Academic & Student Affairs Partnerships: Good Practices, Lessons, and Caveats

Academic & Student Affairs Partnerships: Good Practices, Lessons, and Caveats

Elizabeth J. Whitt, The University of IowaWisconsin College Personnel Association, October 2009

http://www.uiowa.edu/~urphopix/classrooms/pages/BUd-02-06-4410-TJ-16.html

Presentation Overview

Context: Why Academic and Student Affairs Partnerships – and Why Not? Exhortations Research Obstacles and Caveats

Research: Boyer Partnership Assessment Project

Principles of Good Practice for Partnership Programs

Implications and “Lessons” for Academic and Student Affairs Partnerships

Questions, Discussion

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Context: Calls for Partnerships

“Only when everyone on campus – particularly academic affairs and student affairs staff – shares responsibility for student learning will we be able to make significant progress in improving it”.

–Powerful Partnerships: A Shared Responsibility for Learning (AAHE, ACPA, NASPA, 1998)

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“To a five-year-old with a hammer, everything is a nail.” (Source unknown)

“Not all partnerships are virtuous.” (Manning, Kinzie, & Schuh, 2006)

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External PressuresInternal Pressures

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“The list of fissures between higher education’s rhetoric and its performance is long and is growing . . . All this has led to a significant gap between the needs of society that should be met by universities and colleges and the actual performance of these institutions.”

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Newman, Couturier, & Scurry (2004). The future of higher education: Rhetoric, reality, and the risks of the market.


“Colleges and universities, for all the benefits they bring, accomplish far less for their students than they should.”

“Has the quality of teaching improved? More important, are students learning more than they did in 1950?....The honest answer to these questions is that we do not know.”

“The moment has surely come for America’s colleges to take a more candid look at their weaknesses and think more boldly about setting higher educational standards for themselves.”

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Bok, D. (2006). Our Underachieving Colleges: A Candid Look at How Much Students Learn and Why They Should Be Learning More.



Universities as mineshafts.College as a jigsaw puzzle.

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Universities as mineshafts.“We have created an intellectual landscape made up of mineshafts where most of the mineworkers are intent on . . . deepening the mine without giving much thought to connecting the shafts and the miners . . . We have greatly fragmented our shared sense of learning for both students and faculty.” (NASULGC, 2000)

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College as a jigsaw puzzle – an empty bag to fill with puzzle pieces.

“That is a problem because students who cannot discern meaning from their college activities often report academic difficulty or social isolation and are at risk of leaving school . . . This is particularly true for first-generation college students.” (Cross in Kuh et al, 2005)

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What Matters Most for Student Success: Student Engagement

The greatest impact appears to stem from students’ total level of campus engagement, particularly when academic, interpersonal, and extracurricular involvements are mutually reinforcing…The holistic nature of learning suggests a clear need to rethink and restructure highly segmented departmental and program configurations.

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Pascarella & Terenzini, How College Affects Students, 2005, p. 647

What Matters for Student Success: Engagement

1. What students do -- time and energy devoted to educationally purposeful activities

2. What institutions do -- using effective educational practices to induce students to do the right things

http://www.uiowa.edu/~urphopix/campus/aerials/pages/AR-10-07-5407-TJ-016.htm

http://www.uiowa.edu/~urphopix/classrooms/pages/CLR-11-98-0937-07-RB.htm

Effective Educational Practices Academic Challenge Active and Collaborative

Learning Student-Faculty Interaction Enriching Educational

Experiences Supportive Campus

Environments(c.f., Chickering & Gamson, 1987; Kuh et al., 2005;

Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005)

What Matters for Student Success: Engagement


“All those who participate in the educational mission of institutions of higher education–students, faculty, and staff–share responsibility for pursuing learning improvements. Collaborations between academic and student affairs personnel have been especially effective in achieving this better learning for students”. –Powerful Partnerships: A Shared Responsibility for Learning (AAHE, ACPA, NASPA, 1998)

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Obstacles: “Research” on partnerships The body of literature on student and academic

partnerships is extensive and – with few exceptions --:

Is exhortative, rather than based on evidence.

