July 18, 2005

Upwardly Mobile Academic: Robert Sternberg

Robert J. Sternberg’s psychology laboratory at Yale University has put him in the forefront of debates over how to measure intelligence and to promote creativity. Sternberg is a critic of conventional methods of sorting students and others and has conducted research for the College Board, among others, on alternative approaches.

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Tufts University announced last week that Sternberg would be taking his lab with him when he moves to Tufts next month to become dean of its School of Arts and Sciences. In an interview, Sternberg discussed why he is making a career change, the state of his research, and how he will apply his ideas when he becomes a dean.

Q: What motivated you to take a job as a dean. Do you worry about a loss of research time?

A: Three things motivated me to take a job as a dean. First, I study leadership. As a scholar studying this topic, I advise leaders on how to be more effective. At some point, it occurred to me that I would rather actually be doing it than just advising people on what they should be doing. So this is a chance to apply my own theories.

Second, after being president of the American Psychological Association, an association of 155,000 members, I found it difficult to return to my old position. I felt I needed a new challenge that would enable me to build upon the skill I developed leading APA.

Third, I have directed the PACE Center at Yale, which has been a wonderful opportunity. But I felt ready to assume responsibility for a larger and more complex organization where I could make a difference not only to the center, but to a university as a whole.

I do not worry about the loss of research time. After a year, the PACE Center will move to Tufts. I am hoping some of our key staff will move with it. I have confidence in their ability to carry forth with our mission of helping people transform abilities into competencies, and competencies into expertise.

Q: As a psychologist whose work has explored questions of intelligence and creativity, will you bring a different perspective to being a dean? Do you think you will evaluate faculty talent based on some of your ideas as a researcher?

A: One thing that excited me about being a dean is the opportunity to apply some of the ideas I have developed to university education. Our main goal in our research is to help teacher teach and assess students in a way that maximizes their learning — that helps all students to learn at the very highest level possible. This is the orientation I bring to the job. The goal of a university is to develop the next generation of leaders, and helping to create superb teaching, and the research that is at the core of great teaching, is a step toward developing that next generation.

Q: Your lab is following you to Tufts. Will most of the people there move with you? Will the focus of the work change at all at Tufts?

A: I hope our key personnel come with me. I have invited them and expect it is likely they will join me. I hope that the focus of the work will continue to be on improving the teaching/learning process, and that some of the research will be useful to students and faculty at Tufts. But that remains to be seen. The worst thing a new dean (or other administrator) can do is come to a new university with a preset plan, before becoming thoroughly acquainted with the organization’s culture and ambiance.

Q: You received a lot of publicity a few years ago for work with the College Board. What is the status of your efforts to help come up with ways to possibly change the SAT or college admissions?

A: We have published some articles as a result of this work with more to come. The results were, we believe, superb. We showed that it is possible, at least in the diverse sample we tested, substantially to improve prediction of college performance and at the same time substantially to reduce ethnic-group differences in scores on the predictor tests.

Q: Do you think top colleges should rethink the way they admit students? How?

A: I do. One of our goals is to ensure that assessments used in admissions take into account, as fully as possible, all of the different ways in which students can show their strengths. In particular, tests should look at creative and practical skills as well as memory and analytical ones. I hope to be able to contribute to the discussion of these issues at Tufts. Ultimately, rethinking admissions provides a way to increase academic excellence and at the same time increase diversity. I know that the admissions office at Tufts shares my goals of increasing academic excellence and diversity, and I look forward to helping them accomplish their mission.

Q: What are your major goals for the Tufts deanship?

A: In talking to people in higher education, I have heard over and over again how the current leadership team of President Larry Bacow and Provost Jamshed Bharucha is among the most dynamic and transformational leadership teams in the world of higher education. My main goal is to become part of this team, together with all the other administrators and faculty, and to work with this team to make Tufts the foremost school of its kind in the country. And I believe that it will. It positions itself uniquely as a school that balances undergraduate and graduate education, and teaching and research.

Q: At competitive colleges, many students boast about traditional measures of intelligence (SAT scores, etc.). What is your message to them? Do you hope to use this new platform to change the way people think about how we measure people?

A: Traditional measures tell us important things about students’ strengths and weaknesses. But they do not tell us all we might wish to know. Everyone can improve upon his or her performance. For example, someone who is highly analytical might wish to improve upon his or her creative skills, or someone who is highly creative might need to improve upon his or her practical skills, or someone who is highly creative might need to improve upon his or her practical skills. Our work points to ways in which these improvements can take place. Tufts prepares future leaders for America and abroad, and leaders need a variety of skills that are not all encompassed in traditional measures of abilities and achievement.

— Scott Jaschik

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