作者:大卫·辛普森

要让比尔·奥文斯慢下来可费了不少功夫.

A longtime professor of educational leadership at bet8体育娱乐入口, 奥文斯喜欢传达棘手的课堂概念, coaching graduate 学生 toward degrees and adding to his mountain of published books and research papers.

“高等教育是世界上最好的工作，”他说.

But late last year, an aortic aneurysm grew big enough to threaten his life. 奥因斯 had open-heart surgery in early January and has stepped back from teaching this semester as he recovers.

即便如此，事情仍在向前发展. He and his scholarly collaborator and wife, Leslie Kaplan, have another book in the works. On April 8, he won a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Education Finance Academy.

And on April 17, he’ll be the guest of honor at the Spring 2023 Provost’s Spotlight. Presented by Academic Affairs and the 教师发展中心, 活动将于下午3点半至5点举行.m. 在大学剧院举行，之后还有一个招待会.

The Provost's Spotlight is an opportunity to hear distinguished faculty members talk about their life and work in a question-and-answer format. 该活动包括奥斯汀O. Agho, 教务长兼学术事务副校长, 以及安妮特·芬利-克劳斯怀特的采访, director of the 教师发展中心 and professor of history. 

聚光灯下, 奥文斯将有机会谈论他的生活和研究, 哪个关注学校财政, 主要质量, 教师素质与学生成绩. 他近距离了解拍摄对象, 曾在公立学校当过老师, 高中校长, 助理督学和学校督学.

“Dr. William 奥因斯 has been on the forefront of our understanding of how financial resources reproduce inequality in educational systems,莎娜·普里贝什说, 教育基金会和领导力主席. “Having spent over 50 years contributing to the field of education, Dr. 奥因斯 has changed the day-to-day lives of principals and school division leaders, 还有学生和家庭, 通过他的研究和专业服务.”

奥因斯, 谁6月1日退休, answered a few questions from ODU 网站登录 ahead of the Provost’s Spotlight. 以下对话内容已经过编辑.

首先我应该问:你好吗?

现代医学是个奇迹. 我不知道你们对主动脉瘤了解多少. 主动脉是人体内最大的动脉, 当你得了动脉瘤, 就像气球里的弱点. They had to replace 3 inches of the ascending aorta that carried the two major arteries that go one to the right side of your brain and one to the left side of your brain. And then they had to replace the aortic valve because it was leaking, 因为所有东西都被放大了. So our 9-year-old grandson said, “Grandpa, what are they going to do to you?我说, “他们要做的是切除我的一部分主动脉, sew in a nice piece of garden hose and then stick two straws in, one that goes up to the right side of my brain and one that goes to the left side of my brain, 并更换阀门. 他说:“哦，就这些?"

这就是你内心的老师. 你知道如何简单明了地解释事情.

我就是这么告诉我的博士的.D. 学生. 我主持过30篇论文, 当他们交初稿的时候, 他们用的都是50美分的词. The object of a good dissertation is not to prove that you are smarter than a fifth-grader. The object is to explain a complicated issue in a way that a fifth-grader can understand. 我就是这么跟他们说的，到目前为止都很有效. 在这30人中, I've had three dissertation winners of the year – one from the American Educational 研究 Association and two from the National Education Finance Academy.

是什么让你选择了教育?

我一开始是医学院预科生. 我想成为一名牙医. 我父母去找了一个叫. Manuel in Baltimore, and he would let me stay with him while my parents went shopping. He let me mix up the amalgam, the mercury and the silver for fillings. As an elementary school student, to have a dentist say, “Hey, you want to help me?-我说:“我真的很喜欢这个。.“如果病人允许，我就得呆在那里. 我们研究了它们，然后我想，“哇，这太酷了. All you do is drill holes, fill it with this junk and make money.” But somehow the peace movement and all that stuff touched me, 我说, “我可以一颗牙一颗地让世界变得更美好. But I can make the world a better place one classroom at a time in education, 与牙齿相比，这将产生指数效应.” And so I changed over to an English major because I'm one of those weird folks who like science and numbers as much as I like literature and history.

你的教学理念是什么?

我是认知建构主义者. I think what you do is build on previous learning and get 学生 to become really involved and interested and see their relevance to what you are trying to teach, 并在这个过程中建立关系. Without those, if the 学生 don't know that you really care, THEY don't care. 也, 我在教学中融入幽默, 因为当你说, OK, 我们讨论的是财务和数字, 人们会说“啊啊啊啊”!” So I think it's important to infuse humor so that they don't get afraid of what you're going to teach.

谈谈你的妻子在你的学术生活中扮演的角色.

我和妻子是一个团队. I would say the largest percentage of the articles that I've written have been with her. All the books that we've written, 17 books and more than 70 articles, we've done together. 还有我的博士学位.D. 学生 is I have them meet with me one or two times before their dissertation proposal defense where they have to go through a whole process, and then they do their proposal defense in front of Leslie and me so that there's another set of eyes for unanticipated questions that I might have overlooked. 莱斯利从威廉获得博士学位 & 玛丽, and she was an English teacher like I was – building-level principal, administrator and district-level administrator before she retired in 2006 – and she's been writing full time with me. 这就是所有这些文章和书籍的来源. 但他们的论文答辩也是一样. 学生们和我见了两次面, and then they meet with the two of us four or five more times to do their dissertation defense in front of us. 所以他们对每一门课都做了充分的准备.

ODU对你意味着什么?

ODU让我成为了一名学者. They've helped support me in my research, in my conference presentations. 说实话，他们让我一个人去做. There were very few folks looking over my shoulder saying, “Oh, well, why are you doing it like this?“你知道，微观管理. I was producing results, and I was totally supported and left alone. 我真的，真的很感激.

你的退休计划是什么?

我要花更多的时间和我妻子一起写作. 我觉得我们 做出贡献. 我觉得我们做得很好，我也很喜欢.