A discourse analysis of collaboration between academic and student affairs in community colleges

The purpose of this study was to understand the nature of collaboration between academic affairs and student affairs units in the community college context from a qualitative perspective. A discourse analysis study was conducted to explore the ways in which collaborative practice was discussed and understood by chief and midlevel academic and student affairs practitioners in three different community college settings. By using their actual practice and desired practice to understand collaboration in this setting, this article offers a definition for academic and student affairs collaboration that has been absent from most literature on the topic.     

美国高校学生事务与学术事务关系的新发展--加强学生事务与学术事务的合作

在强调学生学习的背景下,美国高等教育领域的研究者和管理者大力倡导加强学生事务与学术事务的合作。本文首先回顾了加强学生事务与学术事务合作的背景,其次从理论基础和具体实践两个层面论述了美国学生事务与学术事务的合作,最后提出了要正视合作的障碍、创造合作的环境和在更宽广的背景中理解合作伙伴关系的价值及内容等几点思考。     

Academic development by way of student affairs: reflections from the first fifty days on the job

ABSTRACT

This reflection on practice describes the first fifty days of a professional transition from student affairs into academic development. Campus collaborations, educational experiences, and holistic student learning are identified as professional parallels between these two institutional divisions. Professionals from student affairs can uniquely contribute to academic development because of their ability to view the campus as a working system and the student as a whole person. This reflection describes how a student affairs background can be a valuable addition and asset to academic development teams.     

高校学生事务管理知识体系的构建

构建高校学生事务管理知识体系对于实现辅导员工作的科学化、丰富学科体系、提高辅导员队伍素质都具有重要意义。研究以＂两层次三维度多线索模块化结构＂构建高校学生事务管理知识体系框架,提出基于学生发展的学习生命周期理论,分析学生事务管理知识模块、学生事务管理工具方法和管理成熟度模型等,并提出了构建学生事务管理知识体系的对策和建议,为全面提高高校辅导员工作科学化提供可借鉴的理论和方法。     

The yin & yang of student learning in college

What are the obstacles to genuine and productive collaborations between academic and student affairs? Is it more than bureaucracy and organizational habits keeping these two groups apart? Elizabeth Blake says “Yes.” She explains why the first step both faculty and student affairs professionals should take in order to work together effectively is to know, and, indeed, to embrace their essential differences.     

Student Affairs Professionals in the Community College: Critically Examining Preparation Programs From a Social Justice Lens

ABSTRACT

To support the success of community college students, the role of student affairs professionals is critical. Therefore, adequate preparation of student affairs professionals who work in community college settings is paramount. However, literature focused on the intersection between the community college, student affairs, and graduate preparation is sparse, suggesting that too little is known about the preparation of student affairs professionals exiting graduate education and entering a community college setting. We frame this dearth of literature as an issue of social justice. The lack of focus on community colleges within student affairs preparation programs further reinforces a systemic cycle of oppression related to the perception that community colleges are not an integral part of the higher education landscape. We point to potential entry points for the exploration of this topic through systematic inquiry. The goals of this work are to bring awareness to the paucity of literature on this topic, ask scholars to join us in adding to what is known about this topic, and encourage readers to think critically about this topic.     

美国高校学生事务的专业化与学术化--以学生事务与学术事务关系演变为视角

美国高校学生事务和学术事务的相互关系经历了从原初的自然合一到有意识的分化与独立,再到趋向协作与融合的教育性合作伙伴关系的螺旋式演变过程.这一过程不仅反映了美国高校学生事务不断向专业化、学术化迈进的内在逻辑要求,同时也体现了美国高校学生事务在其根本宗旨、理念、具体使命及角色定位等方面的深刻变化.     

Enhancing Innovative Partnerships: Creating a Change Model for Academic and Student Affairs Collaboration

This study presents the results from a national survey examining a recent innovation in higher education partnerships between academic and student affairs. The focus was on what change process can best assist institutions in moving to this model, which helps increase student learning on campus.     

The horizontal and vertical fragmentation of academic work and the challenge for academic governance and leadership

Academic work has become increasingly fragmented. The horizontal fragmentation of the profession into disciplinary tribes has been accompanied by the increasing participation of student affairs and educational development professionals located outside the academic units but are actively engaged in academic work, such as supporting teaching and student learning. An increasing vertical fragmentation of academic work has recently occurred within academic units with the increasing employment of contract university teachers and research assistants. In Canada, horizontal and vertical fragmentations have occurred while universities and strong faculty unions have protected the “traditional” tenure-stream professoriate. Drawing on recent research, the author argues that these Canadian full-time faculties have high levels of job satisfaction and are well-remunerated, productive scholars. Maintaining the status and the supportive working conditions of the full-time, tenure-stream professoriate has largely been accomplished through labor cost efficiencies created by the increasing use of part-time, contractual university teachers, now frequently represented by labor unions that are distinct from their full-time peers. This article discusses the challenges for academic governance and leadership associated with this increasing fragmentation of academic work in the context of the “global” university.     

Design Issues in a Cross‐institutional Collaboration on a Distance Education Course

Collaborative learning has been gaining momentum as a promising pedagogy in higher education. Research on student collaboration is increasing. However, one arena is often overlooked—faculty collaboration. In this article, a cross‐institutional faculty collaboration is presented. The context is faculty collaboration on the design of an undergraduate engineering course. Specifically, this paper examines design issues encountered in the faculty collaborations associated with developing, delivering, and redesigning a senior‐level engineering design course that was taught simultaneously at two universities. This course was taught in state‐of‐the‐art distance learning classrooms. Both within class and outside class, participating students and faculty made use of a Web‐based environment that supported a variety of synchronous and asynchronous interactions. The course itself focused on team design projects and provided instruction on the engineering design process, in various specific skills needed for the students’ projects, and on how to function effectively as part of a geographically distributed engineering design team. The participating faculty members represented different backgrounds, academic disciplines, and academic cultures. Issues related to collaborations on development, delivery, and redesign are elaborated. Based on the lessons learned, suggestions for future cross‐institutional faculty collaboration in course development are provided.     

