Role Models: For Good…and not so much?

The prompt for Reverb Broads today: Who are your role models?

I really have been lucky over the course of my professional life to work in a field that offers active discussion about role modeling and celebrates it as one of its cornerstones.  The title of “role model” is important business and I think about the definition in the frame of someone with “behavior that can be emulated.”  There is positive role modeling and I do think there is negative role modeling as well.

I had a negative role model in work life and we’ll use a pseudonym for him and call him “Pete.” (Yes, it’s after Pete Campbell from Mad Men. That character is infuriating!). Pete found a way to skillfully show me everything I did NOT want to be in the event that I got to be anyone’s supervisor. I learned a lot about the supervisor’s role from him and how easy it was to make or break a staff member’s experiences. I’d rather poke my eyes out with a rusty pen than use the term “role model” associated with Pete, but in some weird way I think he might deserve that title because I did take a lot of  learning from that relationship.

Meet some of my most favorite positive role models…

Heather – my friend with the most gracious, spiritual soul that is a role model for my life as a parent.

Cathy – my boss.  She’s taught me so much about how to manage life as a working mom and shows me that I don’t have to sacrifice ambition in the name of having a life with my family too.

Michael – my friend, colleague and mentor with a gift for teaching and motivating college students that is second to none.

Alice- my maternal grandmother who was my role model for lifelong learning. Smartest woman I’ve ever known by far and I can only imagine what college would have done for her if she ever had the chance.

Ryan and Dave – the rest of my heart. My son’s creative spirit and my husband’s generous soul give me examples to work to emulate every day. These two really show me what’s important about life and remind me how important it is to be “role model worthy” myself.

I’m a lucky lady.  Haven’t thought about “Pete” in a long, long, LONG time!

Do you think there’s a kind of “role modeling” that can sometimes be negative?

Nightmares on Willow Street

The #reverbBroads prompt for today is “what gives you nightmares?”  I’m going to stray away from the latest nightmares I’ve been having that have to do with work, and keep things more general and focused on what used to keep me up at night when I was a kid. I have two things in mind and can’t pick between them, but if you know me that’s a typical issue.  One of the nighmarish things is realistic, the other is pretty weird.

The first one is fire.  The thought of waking up with the house on fire scares me to death and sometimes I do think about how if I had to pick a way to go, fire is one of the most horrifying options I can think of. I’m always thinking about escape plans and what we would do, so as long as we can keep things to a healthy level I guess we can categorize it as “family safety.”

The stranger one is the creepy little man.  When I was a little girl, I used to have nightmares that there was a little man who lived in my dad’s shoes (he was a big guy).  The little man would only come out at night and would do mean things to people in the house and play tricks on everyone. I was trying to find an image of what this little guy looked like and very few can do it justice. However, this one can pass for possible:

Rumplestilskin, please stay out of my dad’s shoes and stop messing around with my family!  Sincerely, my five year old self!

Haaaaave you met Mike?

Ok, student affairs. Now that our Commencements are nearly over it’s time to put away the confetti and get serious about helping our job searching, newly- minted master’s graduates find their dream jobs in this field of ours.  This entry is part 2 of a “let’s highlight some fantastic student affairs graduates that I know and love!”  It’s also an ongoing way to express my newfound love for How I Met your Mother

So, haaaave you met Mike? You may know him as @mikecourville on Twitter, but I know him as a wonderful BSU former undergrad student leader and now colleague in the field.

 Q1:  What is your ‘student affairs story’ about how you ended up in the field?

It all started, when a certain woman named Cindy Kane, gave a guy a chance as an alternate Orientation Leader.  Then thanks to chance opening, I was offered the position and the rest if history!  Haha, if only it was that easy!  It’s true that’s how it started, but the path was full of many more turns and twists to get to where we are today.  I tried a little bit of everything when it came to student involvement, from fraternity life, to student government, to the radio station, and so many other things.  I enjoyed some more than others, but ultimately I learned that I enjoyed being a student leader.  I believe the connections I made with student affairs administrators was part of the reason I continued to stay involved throughout my time at BSU.  After graduating and taking three years in “the real world”, I was not especially happy with my career outlook.  With encouragement from my lovely wife Erin, and from all my student affairs friends from undergrad, I began Operation Courville Grad School.  I loved my experience at BSU and I knew that for me to truly be happy then this needed to be my career. That operation came to the finale this past Wednesday when I received my MEd in Student Affairs Counseling.  Now I can do what I love!

