Frameworks for Increasing Competence in Student Affairs

Infusing Daring Greatly into our Practice of Caring Greatly

Dan

There’s a lot of talk about transforming student affairs practice – we need to move the needle from routine to impactful. At the recent ACPA conference we were challenged to dare greatly  – a concept I believe in and feel compelled to act on. While our field has been taught to CARE greatly – convey a sense of compassion and empathy for the students with whom we work – I’m not sure the general field of student affairs is ready to DARE greatly. Collectively, I believe:

We’re not doing enough to demonstrate our contributions.

We’re not doing enough to end negative behaviors.

We’re not doing enough to create a work/life balance that makes sense.

I wonder what needs to happen to move the needle. What would make student affairs practitioners capture the moment and dare greatly?

Don’t get me wrong. Lots of people are doing amazing things: Changing lives and influencing students. People are trying to make a difference. This isn’t a condemnation, but rather an examination of what could change if we aim to dare greatly versus only care greatly.

Daring greatly might mean taking some of the following risks to become better professionals in this important field:

Using assessment to influence our work and infusing tactics to collect evidence of our contributions. We’d spend less time on hoping we’re making an impact and more time on finding ways to determine so as a natural part of our work. Our advising and helping tactics would infuse assessment into them, asking common questions, documenting our answers, using themes to determine strategies for improvement. We would take the leap to transform our work, all the while still conveying care and commitment.

Using different approaches to issues of alcohol, drugs, hazing, etc. Students know it’s against the law – who cares. How about we get more creative and talk about the way these things undermine our relationships. Students seem to like each other by and large – there is some level of care there – maybe appealing to a sense of compassion for others might move the needle to end extreme and negative behaviors. We’d teach students how to take the risk. We’d support them through their enactment of the interventions we developed together.

Being more intentional with how we approach our work. We don’t need to be everything to every student. We need to convey care and concern. We need to handle their needs, but we do not need to lose ourselves as we seek to help them find the answers. Most life/work balance issues I’ve seen come as a result of caring greatly – certainly not a bad quality in a human being – but when we dare greatly, the way we demonstrate care may change.

So many good people work in student affairs. There is such a commitment to helping students. However, for us to dare greatly, we must be clear that our frameworks for practice must change. We must make progress on the things that we continue to push to the margins and we have to figure out ways to move the needle from routine to extraordinary. As we focus on change of our environment, we too will change. We’ll become more competent at demonstrating care while also daring students and ourselves to be all that we can be.

The Ongoing Search for Student Affairs Competence: Becoming the Well-Rounded Student Affairs Professional

Dan

The search for competence: it’s the framework I have used for this blog since its inception just over a year ago. The ongoing quest to be our best is a part of a career in student affairs. Through the simple search for competence we actually can become better and more confident in our work.When we become better we are more equipped to serve our students. The best student affairs professionals I know put students first, but they don’t sacrifice their own learning: they are deeply committed to ongoing professional engagement and development.

However, I believe that the majority of student affairs professionals do not focus on developing the entire set of skills and prefer often to focus on only a few at a time (and possibly only a few at all). I am convinced that our pursuit to be really good at one thing will ultimately be a downfall in modern-day student affairs work. We can’t afford for you to rock at advising when your understanding of legal issues is dismal. We can’t afford for you to be a great supervisor but have zero concern with assessment of your programs.

Student affairs is an ironic field: those who come into the field through a student affairs preparation program, are typically taught to be generalists but new professionals often go into functional area positions that are specialists such as residence life, advising, fraternity/sorority life, and career development. While our generalist skills might come in handy now and then, we default to what defines us as specialists: advising residents in your learning community, helping students schedule their classes, aiding leaders in managing complex organizations, and counseling students as they determine potential career paths. We focus so much on specific skills that those we don’t (or choose not to) use routinely just go by the wayside. The best athletes practice all parts of their game and work all parts of their bodies – therefore, shouldn’t the best student affairs professionals practice every part of ours?

