The shortcomings of a utilitarian approach to New Student Orientation programming: A call for aesthetics

Prior to my current work with Brigham Young University's peer mentoring initiative I was heavily involved in the university's new student orientation programming.  And, because my work is still focused on first-year students, I associate with colleagues (both here at BYU and on other campuses) who spend a good deal of their time thinking about how to orient students to a college campus.  Almost invariably I hear them use terms like "plan," "manage," and "direct" to describe their work.  This choice of words highlights a common metaphor guiding the work of orientation professionals, what I'll term here the management metaphor--one which is largely concerned with relatively superficial features of orientation programming,  including scheduling, event management, feeding large groups of people, and other associated logistics.  Clearly, these are all important considerations for an "orientation director" (something has to happen during orientation and it has to be coordinated, particularly on a large campus where thousands of students and their parents are likely to participate).  However, problems arise when this metaphor is adopted as the guiding principle in making decisions about orientation programs because it fails to attend to the aesthetics of the orientation experience (and I use the term experience very intentionally here).  As a result, students experience orientation as a collection of disjointed events--for example a convocation, campus tour, advisement session, and dance party--and walk away from the experience without having made any meaning, reflected on key messages (e.g. the institutional mission and other core values of the institution), or resolved to do anything differently during their college experience as a result of new student orientation.

A more useful metaphor for orientation programming is the aesthetic design metaphor (yes, I made that up).  Through this lens, the process of developing orientation programming is viewed as a process of designing an aesthetic experience for students, that is to say experiences which are coherent, connected, and infused with meaning.   In his book Art as Experience, John Dewey describes aesthetic experiences as those which are immersive, complete, and transformative.  In contrast, unaesthetic experiences are routine, dispersed, disengaging, and fragmented.  Patrick Parrish has described a set of aesthetic principles which can be applied to the design of instructional experiences in an attempt to avoid the negative outcomes so often associated with educational settings (e.g. boredom, lack of motivation, meaningless and imposed learning activities), which seem useful for orientation programming because of its susceptibility to the the same traps of fragmentation and meaninglessness.  These "first principles" are that

1. Learning experiences have beginnings, middles, and ends,
2. Learners are the protagonists of their own learning experiences,
3. Learning activity, not subject matter, establishes the theme of instruction,
4. Context contributes to immersion in the instructional situation, and
5. Instructors and instructional designers are authors, supporting characters, and model learners

When viewed as an aesthetic design process, orientation programming is elevated to an act of weaving together an experience or narrative which attends to Parrish's first principles and which is meaningful and transformative for students.  The goals shift from scheduling events, providing meals, and holding "sessions," to providing an experience which moves students towards internalizing institutional values and changes their conception of the college experience.  Imagine the impact of an orientation program which not only helps students register for classes and locate campus buildings, but which poses a question or challenge which can provide a purpose or framework for a students entire undergraduate experience (e.g. "How can my learning position me to solve important problems?"  or "As a citizen of a global community, what responsibility do I have to improve my community?  How can my college experience prepare me to do that?" or for a faith-based institution, "How can I integrate spiritual and secular learning?").  Further, why does every student have to have the same experience as the student next to them?  Could students create their own orientation experience by selecting from a number of events and opportunities, those which attend to their needs and concerns.  Finally, as I have written about before here, meaningful conclusions do much to further learning--why couldn't orientation culminate with some kind of experience which promotes reflection, unifies the sub-experiences which have occurred across orientation, and invites students to continue to engage with the problem or question posed on the first day?

None of this is to say that these two metaphors for orientation programming are mutually exclusive or wholly incompatible.  An orientation experience can be both aesthetic and pragmatic; however, far too often institutions focus exclusively on planning and managing and lose an opportunity to design an experience.  An experience which not only welcomes students to campus and answers their questions, but which like a good piece of art, stimulates reflection, action, and (occasionally, when the stars align) promotes personal transformation.

A Ph. D. is not enough

One of the most interesting (and often painful) things I have repeatedly observed in my work over the last five years are transitions in administrative leadership at my institution and the way in which these changes are managed.  Yesterday, I was in a meeting where one of these changes was announced and, to put it mildly, it was like watching a train wreck.  In defense of the administrator delivering the news, I think he meant well and was truly doing his best to be tactful.  But, nonetheless, his social and administrative ineptitude were on display for all to see.  Consequently, an already emotionally charged situation was made worse.  This administrator is, from what I can tell, a brilliant researcher and scholar in his field (Pharmacology); however, like most faculty members, his formal training has done little to prepare him for those responsibilities which take him out of his lab.

While faculty members' responsibilities obviously vary both within and between campuses, it isn't uncommon for them to spend some percentage of their time engaged work falling outside their disciplinary area of expertise.  So, on a tour of a typical campus we would be likely to see sociologists and biologists administering departments and colleges, physicists and engineers advising students, and a lot of non-teachers teaching students.  To be fair, I know great administrators and excellent teachers with Ph. D.'s in things other than management and education; however, they are the exception.  Instead, most have wonderful intentions and want desperately to be good teachers or chairs, but struggle along because of the lack of any real preparation or training.  What's worse, there is a dangerous sub-population who suffer from a common psychological condition that condemns them to repeated faux pas and debacles like the one I saw yesterday.

The thought of an academic advisor teaching a law class or an "administrative" employee teaching teaching introductory biology are, obviously laughable, so its a bit ironic that we don't see problems in transfers in the other direction.  There has long been an assumption that an earned doctorate (in any field) qualifies an individual to do just about any other kind of work on a campus, whether it is directing an Honors college, overseeing first-year programming, or advising students about general course registration.  There may have been a time, before college campuses became the complex animal they are now, when this may have been true.  And, at a small college where resources and personnel are limited, utility infielders who teach, advise, administer, and research will always be a necessity.  However, as college campuses become increasingly complex, there will become a greater need for the professionalization of roles which, historically, have been viewed as just another part of the professorial duty.  At the very least, we cannot afford to continue to assume that a Ph. D. in Pharmacology, in and of itself, prepares anyone to navigate administrative landmines and advise students (about anything but pharmacology), and  teach (virtually anything at all).

Joe Paterno is not a victim and neither are Penn State students

Even if you have no interest in college sports, you've likely heard about what has been happening at Penn State this week, relative to their athletics department and beloved head football coach, Joe Paterno (even my wife, who is so uninterested in sports that she can walk into our living room on Super Bowl Sunday while I'm watching the game and ask in all sincerity "Is this an important game?" asked me what I thought of the Paterno incident last night).

It is undoubtedly a sad and disturbing story.  But, as much as I respect Joe Paterno for what he has done in college athletics, for Penn State University, and for individual athletes whom he has coached and mentored, I am not really all that sad for him.  The real tragedy is what happened to eight young boys at the hands of someone who they trusted.  What's more the riots and protests which have erupted in response to Paterno's firing are not only misguided (and, I suspect for most rioters, an excuse for drunken violence and a tempting opportunity to gather videos that can be posted to You Tube and bragged about later), but draw attention away from the real victims in the situation.

Let me be clear, I am not arguing against public demonstrations and the right for individuals to express their views.  And, I am an advocate for college students becoming engaged on their campuses and making their voice heard.  However, violence, property destruction, and public intoxication are not civic engagement.  And, based on what I have seen and heard from the Penn State "demonstrations" thus far, they look a lot like a bunch of college students wanting to cause trouble, rather than informed citizens working for positive change.  In the Inside Higher Ed article linked to above, a number of student affairs professionals "sympathized" with students who are going through the "healing process."  While I'm sure that there are students distraught, embarrassed, and discouraged with what is happening on their campus and student affairs professionals are positioned to provide support, I would hope that efforts are taken to help students step back and, again, consider who the real victims are in all of this.  While some well-intentioned Paterno-ites surely believed that their protests at his firing would convey messages of support for a campus icon, they likely never considered what kinds of messages such behavior send to, not only the victims in this particular case, but any victim of sexual abuse watching all of this play out.  I hope Penn State takes this as an opportunity to help students move past what seems to be very selfish behavior and take a more mature and productive approach to the tragedy that is unfolding on their campus.