Q2:  As you’re in the midst of your job search, what factors are you looking at in a campus or in a position when evaluating potential opportunities? 

I want to work on campus that puts effort into the college experience as well as their academics.  I want to find a campus that sees the benefits of leadership development and training.  These co-curricular skills are just as important as the skills learned in the classroom.  I believe that with leadership comes a responsibility to the community.  This makes your college experience more satisfying and prepares you for your life after college.  I have now had experiences in four year public, ivy, and community college.  What I’ve discovered is that students at these institutions have different, but similar challenges; however they all need the same support from student affairs administrators.  They need to have someone that can help them navigate their personal development and process their challenges.  They need someone tell them they can succeed, to challenge them to be better, or to just listen.  For me, I want to know about the students at that campus.  How much do they utilize us?  What’s the office environment like?  Do students stop by or do they steer clear of the office?  What kinds of interactions do you have with students?  What opportunities are there to advise student groups or volunteer for events?  I also have to ask about technology and social media.  I believe it’s something very important to our students so we need to know how to use it!  These are all things that I use to evaluate a position.

Q3: What energizes you about the idea of working in the field of student affairs for your career?

I believe that there is a great power in co-curricular involvement on campus that can transform students into great leaders.  When we look back at our college experiences, we look at the relationships that we formed.  We can look at the path of when we started and where we ended, and see the dramatic change.  I want my students to feel the same sense of community and satisfaction that I had from becoming involved on campus.  As an undergraduate student leader, I always believed it was my responsibility to assist new students in discovering ways to have a more satisfying experience at college.  As a student affairs professional this is still how I feel.  I want to instill this with the students I work with.  All students have strengths and the potential to be leader in the community.  I believe it’s my job to help develop their skills and give them the confidence to succeed.  The journey is what energizes me.

Q4: Where do you hope to be working or what do you hope to be doing at the point where you are celebrating your 50^thbirthday?

In twenty years, I hope that I am still enjoying my career and extremely happy with the life decisions that I’ve made.  I hope to be celebrating my 50^th birthday with friends, family, and colleagues in the field.  I hope that I have made a difference on one or a number of college campuses.  I hope to have made a difference in the profession by assisting with professional organizations and development of young professionals.  I hope that I can be just as great as the student affairs administrators that have helped me become to person I am today.

Haaaaaaave you met Amanda?

Barney has a great approach to “networking” as featured in my latest TV obsession, How I Met Your Mother.  Yes, that’s very “five years ago” but I’m on board now and it is fantastic!

He likes to introduce his best friend Ted to women at their favorite bar with a question of “haaaaave you met Ted?”   My version for today… “haaave yuu met Amanda?”

Amanda is the taller one in this picture!

Let’s get to know this up and coming (code: job searching) student affairs professional!

Q1:  What is your ‘student affairs story’ about how you ended up in the field?

A1:  I’m one of those people who say, “I didn’t even know Student Affairs existed as a field!” But, I do know that I always thought those people at my undergraduate institution who were advising student groups, going on service trips, planning events, etc. had the coolest job. I remember thinking that even though it was 10 p.m. and this person was still at work, they were doing something they loved.  But, I ended up with a degree in journalism and got a job at a newspaper after graduation.  Not feeling totally fulfilled, I decided to join AmeriCorps VISTA, and that’s when I was introduced to the world of Student Affairs.  Through my position, I met my current supervisor at Iowa State and worked with a volunteer recruitment and recognition student organization on campus. I thought by pursuing a degree in higher education, I could help young people realize their potential to make a positive difference in the world.

Q2:  As you’re in the midst of your job search, what factors are you looking at in a campus or in a position when evaluating potential opportunities? 

