Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
The Transform your Teaching podcast is a service of the Center for Teaching and Learning at Cedarville University in Cedarville, Ohio. Join Dr. Rob McDole and Dr. Jared Pyles as they seek to inspire higher education faculty to adopt innovative teaching and learning practices.
Hello, faithful transforming teaching listeners. As you may or may not know, we've been running a survey to get your feedback on our podcast. We mentioned that if you fill it out, you'll be entered into a drawing to win a fancy coffee mug or tea or soup, whatever it is you wanna put into the mug. And we had drawings in October, and now we have one here in November and December. And it's time to announce the November winner.
Jared:The winner of this month's coffee mug is Katie Farrell. Congratulations, Katie. And it's not too late to participate. You can find the link to our survey in this episode's show notes. Thanks for listening.
Narrator:This is the Transform Your Teaching podcast. The Transform Your Teaching podcast is a service of the Center for Teaching and Learning at Cedarville University in Cedarville, Ohio.
Rob:Welcome to the Transform Your Teaching podcast. My name is Doctor. Robert McDowell, and I have the distinct pleasure of welcoming Ryan Lyman with us to cohost with me today because we have a very special episode.
Ryan:Yeah. We do. It's special.
Rob:And with us today for the first time is doctor Jared Piles. Thank
Ryan:you. Our live audience is stoked about this.
Rob:Thank Live audience, that's enough. Thank you. Thank you very much. So, doctor Piles.
Jared:Yes. I know I cannot diagnose your rash. I've already been
Rob:asked that. You're not that kind of doctor.
Jared:I've already been asked that
Ryan:so many times.
Jared:It's always rash. Why rash? I don't know.
Rob:I have an educational rash, sir.
Ryan:I can fix that.
Rob:So, doctor Piles. Yeah. How does it feel? You are done.
Jared:I am done. I've been done for three weeks now. Defended on as we record this, three weeks from today was October 14. So I've been done since then and it doesn't feel real. It's not fully set in yet.
Jared:I don't think I'll fully feel done. Although I said this before, because I had to do some final revisions and submit the dissertation to graduate college. I said at that point I'd feel done, but now that I'm past that, I still don't feel done.
Ryan:I mean, we saw you in your regalia, you know, so maybe that day you'll feel
Jared:That's right.
Ryan:You'll like a guy.
Jared:December 14, I think, will be the definitive day.
Rob:Yeah. You and your family get to celebrate.
Jared:Yeah. We're all flying out to Boise.
Rob:That's awesome. So one of the reasons why we have this conversation is not just to celebrate you.
Jared:Mhmm. Oh, okay.
Ryan:There's another shoe that needs about you.
Jared:It's not about think
Rob:we definitely wanna we're gonna hear from you.
Ryan:Mhmm.
Rob:And I've got some questions, and I know Brian probably does as well. But I want our listeners to be able to reflect on maybe particular educational journeys they're looking at Mhmm. Yeah. Embarking upon
Ryan:Sure.
Rob:As well as, you know, just hearing the benefits and the hard things. You know? Yeah. And I think you can provide a perspective on that Yes. Especially how it's been so fresh for you Yeah.
Rob:And new. Mhmm. And so that's kinda where I'd like this to go.
Ryan:I like that. Mhmm.
Rob:So with that in mind, I'd like to ask the first question. And that first question of you is, what major one thing have you learned from this entire process where you say it was, like, transformative for you? Or a better way of saying it is, what changed? What's changed
Jared:in I think if I had to pick one thing, it would be wow. That's a really hard question. Believe it or not.
Rob:Know, as a PhD, There's
Jared:a lot of things that I feel like have changed. You want like an academic or a personal? No,
Rob:it just whatever pops in your head first, just go ahead and do that.
Jared:Rely on your support system. Your support system is more important to you than you realize. And I don't think you experience the length and breadth that people are willing to go to to support you. Because I'm also someone, this is a bit personal, I have an issue with trust when it comes to other people and they say certain things but I don't fully expect that to follow through. So I'm a bit pessimistic with that.
Jared:So, but when it comes to something like you have a support system that you know believes in you, I think that's something was the biggest thing. I feel like I can rely on people more as a result of this. I don't think that wasn't the intention of going through the whole process. But now I feel like, Oh, I do have a support system. When people say that they care about me and they are willing to help me, they mean that.
Jared:They're not against me, which I think bleeds into an impostor syndrome as well, which I fought. I still fight, but I fought the most during the last year of the dissertation process because I still, I thought for sure that the theorists that I was using in my dissertation were going to come out of their graves and show up in my defense and say, you used my theory wrong. Like, the imposter syndrome is dangerous and it's true and it's real and you have to be able to fight it. But support system by far, I think is the number one thing.
Rob:So it sounds like it was a really humbling kind of perspective or process for you.
Jared:Yeah. It was because I I'm an English teacher. Like I came from English teaching and I know how to write a paper. Right? Until I wrote my dissertation.