Instructional Designers as Weavers

I defended my Masters Thesis (actually, it was more of a development project than anything) yesterday afternoon.  It went well and it felt much more like a dialogue about ideas than a "defense" in the traditional sense.  What I enjoyed most was that everyone in the room--myself and the three faculty members on my committee--seemed to learn something during the two hours we spent together.The most interesting idea that came out of our conversation was that instructional design is a process of weaving together an experience (or set of experiences) that move learners towards a desired outcome.  And, that the best instructional experiences are those which are based upon a variety of theories, which have been woven together in a coherent way.

Andy Gibbons has written about a theory of design layering where instructional designers approach the process of designing a learning experience as one of attending to a variety of separate, but highly interrelated "layers" (e.g. content, messaging, representation, strategy).  Similarly, Joseph Schwab described four "commonplaces" of educational thought that should be considered when undergoing curricular design:  the learner, the instructor, the subject matter, and the sociocultural milieux.  When instructional design is viewed through these lenses (i.e. layers or commonplaces) it becomes apparent that relying exclusively upon a single theoretical base in making design decisions is inadequate.  For example, while relying upon a theory of learning may inform decisions about the types of instructional activities to include in a design and how to sequence them, that theory won't be of much help in determining how to present material to learners.  Likewise, a theory of instructional design may provide helpful rationale for the underlying structure of the instruction, but it isn't likely to be much help when a designer encounters problems in measuring or evaluating the learning that is taking place during a course or training program.

Consequently, a good design, while often based upon one or two fundamental or core theories, will rely upon a variety of other theories in order to resolve challenges and problems which arise during the design process (e.g. how will we keep learners motivated? how will we know if they have learned what we hope they will? how will we represent this abstract concept graphically? etc.)  A good designer, then, is one who can weave seemingly disparate theories together to construct a learning experience which is complete, coherent, and experienced by learners as meaningful narrative.

In short, the argument I'm making is that theoretical zealots or those familiar with only a narrow segment of theories, aren't likely to be able to design learning materials, experiences, or systems, which lead to meaningful growth for individual learners.  Instead, they'll produce the bandwagon curricula which seems exciting on the surface, but which flames out and leaves learners, instructors, and administrators frustrated and unfulfilled.  What we need is a generation of design "weavers" who are knowledgeable and nimble enough to weave together great designs.

Why we should all write in library books

I checked a book out from the Harold B. Lee Library on my campus a few weeks ago (John Dewey's Experience and Education) and when I opened it I noticed that at least a quarter of the pages have notes written on them.  To some this would be horrifying or at least annoying--I was excited.  At the risk of bringing down the wrath of my bespectacled elementary school librarian (who, by the way, I am still truly terrified of--it's amazing that I don't have more of a negative relationship with books), I'd like to make an argument for the value of writing in books, particularly those books which are likely to be read by others at some point.

I make the assumption that virtually all learning is and should be approached as a conversation.  It's easy to see the conversational metaphor in traditional learning activities (e.g. conversations among learners and teachers in classroom settings), but reading a book is also a conversation between the reader and the author.  Of course, for some learners, the conversation is largely one-sided because their reading does little to elicit questions, new ideas, or responses.  But, nonetheless, when they read someone else's ideas in a book they are engaging in a conversation.

As an undergraduate I had a tremendous mentor who re-ignited my passion for reading (I loved reading as a child, but about the time I hit junior high school it died out for one reason or another).  One of the first books he lent to me was Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point.   I still remember being intrigued by the fact that he wrote in his books (again, the evilness of this practice had been well ingrained in my mind by Mrs. Robinson at Upland Terrace Elementary).  At first, I didn't pay much attention to his scribbles; however, at some point I realized that reading his notes, not only helped me understand Gladwell's ideas but also helped me see how they applied to my own experiences.  What I loved most were the questions he posed in response to Gladwell's arguments because they invited me into an internal conversation where I could sift through Gladwell's ideas, my mentors responses, and my own wonderings.  I can't say this for sure, but I wonder if I would have been excited about The Tipping Point and reading other things like it, had I not had the "conversational" experience with that copy of the book that particular summer. I spent the rest of that summer borrowing books from the same mentor and I always hoped that when I opened them the first time, they would be filled with his musings and questions.

My reading that summer not only kindled my interest in social science (I read Bob Putnam, Steven Johnson, more Gladwell, James Surowiecki, and Michael Lewis that summer), but taught me about how to have conversations with books.  By the end of August I was buying my own books so that I could write in them, ask questions, draw diagrams, and argue with the author.  I have continued my habit of well-intentioned book desecration and, today, there probably aren't many books on my shelf that haven't been written on. In fact, I lend a fair amount of books out to the students who I work with.  Every once in a while one will make a comment about something I've written, which is gratifying.  It's probably a stretch to assume that any of my scribblings will influence anyone quite like my mentor's ruminations did, but it's a nice thought to entertain.

The world needs more Andy Rooneys

Two Sundays ago, Andy Rooney's final 60 Minutes "sign off" aired.  It was typical Rooney--wise, dryly funny, and thought-provoking.  I haven't ever been a regular viewer of 60 Minutes, but when I did watch, it always seemed to be at the tail-end of the hour, and I always enjoyed what Rooney had to say.

In his final piece, Rooney shared some insights that seem to have wide application, but particularly for those who teach.



Here are some things I took away:

Stop worrying so much about having (or writing) original thoughts (because there probably aren't any).  Sometimes the pressure to do something new, exciting, or original becomes a barrier to doing anything at all and we sit motionless and paralyzed.  Although I wouldn't call myself a "writer," I do a fair amount of writing and when the stars align and I do have something close to a coherent and tight argument or what I might foolishly believe to be an "original" idea, it hasn't come as I've been staring at an empty page or blank screen.  Rather, I've started writing about something that seems relatively uninteresting and that exercise has eventually led to productive thoughts or ideas.  And, in reflecting on my teaching, most of the "disasters" I've had in the classroom or in a training workshop of some kind have come when I was more concerned about being original or creative than I was with facilitating good learning (even if it wasn't the "sexy" kind of teaching and learning that gets talked about on teaching blogs).  There seems to be power in teaching simple, but fundamental ideas, and doing it in simple ways.


Tell the truth.  Truth is, in some ways, tough to define and what is "true" to one may or may not be to another.  But, Rooney seems to be saying that if we were more concerned about being truthful (I wonder if another way to say that might be "sincere" or "genuine") and less preoccupied with being either provocative or "acceptable," depending on the circumstance, our ultimate impact on readers, students, etc. will be more worthwhile.  And, if nothing else, by being authentic and truthful, we will feel better about our efforts and be able to eventually look back on a career with contentment (like Rooney seems to have been able to do).  Rooney also wisely acknowledges the inevitability of our making mistakes and realizing, after the fact, that what we believed was true really wasn't.  However, seeking to be truthful would seem to help eliminate many mistakes that might be made otherwise.

