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About Russ Edgerton

These awards celebrate distinguished contributions to improving undergraduate student success and will serve annually to recognize the professional life of Russell C. Edgerton, a higher education leader whose vision made possible undergraduate education reforms launched throughout the 1980s and ’90s and early years of the 21st Century that are well-established and benefit thousands of institutions and millions of students.

Throughout his career Edgerton served higher education as:

*The first staff member and Associate Director of the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE);

*President of the American Association for Higher Education

*Senior Program Officer for Higher Education at The Pew Charitable Trusts

*Director of the Pew Forum for Undergraduate Education.

His thoughtful and visionary leadership in those roles helped establish many innovative undergraduate education reforms, initiatives, movements and organizations including but not limited to:

• The American Association for Higher Education (AAHE) Assessment Forum launching the assessment movement in higher education and accrediting

• The AAHE Forum on Faculty Roles and Rewards

• The Community College Survey of Student Engagement

• The Education Trust’s initial creation under AAHE and then spinning off

• The Higher Learning Commission’s Academic Quality Improvement Process

• The John N. Gardner Institute for Excellence in Undergraduate Education

• The National Survey of Student Engagement

• The national non-profit organization: Campus Compact

• The national non-profit organization, The Education Trust

• The support for scholarship on teaching and learning as ultimately advanced by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching

• The Service-Learning Movement

• The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Quality Enhancement Process
  The Service-Learning Movement Campus Compact and creation of multi-volumes of resource materials for service learning in specific disciplines

• The support necessary to advance the curricular innovations around Learning Communities.   

• The transformation of Change Magazine into a compelling voice for innovation and discussion of controversial issues in higher education

Call for Edgerton Fellow Nominations

The Edgerton Fellowship recognizes distinctively innovative contributions to improving postsecondary education and student success while honoring the legacy of Russ Edgerton (1938-2022), an innovator and thought leader in higher education. The Gardner Institute will provide a three-year opportunity for postsecondary leaders to join a community of practice with other motivated people who are doing promising work in their respective spheres. Fellows receive a mentor, cohort collaboration, annual participation in a community of practice at the Gardner Institute symposium, a one-time honorarium of $2,500, and opportunities to network and engage with alumni and community networks.

The Edgerton Fellow selection committee will make every effort to identify new talent as honorees who are diverse in terms of race, ethnicity, age, organizational or institutional type, and academic or professional field.

Eligibility:

Applicants should be:

• An accomplished innovator

• Passionate about student success

• Committed to working collaboratively

• Open to diverse perspectives

• Deeply knowledgeable in their field

• Established early-to-mid-career

Timeline:

• Nomination form will be available July 15, 2023

• Nominations are due by January 30, 2024

• Selection Committee will announce a maximum of three awardees at A Symposium on Transforming the Foundational Postsecondary Experience in Pittsburgh, PA in October 2024.

Fellows will:

• Serve for three years.

• Receive a one-time honorarium of $2,500.

• Attend the Gardner Institute annual Symposium, travel expenses will be covered by the Gardner Institute.

• At the Symposium:

  • new fellows will be publicly recognized,

  • all fellows will participate in the Edgerton Fellows Community of Practice and,

  • all fellows will make a presentation and/or be part of a panel.

• Receive additional opportunities to contribute thought leadership with the Gardner Institute and the greater higher education community through publications, webinars, academies, and other opportunities.

• Serve on the nominations and selection committee for future fellows.

• Receive mentorship from a Gardner Institute Board member or Edgerton Award Selection Committee member.

Past Edgerton Awards

The 2021 Edge Award Winners

The Gardner Institute announced three recipients of The EDGE Commendation for Innovation in Undergraduate Education. These awards honor the distinguished contributions of a small cohort of individuals and institutions who are currently on the leading “EDGE” of undergraduate education.

Dr. Maria Martha Chavez Brummel, CEO of Catch the Next (CTN) Ascender Program for Student and Institutional Advancement is being recognized for the unique equity-based model that aims to cultivate the academic success of underserved students in Texas Community Colleges. CTN is a full-service, not for profit, college readiness organization focused on helping Latinos and other students of color accelerate through developmental education coursework using a range of pedagogical and institutional reforms. Brummel is one of the nation’s strongest champions for first-generation, low-income students.  She has worked tirelessly with faculty, staff, corporations, funding agencies, policymakers, and community-based organizations to reduce equity gaps, reform developmental education, and ensure that underserved students attain academic success.  The culturally responsive program she developed, Ascender (Rise), is an outstanding, evidence-based model that is helping hundreds of Texas community college students realize their hopes and dreams.   Because of Dr. Chavez Brummel’s efforts, the Ascender Program is truly at the leading edge of equity-based innovation in American higher education.