A2: I’ve realized I need to work in a collaborative and supportive environment.  I thrive on being able to share ideas and gain perspectives from others, because believe it or not, I don’t know it all.  I have experience in both large public institutions, and small private schools, and I see definite benefits in both, so I am open to any size or type of institution. Also, as an Iowa gal, born and raised (except for a short stint in Savannah for an ACUHO-I internship), I am open to adventure so geographic location is not really an issue for me.  While civic engagement, student involvement, and leadership are my main passions, I’ve always been open to a variety of areas.  Anywhere where I can be making a positive impact while sharing my skills and gaining new ones will likely be a good fit for me.

Q3: What energizes you about the idea of working in the field of student affairs for your career?

A3: I just closed an email from the general co-directors of Dance Marathon, which I advise. It said, “We also wanted to say a HUGE thank you to Amanda! We will truly truly miss her. So if you see her before the end of the year, give her a big hug and a thank you for everything she has done for us!”  It’s knowing that I’ve had an impact on these students and this organization that energizes me. It’s 9 p.m. meetings where I see the dedication of students who want to make a difference. It’s weekend events and retreats where I see students connect with each other and have “aha” moments.

Q4: Where do you hope to be working or what do you hope to be doing at the point where you are celebrating your 50^thbirthday?

A4: Honestly, I’m not the type of person who has a vision for where I want to be in a certain number of years. It’s the “Adaptability” strength on StrengthsFinder in me. However, like I said above, I want to be somewhere where I can be making a positive impact on others and the world.   There is no direct path but I’ll go where life leads me.

Let’s continue the interview.  What do you want to ask Amanda about her career interests, job search or her hopes and dreams?  Let’s help her prepare for the job of her dreams! 

Diagnosis: Working mom guilt

Some low-key chatting with a colleague in line at the campus cafeteria really got under my skin.  We’ll call her “Sheila.”

Me: “So, are you working all summer?”

Sheila: “No, I work from home in the summer. While my son’s still little he needs me.”

Me: “How old is he?” (thinking he was 3 or 4)

Sheila: “He just turned 12.”

For some reason, this brief exchange made me crazy. Absolutely crazy. I obsessed about this for hours.  I was thinking things like “wow, I’m so selfish. I want to keep working and my son is still little. He needs me.”

Never once did I think, “her son just turned 12 and she still refers to him as “little?”  Never once did I think, “my son also needs a mom who is fulfilled, challenged and happy. For me, working in my career field AND being a mom is the way that’s going to happen.”

This was my reminder.  Each of us chooses her own path – for her own reasons. Each of us views her own life through her own eyes – while making her own choices about how that life is going to evolve.

The constant comparison just has to stop and one thing I’ve learned since 28 has been to just focus on living life as the best version of myself I can be .  I’m confident that working is the right thing for me and that my son reaps countless benefits in his own growth because I’m fortunate enough to have a career in higher education.

The antidote for “working mom guilt” is clearly confidence.

Identity crisis

Some of my research in my doctoral program so far is focused on professional development and professional identity.  I’m interested in some of this conversation as it applies generally to the field of student affairs, but I am even more interested in how it applies to my functional area of the field of “campus activities.”

The consistent confusion between “student activities” and “student affairs” is such an interesting phenomenon to me.  Some of it might be just pure name selection, where the differences between “activities” and “affairs” is probably pretty minimal.  However, many campuses have entire divisions called “student affairs” but small departments called “student activities.”  To play the “what’s in a name?” game, we changed our office title to “Student Involvement and Leadership” a while back to try to use a name that was more like what we actually did on campus.  That was fine for us, but when your office encompasses four separate sets of CAS Standards it’s pretty easy to understand why some people don’t know what the heck you are about.

One of the examples of this confusion is the listings on the site higheredjobs.com.  I have always been frustrated by the fact that jobs in campus activities are listed generically under “Student Affairs Programs and Services.” Just to see what would happen, I wrote to their general “site questions” account to ask why.

The response included some helpful search engine tips to make sure that jobs in campus activities could come through, with the following explanation:

“Since campus activities involves planning specific events to foster student development, we list these positions under our Student Affairs and Services category.” (Kristin McNally, Content Quality Assistant).

Kristin is right – that IS part of what we do.  However, are we the only ones in the entire student affairs profession that “plan specific events to foster student development?”  This type of job is more than just event planning. If it was just event planning, don’t you think we’d plan the events ourselves?  Even though a separate section exists in CAS, we still don’t merit our own category for job listings?

