Provost's Spotlight: Justin Haegele

Professor Justin Haegele is a scholar of adapted physical activity, a relatively new interdisciplinary field in which he has become a leader since receiving his Ph.D. from The Ohio State University in 2015. Professor Haegele has published over 265 articles in prestigious peer-reviewed journals and won over $10 million in grant funding. He is also the President of the North American Federation of Adapted Physical Activity and the Editor-in- Chief of the peer-reviewed publications Quest (the official journal of the National Association of Kinesiology in Higher Education) and Adapted Physical Activity Quarterly.

Dr. Tammi Dice, Dean of the Darden College of Education & Professional Studies states, “Dr. Justin Haegele is an outstanding faculty member who has excelled in every area of the academy. He provides exceptional teaching and mentorship to his students, cutting-edge and transformative research in his field, and meaningful public service. His publication record is inspiring, with well over 200 peer-reviewed manuscripts and multiple books and book chapters. Beyond this, he is a caring, inclusive individual, ready to advocate for what is right.”

On November 4, 2024, Interim Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs, Brian Payne, will welcome Professor Haegele into the Provost’s Spotlight to discuss his impressive scholarship, dedication to teaching, and some of his life experiences. The event will be held in the Yetiv Auditorium in the Batten College of Arts and Letters from 3:30PM-4:30PM with a reception following the discussion.

If you have never attended the Provost’s Spotlight before, the series was founded by former Provost and current Chief Integration Officer & Senior Advisor to President Hemphill, Austin Agho, in 2017. The Provost's Spotlight is a forum highlighting the accomplishments of Old Dominion University faculty by offering the opportunity to speak with them about their scholarship, motivation, challenges, backgrounds, and personal interests. Interim Provost Payne has decided enthusiastically to continue the series.

Ahead of the Provost’s Spotlight, Prof. Haegele answered a few questions from the Center for Faculty Development.

Please tell us about your field of "adapted physical activity." What is it, when was it founded, and how would you describe it?

Let’s first start with the definition that our International Federation of Adapted

Physical Activity (IFAPA) uses:

Adapted physical activity (APA) is a professional branch of kinesiology/physical education/sport & human movement sciences, which is directed toward persons who require adaptation for participation in the context of physical activity. From a sport science perspective, “Adapted physical activity science is research, theory and practice directed toward persons of all ages underserved by the general sport sciences, disadvantaged in resources, or lacking power to access equal physical activity opportunities and rights. APA services and supports are provided in all kinds of settings. Thus, research, theory and practice relate to the needs and rights in inclusive as well as separate APA programs” (Sherrill & Hutzler, 2008).”

The field emerged in the late 1970s and early 1980s, with the founding of the Adapted Physical Activity Quarterly and the IFAPA (the international organization). I situate myself in the field of adapted physical activity broadly, and then within adapted physical education more specifically. My background is in schools, and much of the research I do started in Adapted Physical Education (APE), although, I have expanded quite a bit. APE could be defined as individualized or specialized physical education specifically designed for people with disabilities. It is mandated under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) in the United States.

How did you "reincarnate" ODU's Ph.D. program in health and sport pedagogy and how has the program grown since then. Can you give us some program highlights (i.e. how successful have your graduates have been?

I don't think I ‘reincarnated’ ODU's Ph.D. program in health and sport pedagogy. Dr. Xihe Zhu and I re-opened the program in 2016, after it had been dormant for some time. Initially, we had two students in 2016, with the idea that we could grow the program due to some gaps in what was available around the country. Today, our program has about 10 scholars.

One of the ways we have been able to be successful with the program is that many of the students focus within Adapted Physical Education, where there are limited (maybe 8-10) possible programs across the country. At one point (last year), ODU had one of the largest APE focused programs in the US. (We had 8 APE focused Ph.D., students at one time last year).

We have been successful with federal grant funding. In 2019, we were a subcontract, and I was the Co-PI, on a $6.3 million grant from the United States Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) to develop a national consortium to train doctoral scholars. This group was charged with training 28 scholars across 8 schools. We ended up recruiting nearly 36 scholars total, with six receiving training here at ODU. In 2022, we were lucky again and are now the lead on a $3.75 million OSEP grant where we are heading a group of three universities to train 15 scholars in APE. We have 5 here at ODU

(plus 1 departmentally funded scholar).

