Strategic Management – Sarah Easter – Tenure and Promotion Portfolio

Strategic Management emphasizes the applied learning and the development of problem-solving skill sets in the context of abstract and complex business situations. Using a case teaching format, this course focuses on integrating and tying together business knowledge and skill sets that students have learned throughout their undergraduate business studies as they prepare to graduate. Overall, my hope is that students will walk away with comments such as the following:

Sample student comments:

“This class is tough but in an enjoyable way. It’s definitely excellent at taking everything we’ve done over the past 4 years and helping you fit it together, tying it up with a pretty bow. Dr. Easter is definitely the right choice to teach this course. Her energy and passion make a course that could easily be tedious and painful into a stimulating challenge.”
“Real world application was emphasized strongly, and I believe that this class has prepared me for the work field more than any other class at ACU.”
“I think this class was really effective in teaching us skills we need in real life. The case analysis was great to get used to for real life situations.”
“The instructor used collaborative and cooperative assignments that required the dynamic application of the course material, instead of just the memorization of facts regarding the course subject. This made the experience much more rounded and much more effective for preparing me for the business world. Using case–study format for assignments made the course material more engaging and required the involvement of various different disciplines from the business background. This made the course a beneficial and impactful way to end the business school curriculum.”

Of course, the example comments above are not always reflective of the types of impressions with which students leave the course. I have found Strategic Management a difficult course in which to engage and motivate students effectively, especially since the class is made up of graduating seniors and it is a required capstone that does not fall within the clear boundaries of their specific business disciplines. Plus, because it is drawing upon and integrating previous course material in a holistic manner to a large extent, sometimes students obtain the impression that they are not learning anything new even as I can see their development in critical thinking and in the application of business concepts to complex real-world business situations.

First year: Focus on course development and preparation

In my first year of teaching this course, I focused on trying to create an engaging and interactive learning environment that emphasized real world application. Since this was my first year teaching full-time and my first time teaching this specific course, I also spent a great deal of time and energy as it relates to course preparation. A high level of engagement and interaction, emphasis on applied learning, and instructor preparedness were common themes in my course evaluation comments (sample comments below).

“I really appreciate how Dr. Easter ran her class. Using real life case studies was helpful in seeing how the concepts we learned would apply in the business world. She tried to make the class exciting and expected everyone to be engaged which allowed for good discussions. I think the content of this course is important to anyone who intends to go into the business world, and Dr. Easter did an excellent job at making it important, meaningful, and interesting.”
“Really enjoyed the class, and you were very prepared even in first semester of teaching the class! It helped to make the class more interesting.”
“Dr. Easter made this class really fun. Not only would we work with real life cases but she equipped us in how to analyze cases and come up with recommendations. I really enjoyed the class and was glad that Dr. Easter knew her material which made learning easier.”
“Amazing first-year professor. Really takes the time to know her students and is a great teacher. The material is very helpful and the projects are actually meaningful. There is no busy work in this class and participation in class from all students shows how great of a teacher she is.”

At the same time, looking back, I did not do enough in my first year to make this course rigorous and to guide the students in realizing the overall benefits. As well, I still had a lot to learn about effectively facilitating classroom discussions and incorporating interactive exercises which enhance the value of course material, as evidenced by sample comments below:

“Dr. Easter is very engaged with her students. She is interested in their lives and enthusiastic about the subject. However, I think she could use some work in some areas as this is her first year teaching. First, her grading is very much subjective, which is unfortunate if you don’t know how to improve your work for the class. When providing feedback she might give somebody only positive comments but then the individual receives a B or lower on the assignment. Second, because there are no tests and only quizzes, I feel as if I did not retain the information well. Third, I felt like I was in middle school again while in this class. It was very micromanaged in how she kept tallies of students who made comments in class and who did not. She was very enthusiastic while teaching and engaging the class in group discussions, but she could definitely improve.”
“Dr. Easter is a good professor but the class doesn’t seem necessary and a number of the case studies seem irrelevant.”
“The teaching methods are more appropriate for young intellectuals who are having difficulty grasping the topic. To engage college students you can’t bait answers out of them for an hour and a half every class period and expect them to be interested enough to learn anything. The intellectual stimulation was literally nonexistent and it was painful to sit through class and wait for 4 minutes for someone to answer a question every time one was asked. The material could have been covered in 30 minutes or less every day if the professor would stop waiting for someone to answer every question that she posed.”
“I really thought I would be challenged by this class but I have not been. This is supposed to be a senior level writing intensive course and I have not felt that way this far. Especially with the games that we play every Tuesday.”

