Team Members: Mike Eyster, Brandy Ota, Brent Harrison, Bonnie Damewood, Clarice Wilsey, Jackie James, Jason Rodriquez, Jessi Steward, Jon Davies, Lisa Fortin, Sharon Harbert, and Sheryl Eyster
Goal for Programs and Services: Student learning is integral to the creation and delivery of exceptional residential university programs and services.
Objectives:
Committee Charge: Aligning more closely to the academic mission and formulating our role in the academic plan are essential as we identify and review the programs and services offered in the Division of Student Affairs. Furthermore, with identification of our core ideology to enhance and advance student learning and with the BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) to become the preeminent residential university, it is clear that all of our services and programs must be reviewed and implemented with these focuses in mind. To do so, the following research must be done in order to complete a written proposal of next steps and strategies formulated to meet the objectives of the goal of programs and services outlined in the Division of Student Affairs Strategic Plan:
Work of the Committee:
The Committee was able to complete a number of the specific tasks identified. One of the first tasks was to develop a definition of Programs and Services. Below are a number of recommendations developed by the committee. While the recommendations constitute good ideas, the committee did not weigh these recommendations which departments in the division currently engage. This needs to be done because there probably is not time to implement these recommendations and continue all of the present activities.
Programs and Services Definition:
A system of opportunities, services, or projects designed to transform and advance student learning.
The committee focused on all four objectives.
Objectives:
Committee recommendation: We identified a number of strengths within the division regarding programs and services, particularly programs and services that link student and academic affairs. There are numerous credit course offerings available as a result of collaborations between student affairs units and various academic departments. However, as the committee discussed this and best practices, we acknowledged that a weakness in our current approach is that the courses offered within Student Affairs lack a unifying sense of purpose. They have little relationship to each other or to a larger Student Affairs curriculum. We believe this is an area ripe for improvement.
Ideally, Student Affairs departments would collaborate on the planning and development of a student affairs curriculum. The curriculum would provide courses designed for students at various stages of development. The courses would be developmentally appropriate for students at each stage of their college career. This curriculum would form a sequence of courses throughout the academic career of UO students. We would offer a variety of selections of classes ensuring that the classes fit varied leaning styles and interest of students. The idea behind this student affairs curriculum is that it would be comprehensive, thoughtful, and contain courses that follow a developmental chronology designed to enhance maturity and developmental growth of students at each stage of their academic career. The course would be offered for academic credit.
Development of the courses would be guided by the work of the Curriculum Implementation Team.
The development of these courses would provide an opportunity for genuine partnership between Student Affairs professionals and teaching faculty, each bringing a knowledge base and unique experience of the partnership. As this series of courses is developed, linkages between student affairs staff and teaching faculty would become stronger. Student Affairs staff members could even help to link faculty from different departments and thereby lead to collaborations across disciplines.
The Committee also recommends that efforts continue to promote collaboration between Student Affairs units and between Students Affairs units and other units on campus in the provision of programs and services. An example would be to identify ways in which Student Affairs units participate in the University Housing Community Conversations panel series.
The committee identified other “best practices”; however, the idea of the student affairs curriculum was the most comprehensive and far reaching suggestion that developed from the work of the committee.
Some of the current programs identified as best practices are:
- All career counselors serve as a liaison to several academic departments. The idea is that the career counselor can become more familiar with particular fields and thereby be more effective in linking current students to jobs in those fields. All career counselors serve as a liaison to many academic departments in order to create collaborative programs and opportunities for linking current students to future career options related to their major. The Career Connections Program is co-taught with faculty from the College of Arts and Sciences, Lundquist College of Business and the School of Journalism and Communication to teach effective job search and informational interviewing strategies. The highlight of the program connects students with professionals in a career area of interest where the student is able to discuss their academic experience in relationship to a possible career. The Career Center has also collaborated with Family and Human Services to grant credit for the Career Development Internship Program.
