10:15 AM Breakout Sessions

​

​

​Leading through Storms: A Leader's Guide for Supporting Your Team through Uncertainty and Crisis

What does leading through uncertainty require of you? In constant change, strong leaders differentiate themselves through the quality of their response. This workshop equips participants with neuroscience-informed tools to regulate stress, think clearly, communicate with confidence, and anchor teams in values and priorities. Learn to lead strategically, build trust during disruption, and strengthen performance when outcomes remain uncertain.​

​

Create the Space: Building Women’s Leadership Communities Without Waiting for Permission

Women in higher education often seek spaces to connect, reflect, and grow as leaders, yet leadership development opportunities are not always accessible. This interactive session explores how meaningful leadership communities, from structured programs to simple “no‑lift” gatherings, can support women across career stages. Participants will leave with practical ideas and inspiration for creating leadership spaces within their own institutions.

​

Formation: Maximizing the Wait in Our Career Journey

Navigating rough waters in higher education can feel isolating and lead to self-doubt or self-silencing. This session reframes waiting seasons through an anti-deficit lens, exploring how leadership capacity develops during the in-between moments of our careers. Through reflection and dialogue, participants will examine how community, discernment, and calculated risk-taking support leaders in navigating uncertainty and reinterpreting professional turbulence as formation rather than deficiency.

​

Unloading Your Plate: Practicing Radical Care to Minimize Burnout

Women leaders in higher education often carry visible and invisible responsibilities that can lead to burnout. This interactive session explores Christina Maslach's burnout framework: emotional exhaustion, cynicism, and reduced efficacy while introducing a somatic approach to recognizing early nervous system signals of burnout. Participants will reflect on their current workloads and identify radical care practices that support sustainable leadership and well-being.

​​

Visioning New Structures: Creating Opportunity with Reorganization

How can leadership transition act as a catalyst for structural improvements? How can we maintain morale and create opportunities for advancement during this transition? Our session will address these questions through an interactive case study where we reflect upon lessons learned while restructuring the assessment team within the Office of Institutional Effectiveness and Planning at George Mason University.

​

11:15 AM Breakout Sessions

  

Leading Through Change: Building a Resilient and Mentally Healthy Higher Education Workforce

Higher education institutions are experiencing significant organizational disruption, including workforce shortages, institutional mergers, policy shifts, and growing concerns about employee burnout and mental health. Leaders across campuses are increasingly tasked with guiding their teams through uncertainty while maintaining engagement, productivity, and a healthy workplace culture. This session addresses a critical leadership challenge in higher education: navigating change.

​​

Carrying It All: Perfectionism, the Strong Black Woman Schema, and the Emotional Toll on Black Women in Higher Education

Black women in higher education are often praised for strength while quietly carrying the weight of perfectionism and racial battle fatigue. This session explores how the Strong Black Woman schema operates as a survival strategy in predominantly white institutions, and its emotional toll. Participants will examine institutional norms that reward overperformance and identify strategies to cultivate wellness-centered, affirming campus environments.

​​

Bridges, not Ladders: reflecting on 50 years of building the Virginia Network

Preview the oral history project that will be unveiled in 2027 to celebrate 50 years of the ACE Virginia Network. For decades, the Network has served as a catalyst for women’s advancement in higher education, but the stories have never been systematically collected or told. This project seeks to fill that gap by recording and preserving the lived experiences of women across generations whose professional and personal lives and trajectories have been shaped by the power of networking.

​

Leading Without Losing Yourself: Why Women Leaders Are Built for Challenging Times

Women leaders in higher education often navigate uncertainty while supporting both people and priorities, frequently in high-scrutiny environments. Drawing on experiences in sport officiating, higher education, and finance, this interactive session explores how these challenges shape resilient leadership. Participants will examine strategies to balance directive and coaching approaches while sustaining energy, wellbeing, and supportive leadership communities.

​

The Unsinkable You: Navigating Leadership and Hormones with Grace in The Mist of Seasons of Change

Explore how women leaders in higher education can remain “unsinkable” while navigating perimenopause, midlife transitions, and institutional turbulence. This interactive session offers language, strategies, and a resilience tool to sustain confidence, well-being, and authentic leadership during seasons of change.

