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Mentoring Future Gerontology Leaders in Higher Education
Carol Ann Noble and Robert J.F. Elsner, Technical Editors
UGAGC-97-003
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The University University of Georgia Georgia 1
On the Front Page: Jim and Geneva Montgomery Scholarship Competition Winners : (Clockwise from Top Left) Deborah Miles (Third Place), Sufferia Daniels and Michelle Strickland (First Place) (shown with Professor Elaine Hapshe) , Denise K. Houston (Second Place), and Missy Johnson (Third Place) (flanked by Carol Ann Noble and Leonard Poon)
Published 1997 by The University of Georgia Gerontology Center
Copyright ©University of Georgia Gerontology Center. All rights reserved. No portion of this report or the data which it contains may be reproduced without the express written consent of the authors.
Copies of this report may be obtained from the University of Georgia Gerontology Center 100 Candler Hall Athens, GA 30602-1775 Telephone: (706) 542-3954 http://www.geron.uga.edu UGAGC-97-003
Printed in Athens, Georgia by the University of Georgia Printing Department
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Table of Contents
Foreward Leonard W. Poon, Ph.D.
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Opening Address “Mentoring - A View from Social Work” Nancy P. Kropf, Ph.D.
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Keynote Address “The Role of Leadership in the Evolution of a Profession: An Historian Looks at the Future of Gerontology” David R. Denton, Ph.D. 15
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Foreward On April 11, 1997, the University of Georgia Gerontology Center convened its Eighth Annual Student Convention In Gerontology And Geriatrics. The theme of the convention was mentoring. Many of us were fortunate to have had a teacher or professor who made a difference in our education. In graduate training, the mentor, major professor, or advisor takes on a critical role which determines the quality of the student’s training, career choice and direction, and much more. Issues of academic “gamespersonship,” the best ways to learn and participate in one’s training, and how to get the most out of one’s professors are seldom discussed. Hence, we selected the theme of mentoring for this convention. There are different ways and styles of mentoring. During the 1997 convention, we invited two individuals to define mentoring and to outline a history of the development of gerontological education. We invited four faculty - student teams from Mississippi State University, Virginia Commonwealth University, Georgia State University, and the University of Georgia to demonstrate how mentoring is done — working together on research projects; presenting and discussing theories, data, and results; publishing; and being role models. Individual student poster presentations were also included to facilitate student - faculty discussions. Finally, 50 travel scholarships were available to encourage students outside the University of Georgia to attend the convention. This technical report reprints the two keynote presenta5
tions at the convention. We thought their presentations were worthy of sharing. The first is by Dr. Nancy Kropf, Associate Dean, UGA School of Social Work, “Mentoring relationships: Views from social work.” The second is by Dr. David Denton, Director, Health and Human Services Programs, Southern Regional Education Board, “The role of leadership in the evolution of a profession: An historian looks at the future of gerontology.” Leonard W. Poon Professor and Chair Faculty of Gerontology Director, UGA Gerontology Center
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“Mentoring - A View from Social Work” Nancy P. Kropf, Ph.D. Associate Dean, School of Social Work, University of Georgia. Thank you for the invitation to be involved in the Gerontology Conference. I spent three years as an Assistant Director of the Gerontology Center and consider Dr. Poon one of my own mentors. He has been someone who has had a significant impact upon my career development and options. Additionally, Dr. Linda Dougherty was a member of my dissertation committee at Virginia Commonwealth University. Therefore, it is a real pleasure to participate in this conference and to discuss mentoring from the framework of my particular discipline - social work. Social work is an applied profession, and social workers practice in a wide variety of contexts including hospitals, school systems, nursing homes, and mental health systems, to name just a few. The educational approach used by social work includes a combination of classroom instruction and internship experiences. The field based part of our curriculum uses a mentorship model to work with the student to gain skills in working in social work roles. My own understanding of mentoring, and the importance of this relationship, has been heavily influenced by both being mentored in my own education and serving as a mentor for students. WHAT IS MENTORING? Although the discipline of social work uses a mentorship approach in educational model, my profes7
