I can think of no other faculty member across our campus who is more qualified to assume the position of Faculty Executive Director of CIEL than Sarah Williams.

– Tayloe Harding, Dean, USC School of Music

The USC School of Music is lending one of its professors to Academic Affairs during the next three years. 

Sarah Williams, professor of music history, has been appointed Faculty Executive Director of Center for Integrative and Experiential Learning (CIEL), formerly USC Connect. In this role, Williams will work with faculty and staff to develop integrative and experiential learning opportunities for students. She will also coordinate efforts across Columbia and the four Palmetto College Campuses (Lancaster, Salkehatchie, Sumter and Union).

CIEL promotes student opportunities to engage beyond the classroom and synthesize and apply learning across experiences. Graduation with Leadership Distinction is the Center’s signature program and recognizes students for significant engagement and learning, including leadership through solution-oriented thinking. 

Williams, who specializes in early modern (c. 1580-1650) English music and culture — including seventeenth-century popular music, theatrical music and broadside balladry — personally knows the impact of CIEL.

“I have directly benefited from CIEL’s grant programs including a collaborative unit grant which funded a digital exhibit I created with University Libraries called Singing the Archives, and rolling grants that allowed me to increase the accessibility of my MUSC353 (History of Western Music I) as a Museum Learning Course by providing transportation so everyone could visit the Columbia Museum of Art during class time,” says Williams. “I’ve seen firsthand through these CIEL-funded projects how beyond-the-classroom experiences help my students create complex connections between their lived experiences and abstract concepts. The research backs my anecdotal observations up as well: high-impact practices like beyond-the-classroom engagements increase graduation and retention rates, community involvement and overall student success.”

She says she is excited to advocate for experiential learning on a larger scale as director.

“My goals include expanding Graduation with Leadership Distinction (GLD) and experiential learning opportunities and best practices for the Palmetto College campuses and graduate students. As a faculty member in the School of Music, I feel I’m uniquely suited to be able to advocate for GLD and experiential learning grant programs for undergraduates and faculty because of the leading work we do in the School of Music with community engagement and public scholarship,” adds Williams.

Williams begins work with the Center for Integrative and Experiential Learning immediately after May graduation, joining a staff that includes an associate director and student program advisors. 

“I can think of no other faculty member across our campus who is more qualified to assume the position of Faculty Executive Director of CIEL than Sarah Williams. She possesses a deep understanding of the purposes, reach, and impact of experiential learning on student achievement, and a natural inclination towards faculty initiative and involvement as it relates to all kinds of student engagement. I am delighted but not surprised that she was selected as CIEL’s next Faculty Executive Director,” says Tayloe Harding, Dean, USC School of Music.