Thus far, I have had 6 scholars graduate from our program, each of which are tenure track faculty. Here is the list.

• Nicole Kirk (2019): University of Georgia.
• Steve Holland (2021): Norwegian University of Science and Technology
• Katie Holland (2021): Norwegian University of Science and Technology
• Ally Keene (2024): Elizabeth City State University
• Lindsey Nowland (2024): California State University, San Bernardino
• Lindsay Ball (2024): SUNY, Cortland

These new faculty have all gone to successful careers, and I’m quite proud of having been a part of their journeys while they were here (and now, beyond). I currently advise six students (Monica Klock, Shelly Beaver, Sheyla Martinez Rivera, Kat Creveling, Michihito Ichihara, and Baillie Ollila).

Please discuss the importance of the Center for Movement, Health & Disability (CMHD) at Old Dominion University.

That’s a tough question. I don’t think we’ve realized the importance of this yet, as it is still new. But I believe it has allowed us to do more. By that, I mean that it has helped us organize all the work that we're doing, whether through Ph.D. training, service provision, or research, and communicate that to the community (academic, local, national, international). I think that the CMHD has helped us, as well, to talk to funders or gift givers about what could be possible and what we can help to do for people with disabilities.

For me, part of this is being able to highlight the various programs that we've supported over the years, such as Camp Webber, REACH, Mighty Monarchs, which are each programs designed to support physical activity or recreation for youth with disabilities. We also know that we have the resources and support to start new programs as they are needed. For example, we are currently planning to launch a new program in the community shortly (tentatively called Monarchs Move) which is being developed by Baillie Ollilia, one of our new Ph.D. students. Any youth with any disability will be able to come and participate.

I think the CMHD also helps us to extend to new possibilities through our scholarship and collaborations with other Centers and research faculty. There are so many opportunities.

How did you come to edit the foundational journal in this field?

Currently I'm the editor of two academic journals in my field, Quest (the official journal of the National Association of Kinesiology in Higher Education) and Adapted Physical Activity Quarterly (the top journal in APA). For each, I was an

associate editor for several years, and then was afforded the opportunity to edit them after the previous editors stepped down.

How do you define "inclusion" and use it in your discipline? The word, as you say in your publications, has become such a "buzzword" and one we use at the Center for Faculty Development frequently. How does your work with children with disabilities expand that term to include intersubjective experiences and offer spaces where disabled children's voices can be heard?

This is a good question, and one that likely I cannot answer in a short paragraph. In a recent publication, we work to reconceptualize inclusion as an intersubjective experience characterized by feelings of acceptance, belonging, and value had by the person. That is, one cannot be told they are being included, one must feel included (hence, the subjectivity). We recognize in our field, and many others, the word inclusion is used often without clear definitions or as a buzzword to help communicate a message (similar to equity, belonging, etc). For us, saying the word inclusion is not enough, nor is simply putting people in the same physical or material space. Rather, it is the way that people feel within those spaces that is important. Hence, we've (with Anthony Maher, mostly) been writing about concepts of inclusion (and exclusion) as intersubjective feelings or experiences to extend inclusion beyond just a parochial material space and toward caring about and understanding feelings.

This work grew from an overall interest in speaking with disabled people about their experiences within various education contexts (starting in PE) and learning that although they are in the same space, they oftentimes have marginalizing or oppressive experiences. This, to me, challenged ideas of 'inclusion', since that was my limited understanding of the term at the time. That is, how can someone have a poor experience in a setting that is supposed to be 'inclusive'. The problem was, clearly, the definition of the term and our obsession with the concept of putting people together (without really knowing or thinking about how people experienced those settings).

As a SCHEV winner, do you have any specific advice for new tenure-track faculty that might help them be successful?

Over the years that I’ve been here, I've learned that success is different for each person. What I do is not what I consider successful, and I don't think what I've done is more important or successful than others. I also don't think I would have a chance to do half the stuff I've done at ODU without working with Xihe Zhu and Katelyn Makovec. These two are far more important to our program than I'll ever be. With that, I think that new people need to know that most things are possible at ODU. The support is (or can be) there, but new faculty need to do it. That is, they need to come in and do the work, it won't happen for them.