The University of Kentucky’s LEADS: Leveraging Economic Affordability for Developing Student Success, Program.  The program represents one of the most innovative ways that the University of Kentucky seeks to improve the experience of undergraduate students by supporting their persistence. The program utilizes a predictive model to isolate financial need as the root cause of student attrition and shift institutional aid—via targeted grants and financial education—to a broader group of students to provide more equitable access to higher education. The LEADS program has flipped the allocation of financial aid to prioritize financial need over financial merit. This initiative places a greater emphasis on the recruitment of high need in-state students.

Dr. Frank J. Dooley, Chancellor of Purdue University Global and Professor of Agricultural Economics, a highly respected and visionary leader of undergraduate education at Purdue. Two programs created during his tenure, IMPACT (Instruction Matters: Purdue Academic Course Transformation) and Think Summer for Student Success illustrate this vision. IMPACT is a research-based course transformation and faculty development program that transforms traditional lecture/discussion- based courses into student-centered active-learning environments. Dooley was able to identify and ultimately remove barriers to enable all the necessary components for a successful summer session for all Purdue Students. IMPACT was conceived and cultivated by Dooley during his term as a Provost Fellow and is, arguably, the most influential and transformative undergraduate education and student success change initiative on our campus in recent decades. IMPACT is a research-based course transformation and faculty development program that transforms traditional lecture/discussion- based courses into student-centered active-learning environments. As Chancellor of Purdue University Global, the institution has become a nimble, timely, highly relevant institution helping “non-traditional” students learn about and respond to today’s critical issues. With Dooley’s guidance, Purdue is reaching out to a population of undergraduates who otherwise might never have completed their college degrees.

Review and Selection Committee Members

Louis Albert, Scott Evenbeck, Peter Ewell, John Gardner (Chair), Pat Hutchings, Jillian Kinzie, Leo Lambert, Arthur Levine, Ted Marchese, George Mehaffy, and Laura Rendón

2020 Recipient: Peter Ewell

Whereas the selection of Dr. Ewell for the Edgerton Award was based upon his achievement of the following award criteria he has:

1.  Produced significant ideas and vision for how to improve higher education outcomes for our students which, in turn, has moved to a significant scale.

2.  Translated that vision into multiple initiatives that have been widely adopted and extensively and positively evaluated.

3.  Had a demonstrable impact on improving student learning and success.

4.  Helped create and guide value-added experiences for students, the impact of which cannot be accounted for as a function of student characteristics such as race, gender, ethnicity, socio-economic status but instead is attributable to what the initiative actually did.

5.  Showed that his ideas could be widely replicated, adapted, and institutionalized.

6.  Created significant demand for his initiatives that have realized much greater use than might have been originally anticipated.

7.  Demonstrated the capacity for synergy and partnerships with other innovators, their innovations, institutions, and organizations.

8.  Realized significant achievement of the potential of his ideas but with remaining capacity for still greater realization and impact.

9.  Accomplished, in Russ Edgerton’s own words, “a significant proven ability and influence to make institutions take greater responsibility for student learning.”

 Whereas these themes illustrating the overall impact of his life’s professional work can be found in such specific activities as:

• Distinguished service to the National Center for Higher Education Management Systems for 39 years in the capacities of Senior Associate, Vice President, and President.

• Distinguished intellectual and practical leadership in assessing institutional effectiveness and student learning, involving both research and direct consulting with institutions and state systems on collecting and using assessment information in planning, evaluation, and budgeting.

• Recognition by a wide range of philanthropic investors in higher education including the W. K. Kellogg Foundation, the National Institute for Education, The Consortium for the Advancement of Private Higher Education, The Spencer Foundation, Lumina Foundation, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and The Pew Charitable Trusts.

• Consultation with over 425 colleges and universities and twenty-seven state systems of higher education on topics including assessment, program review, accreditation, and student retention.

• International consulting on quality assurance including work in the United Kingdom, Chile, Germany, Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, Dubai, and with the OECD.

• Designing longitudinal student databases and other academic management information tools.

• Authorship or co-authorship of eight books and numerous articles on the topic of improving undergraduate instruction through the assessment of student outcomes.

• Principal author (one of four) of the Lumina Degree Qualifications Profile (DQP).

• Preparation of commissioned papers for many agencies, including the Study Group on the Conditions of Excellence in American Higher Education (authors of the report Involvement in Learning), the Education Commission of the States, the National Governors’ Association, the National Conference of State Legislators, and the National Center for Public Policy in Higher Education.

• Speaker on assessment and quality assurance.  In 1985 he gave the keynote address for the first national conference on Assessment in American Higher Education and has since spoken widely on this topic at both national and international conferences.

• Leading in 1998 the design team that created the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) and chaired its National Advisory Board for many years, as well as chairing the National Advisory Board of the Community College Survey of Student Engagement (CCSSE).

The John N. Gardner Institute for Excellence in Undergraduate Education is an over twenty-year old non-profit organization dedicated to partnering with colleges, universities, philanthropic organizations, educators, and other entities to increase institutional responsibility for improving outcomes associated with teaching, learning, retention, and completion. Through its efforts, the Institute strives to advance higher education’s larger goal of achieving equity and social justice.