sion cannot take credit for creating this professional relationship. The term “mentor” actually originated in Greek mythology. When Odysseus had to be away for a long period of time, he left his son in the care of his friend & advisor, Mentor, who was a teacher, guardian, and substitute parent for the child. In contemporary times, a mentor has been defined by Phillips-Jones (1982) as an influential person who significantly helps you reach major life goals and mentorship by Collins (1993) as a close personal helping relationship between two individuals who are at different stages in their development. Included in both of these definitions is the presence of a relationship that is a vehicle for growth and development. We might have some immediate thoughts about how the protege, or the one who receives the benefits of mentoring, would gain from this relationship. Yet often, the benefits and rewards for the mentor may not be as apparent. Collins’ (1994) empirical analysis of the effects of mentoring on career outcomes of social workers found that both individuals in the mentoring relationship had positive outcomes in their career advancement and career satisfaction. Collins concludes that being in a mentoring relationship facilitates the career development for both the mentor and protégé. Richey, Gambrill, & Blythe (1988)- three social work educators and three generations of mentor-protégé relationships - constructed a conceptual model for understanding mentoring relationships. Within this model, they reflect on the various dimensions of mentoring, and the outcomes on individuals in this relationship. I will provide a few examples of these outcomes and discuss them within the mentoring model used in social work. WHAT DOES THE PROTÉGÉ OR STUDENT GAIN FROM MENTORING? 8
Encouragement, technical and emotional support. This outcome is very important in social work, which is an applied profession. In our graduate program, students in social work complete internships as a method of learning practice skills. In the master’s program, students spend 900 clock hours in social welfare internships. In my opinion, some of the most difficult jobs in social welfare are held by social workers, e.g. child and adult protective service workers. In these roles, social workers have to investigate complaints of abuse and neglect against children or dependent adults, and make critical decisions about whether some type of residential change must take place. These can literally be life or death decisions. Although our students enter the program with noble goals of making society a more humane place to live, having to learn how to deal with families where physical or sexual abuse is taking place can be difficult and emotionally draining. For that reason, our students work very closely with a faculty and agency supervisor in their internship. While these relationships include a focus on integrating academic knowledge in their internship, they also involve mentoring social work students through the more difficult, and emotional aspects of learning how to deal with difficult client situations. The mentor serves as a role models for behavior, attitudes, and values for students In social work, you deal with some very difficult clients. In the example that I just gave about families, think about what it would be like to work with a family where there was alleged physical or sexual abuse against an older adult. If you are similar to me, thinking about an older person being harmed in that way is upsetting, even sickening. Yet my professional colleagues are often in roles 9
where they have to work with perpetrators of these or similar acts. In these situations, social workers need to be able to manage the tension between their own feelings of anger within a professional context. This is no easy task, and our faculty spends a great deal of time working with our students who work with clients that have acted irresponsibly, or in hurtful ways. This type of learning goes beyond reading about researching professional values. It involves creating an environment where students look to us to help with these challenges. Faculty need to provide direction about how to be an effective social worker in these difficult situations. Opportunities and resources. A mentor can provide the student with access to opportunities and networks. In