Jared:Then I realized I have no clue how to write a paper. Because academic writing, dissertation writing is completely different and I was not ready for that. So it was a very humbling experience because Rob, you had talked to me about this and Doctor. Yeh had talked to me about this as well, where there's going to come a point where you just go, you know what, whatever, let's just get this done. And that was the last, I would say since the summer of this year up until now, I was at the, you know what, whatever, let's just get this done.
Jared:I'm done with trying to write this as an English paper. This needs to be a dissertation. So I had to throw all sense of what I thought was good writing out the window and just say, okay, I gotta humble myself to this process and do this.
Ryan:Which, I mean, you know, kind of thinking about the perspective of the listener, there's probably many of our folks who've either gone through this process or kind of what Rob's hinting at, going through this process right now or are thinking about it, considering it. So then the question is, we've got listeners, they're considering advancing in their academic, you know, educating themselves, getting different degrees. Would you recommend that they do that, and why? Or why not? Yeah, or why not?
Jared:I think it depends on what you wanna do with it. When I set off on this journey six years ago with my Ed. Degree, the goal, I was still at high school. I wasn't in high school, I should say that.
Rob:You were teaching.
Jared:I was teaching. Teaching high school. The goal was to come here to Cedarville and teach. But I was told by, those I talked to at the time is like, you have to be at least ABD, which is all but dissertation, to be hired. And I was like, well, my goal is to teach at Cedarville.
Jared:So I'm starting this process now. And then over the course of those six years, I was hired on here as staff as an instructional designer where I'm more intrigued in the instructional design and, supporting faculty.
Rob:But you still teach.
Jared:No, I still teach. Yeah. Still teach, but my pursuit is no longer the full time faculty. So I guess it depends on what you're if you want to get it for the letters, don't do it because, I
Ryan:mean, it's not worth it. Not worth it. But
Jared:I would say you first have to figure out what it is you want to do with it. And then if it's a if it's next on your career path, feel like your trajectory is headed that direction, by all means do it. I think it's an extremely rewarding process. It's also the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. And I'm not gonna sugarcoat it.
Jared:It is by far the hardest thing I've ever done. I broke countless times and I thought, this is it. I'm not going any further. But thanks to be to my wife who provided the support I needed to say, now you gotta, you can still do this.
Ryan:Well, and people need to hear that because the support systems that we have, you know, there's a reliance on on the Lord that you have in this kind of process. And then, you know, in your case, you've got a wonderful wife who we like a lot better than Jared.
Jared:Oh, I I agree. She's so much better than I am.
Ryan:And, you know, and you
Rob:have She makes some really cool furniture as well.
Ryan:She does. She does. Nice bookshelves. That's that's really the only thing I've seen thus far, but far more talented than Jared, but that's
Jared:neither here nor No, I agree.
Ryan:So given that consideration, this idea of a support system, I hope and I think that you felt that from your team here, but also our faculty, those colleagues that you've been able to work with. And translating that then into your work here. What you're doing, part of even your motivation for doing this podcast is helping people who are in academia be better teachers, to be innovative teachers. Yep. And so how have you seen some of your process of the dissertation or even the research that you did itself benefit the people around you?
Ryan:Well, there hasn't been any immediate impact yet, but there will be in
Jared:the future, because I feel like the research that I did opened my eyes up to the complexity of people. And, the majority of the research that I did was on, you know, everyone is trying to figure out how to get people to use an innovation. Mhmm. Either a type of teaching or, I mean, take it outside of education. An app, mobile phone app for banking.
Jared:Crops, like how to better technology to develop better crops, better rice, better corn. And so there's been all these studies done on how to best predict whether or not someone is going to adopt or reject a new innovation and they keep adding things. Well, it could be their personal experience. It could be their familiarity with stuff. It could be this.
Jared:It could be that. It could be their level of innovativeness, which is what I focused on, plus their level of risk. Are Are they willing to take a risk on something like that? And they keep throwing these more variables. Then they flip to the other side and check out the technology.
Jared:Well, the technology is not easy to use or maybe it doesn't correlate with what they're doing now. Maybe they can't test drive it before they use it totally or something like that. And no one can come up with a good reason why people adopt or not. And so to me it just shows, yes, I did turn a page in the research and looked at innovativeness and risk together to see how they related in any way. But the job's not done because people are you can set a technology in front of someone.
Jared:And we saw this during COVID where there was a huge shift towards online usage, like online teaching, because we didn't have a choice. Everything went online. Yet you still had instructors not doing it across the nation. It was like, yeah, I'll just email them. But you can't email them.
Jared:If you're using online stuff, you could use your online platform. Yeah. So you can sit something you can sit something in front of somebody and say, this is the best thing. It's going to give you more access to what you need. It's going to help you do stuff quicker.
