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IGI Global's Outstanding Scholars Program honors editors and authors of exemplary merit, encouraging discoverability and connecting researchers with the greater global community

IGI Global Speaks with Dennis Keefe, Winner of the Outstanding Scholar Research Award

By IGI Global on Jul 7, 2016

In an effort to support the esteemed researchers and faculty members associated with IGI Global publications, IGI Global has implemented the Outstanding Scholars Program. This program honors editors and authors of outstanding merit, encouraging discoverability and connecting researchers with the greater global community. These scholars are the driving force behind modern research innovation and academic inquiry; trailblazers of technological advancement and development. By recognizing these individuals for their commendable work and effort, IGI Global seeks to continue in their mission of disseminating knowledge to the worldwide academic community.

As a result of his extensive work in the area of Adult Education, IGI Global is pleased to honor Dennis Keefe of Florida Atlantic University with the Outstanding Scholars Research Award. Mr. Keefe recently took a few moments to speak with IGI Global on his ongoing research and publishing experience.

Tell us about yourself. How did you become involved with IGI Global?

I became a Presidential Scholar at Florida Atlantic University, and started working as the Graduate Assistant of IGI Global Editor and author Dr. Victor C.X. Wang. Since my focus is Adult and Community Education, Dr. Wang referred me to a number of articles in the field. Some of those articles were in publications by IGI Global.

Why do you choose IGI Global as your publisher?

Above all, I try to study as much as I can a given topic, and then after doing research, I write about it. IGI casts a wide net, and is a good place for many of us in Adult Education.

You have contributed to the publications of one of IGI Global’s most acclaimed editors and fellow Outstanding Scholar, Dr. Victor C. X. Wang. How did you become associated with Dr. Wang?

I followed Dr. Wang from China, so to speak! While teaching at Nanjing University and at Johns Hopkins in China, I started to wonder about getting a PhD in the field of Adult Education. First, I scanned the available programs in the USA and Canada, and then I found that there was a professor in Florida that not only had a large number of publications in the field of Adult Education, but who was also from China. Having lived abroad for 30 years, mostly in Europe, and some seven years or so in China, I realized how important it was for me to have a professor who was pretty much bicultural. And to be bicultural in both the American and Chinese milieus is what I was looking for in a professor from whom to learn.

That said, Dr. Wang is arguably among the most valuable contributors to Adult Education, especially when we take a global focus. There are way too few Adult Educators that combine his binational experience and his dedication to the field -- not to mention his ability to bring a variegated field of scholars from all walks of life into academic publications. Americans are very much isolated by their use of just one language, English, and their provincial focus. Dr. Wang introduced me to the historical links of Transformative Learning and the teachings of Confucius. Adult Education in the USA needs to connect to history and to other cultures. Dr. Wang is in a good position to do this.

Tell us about your academic work in education. What are some exciting accomplishments you’ve experienced in your work in teaching?

Regarding academics, I can honestly say that the only thing that interests me is learning how to serve older learners better. Grades do not count much for me, nor publications for that matter. For many people, they are excited about publishing in this or that academic journal. My question is not did I publish, but rather what did I learn, and what will others learn from what I write. I guest in my first two years at FAU, I had some six publications related to education, including one in the Adult Education Quarterly, but truth be told, I am much more excited by the work that I publish outside of academia, and outside of the world of English. For example, during the same time I managed to get six academic publications, I did a dozen articles for magazines published in the Netherlands, Sweden, Russia and Hungary – all in Esperanto – sometimes about learning and language instructions; sometimes about marketing and social movements.

I read that you were invited to present at Chautauqua last year. Can you give readers more information about that exciting opportunity?

Chautauqua was a wonderful experience. It came about because in the first course that I took with Dr. Wang, I became fascinated with the historical aspect of Adult Learning along with the theory of Adult Learning motivation of Boshier. Well, Dr. Wang liked my paper, asked me to make a couple of improvements, and then he sent it off for a blind review. I was pleasantly surprised that the reviewers liked my paper, and finally Dr. Wang published it.

Naturally, some of my research took me to contact Chautauqua directly, and they also read my paper, and then invited me to Chautauqua to teach a class and to help give a Heritage Lecture. They put me in the guest lecture house, and it was nice to meet Roger Cohen of the New York Times, who was speaking about European relations, and many others including a Pulitzer Prize winner, and even the chief of the Obama White House staff photographers. That said, Chautauqua is a nice place for adults to learn if you are well-to-do, but I am much more concerned about the rest of us, the 99% so to speak, who have, beyond the age of retirement, along with physical, social and spiritual needs, a desire to learn intellectually, and that all the way up to the age of 100!

How can other academics maximize the exposure of their research and publications? What resources are required?

For me, the first thing the academic must do is learn, learn, learn. And this means to read, to think and to write. So first, the artist must do his best at his painting or craft, then, with time, others may discover the value of his or her work if it is good. Such is the case of Van Gogh, for example. First, do the work, then publish. The resources are books and articles and conference presentations, but not only. In my first two years at FAU, I not only did one week of teaching and research at Chautauqua, I also went to the Highlander Folk School, doing archival research. In one summer, I visited Adult Education centers in Europe, including schools for adults in Spain, the Greta organization in France, the Frankfurt School in Germany, as well as the huge adult learning distance learning center called FernUniversitaet in Hagen (Just to note, I speak six languages, including Spanish, French and German – so I do my “field work” in the language of the locals which is important if you really want to understand Adult Education in Europe). Those are resources. Experience and theoretical study make a nice combination.

Dennis Keefe came to pursue his PHD in Adult Education in Florida after working in top European and Chinese universities for 30 years. He also taught for University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign, and Johns Hopkins, and has taught Marketing in 4 languages. He is well-versed in 6 languages. He has successfully connected Adult and Continuing Education with other branches of education and other fields including Business and Management, Leadership, Engineering and Medical Sciences, Vocational and STEM Education. Outside academia, Dennis has served as a manager and director for agencies such as IBM.

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