fact, the relationship with the mentor may be the launching phase into the beginning of a career. In social work where students have to complete so many hours in an internship, it is often this experience that provides students a network for job searches. In fact, it is not uncommon for an internship site to offer the student a job in their agency after graduation. So - for students, mentorship can result in several benefits. This relationship can lead to tangible rewards, such as a job. As importantly, however, close mentorship with faculty and social work field supervisors provides the student with an opportunity to learn about the role of a social worker within a supportive environment. WHAT DOES THE MENTOR GAIN FROM THE RELATIONSHIP? Open respect and admiration. Quite frankly, there is a flattering component in 10
mentorship. Inherent in the mentor relationship is the assumption of both the mentor and protégé that the mentor has something to offer. It is a form of admiration to have students who want to work on a faculty member’s research or project. That is a reward in itself. Intellectual stimulation. Working with students is intellectually challenging. Working closely with a student on a research project can provide a different way of looking at a study. A student can bring a fresh approach, new ideas, an “outsider” perspective which often positively challenges the faculty member. Investment in the future. Like offspring provide biological links to the future for parents, students can provide an intellectual link for faculty. The student can provide a source for continuing a research legacy, or assurance that further development of ideas will continue. Mentoring also provides continuity between generations of professionals. In social work, for example, we continue to wage battles over our professional definition and identity. This is probably shared by many other disciplines as current political and social pressures shape social welfare and health care. When I work with students, I want them to have an understanding about social work’s professional roots and to be sure that Social Work does not lose its historical mission to work with disenfranchised and oppressed populations. It is important to me professionally, that the next generations of practitioners continue to carry out Social Work’s mission in social justice. So - mentors also gain in their relationships with students. The mentor is confronted with a fresh perspective that can result in new ideas and challenges. In addi11
tion, it provides a mechanism to promote continued interest in a research area and a link to the next generation of professionals. SO WHAT DOES THIS ALL MEAN - AND WHAT DOES IT HAVE TO DO WITH THE GERONTOLOGY CONFERENCE TODAY? This conference is a wonderful opportunity to highlight the different research on aging that is taking place not just in Athens, or the State, but all around the southeast region. In looking at the program, we will be treated to a variety of research on important topics in gerontology. That is an extremely valuable experience - we will leave today with a greater understanding of aging. However, equally important is the process and context of the research that will be presented. These projects represent collaborative efforts between students and their faculty mentors. Through this relationship, everyone - faculty and student alike- contributes to a deeper theoretical and empirical understanding of aging. Additionally, through this relationship, students and faculty have shared an enriching experience that goes beyond the research project itself. And that is an important part of this conference - that mutual process of research and study. This is a new model for the Gerontology Conference and it is an exciting direction! So as we listen to the research and discuss the findings throughout the remainder of the day, let’s remind ourselves of the process of inquiry that has taken place. The results of these projects represent collective processes - of learning, inquiring, and sometimes debating - that goes on between students and mentors as they learn together.
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References Collins, P. M. (1994). Does mentorship among social workers make a difference? An empirical investigation of career outcomes. Social Work, 39, 413-419. Collins, P. M. (1993). The interpersonal vicissitudes of mentorship: An exploratory of the field supervisor-student relationship. The Clinical Supervisor. 11(1), 121-135. Phillips-Jones, L. (1982). Mentors and proteges. New York: Arbor House. Richey, C. A., Gambrill, E. D., Blythe, B. J. (1988). Mentor relationships among women in academe. Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work. 3(1), 34-47.