Care about what others think, but not too much.  It was refreshing to hear Rooney's remarks about wanting to be liked.  It seems like an innately human desire.  And, when we feel some desire to have others like us it has a tempering effect on how we interact with and engage with others (read:  it keeps us from becoming complete jerks).  However, if being liked becomes the driving motivation behind our actions, we're likely to end up somewhere we don't like (and, ironically, become someone who others don't really like).  This is especially important for teachers because a lot of the learning--and nearly all of the most important learning--we want for those we teach requires hard work, some degree of pain or discomfort, and  some healthy failure. We don't always "like" those who ask these kinds of things of us.  teachers, parents, and bosses who care more about being liked than facilitating growth, supporting learning, or being truthful, are dangerous.

Of course, none of what I've said here is original and I probably haven't said anything you didn't already know or hadn't already thought about--but, I take comfort in Rooney's words that "that's what writers do."

More on risk-taking and learning

In this morning's edition of Inside Higher Ed, Nate Kreuter writes a column about the importance of failure in the classroom.  The ideas in the column (along with those in Brian Croxall's blog which Kreuter links to at the end of his piece) resonated with me both because of what I have said about risk and failure in the past and more so because of some recent experiences I have had with students on my campus.

All but a handful of first-year students at BYU take a course known as American Heritage to fulfill a particular general education requirement.  It is a tough course, particularly for freshmen, because for most students it requires a depth of learning that they are unaccustomed to and which stretches them in what they feel are uncomfortable ways.  Consequently, students frequently voice complaints about their scores on exams and writing assignments.  

Over the last year, those who administer the course have worked closely with BYU's Center for Teaching and Learning to redesign the course, particularly its assessments.  On the whole this process has led to tremendous improvements, which in my estimation are based on very sound pedagogical principles and which are likely to lead to better learning and better attitudes among students.  One of these changes has been to structure writing assignments in a way that initial writing assignments are low stakes (about 10 points each), build students core writing skills by providing valuable feedback on the writing process, and are directly connected to more hefty writing assignments which come later in the semester (i.e. students can use the writing they have done for the initial assignments in later assignments).  It is a good model and likely to lead to good outcomes.

Here's the problem--faculty members and teaching assistants in the course haven't done much to make this visible or public for students.  In other words, they have built the course to encourage students to take early risks in their writing, risks which can ultimately benefit students; however, they haven't attended to what Kreuter argues are two of the most important things educators have to do when creating a "failure-safe" classroom:  they have neither modeled risk taking or publicly addressed the value of "failure." Consequently, over the last few weeks as scored essays have been returned to students with percentages of 30, 40, & 50 (the average across all sections was around 45%), they have panicked and thought "I've never 'failed' a writing assignment before."  This emotional reaction has been so strong in some cases that the student has ignored the useful feedback provided on the essay, feedback that would pay big dividends for later writing assignments, and complained.

Maybe I'm naive, but things may have been different if a couple of things had happened early in the semester and again just before essays were returned


Clear reminders about the truly "low-stakes" of these assignments:  The first two essays were worth a total of 30 points (10 and 20 points respectively).  That is a whopping 5% of the total 600 points available for students to earn across the semester.  One could argue that students could figure this out on their own, but the 30 seconds it would take to explain this in a lab section would do much to help students see the assignments as "safe."  And, if they see them as safe they are much more likely to take productive risks in their writing and learn more.


Frequent discussion w/ students about the type of feedback they are receiving and its value:  Many TAs have mistakenly assumed that students will immediately see value in the feedback provided and use it to improve their writing in the future.  While some students undoubtedly were mature enough to do so, others likely see any degree of critique as a personal attack on their identity as a "good student."  Time spent inducting students to their role as learners (e.g. welcome and receive feedback, use it to improve, etc.) could shift perspectives and help students interpret feedback in more useful ways.  And, this is a message that should be re-iterated to freshmen again and again during their first semester on campus.

Public sharing of risk-taking and failure stories by faculty members:  Students need to know that failure and risk are a part of any good academic experience and that, more importantly, people survive and benefit from them.  Never underestimate the power of a well-told, genuine, and believable story.

Open discussion about the structure of the course and the rationale behind it:  Good course design is much more likely to lead to desired outcomes when learners are partners with teachers in the overall process and understand the pedagogical strategy being employed.  If writing assignments are structured to build upon one another and to provide good feedback on the writing process, that's an important thing for learners to know--it's foolish to assume they will figure it out on their own.  Instructional strategies shouldn't be secrets we keep to ourselves.  Making them visible to students both orients them to the learning experience they will have in our classroom and facilitates metacognitive activity that makes students better learners even after they leave our classes.

To be fair, there is probably little that faculty members or TAs could ever do to completely eliminate student complaints like those I've heard over the last few weeks.  There will always be students who are so wrapped up in being awarded the same coveted "A's" they received in high school that no amount of discussion about deep learning, the value of feedback, or the importance of failure could ever change their perspective.  But, if we were more intentional about helping first-year students adopt revised perspectives about learning--that it is risky, dependent upon failure and feedback, and sometimes painful--we would both hear fewer complaints and see more students becoming the types of scholars we hope leave our campuses when they graduate

Measuring the value of a university president

Two institutions in my hometown of Salt Lake City, the University of Utah and Westminster College, are currently in the middle of presidential searches.  And, naturally, this has led to discussion about presidential salaries and the need to offer a compensation package sufficient to attract talented leaders. The Salt Lake Tribune published an editorial this morning ("The Pay Game:  Academic recruitment not cheap") and argued that the salary increases proposed by the Utah State Board of Regents for the presidents of each of the state institutions (but called into question by Governor Gary Herbert) are a good investment when it comes to finding the right kind of leader.

I think the Tribune has it right, particularly given the fact that the total compensation increase, across all eight institutions, amounts to around $100,000.  That's a lot of money, but a drop in the bucket when considering the total higher education budget in the state of Utah.  If paying the University of Utah's new president 4% more than her predecessor means the state gets a great leader who can lead the its flagship institution into a new era in higher education, the Regents have made a savvy move and we should be congratulating them for being wise enough to recognize the need to make salary adjustments.

But, how much should taxpayers be willing to pay university presidents?  And, at what point does an increase in salary no longer translate into increased value for an institution?  For instance, does a $650,000 a year post really pull in a better leader than a search committee would find if the pay were $400,000 a year?  And, how does an institution measure the value added by its president?  Fundraising dollars? High-profile faculty hires?  Athletic success?  Achievement of measurable student learning outcomes?  Hitting enrollment targets?

Although Westminster College isn't likely to publicize a whole lot of information regarding the salary which will be paid to its next president, there is some evidence that attractive salary paid to Michael Bassis (the current president) has been well worth it.  In the article the SL Tribune ran in early September announcing Bassis' retirement, it was reported that his compensation package totaled a little over $500,000 per year.  That's less than the University of Utah's president will make in total compensation, but (I'm guessing) quite a bit more than the other 7 state school leaders.  However, based on what has happened at Westminster during Bassis' tenure--increased enrollment, the recruitment of a much more diverse student body, the addition of several academic and athletic programs, to name a few--it has been money well spent.  The interesting question I would ask now is, would Bassis have taken the job for $400,000 a year.  And, if he did, would Westminster have seen the same improvements during his time on campus?  What we really need is for some brilliant statistician to take the Moneyball approach and figure out how the Billy Beans of the world can analyze presidential performance and get the most value for their money.

The conscience of the academy

In a talk given at the 2010 TEDWomen conference, t.v. executive Lauren Zalaznick argued that television can be viewed as our "conscience" in that it reflects who we are as a society.  It's not really an earth shattering concept (although Zalaznick's talk shares some interesting data illustrating the veracity of this claim); however, it does raise an important question for any kind of group who claims to be or behave in a particular way, be it a corporation, a school, or a family.  That question is "Are we who we really thing we are?" or, put another way, "Do our actions, behaviors, practices, etc. really reflect the set of values we claim to espouse?"