Enhancing our competence in all areas of student affairs work requires an intention that many student affairs professionals lack: as we are so responsive to the demands of our students, we often forget to take the time to determine pathways for strengthening our competence and confidence in all the skills necessary to student affairs work. We are not bad professionals for this, in fact if the metrics that people around us care about is how accessible we are to students, then you might be perceived well; however, are you truly developing the competence you need to interact with all of those students? What skills would make you even better at serving your students?

Well-rounded student affairs professionals are important to our field. We have to create environments in which all staff are clear that expertise in an area is good but some level of understanding in all areas is expected.

At the University of Memphis, we have been intentional about creating a framework for ongoing professional development. All training sessions tie back to the ACPA/NASPA Professional Competency areas. Next week we will have our annual Spring Break Professional Development Challenge; participants are encouraged to take part in as many sessions as they can fit into their week (it is spring break) and each session addresses at least one of the 10 professional competencies. I love this week and almost 40 of our staff must also appreciate the opportunity because they have signed up for at least one training!

It’s our hope that this intention will help our staff realize what they know now, what they need to know, and how they can fill the gaps between what they are expected to do and their current skill set. To help others, I have highlighted those I find to be most engaged in their work and ongoing professional development in our weekly newsletter. We can all learn from examples and aspire to be like those who are the most focused on high levels of professional engagement and ongoing development.

We also have developed an individualized professional development plan, using the Competency areas, that can be used to help staff figure out how to accomplish their professional goals. The value of professional development has become an ethos here: coming down from our VPSA, through her AVPs and permeating the director/associate dean level.

Personally, I believe we can do even more! I’d love to see all staff be held accountable for demonstrating at least the basic level of the ACPA/NASPA Competency areas. What if we had to prove annually that we worked on one attribute within the  basic level of each competency area? What if our work was evaluated on our demonstration of each competency level? It would require a high level of intentionality and we’d be laser focused on being the best we can be in order to make a difference in the lives of students. We have to be more intentional to become the well-rounded student affairs professional we are needed in modern day higher education.

What are your professional goals? What competencies do you need to work on to reach your goals? How would you rate yourself in each of the 10 Professional Competencies?

Sometimes change sticks, and sometimes it hangs there for a bit and slides down the wall

Dan

When spaghetti is ready it will stick on the wall. When it’s not, it just slides down, indicating to the chef that more time is needed. It’s an interesting analogy to the concept of change.

Change happens all the time. Each of us are likely engaged in some change effort right now. I’ve led some change initiatives and have been fortunate to be involved in lots of discussions that involve “making a change”. I tend to like change.

However, change can be really uncomfortable, particularly when people don’t know all the facts. Those in the highest positions are trying new things – seeing what sticks. Leaders have good intentions to be transparent – discussing issues, positing approaches, suggesting systemic change approaches. Transparency is by and large the best tactic…BUT, people read into messages and decisions. Sometimes transparency breeds speculation, particularly in times of significant change.

The rest of us are asked to respond to ideas that might come across as etched in stone when they’re nothing more than a passing conversation between two people who have decision power. When ideas are thrown out there they have implications as people struggle to work through logistics of implementing new and different ideas only to find out days (maybe hours) later that it was only an idea. Those tasked with implementing the change ideas are going to spend a lot of time answering the questions of nervous staff who feel threatened or at risk. It’s obvious that saying “give it some time and we’ll know for sure” is not an effective spin strategy.

It’s almost like we need some way to know what’s a change that is sticking and what is a change that is up for discussion. Perceptions of idea traction can be deceiving. Really, we should just assume that nothing is finalized until someone says it is.

What we all should take from change initiatives is that leaders are looking to address financial, structural, political and other forces that are at play. Those things keep happening around us and leaders must respond by indicating they are working toward improvements and change. Problem is that the rest of us have to take a wait and see or hold on tight while we change directions yet again.

How do you perceive change? What aspects make you feel uncomfortable? When have you seen change stick well?

How Professional Association Conferences Give Me Life and Drain the Hell Out of Me

Dan

I attended my 18th Association of Fraternity/Sorority Advisors Annual Meeting in December. I’ve written previously about  how attendance at a functional area association, even one outside of my day to day work and after 18 years of work in student affairs, is still an opportunity to learn about good work in the field of student affairs. In addition to learning, professional and personal relationships I’ve developed through AFA give me a sense of belonging and hope.