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The Role of Leadership in the Evolution of a Profession: An Historian Looks at the Future of Gerontology David R. Denton, Ph.D. Director, Health and Human Services Programs, Southern Regional Education Board
When Leonard first asked me if I would be willing to be your keynote speaker today, I was, of course, very honored that he felt I could make enough of a contribution to justify taking up a full hour of a one-day conference. Then, after I had said yes, I started to get worried. What on earth could I talk about for almost an hour that might conceivably be helpful in shaping the careers of so many future gerontologists? It’s not that I don’t have my own ideas about the importance of gerontology. I have spent a substantial minority of my time over the course of the last ten years or so looking at gerontology and geriatrics from a number of different perspectives. But I am not a gerontologist, and I don’t expect to become one, at least in the foreseeable future, and I am certainly not an “expert” in any particular aspect of aging studies. Mind you, I did have my 50th birthday just a few weeks ago, and I am now a card-carrying member of AARP, though I don’t really think that gives me any special “wisdom” to share with you. Then, as I thought about this session and about what I could say that might stay with you for longer than the few 15
hours it takes you to get home when the conference is over, I realized the best thing I could do would be to try to draw on my own perspective and my own professional experiences to try to give you another perspective, or another dimension, perhaps, for understanding your chosen field. Gerontology is, as I’m sure you are all well aware, a “multidisciplinary” field. That means more than just the fact that gerontology draws on the knowledge bases of fields as diverse as sociology, medicine, public administration, etc. It also means new and different ways of looking at those knowledge bases—different approaches to the organization and analysis of information. The world of higher education in the United States is a highly specialized one. The path to academic or professional success in most fields is the road that grows ever narrower as the individual focuses and becomes an “expert” on a precisely limited subset of a field’s overall knowledge base. That is essentially true whether the field is sociology or psychology, medicine or law. The fit between occupational roles and individual qualification tends to be extremely snug, and it usually grows tighter and tighter over the course of a career. Gerontology, of course, is not immune to the pressures that drive hyperspecialization. But I would suggest that it is quite unusual in the academic and professional world in its belief, both official and implicit, that one cannot really be a good gerontologist or geriatrician without embracing a truly multidisciplinary body of knowledge. In a 1994 report from the Association for Gerontology in Higher Education, three prominent leaders in the field came up with this graphic to represent the multidisciplinary idea graphically. They used the model of a tree, with the social, biological, and psychological 16
sciences represented as the “root” disciplines of gerontology. As we move up the trunk of the tree, overlaps begin to occur among the research being conducted in these basic sciences until, at some point, the lines separating the different scientific orientations blur and the general area of aging studies starts to emerge. Farther up the tree, multidisciplinary aging studies become sufficiently mature that they acquire their own identity as the “new” field of gerontology. And once gerontology begins to be seen as distinct area of intellectual and scientific inquiry, branching can begin, as academic and applied gerontology begin to separate and specialize. But even as new areas of specialization appear, certain core organizing principles remain always present that provide a unity and a common sense of purpose that give the new field of gerontology its identity. I’m not
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going to talk about these organizing principles in any depth today, because there are many people who are gerontologists who could talk more knowledgeably about them and about how they apply in gerontology; but the point I want to make is that it is here at this intersection between an identified sphere or spheres of scientific knowledge and a commonly accepted set of principles used to interpret and apply that knowledge, that you will find the essence of professional identity. It is that idea of professional identity that I really want to talk about today. But first I’d like to illustrate some of what I’m talking about using my own professional identity. I have a diploma at home that says I have a Ph.D. in History. What does that tell you? Not much, I think, about who I am or what I can really do that might be useful to anyone. The one thing it does tell you is that I hold a credential that makes me eligible to work and compete on a more or less equal plane with others who hold the same credential. Basically, it lets me onto the playing field, and it is the only way to get on the playing field. But it doesn’t help you to understand much about what kind of specialized historical knowledge or skills I may really have, and it doesn’t show you the characteristics of the playing field. It’s just an isolated fact, about as informative as the word football might be to a Martian. Within that overall field of history Ph.D.s, it is a much more detailed and limited identity that really matters. First, I am an American Historian. Second, I am an American Economic Historian. Third, I am an American Economic Historian with a specialization in labor history. Fourth, I am an American Economic Historian with a specialization in labor history in the period since the Civil War. Only now are we beginning to get close enough to an identity that might get me a second look if I submitted an 18