Seems to assume that AA/SA partnerships are, almost always and everywhere, an appropriate response to challenges in facilitating undergraduate student success – an all-purpose response and an end in themselves.

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Obstacles: Academic and student affairs partnerships

“have become a bandwagon . . . Because [partnership] is fashionable and sounds right, [adopted] often without purposefully and carefully considering whether a particular partnership has merit . . . I remain unconvinced that all such efforts to reorganize the way individuals and offices work together are worthwhile . . . The all-important question is, ‘Is collaboration a good idea?’” (Magolda, 2005)

Lessons from Project DEEP Shared Responsibility for Educational Quality – and

Student Success

Supportive educators are everywhere

Student and academic affairs collaboration

Student ownership A caring, supportive community

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At Alverno, student affairs staff members described themselves as “partners in learning in developing a community of learners” and have identified desired cocurricular outcomes that complement the College’s Eight Ability outcomes. A staff member noted, “We see ourselves as an extension of the classroom.” 18

Project DEEP: Shared Responsibility

Context: Calls for Partnerships Obstacles: Within institutions, between

the potential partners Cultural differences: key assumptions about

purposes of undergraduate education, what matters in undergraduate education, how students should spend their time in college.

“Silos”: historical separation of curricular and co-curricular aspects of college; organizational structures.

Scarce resources Different professional expectations,

preparation, rewards structures.

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Calls for reform: improve student learning by (among other things) reducing fragmentation.

Research on college impact: Student engagement is the key to

learning. Learning takes place most effectively in

seamless learning environments. AA/SA partnerships MIGHT help

create those seamless learning environments, but obstacles exist.

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Boyer Partnership Assessment Project (BPAP)

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Boyer Partnership Assessment Project

Purposes of the Study: To identify and describe principles of

good practice for partnership programs.

To identify and describe outcomes and impacts of partnership programs for students, educators and institutions.

Research Team: Seven researchers with varied

backgrounds and experiences in postsecondary education.

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Sample Selection Priorities: Variety: in types of programs, in types of institutions

Assessment Ongoing program and commitment

Defining “Partnership”23


Sample: 18 institutions14 4-year: 6 public, 8 private (5 religious affiliation)

4 2-year: community colleges

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Sample: 18 institutions Programs: first-year programs

(curricular, co-curricular), service learning, learning communities (residential and non-residential), multicultural programs, developmental education, internal grant programs.

Concerns: student attrition/retention, student learning outcomes, student adjustment and transitions, budget cuts/scarce resources, aging housing stock, external competition, campus ‘silos,’ community needs, institutional renewal.

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University of Arizona: Faculty Fellows and Student-Faculty Interaction Grants

William Rainey Harper College (IL): Learning Communities

University of Maryland: College Park Scholars George Mason University (VA): New Century

College University of Missouri: Freshman Interest Groups Messiah College (PA): External Programs Villanova University: Villanova Experience North Carolina State University: First-Year College

Living-Learning Community Virginia Tech University: Residential Leadership

Community

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Barnard College (NY): In-Residence Seminar Portland Community College, Cascade Campus

(OR): Multicultural Awareness Council Brevard Community College (FL): Center for

Service Learning Prince George’s Community College (MD):

Developmental Math Program Carson-Newman College (TN): Boyer Laboratory

for Learning Saint Mary’s College (CA): Catholic Institute for

Lasallian Social Action DePaul University (IL): Chicago Quarter Siena College (NY): Franciscan Center for

Service and Advocacy DePauw University (IN): DePauw Year One

Qualitative Research Methods:

Data Collection▪ First round site visits 2002 – 2003▪ Second round site visits 2003 – 2004▪ Data Sources and Collection Methods

Data Analysis▪ Within-Site Analysis▪ Cross-Site Analysis

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Principles of Good Practice for Partnership Programs

Good Practice in Partnership Programs

Good practice for partnership programs reflects and advances the institutional mission.

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Good practice reflects and advances institutional mission.

Partnership programs are grounded in, and extend the influence of, the institution’s mission in their purpose, design, implementation, and assessment.