- The Health Center offers two peer health classes through the Human Physiology department. These classes provide students an opportunity to link academic knowledge with first hand experience because these students also serve as peer health educators.
- University Housing has a wide variety of academic connections that could fall into the “best practices” category. Paraprofessionals in student housing take a credit course to help them serve in leadership roles. These students later are placed in positions of responsibility and work under the guidance and ongoing supervision of housing staff members. In many cases these leadership experiences are training grounds that lead to careers, in other cases the knowledge gained supplements work of these students as they enter their career in unrelated fields. The Leadership for the 21st Century class is a credit class that was developed through collaboration between the dean of students office and university housing. This for credit course gets entering students off to a great start. Residential Freshman Interest Groups are yet another very successful collaboration between University Housing and the Office of First Year Experience.
- The Holden Leadership Center provides a number of credit bearing courses as well as other collaboration bringing students together with faculty in academically meaningful ways.
- Various courses are taught in the Office of Student Life – Educational Leadership 199 and 409 assist in providing underrepresented students with opportunities to adjust to and be successful in the college environment. In addition the 409 course provides opportunities for upper division students to learn and practice leadership skills. The Theater for Change class offers students an opportunity to enrolling a theater class that places student performers in the position of providing educationally meaningful information to peers.
- The PE and Recreation department teaches between 160 and 190 credit bearing physical education classes every term.
- The EMU offers Club Sports offer credited practicum experiences through College of Education. Craft Center offered credited practicum experience through the Arts and Administration program. Moss Street Children’s Center offered 8 students teach and practicum experiences; four through College of Education, one through College of Arts and Sciences, and one through LCC’s Early Childhood Education program.
- The Counseling Center offers classes for credit in Life Skills and in Leadership in Fraternal organizations.
The lists provided above are not comprehensive. Rather they are examples of what is currently being done within the division and examples of some of the best work being done within the division. A comprehensive list of academic connection programs and provided in the appendix.
One of the suggestions in the list of tasks for the committee was to review CAS for best practices. CAS is probably not the best source of information regarding best practices. Rather CAS lists minimal standards for Higher Education Programs. A better source of information about best practices would be the most up to date information from various professional associations represented within the division. Our committee did not have time to conduct a comprehensive review of best practices. This is a project that should be undertaken at some point.
Another task assigned to our committee was measurement of student engagement. UO is developing a nice history of measurement of student engagement. UO has administered the NESSE (National Survey of Student Engagement) several times. In addition we have had a NSSE representative come to campus to assist us in analyzing our results. Much of this work is in the purview of the Vice Provost for Undergraduate Studies. The UO would benefit by having assessment specialists on staff to assist with the ongoing analysis of this data. Assessment staff could interpret the information collected in the surveys so that data could be used to guide decision making. The advantage of having a history of administering NSSE is that it would provide an opportunity for before and after comparisons. It will be interesting to see UO scores in student engagement change after a student affairs curriculum is implemented.
Best practices are best arrived at through assessment instruments such as NSSE as well as through continuously feeding in ideas from professional associations.
Another task assigned to the committee is to set clear and measureable metrics. Four sources of metrics are immediately obvious: 1. NSEE survey results. 2. The establishment of learning objectives for each of the courses developed and administering surveys to students at the end of the course to determine if Learning Outcome objectives were met. 3. The numerous satisfaction surveys currently being conducted in units throughout the division. 4. The periodic external reviews that are conducted by various units throughout the division.
Services:
While many of the programs and services provided within the Division of Student Affairs contribute directly to the academic mission through offering credit courses and or supporting various academic programs, there are other functions provided within the division that are clearly more service oriented. University scheduling, University catering, cash dining operations, the Student ID card operation, health care services, and recreation services are functions that are primarily services and as such, could be provided by the private sector, either through contracting out, or by simply letting the private market address these needs.On the surface, it may appear that each of the examples cited above involve relatively cut and dried transactions, and therefore might be more efficiently performed by the private sector. This raises the question of whether certain services should be contracted out or whether they should be provided in-house by university agencies. There are however, reasons why a university may want to provide these services (and others) in house, rather than have them performed by the private sector.