I think “campus activities” means something different at nearly every institution you could work at.  However, I think the most important elements are student involvement and leadership education. (Leadership education doesn’t have its own area either).  I don’t think other functional areas have this high degree of variation from campus to campus.

What does a “campus activities” department mean on your campus?  Programming? Student organizations? Fraternity/sorority life? Leadership education? Orientation? Community Service? Commuter life? Campus Center operations? (can you see the confusion here?)

Equal Pay Day and ACUI Salary Data

I’m wearing red today for Equal Pay Day and was inspired today to review specific information on the gender gap for compensation in the field of student affairs.  From the outside looking in at student affairs it is a field heavily dominated by women. For the outsider, it’s probably easy to assume that all is well for women in our field and that there aren’t any “issues” with advancement or equal pay.

The Association of College Unions International (ACUI) publishes an Annual Salary Survey and is one of the most useful resources to me when looking at this type of question specifically applied in the arena of college unions and activities.

The average salary for all positions submitted at all levels was $51,989 with the overall average for men and women reported at $56,584 and $47,816 respectively. Women had higher average salaries in 10 of the 28 positions: art/gallery director, assistant director (operations), bookstore director, building/operations manager, craftshop manager, day care manager, indoor recreation manager, information/ticket manager, performing arts manager, service learning manager. 

There is a great deal of useful information here to consider when assessing the “state of the union” (pun intended) in this part of the profession. Check out the data.

I’m growing weary of the world of slacktivism and trying to think about whether wearing red today is really going to do anything.  There are plenty of people I know who want to raise awareness of equal pay issues and may not own a thread of red clothing.

The more important question today, what can we do to be sure that contributions of women are valued just as much as the contributions of our male counterparts?

• Let’s get more women in the college presidency and in senior leadership roles who are making the big decisions about compensation.
• Let’s stop using benchmarking as a way to say “see, other campuses are paying this low” and instead have the courage to work toward progress.
• Let’s start teaching our student leaders how to advocate for equality in the workplace that also means equality for compensation.
• Let’s welcome feminists from all genders to examine systemic factors in their organizations that may perpetuate this inequality.

I read today that the improvement to the gender gap in wages has only improved a 1/2 a cent per year since 1963.  To borrow a phrase from my friend Joe Ginese, “we can do better.”  We have to do better.

I wear red today because as a leader in our profession I know that I have an obligation to educate about what is and to inspire what could be.  

What can we learn from this data that can inspire progress in the college union and/or campus activities profession?

For Men Only?

I just wrapped up some work with a group of men on my campus to sponsor our first Men’s Leadership Retreat.  This event idea generated from frequent conversation on my campus about our female-dominated organizations and what seems like a relative challenge in getting men to step forward and volunteer for leadership roles.

Some of you have asked about our results from this event and we are still working through post-event surveys and planning a focus group. However, I wanted to share some things that we’re especially proud of…

• Diversity: Given this was our first attempt at an “open invitation” kind of retreat for the campus community, we couldn’t have hand-picked a more diverse group.  We had students from all walks of our campus life. It was seriously amazing – in my brief time at the event I got to see a first-year student athlete interacting with a graduating student of color and a married veteran undergraduate student talk about how to make our campus more inclusive.
• Faculty/Student Affairs collaboration: I’m proud of the fact that our faculty seemed to learn from what our student affairs administrators brought to the group and vice versa.  It was a rare opportunity for me to see true collaboration at work, rather than just witnessing “cooperation” in support for one idea brought forward from one source or another.   I loved to watch the group develop the content using their unique talents where all of them created something together.
• Focus on Men: I’m not saying that our campus has fully arrived when it comes to support for women’s leadership development, but our men are seriously in need of some focus. I’m proud of the fact that we could provide a structure for action to an issue that we had only previously talked about.  We were able to shine the spotlight on a group of men who were willing to commit to stepping up.

You know how retreats go…there’s this awesome post-retreat “high” that comes from spending a focused amount of time with any group of committed individuals.  We’re so excited for what this effort may mean for men on campus.