Jared:It's going to, you're going to grade quicker. You're going to communicate. It's the best thing ever for you. And they'll go, I don't want to use it. So it just shows that we need to explore more and we need to consider the whole faculty member or the user as well, because it's so complicated.
Jared:It's so complex. So, I mean, immediately there's no, I don't see any practical, tangible change to what I do here at the university, But in the future though, it's going to affect to make me explore the next steps of, you know, I'm I'm rambling.
Rob:You know you where you're headed though. Mean Mhmm.
Jared:I know where I'm headed. Yeah.
Rob:Yeah. I think that's probably to have to have a destination
Ryan:Yep.
Rob:And then to be able to work towards it. Now that you've done this process, you can actually reuse the process without having to necessarily jump through all the hoops, but still remain true to the amount of work and the study that you need to do. Right. But you also get to think outside of the box, and you get to look at this along with others like myself and doctor Yeh and others who who have interest in these areas and and study things together. And I think that's I don't know about you, but that is something I am looking forward
Ryan:to.
Jared:There's so many directions I wanna go to as far as research goes here at Cedarville. If
Ryan:I may, I mean, thinking about all this often can sound really daunting, you know, all the different process that you went through. But even what you're saying, Yeah, hey, have kind of a launching point from all the dissertation work, but also the change that took place in you, so I disagree with you that it hasn't made any kind of difference yet. Because that's not true. I mean, the way that you work is different. The way that you're processing information is different.
Ryan:Rob talks about that all the time because he can see it in you. He's been through the dissertation process. He's gone through what you've gone through. And now, it makes me think of something that Rob often tells us as a team. Like, stuff doesn't need to be perfect now.
Ryan:We're taking small steps, small iterations towards whatever our goal is. And you've taken a big step in that direction. So, as an encouragement to you, and you both are an encouragement to me, as I even consider moving forward in terms of professional development, what I get to do here, we're continually improving. Know, work, work. I mean, that's true of our relationship with Christ, that's true of us in our academic pursuits, it's true of us in our work.
Ryan:All of those things. You're moving from one point to another point with a lot of tiny points or or bigger ones in between. I appreciate that.
Rob:Yeah. That leads me to another question for you is is Here we go. You know, one of the one of the big things that that you learned, and I appreciate you talking about your support team, but what did what did the spirit teach you in the process in terms of your relationship with him? Would you be willing to reflect on that?
Jared:Yeah. Let me pull up a verse because there's one that's stuck in my head. I have redeemed you. I have saved you. I know you by name.
Jared:So what are you so worried about? And so it's the whole idea of like, you know, Yeah, I've been here the whole time. So it's the idea of that is that I was never left alone in this process, even though I felt alone a lot. And that's something this process does as well as you isolate you. But I had plenty of conversations with my Lord and savior while I was in there and the depths of it going, what am I doing?
Jared:And there was always, I'm here. I'm not going to solve this problem for you, but I'm here to support you along the way.
Rob:And I've given you what you need. Well, I think that it stands as a testimony or an Ebenezer, if I can say it that way.
Jared:Sure. This is a huge Ebenezer.
Rob:Yeah. It is. It's it's a reminder to you and to your family
Ryan:Mhmm.
Rob:That you can do hard things.
Ryan:Praise the Lord. And
Rob:that he is there with you. And I think watching you go through it, watching you go through the highs and lows because we participated with you. I know your family did more so than we did, but I I think we you know?
Jared:Yeah. You guys got it.
Rob:We we yeah.
Ryan:I'm a big big Jared Encourager. Yeah. It's part of my new new title, actually. Thank you.
Rob:Jared Encourager.
Jared:Thank you.
Rob:But, you know, when others I think the one thing that I remember anyway is thinking, if I have the opportunity, I will encourage. I mean, I'll put the screws to you.
Ryan:Mhmm. Mhmm.
Rob:Right? But at the same time, encourage. Yeah. And there's this balance that goes as, like, I'm not gonna let you up. Right.
Rob:I gotta keep my thumb on you. But at the same time and that's what was done to me. Mhmm. And at the time, I was like, I was ready to fight, you know, until I got to the point where I realized what God was doing.
Jared:Right.
Rob:And I I sensed that out of you as well.
Jared:Yeah. It's just a matter of, again, it's the whole idea of you're not alone.
Rob:Mhmm.
Jared:I brought you this far. You're gonna finish it. Yeah. So, yeah. Jared, it was
Ryan:great talking to you about this process and Thanks for interviewing me. You bet.
Jared:I I love the podcast. I'm a big fan. I love what you guys are doing.
Ryan:The two hosts, wonderful. Great great guys.
Jared:There's I don't know. There's one guy that I'm not too too sure.
Ryan:Well, he has his doctor now. So Oh. It makes him even cooler than he was before.
Rob:Oh, he was talking about me. Oh,
Ryan:yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Rob:Well So has been really wonderful. Thank you for listening, and please take time to like and subscribe. Connect with us on LinkedIn. We're here to serve you. And as always, thanks for listening.