Thursday, April 20, 2017

Making meaning in different ways - student affairs educators today

In an essay citing one of the student development era's most significant early researchers, William Perry, Sheila Murphy asserts that the old ways of making meaning in students' lives have changed. She quotes Perry as saying, "Students are lively makers of meaning" as a presumed rationale for staying out of their way.

While Murphy's essay is important in recounting the ways that student affairs administrators' roles have changed in the last ten years (rising mental health concerns, campus safety, sexual assault, and many others), I wonder if she hasn't taken Perry too literally in a limiting way. Perry's research in the 1950s and 1960s included only the all male, privileged, students of Harvard. This type of student was different then and now; highly resourced students have always been given greater opportunity to learn early and deeply those things that perpetuate their privilege. On the other hand, Perry, as well as interpreters of his model, sought to broaden the implications of his Forms of Intellectual and Ethical Development (1968) that would benefit a broader cross-section of students. Having stood on the stage with Perry as a graduate student at the University of Maryland in the 1970s, I can say without question that he was concerned about all students' development and that he would not have advocated to simply stay out of their way.

Murphy says that student affairs administrators and educators face a more complicated set of expectations today than they previously have. I'm actually not sure if today's Vice Presidents are any more challenged than my Dean of Students at Colorado State University, Burns Crookston, who worked to quell student protests by going into student crowds to talk with them about their concerns and ways to address them. Or who advocated for the diversification of CSU's student body in terms of race, gender, and class. Or who strove to accommodate the largest growth in student numbers ever witnessed in U.S.A. history.

Let's not lose sight of the fact that each generation of educators, whether in student affairs or other roles, face unique challenges and that the core of our work is to both ease the obstacles to participation (the administrative work) as well as enhance the experience (adding to learning and development) of our students. These dual purposes have been present in U.S. student affairs work for many years. They are increasingly being embraced by international higher education colleagues as well, although the dynamics of administrative work and enhancing student learning and development (see Enhancing Student Learning and Development in Cross-Border Higher Education, Roberts & Komives, 2016) are quite different in many other cultures. Murphy credit's NASPA current President, Kevin Kruger, with saying "This is our time. Student affairs has never been more important on campus than it is today." Kevin is right and Murphy is correct in referencing him but it's not because of only the administrative and managerial functions of this work. It's because of the "whole" package.

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