application for a faculty position in history. But there is one more piece of my identity that is crucial and that, for all intents and purposes, renders all those other credentials meaningless in terms of my place in the field of academic history. That is the fact that since completing my Ph.D. something over 20 years ago I have never sought or held a faculty position in any area of history. Even worse, I haven’t written a book or published a single article that my fellow historians would regard as serious historical scholarship. That means that in the world of academic history, I really have no identity at all—I’m the invisible man. But there is one other thing about my professional identity that is very important but that is, I’m sorry to say, completely irrelevant from the perspective of most of my academic colleagues. By going through the long process of obtaining a doctorate in history, I acquired a very distinct perspective that is more or less unique to historians, a way of looking at the world from a decidedly historical perspective. And I have brought that perspective to bear on everything I have done since I finished the degree, which means that whether I was searching for ways to reach the medically underserved or trying to figure out whether the State of Texas needs another Ph.D. program in nursing or trying to generate state support for gerontology education, I have always started by asking first, how did we get where we are now? It is a shame that my fellow historians fail to recognize that my education in their field actually has meaningful applications outside the pages of the American Historical Review or the departmental tenure committee. The self-imposed boundaries of their professional world are simply too limited, and the protective walls they have erected are too high, to allow most of them to seriously consider that it might be possible to practice history on 19
the outside. But mostly it’s sad for them and, especially, for all the students who are made to feel that an education in history is useless for anything other than a traditional academic career. It is not particularly sad for me; I have thoroughly enjoyed the course my career has taken, (and the more I see of academic politics, the happier I am not to be a part of it). I tell you these things about myself and my field for two reasons. The first, and probably most important, is that Gerontology does not need to be like this. Gerontology as it has developed to the present is not an insular and self-absorbed discipline as so many traditional academic disciplines are. Gerontology recognizes the value of different perspectives and of having diverse career paths to allow those in the field to use their knowledge in the way in which they can be most effective. My second reason for talking to you about these experiences is, however, one that my colleagues in the field of history will probably recognize more readily than you will. History is important, whether of a nation or a species or a discipline. And my guess is that most of you know very little about the history of your chosen field, and even less about the history of professions and professionalism. Well, guess who’s going to see that you leave here knowing at least a little bit more about those subjects than you did before? The concept of professions or professionalism goes back to the medieval universities of Europe, which spawned the 3 original learned professions—medicine, law, and the clergy. The literature on professionalism is quite extensive, and the debate over what constitutes a profession is far too extensive to get into here, and it would probably put you to sleep anyway. Clearly the concept of professionalism from those 20
earliest days has generally included the idea that a professional has some sort of special training or education. Accompanying that idea traditionally has been some connotation that a profession is characterized by disinterested dedication and the pursuit of knowledge. Eliot Freidson, one of the leading scholars on the professions of the past 50 years puts it this way: “Profession is synonymous with occupation;” it refers to specialized work by which one gains a living in an exchange economy. But it is not just any kind of work that professionals do. The ... work they do is esoteric, complex, and discretionary in character: it requires theoretical knowledge, skill, and judgment that ordinary people do not possess, may not wholly comprehend, and cannot readily evaluate.” That last phrase is the key; listen again: “It requires theoretical knowledge, skill, and judgment that ordinary people do not possess, may not wholly comprehend, and cannot readily evaluate.” In other words, to be successful, a profession requires a willingness by clients— whether they are students in a classroom or patients in a hospital, to accept more or less on faith that the professional really has something to offer. Let’s think about the word “professional” itself. If you take it apart, you find that the verb to profess stands out. Taken literally, the term profession doesn’t refer to someone who has special knowledge or skills, but rather someone who claims to have special knowledge or skills. By this definition, which I am inclined to subscribe to, a true profession then is any occupation that is successful in convincing society that it really does possess special and useful knowledge and skills. 21