When looking at the quantitative results of my course evaluations, there was a marked difference between my first semester of teaching: 4.4 average rating (for both sections of the course) in Fall 2016 versus 3.9 and 3.5 ratings in Spring 2017 (for the first and second section, respectively). After contemplating these differences, particularly in consideration of the fact that I did not make major changes to the course or my teaching method between these two semesters, I believe this can largely be attributed to class culture and make-up. I connected very well with the students in both sections of the course in my first semester of teaching and we built a great rapport and learning culture. In my second semester, I did not connect as well with the students in the classroom. One section tended to be comprised of students who were very quiet; in the other section, the class where I received a 3.5, the size was much too large (over 60 students) for a capstone, discussion-based course. What’s more, since this was my first-time teaching in a full-time capacity and I am a younger female instructor, I also received a number of comments related to the notion that I should not be teaching a capstone class given my lack of experience. In my first semester, I think students likely gave me more leeway in course evaluations because it was my first-time teaching full-time. Below is a sample comment in regards to my lack of experience:

“I honestly do not think a first year professor should be teaching a capstone course. She has the degrees to teach the course but she only has minimal experience and with this course coming at the end of my college career I would prefer a professor who has more real life experience to relate this class too. Also this being her first class to teach means she was learning as she went which is not what a capstone professor should be doing.”

Second year: Focus on stimulating learning and increasing rigor

After reflecting on feedback from students in my first year of teaching Strategic Management and talking with colleagues about the input obtained, I decided to make some rather substantial changes to the course in an attempt to better stimulate learning and incorporate more rigor into the classroom. Specific changes included adding a rigorous team semester-long project and two challenging short-answer tests. The reaction from students to these course changes was less than stellar (to put it mildly). In fact, while there were some positive comments, overall, students reacted quite negatively.

Below are some examples of positive student feedback:

“Dr. Easter is such a wonderful human being. I love being around her; she is genuine and actually takes an interest in what is going on in our lives outside of class. She was the one teacher I had this semester that actually took an interest and reached out and tried to keep up with what was going on in our lives. I would love to take another class that she teaches.”
“Dr. Easter made her class very entertaining and interesting which made it easier for me to learn this subject that I first found difficult. Dr. Easter was always there to provide help and she provides helpful comments on the works we had to give back. Overall, it was a good experience to take this class and I really enjoyed it.”
“She made class very interesting and interactive. Interested personally and professionally in students and encouraged them to take their thoughts a step further and apply it.”
“She really cares about her students and got to know us all by name within the first week. She has a great attitude and really knows her stuff, using her experiences to help students. She clearly defined each day and gave us a roadmap so we knew why things were important and what we were doing. Great work”

I received many negative comments from students, particularly in regards to the difficulty of the class, including the following:

“This course contained much more work than my other courses. The “quizzes” were harder than any test I have been given this year with much more needed knowledge/memorization of the content than most. As a capstone course, I do not believe that the content should be as hard or as time consuming as it was. There were many weeks that I had hours of work to do from this course and not others. The group project was a lot of work that I did not have time for.”
“I felt the tests were a bit ridiculous. They were initially called quizzes, causing us to feel that they would be about equal to quizzes in other classes. We were met with a 35 question fill- in-the-blank test that was difficult. This wouldn’t have been as much of a problem if we were prepared for the difficulty. To make matters worse, those “quizzes” were then graded extremely harshly, looking for exact wording used in class rather than an overall understanding of the concept. None of us were prepared for that. Because there were only 2 tests, this caused anyone who was confused by the first test to be greatly behind in the class. While she offered extra credit, it only added about half a point to the test grade in the end. I feel we were extremely unprepared for this type of test and I felt that she did not try and help us succeed in this instance. I did like the case group project and felt this was a good addition to the class. She gave us a lot of instruction and was helpful in providing examples. Overall, I think Dr. Easter is a great person and does want us to succeed, but I did not always feel that way in the way the class and grading was set up, especially when it came to the tests.”
“It is not fair to change the difficulty of the course every semester. The ever-changing style of the course allows students in previous semesters to make easy A’s and some this semester to hardly make a B. While you think it’s all about improving yourself, we are all competing for the same jobs and it is not fair for you to play around with our GPA’s for your own improvement. 2. In the projects and assignments, there were no clear requirements. We would be given a rubric, but the professor had a list of “hidden expectations” that she would either never say, mention once in an hour-and-a-half lecture, and never put on the rubric that we were supposed to follow. If you want to use a requirement to grade, either put it on the rubric or don’t give us a rubric at all. 3. The tests are not effective. There is no textbook or clear information, but we as students are required on the test to answer specific, open-ended questions with the EXACT wording that the professor wants. How are we to know the exact words? All she does is lecture for an hour and a half, put no concrete information on the slides with those specific words, and provides no textbook or review that tells us what words are on the test. Then she expects us to know exactly what she’s thinking. IF SHE WANTS SPECIFIC ANSWERS, GIVE US A MULTIPLE CHOICE TEST. If she wants open-ended and free-response answers, then allow in the grading for the answers to be open to interpretation and/or discussion.”
“This class sucks. All the grading was incredibly subjective, and I wasn’t really motivated to work hard because no matter what I did I just got an 80. Also I basically learned nothing”

During my second year of teaching, I enrolled in the Master Teacher Program offered through the Adams Center. As a part of this program, in spring 2018, Dr. Rodney Ashlock observed one of my Strategic Management classes and provided feedback. This was very valuable in terms of helping me to better understand my strengths and areas for improvement as an instructor.

After gaining a bit of distance and perspective from these evaluations, I realized that I did not do a very effective job of clearly communicating my expectations on deliverables and emphasizing the challenging nature of the course up-front. I believe this lack of clarity was augmented because of the way that I come across to students – as being very friendly and approachable. Plus, students enrolled in the course talked to other students who had taken the course in the 2016-2017 academic year and had certain expectations entering it, unlike my first year of teaching when I started with a clean slate.

Third year: Focus on clearly communicating my expectations and real-world application

In response to student input, I made some additional changes to the team and test assessments to better align with expected course outcomes, to better communicate my high expectations up-front, and to offer more consistent feedback throughout the semester. I also included two panel sessions with leaders in a variety of different industries to help make the strategic management content come to life for the students. This approach seemed to work very well and my evaluations were more positive, although the evaluation participation rate for both semesters was rather low.

“It was obvious that Dr. Easter was well prepared for each class, and communicated her expectations very clearly”
“I enjoyed the fact that Dr. Easter made us read various real-life cases and had us attempt to analyze first, before going through it with us in class”
“Analyzing cases was extremely effective, as it helped to refine my analytical skills and learn more about executive decision making”
“Tests were in an emphasized “hands-on” format, allowing students to apply concepts learned throughout the course of undergraduate education to topics at hand”

Many of the negative comments I received related to the MFT assessment, the difficulty of the reading quizzes, and the repetition of the case structure. For context, the MFT is a national assessment that COBA seniors take periodically as a performance benchmark that is utilized for accreditation purposes. Since Strategic Management is the last required course that all graduating seniors take together (irrespective of major), this assessment is integrated into the course and students receive a grade. On the whole, students were very frustrated that their performance on this standardized assessment affected their grade in the course.