This is an interesting question for academic institutions to consider.  And, leads to another useful question, which is "What is the conscience of the academy?"  At first glance, it seems like a fairly simple exercise:  just examine the mission statement, last presidential address, catalog, or set of standards from the last accreditation.  Clearly, these official pronouncements reflect the values of the institution and give us insight into the degree to which an institution is committed to providing a high quality educational experience for students.

The problem, however, is that saying and doing aren't always in alignment with one another.  Work in the field of action science has suggested that two types of theories influence the actions of an organization.  Espoused theories are those which individuals or organizations claim to follow (i.e. the theories and values manifest in mission statements and catalogs), while theories-in-use are those theories or values that can be inferred by observing the actions of an organization or its individual members.  This is not to say that all universities do one thing and say another (In Chapters 11 - 16 of his book, The Learning Paradigm College, John Tagg describes a number of colleges which have achieved a high degree of alignment between their mission to provide a high quality learning experience for students and what actually happens in the day-to-day happenings on their campuses); however, most organizations struggle to some degree to stay true to their stated missions and goals, particularly in the current economic climate when staying financially viable has become increasingly difficult.

Complicating all of this is the fact that those of us who do the work of education students on college campuses are often unaware of the gap between our actions and our stated values.  So, training ourselves to examine key practices on our campuses can be helpful in making the invisible paradigm influencing our work more visible and apparent.  So, what (or where) is the "conscience" of a campus?  Where do the underlying (and most influential) values manifest themselves?

Just like t.v. is not the only place a society's values are apparent, there are likely a number of aspects of a campus where its values shine through.  Here are a few that seem worth taking a look at:

General Education & Graduation Requirements:  Virtually all students, to some degree or another, view college as an exercise in earning a credential--the degree--which becomes a key for opening other doors (e.g. jobs, graduate school, etc.).  Institutions, then, are charged with outlining a set of requirements which, when completed, demonstrate that a student has "earned" this credential.  Thus, this set of requirements speaks volumes about what an institution believes an "educated," "learned," or "competent," student looks like or has done.  And, this means more than just the classes a student takes.  What a school requires in the way of internships, service-learning, capstone experiences, etc. communicates a set of values about what constitutes an educational experience.

Advisement Centers:  A fly on the wall in an academic advisement center would learn a lot about what an institution really values.  Is it a speedy path to graduation?  A well-rounded educational experience?  Personal growth?  Self-authorship?  The sub-text of these advisement sessions is something students pick up on and use to inform subsequent decisions they make regarding their academic experience.  If academic advisors engage students in conversations about what they are learning, what experiences they are seeking out to experience the growth they hope for, how their thinking or views are changing, etc., students are much more likely to conceptualize their time on a campus as an opportunity for discovery and growth.  In contrast, if these sessions are only about graduating in four years, meeting application deadlines, submitting the proper forms, and fulfilling course requirements, a completely different message will be communicated.

New Student Orientation:  Students make a lot of unconscious judgments about their college based on what they see and hear during their first few days on campus.  If institutions value a particular kind of learning for their students, this should be explicitly stated and modeled during orientation.  Of course, campus tours, social events, and other student-life types of activities are an important part of this experience.  However, if orientation doesn't do any more than disseminate information to passive human receptacles and bring students together for dances, parties, and athletic events, a tremendous opportunity is lost. A campus who claims to value service-learning, collaborative experiences, open dialogue, or undergraduate research, needs to ensure that, when feasible, these values are reflected in what students do (not just what they hear) during orientation.

Faculty Reward Systems:  Like students, faculty shape their work based, in part, upon what is rewarded by   department chairs, deans, and provosts.  What is it that faculty are rewarded for and how much does it align with what we say we really value.

Where else are institutional values (particularly hidden ones) made visible?

College Choice: The myth of the perfect fit school

My friend Gary Daynes linked to a fascinating article from The Washington Monthly in a recent post on his blog. The article reports on the changing landscape of college admissions and highlights ConnectEdu, a company that, among other things, helps match colleges and students in attempt to find "the right fit."

Tools like ConnectEdu and others are long overdue and will be great assets for students, parents, admissions counselors and just about anyone else who cares about the college selection process.  However, there is a potential pitfall in this path which is that some students and parents may come to believe that there is a "perfect college" out there for them.  This isn't necessarily a new problem (no doubt, some students and parents have always believed this myth); however, the proliferation of college choices available to students in today's educational marketplace, the ease of accessing school information via the web, and (now) tools that help students find "the right fit" are a recipe for what psychologist Barry Schwartz has termed the "paradox of choice. "

For a student, finding a college that provides the academic programs, social opportunities, environment, diversity, etc. they are looking for is a great thing.  But, the reality is that the list of schools meeting these requirements is likely to include at least a handful of potential "matches," all of which could end up being a "good fit."  The operative word here is could.  I say that because the college experience a student has on a particular campus is shaped largely by what the student does once they get there.  All the intramural sports, small class sizes, service learning opportunities, and research labs in the world won't make a difference without an engaged, invested, and proactive student on the other end.  And, I don't hear this message being voiced very often in the discussions about school choice.  Rather, many students (and their parents) are increasingly believing that their college experience will be made or broken by the initial choice they make regarding which school to attend.  What happens when a student enrolls at the "perfect fit" school suggested by a match-making service, and then mistakenly believes all her work is done?  Will she put forth the effort to become engaged in her campus, get integrated into the community, and do the hard work to find her niche?  Maybe, but not if she assumes that club membership, relationships w/ faculty members, and engaging academic experiences will happen on their own.

So, it seems important to temper conversations about finding the right fit, with complementary discussion about the responsibility students have to shape and mold their experience once they arrive on a campus.  Otherwise, our institutions will be welcoming excited students who want to be at our schools, but who have no expectation of putting forth the effort necessary to have a great college experience.

Should freshmen be allowed to play?

Stanford's Athletic Director, Bob Bowlsby, made waves this week with his call to ban freshmen from participating in intercollegiate athletics.  While some think such propositions are merely an aim to curb the trend of men's basketball players leaving for the NBA after their freshmen year (the NBA currently requires draftees to be at least 19 and one year removed from high school), Bowlsby's stated rationale is that sitting out a year would give student-athletes time to adjust to the academic rigors of higher education.

While the chances of such a proposal being accepted by the NCAA and its board seem like a longshot, it will be entertaining to see how the rest of college athletics responds and where the idea goes.  Even if some version of this proposal were to be accepted (some reports cite that Bowlsby has suggested mandatory red-shirting during the first year as a compromise of sorts), sidelining athletes, by itself, isn't likely to lead to the improved academic adjustment Bowlsby is hoping for.  Many athletics departments (including the one on my campus) have bridging programs designed to assist student athletes in making the transition from high school to college (both in and out of the classroom), which should become mandatory and monitored closely to ensure they are doing what they propose to do and not just orienting freshmen to the culture of athletics on a campus.  

The bigger issue here is the increasingly wide divide between the academic and athletic missions of big-time college sports institutions.  In an article published this morning in the Salt Lake Tribune, the University of Utah's head football coach, Kyle Whittingham, responded to Bowlsby's proposal.  As a fan of University of Utah athletics, I like Whittingham and think he has done a tremendous job with his team (they win games and rarely have the off-field problems that sometimes plague other high-profile teams).  However, his comments in the article reflect two problematic attitudes that seem to be prevalent among college coaches.