Partnership programs demonstrate and enhance institutional commitments to students and their learning.

Partnership programs’ success in achieving the institutions’ missions can provide visibility to the programs and enhance their influence on their campuses.

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To understand the Chicago Quarter, one must also “understand DePaul’s Catholic, Vincentian, and urban identity. [The CQ] communicates the urban mission to our students. We’re Vincentian. We should have programs in the community.”

The Chicago Quarter “really does mesh with the mission of the university and reflects DePaul’s values. [The CQ] is an academic illustration of the mission of the institution.”

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This is not news.

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Good practice for partnership programs embodies and fosters a learning-oriented ethos.

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Good practice embodies and fosters a learning-oriented ethos. Partnership programs foster

learning, in and out of classrooms, in formal and informal settings, for educators as well as students.

Partnership programs provide seamless learning opportunities, environments, and experiences for students.

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Good practice embodies and fosters a learning-oriented ethos.

“CILSA has been a great way to expand everybody’s notion of where and how education does take place.”

Service-learning courses and community-based research.

Assist students and faculty to build connections between service and study across the curriculum.

Join intellectual development with understanding and resolving social and economic issues facing the community and society at large.

(Saint Mary’s College: Catholic Institute for Lasallian Social Action)

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Good practice for partnership programs builds on and nurtures existing relationships and new collaborations.

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Good practice builds on and encourages relationships.

Partnership programs grow out of existing relationships between and among academic and student affairs professionals.

Partnership program relationships – often based on mutual interests or shared experiences – cross organizational and cultural boundaries to blur the distinctions between academic and student affairs.

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Good practice builds on and encourages relationships.

Father Dennis and Brother Michael are “friends who interacted respectfully and trust each other. I can’t say enough about the value of relationships . . . In our roles [we] have a good working relationship and foster our groups not to get too focused on turf issues but to look at the common good for students. I think us modeling that and really working at that is key.”

(Siena College: Franciscan Center for Service and Advocacy)

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Good practice for partnership programs recognizes, understands, and attends to institutional culture.

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Good practice recognizes, understands and attends to institutional culture.

Partnership programs fit the needs and characteristics of their student, staff, and faculty participants.

Partnership programs heed and respect institutional cultures while creating new structures and practices consistent with institutional values and beliefs.

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Good practice recognizes, understands and attends to institutional culture.

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“We have discussions about what’s important and who our students are . . . We’re all part of the Cascade family – it’s a culture that’s been here since the beginning – conversations about values and our relationships.”

“The MAC brings together the key components of the college, like a marriage.”

(Multicultural Awareness Council, Portland Community College, Cascade Campus)

Good practice for partnership programs values and implements assessment.

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Good practice values and implements assessment.

Partnership programs have a clear understanding of what they intend to accomplish and identify means to evaluate their accomplishments.

Partnership programs use multiple assessment strategies and data (e.g., participation rates, retention rates, satisfaction and learning outcomes) consistently and rigorously to guide and improve the program.

Partnership programs’ assessment data inform decisions about funding and allocation resources. 44

Good practice values and implements assessment.

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During our recent budget cuts, the VPSA said he’d preserve the programs that were most effective. How did we know what was ‘effective’? We had assessment processes in place. We knew what we were doing well. The RLC survived the budget cuts because we had evidence of its effectiveness.”

(Residential Leadership Community, Virginia Tech)

Good practice for partnership programs uses resources creatively and effectively.

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Good practice uses resources creatively and effectively.

Partnership programs thrive in both resource-rich and resource-limited contexts.

Partnership programs demonstrate that creativity and innovation can substitute for money.

Partnership programs capitalize on existing financial, human, and environmental resources and generate new resources as necessary. 47

Good practice uses resources creatively and effectively.

“We’re kind of running full speed ahead but on empty.” One way the program has managed to be “successful on a shoestring” and known to be both “inexpensive and effective” is by establishing partnerships with campus units beyond academic and student affairs. For example, “Campus Dining is another partner that has been supportive. They have provided dining cards for [FIGs faculty] and feed all the FIGs students a day early”

(University of Missouri, FIGS)

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Reflective Moment

What is 1 thing you’re taking away from these examples? Why?

