, also addresses the issue directly: What’s really being called into question is the reward system and the key issue is this: what activities of the professoriate are most highly prized? . . . Ultimately, in the current scheme of things, the nation loses, too. At no time in our history has the need been greater for connecting the work of the academy to the social and environmental challenges beyond the campus. And yet, the rich diversity and potential of American higher education cannot be fully realized if campus missions are too narrowly defined or if the faculty reward system is inappropriately restricted. It seems clear that while research is crucial, we need a renewed commitment to service, too. . . . It’s time to recognize the full range of faculty talent and the great diversity of functions higher education must perform (Boyer 1990, xi, xii). What is the UniSCOPE Learning Community? On March 24, 1998, a small group of faculty and administrators at the Pennsylvania State University formed a learning community to engage in a deliberative dialogue about recognizing and documenting outreach scholarship in the university. We chose UniSCOPE, University Scholarship and Criteria for Outreach and Performance Evaluation, as a title to encapsulate our mission. Our goal was to consider the meaning of scholarship in the contemporary academy and to consider the role of outreach therein. We did this in the context of the Penn State promotion and tenure system to gain a better understanding of its effect on scholarship. We quickly learned that outreach scholarship cannot be examined in isolation, and we broadened our deliberations to consider the full range of scholarship. This article articulates the main concepts of UniSCOPE as a multidimensional model of scholarship that emerged two years later, of which outreach scholarship is a key component. We also discuss our recommendations for action. 44 Journal of Higher Education Outreach and Engagement Several works pointed the way and established a fertile atmosphere for our inquiry: in particular, the Kellogg Commission report, Returning to Our Roots: The Engaged Institution (1999), and the Carnegie Foundation report, Scholarship Reconsidered: Priorities of the Professoriate (Boyer 1990). We also drew upon reports and documents from other universities including Michigan State University, A Guidebook for Planning & Evaluating Quality Outreach (1996); University of Wisconsin, Commitment to the Wisconsin Idea: A Guide to Documenting and Evaluating Excellence in Outreach Scholarship (1997); University of Oregon, A Faculty Guide to Promotion and Tenure at the University of Oregon (1994); and Portland State University, Promotion and Tenure Guidelines (1999). Penn State reports reviewed include early drafts of the report of the University Faculty Senate Committee on Outreach Activities, Engaging Tenured Faculty in Outreach Activities (1999); and Making Life Better: An Outreach Inventory of Programs and Services (1998). What are the premises on which UniSCOPE is based? A key premise of the UniSCOPE challenge is that all forms of scholarship should be recognized equitably. A corollary is that each form of scholarship—teaching, research, and service—should be recognized for its primary product. That is, if resident education is recognized as a valued product, then extension and continuing education should receive equivalent recognition. If basic research is recognized for contributions to knowledge through refereed publications whether or not its insights are applied in the field, then applied research should be recognized for applications in the field whether or not insights from the experience are extended to the literature. This is not to suggest that lessons from applications should not be communicated in the literature and theoretical insights ought not to be tested in the field. The issue is that while the logical extensions of scholarship should be encouraged, each type of scholarship should be recognized mainly for its own inherent contribution. The following sections summarize UniSCOPE and present models of teaching, research, and service scholarship that we believe provide a framework for significant steps toward meeting the UniSCOPE challenge. “A key premise of the UniSCOPE challenge is that all forms of scholarship should be recognized equitably.” The UniSCOPE Model of Scholarship 45 Scholarship is defined as the thoughtful discovery, transmission, and application of knowledge. Academic scholarship is thus a term of the academy; similar activities in the community may go by other names. In this context, scholarship is rooted in the ideas and methods of recognized disciplines, professions, and interdisciplinary fields. Scholarship is informed by current knowledge in the field and is characterized by creativity and openness to new information, debate, and criticism. For scholarly activity to be recognized, utilized, and rewarded, it must be shared with others in appropriate ways. Publication in scholarly journals or by respected presses, presentation at professional forums, and resident education are contemporary means for disseminating the results of scholarship in the academic disciplines and professions. The creation