Interestingly, this is a peculiarly Anglo-American definition of a profession. In the rest of Europe and in much of the rest of the world the use of the term “profession” is limited to a far more restricted range of occupations than in the U.S. and England, and it is very difficult for any occupation that doesn’t already have it to achieve recognition as a profession. I suspect that this is mainly a function of the laissezfaire economic philosophy that characterizes the Englishspeaking world. After all, it’s the American way! Occupational success translates into social status, and if you’re really successful you can call yourself anything you darn well want to! The extreme example of this pragmatic use of the term “professional” is its application to athletes— when you boil it down, the professional, unlike the amateur, could be anyone who does sufficiently good work to warrant getting paid for it. Now let’s turn to what is probably the supreme example of the successful profession—medicine. Medicine was not always the powerful and respected profession it is today. The efforts of medical practitioners to convince the public that they had special knowledge and skills was complicated until very recently by one simple fact—they didn’t. At the time the American Medical Association was formed in 1847 (this is the AMA’s sesquicentennial year) those who called themselves physicians and surgeons were a decidedly motley crew, ranging from the small minority who seriously pursued scientific inquiry to the great majority who prescribed snake oil and leeches and whose main source of surgical expertise was their experience as butchers, and I do not mean that figuratively. It was not until the 19th century was three-quarters over that the basis of today’s medical profession appeared with the discovery of bacteriology. And even then, it was not until the 22
second decade of the 20th century, less than 90 years ago, that medicine began to have anything like the scientific credibility we see today. The emergence of the modern American medical profession was in considerable measure the result of one man’s persistence and dedication to the idea of scientific medicine. That man was Abraham Flexner. At the beginning of this century, there were well over one hundred so-called medical schools in the U.S., and they ranged in quality from state-of-the art programs to what were little more than diploma mills, with the majority tending to be closer to the latter than the former. Possession of a medical school diploma meant very little in terms of an individuals qualifications. The AMA tried to establish standards for medical education beginning at around the turn of the century, but they faced political and economic obstacles that were daunting—running a medical school on a shoe-string was a great way to make money, and the operators weren’t about to give up their cash cows without a fight. It was not until 1910, when Flexner, working under the auspices of the AMA and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, surveyed all of the nation’s medical schools and published a scathing report on his findings, that there was broad public and governmental support for reform of medical education. The result of the Flexner report was that more than 80 percent of the nation’s 155 medical schools closed, because their graduates had lost their claim to possess even a minimal level of specialized knowledge and skills and, as a result, they could not recruit students. The 31 medical schools that survived each offered a more-or-less comparable 4year curriculum and agreed to abide by the standards developed by the AMA, and finally the medical profession was on the way to the kind of homogeneity and high edu23
cational quality we are familiar with today. The professional model perfected by medicine and based on accreditation of training programs and licensure of graduates was the model that virtually every other would-be profession in the United States has tried to emulate, with varying degrees of success. In the health care arena, only nursing was able to carve out a professional niche even remotely comparable to medicine. This was because medicine attempted and was successful at claiming virtually every kind of health care function except nursing care. As the scientific base of medicine and the attendant range of necessary skills expanded, especially after the Second World War, medicine responded in two basic ways: they began to split into increasingly narrow subspecialties while, at the same time, delegating many of the more routine functions to so-called allied health professions. Since they were following both the model of medicine, each new allied health occupation sought to carve out a distinct area of practice and then to establish exclusive claim to those functions. Needless to say, as the number of allied health fields mushroomed, their areas of practice became increasingly narrow and turf wars became a common problem. Ultimately, it has been financial success that has given some of these allied health occupations true professional status; the sign that a health care discipline has truly made it as a profession is the point where third-party reimbursement becomes available for the services they provide. And the ultimate in professional status in health is reached when the members of the occupation can be reimbursed directly for their services, as opposed to having physicians or hospitals bill and be reimbursed for services provided by individuals working under their auspices. The exalted status, at least in economic terms, of physical 24
therapy today is a very recent phenomenon that can be traced directly to the decision of Medicare to directly reimburse PTS.. for their services in the early 1980s. For all intents and purposes, medicine remains the ideal model of a successful profession. In recent years, with the emergence of managed care, physicians have certainly lost some of the perquisites and power that they previously enjoyed. But medicine certainly is still a major force to be reckoned with. And its not likely that any new professions are likely to ever attain the kind of hegemony that medicine once had. Their success, after all, had a great deal to do with ownership of a well defined body of information, and in the information age, both the sheer volume of information and the ever expanding means of gaining access to it make such control virtually impossible. Now let’s get back to gerontology. How did the broad and multidisciplinary field of aging studies begin to find its own professional identity? Not surprisingly, it starts with specialized learning. This graph from another publication of the Association for Gerontology in Higher Education (AGHE) is almost a capsule life history of the field of gerontology.