All of this aside, professional associations also drain me and give me cause to worry about our field. Here’s how one experience can both enriching and draining all at the same time.

Learning: I attend conferences to learn. I do this in three ways: attend sessions, facilitate sessions, and connect with colleagues to talk about issues. Student affairs association conferences, for the most part, tend to have good content and good facilitators doing the work. I always feel like I’m learning, even in sessions that might be “routine” for me. I have a learning orientation, but….

Not everyone does. Student affairs professionals must realize that we are not at conferences to vacation. Resources are put behind us to participate: Time away from work, money from the dwindling higher education budgets, etc. If I could change one thing about how people approach their time at professional conferences it would be that everyone would recognize this need to learn and then teach others. Additionally, no matter how much fun you have or how many relationships you want to nurture (for personal and professional reasons), attending sessions is tantamount. It is not in question: you go to things, you participate in learning for some significant period of time each day at the conference and then you share what you learned with others upon return.

Relationships: I attend conferences to maintain and nurture relationships. These are  professional and personal and often both. I appreciate those who have mentored and supported me and I try to pass that on to others. I enjoy time talking through issues. I enjoy time at dinner. At the bar. I enjoy time exercising before sessions start. I truly enjoy these relationships, but….

These relationships can be draining: some are terrific and there’s not so much an issue with the relationship but more about the time spent nurturing them. Staying up all night hanging with friends is something that’s particularly challenging if I also want to prioritize my learning. I have to figure out how to spend better time with people rather than less. There are also some relationships I need to spend time on repairing and some that I need to let go of – not for any reason other than I can’t be everything to everyone. My best self never shows up in that scenario.

Because I value supporting others, I find that I spend a lot of time at AFA in particular, but at any conference, I want to mentor and support. This means lots of hallway conversations, coffee and lunch meetings, fitting in discussions between sessions or at dinner, the bar, etc. I won’t stop doing this BUT it is time away from some of my prioritized relationships; can I support others while being supported myself?

Drama: Associations come with drama (don’t even get me started on the ACPA/NASPA consolidation matter) and AFA is no stranger to this. It’s particularly salient in AFA because (1) we’re a relationship oriented function, (2) not everyone plays nice together in the sandbox, and (3) for me, I’ve been so engaged in so many ways that I traverse in different circles, know different things, etc.

I see nothing valuable about unfounded drama. Sometimes the conversations that result from discussions (i.e. the never ending perception of an in/out crowd in professional associations, members’ perceptions of how leaders are doing) can be powerful, rewarding, learning experiences, but…

I have to step away from the drama. I often think I’m not immersed in it, but I become immersed because I respond to it. Because I value relationships, I want to ensure that all have the right information and we all know drama comes from perceptions that something isn’t right and that someone wasn’t involved or didn’t have the right information.

I also wonder if the drama continues to suck the life out of the relationships, how can we make progress? How can we move beyond territory and ownership to shared goals? Prevalent in AFA and any association, this is a real problem in student affairs: are we always truly about the right things or do we let personal hangups influence our work?

So, what does this mean for me and how can someone take this and use it for their own association experience:

1. If I am focused on learning, how can I do this in a way that doesn’t exhaust me. I am less willing to compromise the learning orientation but I also may need to be less involved in creating the learning experiences. Maybe going to sessions or facilitating one or two sessions rather than facilitating five is a good idea for me.

2. If I am focused on relationships, what do I need to do to prioritize the ones that matter most, incorporate opportunities for mentoring and relationship building, and minimize the time spent in interactions that may be valuable/important but not priorities? How can I ensure relationship building occurs and still get enough sleep to prioritize learning?

3. If I am focused too much on drama, or fixing perceptions, I get wrapped up in the things that drain me the most. My investment in professional associations is meaningful and I demonstrate care through my contributions. However, I can’t change the perception of all persons and I need to determine when I have crossed the line between getting involved in meaningful discussions about the future of an organization and the experiences of members and that of being dragged down into drama ridden, mean or spiteful. and often uninformed conversations.

