5 Questions with... Kevin Egan

For today's 5 Questions, we are in Pennsylvania to talk with Kevin Egan, PhD from Drexel University

Tell us a little about yourself.

I came to Drexel in 2011 to help run the newly-created Center for Interdisciplinary Inquiry, and, more specifically, to help get the new Custom-Designed Major off of the ground. Prior to that, I earned my PhD in Political Science at Penn State and had spent a year as a Visiting Fellow at Drexel. In my current job as Acting Director of the Center, I liken my self to a Swiss Army knife, in that I have to carry out multiple functions at any given time. These include: teaching the core courses for the Custom-Designed Major, advising students within the major, administrating both the major and some other academic programs that we run out of the center, and acting as hub for researching and developing new interdisciplinary teaching initiatives.

What is your experience in academic advising, higher education, and NACADA?

I've been the academic advisor for the Custom-Designed Major at Drexel for almost three years now, and really pretty much everything that I know about the job has been learned on the fly. I think, however, that is actually a necessity when starting up a new program, especially one as unconventional as this one. It is difficult to predict the needs of students who are given the empowerment to design their own curriculum - and, I've found that, while a good chunk of the job has to do with logistical issues, it has very little to do with being prescriptive. As I've become more immersed in the literature surrounding academic advising and NACADA (this will be my first conference!), I've been happy to see that the nature of advising within the Custom-Designed Major, as well as a number of the practices that have been developed have been reflected in the discussions about advising as learning.

Tell us about your poster session. What can attendees look forward to?

My poster presentation is really about inviting conversation and thinking about new applications. While it will be based on my experiences in the program at Drexel, attendees can look forward to it acting as a provocation to think about how some of these experiences and lessons can be adapted, adopted, and applied to their own programs.

What do you hope attendees gain from going to your presentation?

I hope that attendees will gain some insights into how advising can be used to build collaborative efforts among colleagues at the institutional level, as well as how it can be used to promote an appreciation for interdisciplinarity among advisees. Even though a student might not be designing her own major, she can still benefit from the practice of thinking intentionally about her curriculum and how other fields and disciplines might help to inform her learning.

What do you hope to personally gain from presenting in Lancaster?

I am hoping to gain more experience in conversing with my peers about novel ways that advising can be used as a teaching tool. I'm also hoping that the feedback I'll receive will spark some new ideas and applications that I can bring back to Drexel. Much like the Custom-Designed Major is an entrepreneurial and experimental endeavor, I treat the advising and support structures within the program as experimental and always open to re-imagining.

Thanks Kevin. We'll see you in Lancaster!