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The longer line traces the growth of credit courses offered in Gerontology, Geriatrics, and Aging. As you can see, when the first survey of such courses was conducted in 1957, there were only 57 identifiable gerontology courses offered in the U.S. Thirty-five years later, in 1992, that number had increased by almost 3,000 percent, to more than 1600. The shorter line below, indicates the growth of programs in gerontology, geriatrics, and aging. The first comprehensive attempt to count programs came in 1985, when there were already more than 400 programs operating, and growth has continued steadily to almost 700 programs in 1992. But the real watershed year for gerontology programs is only suggested by this graph—1965. That was the year the Older Americans Act was passed by Congress, creating the Administration on Aging. One of the AoA’s first activities was to make grants to institutions of higher education to support development of programs in gerontology. Now let’s move ahead two years to 1967, the year on this graph when course offerings took a steep upward turn. It is not a coincidence that this spurt in course offerings came two years after the Older Americans Act of 1965. Nor was it coincidence that 1967 was also the year that the first two university-based programs awarding formal credentials in gerontology began operation—at North Texas State University (now the U. Of North Texas) and the University of South Florida. At this point, I should probably step back and add a footnote, since there seems to be something about being first at anything that is very important to people, I want to give credit where credit is due. The North Texas and South Florida programs were the first academic programs to award gerontology credentials, but they were not the first organized units in aging to appear on a university cam26
pus. That honor goes to Duke University, which established its University Center for the Study of Aging and Human development at about the same time that first count of course offerings was done in 1957. The Duke Center did not offer a credential—its mission was primarily to conduct research—but it certainly played an important role in establishing the credibility of aging studies as a legitimate area of academic endeavour. Much water has passed under the bridge since those halcyon days of the mid-1960s. In 1974, gerontology educators from across the U.S. joined together to form the Association for Gerontology in Higher Education. In 1983, the federal government gave the academic study of aging another major boost when it began providing funds for the development of Geriatric Education Centers. The Veterans’ Administration also helped by establishing Geriatric Research, Education, and Clinical Centers at many VA medical centers. By 1985, as we have seen, there were more than 400 gerontology programs in operation in the U.S. In 1987 AGHE published the first directory of Educational Programs in Gerontology in the United States, and seven years later, the number of programs had nearly doubled. Despite dwindling federal support for gerontology and for higher education in general, academic gerontology has continued to expand and, relatively speaking at least, to prosper. In 1995, the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) surveyed every gerontology program (300) we could identify in our 15 state region, and, though the response was a disappointing 30 percent, the survey clearly indicated that on most university campuses gerontology is stronger than ever before, with more student interest, more courses, and more institutional support than ever before. The survey also clearly revealed the multidisciplinary nature of gerontology, as this summary 27
of respondents academic addresses shows. The one significant area of weakness we found was in the status of gerontology at the level of state higher education policy. I believe that is in large part a result of gerontology’s multidisciplinary nature. Change in higher education tends to come slowly, and the sometimes unwieldy state governing structures for higher education, accustomed to the old narrowly discipline-specific model, have not yet quite figured out what to do with programs that cut broad swaths across departmental and even college lines. But it is on the individual campuses that major organizational changes in higher education usually appear first, and on many campuses, multidisciplinary thinking is gradually coming to be seen as the way of the future. Perhaps the most established model for full professional acceptance of a multidisciplinary field is public health, which is built around the six basic disciplines of epidemiology, biostatistics, health services administration community health education, and environmental health. It is possible to get an education in any of these fields in a variety of education settings, but, with the possible exception of health administration, virtually all of the most prestigious programs in each area are offered by the nation’s 25 accredited schools of public health. Equally important is that within each school and across all the disciplines, students can choose between M.S. or Ph.D. degrees, aimed at preparing them for academic and research careers, or M.P.H. and Dr.P.H. degrees aimed at preparing public health practitioners. And Public Health is by no means the only other multidisciplinary fields. Engineering is perhaps the best example among established professions, having brought together under one umbrella what were once very distinct occupations that included architecture, mechanical 28