We’ll see how I do. I don’t get as invested in ACPA or NASPA issues and tend to focus my learning and relationship orientations pretty well there. I imagine trying out this new balancing approach to engagement in professional associations, specifically their conferences, will end up with lots of hiccups rather than perfection, but I am committed to trying.

What are your experiences like in professional associations? How do you engage at conferences? What do you love and hate about these organizations?

Evolving to Practitioner/Scholar

Dan

Today I sat in on a friend and colleague’s dissertation defense. He did a great job and is now Dr! However, of all his responses today, the one that stood out to me was less about his research and more about his evolution as a student affairs professional.

When he was asked how the process of pursuing the PhD changed him, he indicated that he set out to do the degree because he wanted to move up in the field, eventually becoming a VP. However, while that might still be a professional goal, he explained that the pursuit of the EdD has helped him be more in the moment with his current work as a director. Even more importantly, he described how the doctoral pursuit helped him rethink approaches to work, making him more focused on doing his work BETTER. He explained that better meant more data driven and using the framework of research to approach how he conducts his practice.

He will now listen to conversations differently – as a researcher. The pursuit of the dissertation is about the research but it’s also about how you become better at what it is you plan to do. You do the dissertation to inform your current and future approaches to research, teaching, or general professional practice. It’s nice to hear how this process changed him and how it will inform who he is now and who he becomes. It was nice to see how what began as a means to an end became a lesson in how to approach the present.

How do you frame your work?

How has the pursuit of additional knowledge through pursuit of advanced degrees or participation in professional development activities influenced your approach to work in student affairs?

 

What student affairs professionals can learn from the series finale of Breaking Bad

Dan

Since last night’s finale, I’ve had Breaking Bad on the mind. It may be one of the best television shows I have ever watched. When I was driving to work this a.m. I was thinking of all I had to do this week and then my mind went back to Breaking Bad. At some point this morning, it occurred to me that some of the lessons from the series finale can be applied to student affairs. Mild spoilers are included, but nothing too revealing.

1. Deliver on your promises without compromise. Throughout the season, Vince Gilligan (creator, writer) has promised to wrap up stories in a way that would be satisfying. The series finale did this and there’s really no unanswered questions remaining. It occurred to me that this is similar to how we should approach annual planning, reporting and assessment processes. As we develop goals as departments and divisions, we should ensure these goals drive our work (much as resolution drove Gilligan to write the finale as he did). Realizing these goals and documenting the processes used is a vital part of demonstrating leadership in student affairs work.

2. Examine why it is you do this work (and determine to what extent that’s ok). Without giving too much away, Walter makes a confession to his wife – he had justified his “work” because it was for his family. Last night, he admitted it was because it made him feel alive and valued. Why do you do student affairs work? Is it because you define yourself through how students value you? Or is it because you aim to add value to the lives of students? There’s a difference. Consider your personal foundations, what drives you to do this work?

3. There is calm after the storm. Two episodes prior to the finale (Ozymandias), the world comes undone for Walter and other characters. It was arguably the best hour of the show I have watched. However, the final two episodes don’t live up to the pace or drama of Ozymandias (though PARTS of the finale feel as edge of your seat awesome). During these two episodes things were wrapped up, relationships were examined, Walt went into and came out of hiding, etc. The pace was different and I think many audience members may have felt let down. Well, we shouldn’t.

Many of us who work in student affairs take a breath after a large scale event and to some extent we might miss the activity and interactions around the event. What we should do is come to value the times when we are not driven by someone else’s agenda and develop our own – get caught up on other projects, develop reports, document program successes. All things we can do better in our student affairs work.

I believe we can learn a lot from a show like Breaking Bad (not to mention the anti-drug campaigns that are very helpful). I think pop culture teaches us about who were are and allows us to reflect on what we should and could do. What are lessons you’ve learned from Breaking Bad? Other shows? Music? How do you apply those in your work?

 

 

What are Effective Practices for Professional Development in Student Affairs?

Dan

For the last nine months, I’ve asked a lot of questions.