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So What?

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Dialogue and Implications

“Only when everyone on campus – particularly academic affairs and student affairs staff – shares the responsibility for student learning will we be able to make significant progress in improving it” (Powerful Partnerships, 1998).

“To a five-year-old with a hammer, everything is a nail.” (Source Unknown)

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“Lessons” and ImplicationsLesson 1: Know your context.

Institutional mission and culture matter. Effective partnerships attend to the

institution’s educational purposes and values.

Effective partnerships require clear, shared understanding of their cultures’ roots – the cultures of the institution, of academic affairs, of student affairs, of faculty, and of students – and proceed only on the basis of that understanding.

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“Lessons” and Implications

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“One of the most disappointing aspects of partnerships between [student affairs and faculty] subcultures is members’ lack of awareness of the norms and values that guide their own everyday practices. This lack of self-awareness is a setup for confusion in the collaboration process.” (Magolda, 2005)

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“Lessons” and ImplicationsSo: First, know yourself . . .

“Student affairs professionals tend not to challenge their own assumptions about their knowledge, beliefs, values, students, faculty, and organizational functioning.”

As we become socialized to student affairs, we are less and less likely to challenge what we know and believe about students, faculty, our roles, and our institutions.

(Woodard, Komives, & Love, 2000)

Lesson 2: Focus on student learning. Effective partnerships focus on things that

matter to the partners and the institution – “issues that people really care about.” (Schroeder, 2004).

In the BPAP schools, issues people really cared about (e.g., attrition, aging residence halls, budget crises, negative data about student engagement) were addressed by engaging students in educationally-purposeful activities that bridged in- and out-of-class venues.

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Lesson 3: Take advantage of existing opportunities – existing relationships, existing conditions. Create partnerships with your friends.

Do not try to create partnerships from scratch.

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Lesson 4: Engage in assessment. Identify outcomes. Build a body of evidence aimed at effectiveness, improvement.

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Lesson 5: Expect partnerships to be a lot of work. Attend to relationships; maintain shared vision, focus and communication.

Obtain and sustain administrative support.

Take nothing for granted. But “It’s so much fun.”

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Lesson 6: “Keep your eyes on the prize . . . “ Effective partnerships are not about: ▪ Concerns about equality of responsibility.▪ Concerns about credit.▪ Concerns about status.▪ Concerns about equality of resources.

Effective partnerships are about:▪ Students and their learning.

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Lesson 7: Partnerships between academic and student affairs aren’t necessary to foster student learning. There are things student affairs folks can and should do all by ourselves.

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“Lessons” and Implications For example:

Don’t develop programs, practices, policies that conflict or interfere with academic endeavors.

Help students connect what they are learning in class with out-of-class experiences. So: know what they’re learning in class.

Inquire about students’ studies and academic progress; know who’s struggling and who’s succeeding and respond accordingly.

Encourage study groups, study time; confront students who are overly involved in social activities or ‘student life’ activities to the detriment of their studies. And never dismiss academics as less important than out-of-class experiences.

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So, partnerships are “a good idea” if: They reflect and respect their contexts. They are created and implemented for

reasons and in ways that serve the interests of students and the partners.

They are consistent with the partners’ individual and collective values about undergraduate education and students.

They are approached “cautiously, purposefully, and honestly.” (Magolda, 2005)

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Questions & Discussion

http://www.uiowa.edu/~urphopix/campus/aerials/pages/AR-10-07-5407-TJ-312.htm

http://www.uiowa.edu/~urphopix/activities/pages/CDd-06-03-3316-TJ-24.html

http://www.uiowa.edu/~urphopix/activities/pages/COMd-05-04-3710-TS-10.htm

Publications

Partnerships: Good PracticesJournal of College Student Development, May/June 2008Whitt et al.

Partnerships: Student OutcomesJCSD, July/August 2007Elkins et al.

Documents

Academic & Student Affairs Partnerships: Good Practices, Lessons, and Caveats