  

2:15 PM Breakout Sessions

​

The Inner Lighthouse: Playful, Joy‑Centered Practices for Resilience in High Tides

When stress rises and clarity feels distant, resilience often comes from small, human practices. This interactive session explores play and joy as ways to stay oriented during high tides. Through reflection, metaphor, and connection, participants leave with simple practices to tend their inner lighthouse and navigate challenge with steadiness.

​

Your Kitchen Table: Building a Support Network Based on Care, Trust, and Accountability in Times of Change

In the face of constant change, women often prioritize the visions of others, tossing their own aspirations and support into the "NEVER pile". This session focuses on building "Your Kitchen Table," helping participants understand the power of navigating life with a strong support system to shift from solo survival to collective resilience. Just as a captain needs a reliable crew to weather a storm, leaders need a network built on care, trust, and accountability to stay on course.

​

Business Thinking for All Eight Core Competencies for Leading in Today’s Turbulent Higher Education Landscape

Higher education professionals operate in a time of rapid technological change, limited resources, and complex institutional systems. Whether they have studied business or not, many rely on business thinking more than they realize as they influence strategy, budgets, and student outcomes. This interactive session introduces eight core business competencies and uses a guided higher education case simulation to help participants navigate complexity, make strategic decisions, and lead change.

​​

Navigating the Journey to the Vice Presidency Through Transitions and Turbulences

This panel brings together vice presidents from diverse institutions to share personal stories of their journeys to the vice presidency, along with candid insights on navigating leadership transitions, setbacks, and uncertainty. Grounded in the theme of The Unsinkable Leader, panelists will explore resilience, purpose, and adaptability. Participants will gain practical strategies and reflect on their own leadership paths.

​

Senior Seminar Alumni and Friends
Join us for a relaxed reunion and networking session designed to reconnect past and current Senior Seminar participants, spark new connections, and celebrate the shared impact of the experience. Curious about Senior Seminar? Prospective participants are encouraged to stop by, meet alumni, and learn more about the program and application process.

​

3:15 PM Breakout Sessions

  

Supporting The Motherscholar

This study examines the experiences of Black mother scholars navigating intersecting identities within higher education. Using interviews, focus groups, and photovoice, the research explores how participants construct identity, access support, and navigate systemic barriers, including misogynoir and limited institutional resources. Findings emphasize the importance of community-building and call for more inclusive institutional practices.

 

Did You Schedule That? Leading Change Through Effective Calendar Management

Change leaders are often pulled in many directions, struggling to balance operational management, purposeful leadership, and team member development. We are often left struggling to keep up, rather than working with intention. Participants will learn to leverage the power of the calendar to maximize their effectiveness and impact. Attendees are encouraged to bring three to four weeks of their work calendar to this session (optional).

​

Navigating Rough Waters: Leadership Without Recognition

Leadership often occurs without visibility or recognition, yet it drives meaningful change. This presentation explores “invisible leadership,” particularly among women, and uses the metaphor of navigating rough waters to examine the resilience, ethical commitment, and inner strength required to lead despite structural barriers. Through an illustrative and interactive format, participants will reflect on their own experiences and explore strategies to sustain purpose and effectiveness.

​

A Solid Foundation for your Lighthouse: designing natural boundaries and efficient habits

Reclaim your time without sacrificing excellence. This session offers a tactical roadmap to manage the "always-on" workplace. Learn to master notification schedules on apps like Teams and Zoom, craft effective Out-of-Office messages that will reduce post-vacation anxiety, and learn tips to help make your To-Do list work for you. From calendar "buffer" tricks to setting digital boundaries, learn tricks to design your practical manual to silence the noise and focus on what matters.

​​

The 3-entry point model: Inspiring transformation in times of uncertainty

Discover the 3‑Entry‑Point Model, a flexible framework for leading change when teams have different levels of readiness. This session offers practical strategies and examples-like navigating generative AI or teaching after emotionally charged events-from quick, low‑barrier actions to institution‑wide approaches and guides participants in creating a personalized plan for navigating uncertainty and driving meaningful, sustainable transformation.