For our Division of Student Affairs, I develop a monthly professional development newsletter. Since our October 2012 edition, one of the recurring columns are to highlight stories of “workplace engagement and professional development”. I interview someone each month and ask them three basic questions: what does it look like to be successful in your job? Why do you value professional development? What are the approaches you are currently taking to professional development.? I have also conducted interviews with staff here at the University of Memphis who I identify having a high level of confidence and competence in each of the ACPA/NASPA Core Competencies. I featured these interviews in the February 2013 newsletter. From these 16 interviews since October, I have heard three common themes about how our staff demonstrates commitment to good work and professional development.

1. Good work requires one to go the extra mile and engage others in a shared goal.

2. Professional development is important because it helps us to be better in our work. It has personal benefits as well but ultimately the commitment we give to learning and improving in student affairs is because we want to be better facilitators of student success.

3. People engage in a range of professional development activities. Conversations with colleagues, serving on campus committees, and reading articles about specific competencies they wish to develop was as important as attending a conference. Additionally, such approaches are more sustainable and can have more frequent benefits.

These findings aren’t surprising to me. In my dissertation I identified professional development was a value of graduate students entering student affairs. Others such as Darby Roberts, Stan Carpenter and Steve Janosik have also explained some of these approaches to professional development. So, why does this matter when it’s already been established?

It matters because it happens here. It matters because my colleagues are committed. It matters because a place I love to work has an ethos of being better. I may have just reinforced the obvious, but it wasn’t “known” here. It’s important that we continue to ask the questions about what good work looks like and why and how we prioritize professional development. When we do that, we create a culture of being better. That’s an environment in which I really enjoy spending my time.

Discovering Your MOOC: For What Would YOU Want to be Known?

Dan

I spent the last four days as a fellow at the Interfraternity Institute. I was tasked with helping participants make sense of their experiences and facilitating dialogue in small groups. However, I learned a lot and a lot that while influencing fraternities and sororities are really issues of higher education and student affairs.

Allen Groves, the dean of students at University of Virginia, did a session on issues in higher education. He focused significantly on issues such as the financial climate (so little money), legal issues (so much documentation), and the press towards increasing opportunities for access, affordability, and ease of getting a degree (so many options). One of the things he talked about was MOOCS (Massive Open Online Course). He was so interesting, engaging and informative I told him that he should do a MOOC on issues in higher education! He’s clearly a well-read and well-versed administrator with his finger on the pulse of issues in higher education. I would take his class because he’s an expert – almost a master – of the topic, particularly law and finance.

It got me wondering – what could be my MOOC? On what would I educate thousands of people if I had the opportunity? Ultimately, for what would I want to be known? And what learning experiences should I expect that thousands of people would actually want to listen to me? This isn’t about presentation style or reputation. It’s simply about what I might understand so well and so thoroughly that I should have the guts to declare I am an expert and to invite thousands of people to learn from me.

I present on lots of things, but I wouldn’t go near the idea of a MOOC. Declaring ourselves the expert, requires us to be absolutely intentional about our development as professionals. It requires us to determine our strengths, interests, skills and to focus on some specific aspects of this work to become the expert – not just a person who reads something and then can facilitate it well. There’s lots of people who can facilitate almost anything. I know lots of good to great facilitators, but I’m not sure all of these people should be declaring themselves as “expert” and opening up their message to the masses. Watching Dr. Groves reminded me that I have more work to do even on the things at which I am good. I’ll continue in my small world while letting experts tackle some of these big issues in the big MOOC based world.

What kinds of things do you feel you have expertise in?

How have you developed that expertise?

Are you so good at that subject that thousands should want to hear you?

 

Gone to a Workshop and Think You’re An Expert? Think again.

Dan

I love college students. I’ve made working with them my life’s work. That said, there’s a few things that can drive me a little crazy about educating college students, particularly when it comes to out of classroom educating.

Sometimes, college students think they have all the answers or know it all once they’ve done one leadership retreat or attended one workshop. Really? You know it all now? Think again.