First, Whittingham's statment that "if a guy is ready to play, why wouldn't you play him?" suggests that he wants the best athletes on the field, whether or not they are ready for everything else that comes with being a college student (read: academics) In defense of the corps of coaches Whittingham represents, they face tremendous pressure to be successful and please alumni, donors, and administrators.  So, in many ways, they walk a difficult line as they try to put a good product on the field or court, while also pleasing those who want to hold their athletes to high academic standards.  The problem is that the pro-athletics voice is almost always stronger (and has deeper pockets) than any of the other stakeholders on a college campus.

Second, although the reporter for the story may have misrepresented Whittingham's views, the article suggests that Whittingham believes that if a student-athlete is "mature" enough to garner signficant playing time, it can be assumed that they are ready to take on a college academic load as well.  This seems like a huge stretch and one I'm sure would elicit countless anedcotes from faculty members and administrators demonstrating that athletic maturity/leadership doesn't always transfer into academic settings.  

Whittingham does, however, point out one of the biggest flaws in Bowlsby's proposal which is that it is a blanket solution for a problem that only effects a percentage of college athletes.  Of course, as a former student-athlete I am biased in my belief that there are plenty of athletes (even within high-profile football and men's basketball) who can balance athletic demands with the academic requirements of university life.  Barring all freshmen from participating punishes those who are well prepared and could potentially shield athletic departments from addressing problems which contribute to poor academic peformance (e.g. recruiting and signing students grossly underprepared for college, monopolizing athletes time by involving them in athletic activities for 30+ hours a week, and failing to provide sufficient support and resources to athletes to assist them in being successful in the classroom).  A better solution is to hold individual institutions and the NCAA as a whole more accountable for doing what they say they do--providing an experience for student-athletes that enhances their overall education.  

On the marginalization of the "scholarship of teaching and learning"

"[T]here remains a troubling gap between rhetoric about teaching's value and the realities of teaching's recognition and reward."

This statement from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching's latest release (The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Reconsidered:  Integration and Impact) sums up one of the main arguments of the book, namely, that institutions would do well to modify faculty reward structures to recognize the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) as valid academic work on par with traditional research scholars may do within their discipline, be it physics, economics or theatre.  

One associated with such a change is the fact that at most institutions (particularly large institutions), decisions about promotion and rank advancement are guided by general policies which are then interpreted and applied by academic colleges and departments.  While the idealist in we would like to think that one day it might be a formal expectation (read:  requirement) that the vast majority of faculty members engage in substantial scholarship related to improving the way they teach or facilitate learning, that seems like a steep hill to climb.  However, a more feasible alternative would be for each college or department within an institution to commit to having one scholar who conducts a significant portion of their research on teaching and learning within that particular discipline or field.  

A structure like this would lead to at least a couple of productive things.  First, it would be a way for institutions to make good on the rhetoric commonly heard about the importance of good teaching and learning.  Additionally, a researcher in this position (I'll call them "SoTL fellows") would be better positioned to consult with their colleagues than would the traditional teaching and learning consultants working out of the Centers for Teaching and Learning found on most campuses.  They would be fluent in the disourse of the discipline, be familiar with curricula for courses taught in the department, have relationships with others in the college or department, and (hopefully) be engaged in enough traditional academic research that they are seen as credible scholars by those they consult with.  Finally, they could be effective advocates for promoting the SoTL among their colleagues and help them see the difference it can make in their experiences in the classroom, the lab, or the lecture hall.

An institution who was willing to make this sort of change would also be positioned to gather meaningful data about how the SoTL impacts teaching evaluations, learning outcomes for particular courses and programs, satisfaction rates among faculty members who do significant amounts of teaching.  In other words, it would create small cells of innovation across a campus that, in time, could have more far reaching effects upon the learning that students experience. 

What is Higher Education doing to address "the demise of guys?"

In this short TED talk, Philip Zimbardo shares some alarming statistics about males and why we should be worried about them.

One of Zimbardo's arguments is that the traditional industrial model of education--large classes, lecture delivery, rigid policies and requirements, etc.--is a pretty poor fit for male students who want change, novelty, and excitement.

This raises an interesting question about how far institutions should go to "engage" learners, and what that might mean.  What kind of responsibility do institutions and individual educators have to provide change and novelty?  The knee-jerk response from some in educational technology and instructional design is more media, more gaming, and more online learning.  While, technology is likely part of the solution, these cries for technology-rich classrooms seem a little narrow.  And, some in education (like Zimbardo) seem to believe that it's gaming and media that have led to some of the problems we see among males (for a counter argument, watch this TED talk from Ali Carr-Chellman).  

What else could or should higher ed be doing, both in and outside the classroom, to address the problems we see among male students?  When I think about my own campus I can't think of a single initiative, policy, program, or otherwise aimed at enhancing the experience or learning of male students.  This is odd considering how much success we've seen from programs focused on women (e.g. Women in STEM, Women's Centers, etc.).  Let me be clear that I'm not arguing that we should stop focusing on women.  Rather, what could higher ed learn from its efforts to support female students that could now be applied to the "male dilemma?"

Zimbardo and others mention the importance of male role models (I've written about this in a post from about a year ago) and campuses are beginning to address this through mentoring programs and male initiatives like the one at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.  But, in talking to those who administer these programs (I learned about UA-LR's program this summer at a conference in the UK), they are small, underfunded, and generally an afterthought of the administration.  Additionally, they are frequently focused on segments of the male population (e.g. minority students, first-generation students, or student-athletes).  

If institutions are really serious about improving the retention rates, graduation rates, learning, and overall experience of males on their campuses, these marginal programs and the work they are doing will need to influence wider campus practices.  Is this happening anywhere?  And, if so, is it working? 

Can good people make it in corrupt systems?

In a recent post, I wrote about situational forces and the impact they can have on individual behavior.  The argument made is that good people can do terrible things under the right (or wrong) circumstances.  On Wednesday, this became a little more personal to me when a Provo City Council member, who is also one of my neighbors, was charged with 10 felonies relating to his dealings in local real estate development.  He isn't a next door neighbor and I've never been to his home, but I see him once a week or so and always got the impression that he was a pretty good guy--not someone I would take for a felon or defrauder.  The saddest part of it all is that he has a wife and young children that now have to deal with the fall out and find a way to hold a family together.  

I have no idea how much truth there is to the claims being made and don't care to make any kind of judgment.  It's just a sad situation and one that has brought me back to a question I have wondered about off and on over the years:  Can good people survive in systems or environments that seem to incentivize unethical and corrupt practices.  I first began asking this question as a new voter trying to make informed ballot decisions.  I saw the media regularly uncovering corrupt politicians and started to wonder if candidates in any very visible election or anyone in high profile public positions could hold on to their values and integrity.  As a student in an introductory political science class I asked this question of my professor (mostly because he gave us extra credit for visiting him during office hours).  After beating around the bush a little, he eventually told me that, no, he didn't think very many politicians stayed 100% honest (which is a little ironic given that until just a few months ago this professor was the chair of the Utah County Democrats now the chairman of the Utah County Democratic Party) and most compromised on their values.  Even as a fairly dense adolescent, I was a little shocked and pretty discouraged by his response.  And, voting that November wasn't as much fun as I thought it would be.

It would be unfair to paint all politicians or all business people as dishonest, but the reality is that those who work in these environments are often under extreme pressure to produce results, be it a victorious campaign or great quarterly report.  Similar pressures exist for professional and high profile collegiate athletics, some branches of academic research, and plenty of other settings as well.  And, because we are increasingly becoming a society which values "results" above all else (and, by results, we usually mean things that are easy to measure like profits, votes, and wins), we create systems that reward "producers," sometimes at the cost of values, relationships, and community.  