香港高校学生工作的探察与思考

在全人教育工作理念下,香港高校学生事务工作的目标与理想是为了促进学生的全人发展,一切工作都是为学生的全人发展提供各种服务,并由此形成了独特而完善的高校学生事务工作组织体系。这对大陆高校学生事务工作提供了一些启示,特别在全人发展的育人理念、学生主体作用的发挥、完善开放的育人网络方面值得思考与借鉴。     

Academic developers and international collaborations: the importance of personal abilities and aptitudes

Academic developers are increasingly involved in international collaborations in learning and teaching. Many factors contribute to successful collaborations; we argue that the personal abilities and aptitudes of academic developers are one key element. Building trust and relationships are central to creating the networks at individual, group, and institutional levels that are essential for effective collaboration. There is limited literature on academic development in international collaborations and on its personal dimensions. We illustrate these ideas using a UK-Pakistan collaboration. Attention to the personal dimension is likely to be a key consideration for other academic developers working in international collaborations.     

Implementing Outcomes Assessment in an Academic Affairs Support Unit

While outcomes assessment has become a focus for institutions of higher education, assessment in academic support units remain sparse. Traditionally, assessment has been comprised of one-time student satisfaction surveys and/or supervisor evaluations tied specifically to job criteria. Although informative, these methods fail to account for or measure specific student learning outcomes completed by students via their interaction with faculty and staff. This article presents the development and implementation of a program of outcomes assessment at a 4-year public university in the northeast. Results indicate that students come to college with varying expectations of the role of academic advisors and range on a continuum of academic and social preparation to meet the demands of higher education. A majority of students are meeting the stated learning outcomes. Feedback from this assessment model is being used to improve the quality of services provided to successive cohorts of students at this institution.     

Understanding student learning in context: relationships between university students’ social identity,approaches to learning,and academic performance

This research focuses on understanding how socio-psychological dimensions such as student social identity and student perceptions of their learning community affect learning at university. To do this, it integrates ideas from phenomenographic research into student learning with ideas from research on social identity. In two studies (N = 110, and N = 97) the relationships between student social identity, perceptions of the learning community, approaches to learning, and academic performance were explored. Our findings suggest that a strong student social identity is associated with a deep approach to learning, which in turn is linked to higher academic performance. Also, perceptions of learning community mediate the relationship between student social identity and deep approaches to learning. Significantly, a surface approach turns out not to be associated with student social identity or perceptions of the learning community, but it is negatively related to academic performance. Our research argues for the value of an integration of complementary frameworks, emphasising social and psychological aspects of the learning experience that can be used to improve our understanding of how and why students vary in the quality of their learning.     

Opportunities for intra-university collaborations in the new research environment

ABSTRACT

New opportunities for research collaborations within universities are explored through reflection on a recent collaboration between an academic researcher, the library and the eResearch Centre at a regional Australian university. Such opportunities arise from significant changes to the research landscape, including increased emphasis on open access publication of research outputs and the growth of eResearch capabilities. The latter has resulted in increases in data size and complexity and provides opportunities for collaboration across research institutions. This article reflects on the dynamics and assesses the outcomes of a collaboration formed during an externally funded open research data project. This project and a precursor project are briefly described, together with the specific contribution of each collaborator. Collaboration dynamics and the reasons for project success are assessed, as are implications for future research practice. Outcomes from eResearch collaborations may provide broader benefits to universities, as well as rewards to academic researchers.     

In Practice: Communication,communication, communication: The three rules of large‐group planning

One college's commitment to large‐group planning resulted in a partnership between academic affairs and student affairs that has created positive student learning outcomes beyond the expected.     

Schools and informal science settings: collaborate, co-exist, or assimilate?

In this metalogue we build on the arguments presented by Puvirajah, Verma and Webb to discuss the nature of authentic science learning experiences in context of collaborations between schools and out-of-school time settings. We discuss the role of stakeholders in creating collaborative science learning practices and affordances of out of school time and formal science learning contexts. We contend that authentic science learning experiences are those where science learning happens within a social milieu and advocate for true collaborations between schools and informal settings in ways that emphasize the goals of the collaboration and strengths of each setting.     

Belonging to higher education: inclusive education for students with intellectual disabilities

Abstract

The college experience in Iceland has traditionally been reserved for those who have passed the matriculation examination and meet the admission requirements of higher educational institutions. Since 2007, the University of Iceland has offered a Vocational Diploma Programme for people with intellectual disabilities in inclusive settings. The purpose of this article is to describe the diploma programme as well as exploring students’ sense of belonging to the college community. The diploma programme is located at the School of Education and students trained to work at pre-primary schools, after school clubs and within the field of disability such as self-advocacy. Inclusion has been achievable by adapting the general curriculum and learning outcomes to individual needs, flexible teaching methods and the cooperation between academic faculty members, programme coordinators, student mentors and the diploma students themselves. The diploma students receive academic and social support from student mentors who are other undergraduate students at the School of Education. The collaboration with student mentors has proven to be valuable, expanded diploma students’ social networks and contributed to a sense of belonging. Regardless of various attitudinal and structural hindrances, there is much evidence that the diploma students are not only tolerated but welcomed at the School of Education and belong to the college community.