The same kind of inflated sense of competence and confidence is often articulated by us as student affairs professionals. Go to a conference session on leadership programs and come back and you know it all. Attend the social justice institute and you’re the campus expert on inclusion. Listen to a webinar on assessment and think “I can write the best survey questions ever!”. Think again.

It’s time for student affairs professionals to demonstrate our field’s value of lifelong learning. We hold up the ongoing learning that a student experiences across her/his time as an organization leader, participating in community service, and attending our campus programs and events. We know students do not learn all it takes to demonstrate leadership in one program and we should remember that we cannot become experts in the same manner. Learning something takes time. Incorporating it into our framework as we conduct student affairs practice takes even longer. Becoming an expert? Well, that’s a life’s pursuit.

Considering how context and culture influences how we apply lessons in our work is another factor for consideration. You might know a thing or two about cultural competence in one setting, but is the same level of understanding sufficient in another? Again, as educators we must adopt a commitment to lifelong learning – always improving.

Think about the things on which you may have a high level of competence and confidence: what can you do better? Examining the ACPA/NASPA Professional Competencies is one way to be humbled: do you really know everything at the basic, intermediate and advanced levels? And what are you doing to develop the long list of attributes needed to demonstrate sufficient and advanced skills in each of the competency areas?

Cutting Budgets? Rethink Professional Development!

Dan

A colleague recently lamented on Twitter:

“Finished prelim FY14 budget…another year of no pro devo conferences for this guy. 🙁 Oh well, it’s more $ directly benefiting students!”

That’s 140 characters of sadness right there!

For divisions of student affairs to make ends meet, professional development, particularly conference attendance and travel, may need to be an area to cut. However, there’s two big problems with this line of thinking: first, cutting staff professional development means they may not have access to education on some of the issues they most need to learn about. For example, if your state uses a graduation formula for funding, then you better know how to retain students. But what happens when your entire work has been focused on planning events, advising students about policies/procedures, offering services and programs, and organizational management practices and you haven’t considered retention conversations as part of your work. While these things may influence student retention, it doesn’t mean that you know how to use retention of students as your FRAMEWORK. How do you go about developing the competence and confidence to have the conversations and focus on the right topics to influence retention without some training?

While I would encourage divisions of student affairs to think twice about cutting conference and travel funds, the second issue is that when we think of professional development as ONLY going somewhere else and having to travel to get there then you miss the mark and professional development becomes something done once a year versus something that is integrated into your approach to work. While it stinks that you won’t head to your favorite association’s annual meeting, you can rethink professional development in a way that uses the human and fiscal resources you do have. Here’s a few ideas:

1. Form a reading group: discuss an article from a book or journal a few times a month. Put those association magazines and journals to use. You can use wikis to form discussion groups.

2. Determine an area of improvement, possibly one of the ACPA/NASPA core competencies, and meet with a colleague on campus who you believe is already strong in this area. Interview them about how they developed their skills. Develop an ongoing mentoring relationship.

3. If you’re in a location with multiple institutions around you, coordinate some in-service trainings using each other as resources. For example, here in Memphis we could have staff from student life at Rhodes, LeMoyne-Owen, Southwest Community College and many others meet to discuss best approaches to leadership development. And treat the day as if you were at a conference. You don’t have to go to your office before or after. Use the full day!

4. There are lots of free or low cost webinars offered by associations. If you’re a Campus Labs or Map-Works client, there are numerous assessment webinars that come with your package – and know that there are likely other services being used by other places in the university/college at which you work that may provide similar “free” services.

5. Coordinate a monthly call with colleagues across the country who do similar work to you. Pick a topic and have everyone bring two to three questions they have about the topic. Have people provide thoughts. For questions you can’t answer, have people commit to finding resources and sharing with the group.

6. Is it time to begin classes toward that next degree?

What matters is that you’re thinking intentionally about your professional development. Try creating an individualized plan using the ACPA/NASPA Core Competencies, possibly using this model that we’re beginning to apply here at U of M.

There’s value to coming together to learn. Ideally, divisions of student affairs can fund your participation at national or regional conferences, but when that doesn’t happen, it doesn’t mean to stop focusing on your development. Look around you and you’ll be able to find creative ways to keep learning without breaking the bank.