In my heart of hearts I know that there are plenty of good politicians, CEOs, and sports executives that are successful and upstanding.  But, I wonder how rare they are becoming and how many of them we'll see 10 or 25 years from now.  

Cafe West: An unlikely gathering place

My wife and I had a new addition to our family early on Monday morning.  Her name is Ashlyn and she weighed in at a hearty 6 lbs. 10 oz. (which, surprisingly, is a pound heavier than our first daughter).  Needless to say, it has been an exciting and tiring week as we've adjusted to having both an infant and a toddler at home.  But, she slept nearly 6 hours without interruption last night and our two year-old has only had a minor show of jealousy, so we are feeling like things are going well.

In between holding Ashlyn and watching a ridiculous amount of baseball while my wife recovered in a hospital room, I discovered "Cafe West," what, at first glance, appears to be a typical hospital cafeteria at Utah Valley Regional Medical Center in Provo, Utah.  I had eaten at Cafe West three years ago when our first daughter was born and knew the food was good, so I went back the night after Ashlyn was born.  It was nearly 11:00 p.m. when I walked down from the hospital room, so I expected things to be pretty quiet.  However, when I got to the cafeteria, I was surprised to find nearly 30 college-aged students camped out in a corner of the cafeteria eating, laughing, and just hanging out.  And, it was fairly obvious that none of them were patients at the hospital or there to see patients.  I went back the next night (mostly out of curiosity, but also for the most amazing onion rings I have ever had in my life) and there was a completely different (and smaller) group of students there.

Provo is a college town, so to see a group of students  out enjoying a late night meal at a local gathering place isn't uncommon at all.  But, I would never have guessed that gathering place would be a hospital cafeteria.  Let alone a cafeteria whose web presence is 4 lines on the general visitor info page of the hospital, who has no signage visible from outside of the hospital, and which a large percentage of the full-time citizens of Provo probably don't know about.  What has made Cafe West a gathering place?

I'm guessing here, but these are my hunches:

1.  Really good food.  No one hangs out at hospitals unless they have a good reason for it.  The food is what brings students to Cafe West (and keeps them coming back).  Not only does it give them a reason to gather, but facilitates conversation and connection.  And, yes, the food is that good.  I wasn't lying when I said their onion rings are the best.  They make my top 5 milkshake list as well (although there are only 4 flavors to choose from).  It also helps that their menu is very simple and easy to navigate--an idea I have blogged about before.  

2.  Cheap prices.  College students, particularly those in Provo, don't like to spend much money on their food (I know this from suffering through six months as a server at a local restaurant where a "good" tip was around 7%).  They gather to places where they can hang out, get full, and do it without taking too much of a dent.  

3.  Unique environment.  As far as cafeterias go, Cafe West isn't really all that unique at all (aside from the onion rings & milkshakes).  But, as a college hang-out, it's as different and unique as you can find.  College students like to feel different and to feel like they have insider knowledge.  When you eat at Cafe West for the first time, you feel like you have discovered a hidden gem amidst the relatively boring Provo landscape.  I think this adds to the allure and appeal for students.

4.  Small and intimate setting.  Cafe West couldn't have chairs & tables for more than 60 people and it is tucked away in a back corner of the hospital (just as you come in the "Labor and Delivery" entrance, which is how I found it).  What's more, the staff that run the cafe have a knack for making you feel like your welcome there and they're happy to see you (I have a hunch that this is a very intentional effort on the part of hospital administration--Utah Valley Regional Medical Center is part of Intermountain Health Care (IHC), who are well known for their patient-friendly culture and their efforts to embed that culture throughout all parts of the organization, from the housekeeping staff to, apparently, the 20 year old kid who makes shakes in the cafeteria).  When I went back on my 2nd night at the hospital, it was the same staff working behind the counter and I got the distinct feeling that they remembered me from the night before.  It was also obvious that they were familiar with the "regulars" and called them by name.  That's the kind of place people want to go back to and feel comfortable gathering to.

5.  Openness and accessibility.  Cafe West is open 23 hours a day, which makes it an ideal gathering place for college students who rarely sleep.  And, architecturally, it is wide open which facilitates larger groups and makes it easy to see late arrivals, acquaintances, etc. as they walk in (the large group I saw on my first night started with about 10 people and grew and grew as others came).  The lightweight, easy-to-move tables and chairs also provide flexibility in accomodating whatever size of group is there to gather.

The thing that I couldn't get over as I watched students and enjoyed onion rings was that Cafe West was never intended to be a gathering place for this demographic, but it happened rather serendipitously because the right conditions were in place.  What makes me laugh is that most of the gathering places we try to create inentionally aren't even close to this successful.   

Joe Castillo & Sand Art: Stories in unexpected places

I've posted, several times, about the power of story in learning and communication.  This is not, by any means, a new idea--we have come to expect story in certain aspects of our experience.  For example, we recognize that the best speakers are those who can tell the right story in the right way (think of the best TED talks you've listened to--chances are they include some elements of story and feature a great story teller).  We, obviously, look for good stories in the film and literature we consume.  And, to some extent, story is even starting to make headway in the classroom (e.g. problem-based learning, the case-study method, etc.) and we expect good teachers to incorporate narrative into their classrooms.  

More and more, however,  I am starting to see story in places I wouldn't expect.  My most recent experience with an unexpected use of story was the website of a very skilled artist.  Joe Castillo is a sand artist who makes a living creating art (very powerful stories in some cases) using a pretty non-traditional medium.  Although I didn't think I would ever have much interest in watching someone play in the sand, Castillo turns it into a very powerful art form.  What, for me, makes his art so powerful is that he tells stories--some of which are incredibly moving (watch the 9/11 memorial performance posted on his homepage for an example).  Part of what is inspiring about great artists like Castillo is their skill and precision in their craft.  However, there is plenty of art work out there that is highly skillful, technically sound, and precise, but which doesn't inspire and move us.  The power comes in the story.  

This all makes me wonder whether we could use story in non-traditional ways in other settings and achieve a power and impact that is generally missing.  What if administrators and team leaders pitched ideas and managed projects in ways that capitalized on story?  What if the painfully monotonous and largely unproductive meetings we all attend were recrafted to tell stories or so that those in attendance felt like they were part of some kind of meaningful story?  Could we rethink the way we plan and organize events--weddings, new student orientation, training seminars--and use story to drive learning and increase engagement and meaning?  Or, what if the four year university experience were viewed by higher education leaders as a narrative with all of the elements of a good story, including beginnings & endings, intrigue, authenticity, and risk?  

Where else could we start using story to make an impact or frame our work in terms of narrative?  Story seems to be engaging, motivating, and captivating in almost any setting.

 

Situations & systems matter: Lessons for higher ed from the Stanford Prison Experiment

After looking at it on my bookshelf for the better part of three years, I finally resolved to tackle Philip Zimbardo's book, The Lucifer Effect.  I'm only about half-way through, but it has been a fascinating read and helped me see both my work and personal life through a new lens.  The underlying argument of the book is that individual behavior can be heavily influenced through what Zimbardo terms "situational forces" and that the systems we create, be it in prisons, businesses, homes, or schools, are critical in determining actions of the individuals within those systems.  Zimbardo also points out the common tendency we have to attribute negative (or even evil or destructive) behaviors to individual dispositional factors (e.g. genes, personality traits, personal pathologies, etc.), while completely disregarding situational or systemic factors.  

