Faculty Leadership in Academia: From Inspiration to Reality is a program that helps faculty members prepare to advance their careers by taking on formal leadership roles. The Executive Vice Chancellor’s Office provides this professional development opportunity for faculty who are considering a leadership role or are in their first leadership position and considering continuing on a leadership path. FLAIR is a cohort-based program that runs from January through December.

Programming includes a series of leadership workshops in the spring, a required summer reading list, and another series of workshops in the fall. Topics focus on leadership as it relates to campus administration, faculty governance, professional societies, research, and academics. Big issues in higher education are covered, as well as practical discussions on goal setting, effective meetings and team building. Participants will explore leading through the Clifton Strengths program.

Participation is open to faculty with strong, untapped leadership potential who have the rank of associate or full professor (tenured, practice, research or extension). Participants must commit to attending all workshops, which will be held on City Campus, Wednesdays from 3:30 to 5 p.m., Jan. 22, Feb. 12, Feb. 26, April 8, April 29, Aug. 26, Sept. 16, Oct. 14, Nov. 18, and Dec. 2. In-person attendance is preferred, but Nebraska Extension is partnering to make the sessions available to participants statewide.

Interested applicants should send a cover sheet, current curriculum vitae and a brief statement of interest to executivevcoffice@unl.edu by Nov. 4.

The cover sheet must include the applicant’s name and email address, department, name and email address of the applicant’s department chair, and a statement committing to attendance at all workshops. The statement of interest must include information about the applicant’s prior leadership and leadership development opportunities and experiences, the types of leadership positions to which the applicant aspires, and what the applicant hopes to gain from participation in FLAIR.