Radical Student Engagement

Ever since becoming active on Twitter, I have enjoyed following different people from all walks of life.  Following people who work in higher education and people who write and speak about leadership have provided me with great opportunities for reflection about the issues I care about.

One such person who gets me thinking is Eric Stoller (@EricStoller) who put something out there about what it means to be "radical" in Student Affairs.  This got me thinking about the history of our profession, where we are now, and where we are going.  If you are on Twitter, follow Eric.  You can thank me later.

Student Affairs was a profession born of controversy.  The Student Personnel Point of View in 1937 suggested that faculty were no longer able to take care of anything other than the intellectual development of college students.  Other people had to step up and play a role to monitor these students by making sure they checked into their dorm rooms at night and had something constructive to do when they weren't in class.  This movement also gave rise to literary societies and other spaces outside the classroom for students to discuss the issues of the day and think big about the world.

That beginning gave rise to a profession that is now driven by student development theory, assessment strategies, and strategies for increasing retention and student success.  Those are the things that drive me in our field, but are those the only things that drive our profession today?

We also live in an era of increased accountability, decreased resources, and increased competition for students who now have more options for pursuing higher education than ever before.  An unintended consequence of wading through all these factors is a decreased focus on student engagement.

Today, it seems a radical idea in higher education is that...

Student Engagement = Student Retention = Student Success

All of the researchers that drive our profession would tell us this, but why is it so difficult to focus on student engagement?  We might be too distracted by the politics of the day, the battle over resources, or the "fires" we have to rush to put out.  I wonder if this pull away from student engagement has made us less intentional and has cast us as reactive service providers who are just trying to keep up with the day.

Persistence research in higher education suggest students need to feel a connection with the institution and if that connection is made, they are likely to stay through graduation.  I've heard my friend Dr. Jorg Vianden (He's on Twitter too! @jvianden) refer to this as the "Cheers" affect.  Create a place where "everybody knows your name".  Whether you remember the TV show are not, creating that environment for students is something everybody can do no matter what job you have on a college campus.

So...how can we get really nuts in Student Affairs and make an effort to return to our student engagement roots?  Let's try...

• Making leadership opportunities more inclusive!  How often do we only interact with students in elected or selected leadership roles?  Create leadership opportunities that are low commitment and high reward.  Read more of this blog for more ideas! (Sorry...that was shameless...)
• Collaborating with others to create a seamless co-curriculum.  Students don't care who puts on the program they want to attend.  Why do we?  Break down the silos and create something together that everyone has a piece in creating and sustaining.  Student don't have time to pick and choose between us and we shouldn't be pulling them in multiple directions.
• Getting out of our offices and talking with students in small groups.  Join students for lunch in the University Center, visit a student organization meeting, invite a random student walking around to a program  happening that evening (do we even know what programs are happening that night?  If not, we should!).
• Reaching out to our faculty colleagues to gain insights into student engagement experiences we could create that would connect with the curriculum.  Faculty can be the best marketing team we could ever have.  We need to show them what we are doing, why we're doing it, and how it connects to broad learning outcomes that are meaningful to the institution.
• Interacting with students using social media and other technology.  Facebook is free...so is Twitter...the only thing I suspect is stopping us is the time, but that is in our control.  If we know students want a connection and view connecting virtually as the same thing (sometimes) why not give it to them.  Why not also use portal platforms (I'm partial to OrgSync) to essentially create a virtual one stop shop for all student engagement information.  We should make it easy and convenient for all students to engage whether they live in the halls or are only on campus one day a week.

I don't pretend these ideas are radical in the sense that nobody thought of them before.  They are radical because they are rarely implemented broadly and systematically.  Time may not always be our best friend, but it is something we can and must control and reclaim. Are there other barriers...sure, but we are a "can do" people and if we have lost that somewhere, we should do whatever it takes to get it back.  Let's embrace the days when we were all programmers and work together to create a system of student engagement that will increase student success during college and after graduation.

If that is something we could accomplish...that would be RADICAL.

BTW...I'm on Twitter too...@pshepRF