“In regards to the MFT, I do find it ridiculous to be counting such a large portion of our grade for a test that covers the subject matter that not all students have been taught. Also, the study materials given to us were inadequate in making any difference in the scores we made”
“The MFT assessment is absolutely ridiculous. Way to make a senior feel prepared by putting this test in front of them”
“I thought the quizzes, in general, were too in depth. I read all but one case two times and I was never able to get more than one perfect score even though I prepared for class each time and it was extremely discouraging.”
“I wish that instead of doing so many cases, that we had focused on fewer cases and explored them more deeply. It started to feel repetitive and I felt like I started to experience diminishing returns from the process as the semester went along. I think the reading quizzes are fine, even though I didn’t always do so well even if I read, but the number of cases is a bit much”

Fourth year: Restructured course to better stimulate learning and engagement

In the 2019-2020 academic year, based on student feedback, including a focus group I held in spring 2019 with former students, I chose to make some significant changes to Strategic Management in an effort to stimulate increased learning and engagement in the course. Specifically, I re-structured the class to focus on core strategic management concepts – discussed via mini lectures and in-class case discussions – in the first part of the semester, followed by an increased emphasis on career development as well as experiential individual and project application of strategic management concepts in the second part of the course. Based upon feedback from students, the re-structuring of the course seems to have been positive overall and helped to keep them better engaged with the course material.

“I really enjoyed the layout of this semester’s course, with the three sections. I found the case analyses to be a good intro, and then the real-life application made it evident how this content was applicable to real life management situations”
“Easter clearly explained the course materials and gave us real-life situations to work with. The client presentation at the end of was one of the most beneficial”
“Everything about this course was good in my mind. She ran this class in good style in my opinion”
“Discussion was extremely effective, all work in the class felt useful and valuable”

Of course, in teaching a required business course, I have also had to come to grips with the notion that while I will continue to look for opportunities to grow and develop as an educator, I will never satisfy all of my students simultaneously. This past year, I received a number of negative comments related to a variety of different areas (samples below), although I did not notice overall common themes in the remarks as in years past.

“This is not a capstone class for accounting and finance students. There is no application in this class for those majors”
“The case studies are not really helpful”
“It would be nice if there were smaller class sizes”
“Dr. Easter did not communicate the requirements for the course clearly nor did she communicate the requirements for individual projects clearly either. The class was very vague and grading was very subjective. There were no attempts made by the professor to make sure all students understood the requirements for participation, which were very subjective in nature.”

Fifth year: adaptations due to COVID-19

It probably goes without saying that the 2020-2021 academic year afforded a number of significant challenges due to COVID-19. I had to think carefully about how to restructure this very interactive and discussion based course, which relies heavily on in-class team and large group discussions, in light of COVID mitigation tactics in place, including a masked and social distanced environment. In response, I actively utilized a number of technological tools in the classroom, including Google Docs and Google Jamboard, which allowed teams to respond to prompts in class via these platforms rather than relying primarily upon verbal, large group discussions.

I did receive some feedback from students, as illustrated by the following comment received in the Fall 2020 semester, indicating that some felt that the set-up was challenging, particularly as it relates to carrying out a discussion-based class in this environment in Hart Auditorium:

The case study discussions, however, were rough. I think this may have been a COVID thing, since there’s no one within 6 feet of you and we were in a huge auditorium, but this is something to take into consideration as COVID craziness looks to continue next semester.

However, on the whole, very few students noted COVID in their course evaluations and there were still many positive comments related to course benefits and engagement. One sample positive comment is shown below:

I can truly say this is probably one of the most rewarding classes I have taken at ACU! I actually learned a lot and I know that this is information I will be using even outside of college. Dr. Easter is extremely Christ–centered, which is so encouraging. I love that she always gave an example worth following and always makes herself available even if it’s just to talk about life. She’s really passionate and you can tell she loves what she does!

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