design, and military engineering. Some current observers have identified an emerging profession called “counseling,” which brings together the fields of psychiatry, clinical psychology, pastoral counseling, and social work. Counseling as a distinct field seems to be gathering steam especially since psychiatry has whole heartedly embraced the use of psychoactive drugs, often to the virtual exclusion of other forms of psychotherapy. And it is no accident that this same trend, which has brought the disciplines that emphasize counseling closer together, has also brought psychiatry much more in line with most other medical specialties than was ever the case before. I cannot say what organizational direction the profession of gerontology will take in the future, whether it will follow a path similar to public health or engineering, or some other as yet unimagined organizational model. But I am inclined to suspect that it will be the latter, a new model incorporating pieces of others that have gone before, building, as it were, on history. But there are two things I do feel fairly sure about. First, gerontology is going to continue to develop and move steadily toward an increasing sense of occupational cohesion and professional identity. The chart from an AGHE report I mentioned earlier gives some indication of the pace of change and of my reasons for being so confident of gerontology’s strong future. Look at the dramatic expansion of program activity at the doctoral and post-doctoral levels between 1985 and 1992 (graph next page). I do not in any way want to diminish the importance of gerontology education at other levels, but the doctoral level is an essential component of strong professional identity, and it is the expansion of doctoral level education that will secure for gerontology its place in the world of 29
academic endeavour, and in doing so, it will ultimately bring greater credibility—and greater market value—to every other level of educational preparation in gerontology. One of the great debates in gerontology has been whether there was a place for educational programs granting degrees in gerontology, as opposed to certificates in aging that are added on to degrees in other fields. With four Ph.D. gerontology programs now operating, that debate is over, there will be both. The other thing I am quite certain about is that the future of gerontology will be determined to in large measure by the decisions of a relatively small group of leaders. Quality leadership has been a part of the history of every truly successful professional group. You don’t need to do anything more than read the 350 brief biographies Andrew Achenbaum’s Profiles in Gerontology to see how important leadership has been in bringing gerontology to where it stands today, or how multidisciplinary that leadership has been. (Achenbaum, by the way, for those who may not be familiar with him, is one of that very small group of serious academic historians who have made ag30
ing their primary area of study.) I have no doubt that some of the next generation of leaders who will shape the future of gerontology are among you here today. That is something you all should keep in mind as you make your career decisions. There are roles for leaders in many different arenas, including each of those other individual disciplines that formed the roots of the gerontology tree. But over the next two or three decades I think we will see the foremost leaders in gerontology coming from the ranks of those who have made gerontology their major field. The first graduates of those new gerontology Ph.D. programs are true pioneers, just as the people to get gerontology Master’s degrees were not very long ago. That seems to me to be a very exciting, if also a bit scary place to be. And it is not just about leadership within gerontology. It’s also about leadership in society, because in our rapidly changing times, any field that offers new ways of thinking and new ways of solving problems, whether at the academic or the applied level, will find itself in great demand. The world of the 21st century is going to demand new ways of thinking that draw upon multiple traditional disciplines without regard to artificial professional boundaries. I thought Tom Visiglio, who heads the gerontology program at Kings College in Pennsylvania put it very well at the recent AGHE Annual Meeting in Boston when he said that Gerontology is one of the best ways to get training in synthetic thinking, in the ability to take pieces of knowledge from many different disciplines and areas of activity and put them together in new and different ways that no one ever thought of before to help deal with the issues facing society. Each and every one of you have an opportunity to help shape the future, but please, don’t forget about your 31
history and the history of your field: it’s awfully difficult to see clearly where you want to go if you don’t know where you came from. And remember, too, that the decisions you make will affect not only your own future but the future of your discipline. Don’t let your history come back to haunt you because you forgot to learn from it.
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