Those of us working in higher ed (particularly those of us who work with first-year students) frequently yield to the same cycle of analysis in that we attribut student failures, less-than-desirable learning outcomes, etc. to the personal or dispositional attributes of the students on our campuses.  As I read Zimbardo's book, I had to ask myself, what situational factors on my campus might be to blame?  And, what could we do on campuses to create systems that are more likely to facilitate the behaviors we want from students?

This post, is not in any way meant to compare college campuses to prisons or to suggest that the negative things that happen on campuses are comparable to the horrific things that happened in Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE).  However, there are lessons and findings that emerged from the SPE that could be instructive for any organizational leaders, including higher ed administrators:

1.  Rules, policies, and requirements matter.  Students come to understand expectations and behavioral norms, in part, from the rules and policies enacted on a campus.  What they read in the student catalog and see on the campus website communicates a set of values about the institution and what is viewed as most important.  Even more importantly, if we want students to have particular types of experiences (e.g. service-learning, engagement with peer mentors, etc.), then it is imperative that we embed these practices and experiences within the required curricula and co-curricula.  George Kuh has repeatedly made the case for making high impact practices more visible and institutionalized on campuses.

2.  Inviting individuals to take on new roles changes thinking and behavior.  When individuals integrate or socialize into new organizations (e.g. a college campus), their subsequent behavior is shaped, in large part, by the role they see themselves playing.  Consequently, careful attention should be given to the way in which new students are "inducted" into the campus community and what kinds of messages are conveyed about their role as students.  Even using the term student has potential for being problematic because students see this as a role they have played (and played well) across their K-12 school experience.  Subsequently, they see themselves in a similar role as before and bring with them the same set of behaviors, attitudes, and dispositions that, frequently, are not a good fit for their new college environment (e.g. study skills that worked in high school but which are ineffective in facilitating the kind of deep learning necessary for success in college courses).   Something to chew on--what if we frequently referred to students as "scholars" or "learners" in our conversations, literature, etc.?  Maybe it's a bit cheesy or over-the-top, but if that is the role we hope for students to play, our language needs to reflect that and reflect that we expect them to play a different role than the one they likely played before they arrived on our campus.  Interestingly, clinical psychology and its practice of role induction, may have something to contribute to our thinking in this area.  In short, therapists and clinical psychologists have found that patients persist in treatment at higher rates and demonstrate desirable patient behaviors more frequently when they clearly understand their role as patients.

3.  Leaders can shape behavior by playing reciprocal roles.  In the SPE, subjects selected to play the role of "prisoners" would have had a difficult time playing that role without others playing the reciprocal "guard" role.  Consequently, the role faculty members, advisors, peer mentors, and administrators play will influence student behaviors.  When we play the role of parent, disciplinarian, grader, or punisher, we invite students to play the reciprocal role (e.g. child, rebel, surface learner, victim, etc.).  Constrastingly, if we see ourselves (and our behaviors align with this view) as mentors, guides, co-learners, etc., we're more likely to call forth the behaviors and attitudes we most want in students and which we know will lead to transformative learning.

4.  Anonymity = Trouble.  One of the most powerful lessons I have taken from reading about the SPE thus far is how much conditions of anonymity influence individual behavior.  What's more, many of the current practices on college campuses (particularly large research institutions) have the potential to increase students' feelings of anonymity.  Think for a moment about the experiences a new student on a college campus might have--the classes they take, the communication they receive from the institution, the way they conduct business or transactions with the institution, etc.--and then ask yourself whether these experiences leave a student feeling "known" or anonymous (there seem to be some strong connections here to Schlossberg's work on marginality and mattering here as well).  I doubt that students who feel anonymous or marginalized will begin to behave like prisoners on our campuses; however, when our campus practices and policies make students feel as though they don't matter or limit their access to meaningful personal relationships with faculty members, advisors, and administrators, their learning will suffer.  

So, the next time you hear yourself or a colleague complaining about students, take a moment to think about the system and situuational forces your institution has created and how they might be contributing to the problems.

Answering tough (and meaningful) questions: A case for narrative inquiry in educational research

In a recent posting  on his blog, John Gardner raised some intriguing questions about measuring the impact of our work with first-year students (e.g. How do we measure whether or not students love their university experience?  How do we measure transformation?).  These are, no doubt, important questions for First-Year Experience professionals to ask.   And, if we see our work as more than just boosting retention stats, they are questions that we have to grapple with.

The trouble with questions about “love,” “transformation,” or “the impact of a mentor” is that these things are tough to measure.  Granted, researchers can operationalize concepts like love and develop instruments that measure proxy indicators that the more fuzzy concepts are present (e.g. we measure “engagement” by measuring a variety of indicators including time spent working outside of class, interactions with faculty members, study w/ peers, etc.), but this approach has its problems.  Before readers’ red-flags go up, this is not a rant against quantitative research or operationalism—this type of academic work has its place and helps us to answer critical questions about student experience.  However, while p-values, standard error estimates, and confidence intervals, are sometimes seen as the coin of the realm in academia, for some questions (i.e. those mentioned by John), particularly those with deep personal relevance for us, the traditional quantitative approach can leave us feeling unfulfilled, still questioning whether or not our work has really mattered in the lives of individual students. 

 The good news is that there are other research approaches coming to be recognized as just as viable as more traditional quantitative approaches.  One that may hold particular promise for FYE researchers is narrative inquiry.  A blog post is not the place to attempt an exhaustive explanation of this discipline; rather, my intent here is to provide a brief sketch outlining the general landscape of the field.  For those wanting more depth (and much more sophisticated) than is found here, these are some good places to start:

“Stories of Experience and Narrative Inquiry,” Educational Researcher, 19(5), 1990

Narrative methods for the human sciences, Catherine Riessman, 2007

Narrative Inquiry, Jean Clandinin & Michael Connelly, 2004

Touching Eternity:  The enduring outcomes of teaching, Tom Barone, 2001

 

Narrative inquiry is a sub-discipline within the broader field of qualitative research.  Based on the premise that storytelling is an inherent human quality and that we live “storied lives,” narrative researchers use narrative data sources (e.g. story-telling, journals, field notes, interviews) to study how we experience the world and then make meaning of these experiences.  As an example, John’s question about love for an institution could be addressed by interviewing graduating seniors, soliciting stories from sophomore students, or analyzing  journal writing from a freshman seminar course, then identifing meaningful themes that cut across the entire set of “data.”  Ultimately, the researcher would aim to use these narrative sources to construct a “meta-narrative” that tells an overarching story related to the initial research question. 

As with any research methodology, narrative inquiry has its critics.  Common criticisms of narrative inquiry include a lack of generalizability, reliability, and validity (similar to the arguments against most qualitative approaches) and these are all fair claims.  However, as a general rule, narrative inquirers don’t view these criteria as goals of their research.  Rather, their focus is on transferability, apparency, and verisimilitude.  To narrative researchers, the narrative approach is a way of addressing personal and human dimensions of experience in ways that quantitative data cannot—they are working from a completely different set of assumptions about research.  Jean Clandinin and Michael Connelly (arguably the most well-known and well-respected narrative researchers) put it best in their paper “Stories of experience and narrative inquiry” when they said that “stories stand between the general and the particular, mediating the generic demands of science with the personal, practical, concrete demands of living” (1990). 

Lest this post be viewed as a one-sided push for a problem-free research approach, it is important to recognize narrative’s dangers and pitfalls.  Because narrative asks researchers to construct stories from qualitative data, the possibility exists for individuals to fake the data and concoct pure fiction, based on nothing but unfounded assumptions and only anecdotal data.  Additionally, narrative could be used to misrepresent experience and promote deception.  Finally, some narrative researchers (particularly when stakes are high) may present only “Hollywood stories” where, for example, students love everything about their university experience, become deep learners, and are transformed by their college experience for the rest of their lives.  But, it bears mentioning, that similar claims could be made of virtually any approach to research, even quantitative methods.