There are several reasons why these services would be performed in house on a campus rather than contracted One of the most important reasons is the extent to which the particular service/function is related to the academic mission of the university. That is, the more closely related to the academic mission, the greater the reason for performing the function in house. 1*
Some of the above functions may, on the surface, appear to be relatively mundane and unrelated to the academic mission of the university. While these services may not involve the service provider offering courses for credit, there are specific and important ways in which providing these services on a campus relate to the academic mission of the university.
Several examples follow: College Health Services evolved out of a concern by the faculty of the University of California in 1900. The faculty were concerned about class attendance. The faculty expected the cause of low attendance would be the result of delinquency. Upon closer inspection however, they discovered the reason for low attendance was “sickness and not idleness”. The development of College Health Centers while not related to Health Centers providing academic courses was none the less directly related to student academic success. The Health Center at the University of California was established in 1901 specifically to address this concern. Thus health services are directly related to the advancement of academic success of students. *2
A catering operation on a campus may also seem to be relatively removed from the academic mission of most campuses. Again, this is not necessarily the case. Of course in some instances catering may be related to an academic program such as food science or leisure studies. However, even on campuses where there is no direct connection to course work being provided through the catering service, there may be reasons for this service to be in house rather than private. For example educational programming for students often revolves around meals that are provided through a catering operation – International programs, programs on nutrition, and programs related to recycling and sustainability of food are examples of programs that can fairly easily be folded into an in house catering operation. Where as a private caterer is often not staffed or equipped to handle educational programs and/or programs that routinely take place during hours when students would be most likely to attend, an in house catering service can be customized to perform these educational functions as well as provide outstanding catering services for the university.
One final example is scheduling services. On the surface scheduling may seem to be a relatively mechanical function not particularly related to the academic mission of the university. However, the staff in the scheduling office play a vital role in working with students and others on issues related to freedom of expression and the responsible exercise of rights. In many cases the events being scheduled involve students exercising and developing leadership and organizational skills. The educators in a university scheduling office incorporate into their practice, an approach that facilitates student learning as students organize these events.
In the examples above, if the goal of a university is to have these services performed in a way that is directly related to the academic goal of the university and the success of students attending the university, then these services are probably best performed in house. To the extent that it is unimportant that these functions be performed in a way that incorporates educational outcomes, then the campus may find that they would be better served to have these functions performed in the private sector.
This discussion is incorporated into this paper because there are a number of service functions provided within the Division of Student Affairs, that are not directly related to teaching classes (what some think of as the academic mission of the university). The Programs and Services implementation Team takes the position that these services, while perhaps a step removed from teaching classes, none the less involve teaching, learning outcomes, and a means to academic success for students.
Services provided “in-house” by the university should be periodically evaluated to ensure that providing the service “in-house” vs. contracting the services is still appropriate. Two criteria that need to be weighed making this determination are:
- Cost effectiveness of each method and
- The extent to which the university defines the service as part of academic mission of the university. Other criteria might relate to the value the university places on providing employment for students through a particular service and the extent to which learning outcomes are built into the student jobs being provided through the service.
Work that remains to be done:
Resources needed:
Attach appendix A and B
1 * Patricia Kearney, former executive director of student housing and financial aid at the University of California, Davis, elaborates on this concept in the monograph, “Privatization of Campus Housing in Higher Education”, based on papers and presentations at a symposium sponsored by the National Association of College Auxiliary Services (NACAS) and the Association of College and University Housing Officers-International (ACUHO-I) in January 1997.
2 * The History and Practice of College Health. H. Spencer Turner and Janet L. Hurley University of Kentucky press 2002.