Our next challenge is to make sure that this group stays in contact and harnesses the positive work done at the overnight event.  Some ideas we have in the works include a “reunion event,” some dialogue via their Facebook group and exchange of leadership opportunity info.

What do you think the next steps should be to keep the enthusiasm from this group going? They have a lot to offer… what are your thoughts?

Lots of Leadership – a #dayofhighered

I see that today is a #dayofhighered.  This post on Inside Higher Ed called for academics to share more of what they do during the day and to document how we spend our time during the workday.  While I can tell that post was directed to faculty, I couldn’t help but see myself in the quote here:

“we collectively do very little to change the perception that the general has about people teaching in higher education.

And I say teaching because so many of us who are teaching aren’t officially professors.”

I consider what I do each day to be so inextricably connected to teaching and learning that I know it counters common assumptions about what a job as “Director of Student Involvement and Leadership” is supposed to be.  Yes, my kind of teaching is “fun” and I consider myself extremely lucky to get that opportunity to teach in a nontraditional kind of way.

Today was a good day for me, mainly because I spent a good portion of it working on some follow up pieces to our Men’s Leadership Retreat that just happened this past weekend. I’m insanely psyched about how great this program was, mainly because of how great it feels to have accomplished what we set out to do with this new event.  We wanted to work on connecting like-minded men who are committed to excellence in leadership and I couldn’t be more proud of what was accomplished thanks to my great colleagues who were the facilitators and the results of our extensive planning.

Today I spent time sharing highlights of that experience with whoever would listen, working on our post-event assessment and developing a protocol for a focus group evaluation.  I also will confess to checking the retreat group’s Facebook page about a thousand times because I was so excited to see the posts that the retreat participants were sharing. I tried to find some of the students who went because I loved the idea of hearing them talk about their thoughts about the retreat. I reached out to some of the facilitators to talk about their post-retreat thoughts and engage their help in the assessment project.  I didn’t do my usual “unpack the boxes and put the stuff away” post-event drill.  I just wanted to learn as much as I can about the participant experience. That junk will still be in boxes tomorrow.

What did I do today? I did a whole lot of other stuff, but nothing really mattered at all compared to giving this event the follow up it deserved. I’m so PUMPED to have seen an idea like this come to fruition and I can’t tell you how happy I am to share some of the great learning that happened.

What did I do today? It was like course evaluation day for this teacher. Loved the way this ended and can’t wait to learn more about what kind of impact this event had on our students. I know what kind of impact it had on me!

My 28th birthday – again!

Since it’s my birthday today, I am loving the chance to spend some time reflecting on life in general and where things have evolved.  We’ve all been at a frantic pace over the past month and I’m so glad I took a day off today and get to spend some time alone. I’m just coming off of a busy month or so that included a crazy number of presentations, a week in Disney with my family and attendance at the NACA Convention in Charlotte.  I’m an “E” on the MBTI scale for sure, but I’ve never experienced a time in my life when I needed some recharging time more than I do right now. We all know that Disney with a 7 year old isn’t exactly a relaxing vacation and for those who don’t know, the pace of the NACA Convention is just nuts.  I feel like I could sleep for a day!

For someone who really thrives on having engaging people around all the time, I’m growing more and more aware of how rare time alone actually is for me.  I’m with the little guy from “son up” when he comes in to wake me and my commute to/from work is a precious seven minutes long.  I’m with lots and lots of amazing students and staff all day long at work and then with my son and my husband in the evenings.

Today I was looking forward to the chance to spend a day alone, but I’m now reflecting on whether that actually happened.  I got a massage in the morning and had visions of tranquil solitude.  In reality, I spend most of the time talking with the massage therapist. In the afternoon, I had to get some things for school done. I had visions of coffee-supported intellectual catharsis. In reality, I interspersed reading time with all kinds of time jumping from Facebook to Twitter. I didn’t do a ton of engaging, but I loved the chance to get the birthday messages on Facebook and the chance to read what was up in my Twitter feed.  All of you were with me all day long and it was a good day.

I love that the cry for “me time” was really a cry for “I decide” time instead.  I really just wanted to get the chance to have some discretionary time where I got to decide what I wanted to do.  There will be other birthday celebrations this weekend with the family, but I wanted to say THANKS for joining me today on my day of “solitude!”