While narrative inquiry may not have the tables and statistical significance that sways some political and campus leaders, there is rhetorical power in human stories that we can relate to and that elicit similar stories from our own experiences.  What’s more, narrative inquiry is gaining traction among educational researchers, as evidenced by the recently formed Narrative Research SIG within AERA, the convening of the first ever Narrative Inquiry conference this last May, and the well-respected work of Clandinin and Connelly.  Most importantly, narrative offers an approach for answering those questions, like John has posed, that are deeply meaningful to us personally, and whose answers we use to measure the impact of our careers.

 

What does it mean to be a university student?

"Neither my undergraduate nor my Master's experiences imprinted themselves on my heart and in my life . . . . I wasn't heavily involved in anything and I feel no special connection to either of my alma maters.  And I don't feel like a bad person and I don't feel regretful for having walked a different path."

A reader made the above comment in response to a recent blog post by John Gardner (John is the senior fellow for the National Resource Center for the First-Year Experience and blogs about issues relating to undergraduate education and the first-year experience).  

The poster goes on to make the point that, as educators, we have to be careful not to project our own experiences or aspirations onto the students we associate with (e.g. assume that because our undergraduate experience played out in a particular way, that all the students we work with should have the very same type of experience).  This is an important caution because I see colleagues making this kind of assumption (and catch myself as well) quite frequently.  We are not in the business of cloning ourselves or dictating that all students approach their education in the same way we did.  But, there is a troubling tone to the comment and it seems to suggest that students have the right to be invisible members of a campus and make no real contribution to what takes place there.

A university is, by definition, a community. Accordingly, when a student makes a choice to enroll at a particular institution, they are not just agreeing to take classes and complete assignments.  More importantly, they are making a commitment to become a member of the university community by participating in its practices and upholding its ideals. Universities always have (and I hope always will)  be gathering places where scholars can come together to both learn from and teach one another. 

Although students will sometimes choose to be "uninvolved and uncommitted," it seems slightly selfish to do nothing more than attend class lectures, complete assignments, and then get out without making any attempt to invest in or contribute to the community of which they are a part. And, it runs counter to the commitment they made when they decided to "matriculate" at the university.

I'm not saying that every student needs to be in a campus club or go to the football games. What I am saying is that there are diverse ways to become involved on a campus, from service-learning, to studying with classmates, to working in the on-campus burger joint. And, one of our roles as educators is to encourage and facilitate participation by all students in our campus communities. That may be particularly true of those students who come onto campus with an initial tendency towards being "uninvolved" and "uncommitted." The key, and maybe this is what the poster was getting at, is in extending those invitations in skillful, compassionate, and respectful ways. 

As an aside, it would also help if we stopped "recruiting" students in the traditional ways (e.g. "look at our nice dorms," "we'll give you a laptop," "we have great tailgates") and did a better job of helping them understand what kind of commitment they are making when they make the choice to come to our campuses. "Recruiting" needs to be balanced with a healthy dose of "educating," before they've even stepped on campus or registered for their first class.

Dilemmas and the difficulty of being wise

A few months ago I blogged about the concept of "practical wisdom" and linked to a TED talk by Barry Schwartz in which he describes this idea.

I started reading Schwartz' book earlier this week and have enjoyed it thus far.  One of the arguments made by Schwartz and co-author Ken Sharpe is that the rules we make to "simplify" or systematize decisions or actions will often fail us.  It was an idea that made perfect sense to me and, at least once, I had the thought "People (not me) are stupid.  Why can't they be more wise and stop holding on to their rules so rigidly."  Then, today, I had an experience that reminded me how hard it is to be wise.  

Each year at this time, my department interviews and hires a large number of undergraduate peer mentors to work with freshmen students during the coming academic year.  Like most departments, we have a formal application process and have developed policies to help us make decisions about who to hire (e.g. minimum GPA of 3.4, completed core first-year requirements, not a felon, etc.).  Most of the time the system we have put in place is actually quite helpful in (1) winnowing the list and (2) making distinctions between applicants.  One of the "requirements" that we have held to in the past is that anyone we hire must be able to attend our "mandatory" week-long training workshop held a few weeks before the fall semester begins.  We do this because we believe that the training we provide is beneficial for the students we hire and (I think) that a student's attendance at five days of eight hour training is a sign that they are committed to our program.  Anecdotally, I can say that the things peer mentors learn during this week and the social connections they forge with their peers and supervisors are critical to their success and the overall success of our program.  So, in general, it is a pretty good policy to require peer mentors to attend.

Well, about an hour ago we interviewed a candidate who I feel comfortable saying is the strongest applicant we have had among nearly 100 that we have interviewed.  He is a deep learner.  He is personable and has an almost unmatched social ease.  He has remarkably pure intentions for wanting to work for us.  And, his father is a faculty member here who has been a friend of our department for years.  The problem--he is getting married on August 12th and will be away from campus until August 20th, and our "mandatory" training begins on August 17th.  

So, my colleagues on the selection committee have a couple of choices:  (a) We stick to our guns and let him know that, because he cannot attend the training, we can't offer him a position; or (b) We make an exception to the policy and hire him.

I'm torn.  I actually knew before he interviewed this afternoon, that he had a conflict with the training.  I hoped that the interview would be lousy and it would be an easy decision for us.  We weren't that lucky.  What complicates things even more is the fact that we have told other applicants with similar conflicts  (far less prepared, impressive, and qualified applicants mind you) that we couldn't hire them.  We even told another student, who was a peer mentor for the last year, that because she wouldn't be back from her study abroad trip until after training was over, that she couldn't come back and work for us.

So, now that I'm facing a situation that requires the type of "practical wisdom" Schwartz calls for, I'm realizing that it's not just stupid people that struggle with these things, it's all of us.  I really have no idea what we're going to do, but here are some things that I think will guide us.

1.  Past experience.  There was a time when we didn't have a hard and fast "you can't miss training" policy.  It would be instructive for us to think about students who missed training and then look at how effective they were in their role as peer mentors.  If, in the past, we've gotten burned then we might take that as fair warning.  If, on the other hand, there have been highly effective peer mentors that missed all or part of training, maybe we need to rethink our policy (and design better training).

2.  Empathy & perspective.  Seeing the situation from a variety of vantage points (the student we interviewed, the student on study abroad that we decided not to take back for next year, the loyal faculty member father) will help us create a clearer picture of the nuances of the situation.  And, it will likely help us be more "human" in our decision.  For example, how would we feel if we were "punished" for getting married and taking a honeymoon (which is a particularly interesting question for us to ask given the emphasis our university's sponsoring institution places on marriage and family).  How would we feel if we were a peer mentor who had cancelled a family vacation or ended an internship early in order to attend training, only to find out that one of our peers was given the luxury of coming three days late?

3.  Thinking outside of the box.  It's very possible that we are thinking about this in overly black-and-white terms.  It may not be an issue of hire him or don't hire him.  Rather, there are probably a lot of ways that he could become involved with our department, without being hired as a peer mentor (the policy only applies to peer mentors).  For example, he could work in a volunteer capacity, could work in a specialized role under the direction of a staff member (he brings a great deal of media and technology experience with him that we could likely use), he could work as a research assistant for a semester and then become a peer mentor.

So, for the four people that actually read this blog (and that might be generous), what would you do?  Are there other guiding principles we could use to help us in our decision?