The Student Affairs Blog

They Don't Know What They Don't Know

Students and new staff members will frequently ask me about surveying their students.  They often seem very matter-of-fact and self assured that they've found an answer to one of their pressing programming  issues:  what to present on campus.

It makes sense at first glance.  Wondering what to program on campus?  Ask your students!  Brilliant.  And wrong.

Here's the problem with surveying your students in order to plan your programs:  They don't know what they don't know.

The vast majority of the students on any campus are blissfully unaware of the universe of student activities programs that are available.  They don't attend APCA and NACA conferences.  They don't read Student Activities Journal, Programming  or Campus Activities magazines.  They don't even read this blog.

They essentially have no idea of what's available in the marketplace.  They don't know what they don't know.

Ask them what bands to book, they'll tell you "My Morning Jacket" or "Fall Out Boy."  If you ask about comedy, they'll tell you Chris Rock or Dane Cook.  Odds are, your campus can't afford those acts.  Or at least not all of them.  So you haven't gained much from your survey.

But more importantly,  my original premise:   They don't know what they don't know. 

Ask your students:  would you like to stick your hands in different colors of hot, molten wax?  Really?

Yet we've all seen students at conferences line up for hours, waiting to produce their very own "Wax Hands."

Ask your students:  would you like to see a ventriloquist?  Really?

Many students may not even know what the word means.  Yet we've all seen students rolling in laughter over Dan Horn, Jeff Dunham, or Taylor Mason.

I often liken entertainment surveys to asking children about dinner.  If you ask the average child what he or she wants for dinner, they'll tell you what they know:  they want a Happy Meal.  And if that's what you always give them, they never learn to appreciate more exotic food like broccoli or sushi.  Don't we all know college students whose diet consists of burgers and chicken strips-- because it's the only food they learned to like?

Take your co-curricular duties to heart.  Remember that you serve an important teaching function on your campus.  Avoid a regular diet of "Happy Meals" for your students.  Book some unusual programs, events that aren't even on the students' radar.  Your students-- and your campus-- will be better for it.

As Students Go Mobile, Will Student Affairs Follow?

Long a prediction, not at all a surprise, perhaps more hype, but seems even more real:

In very short, Yahoo is planning to release an "all-in-one" messaging service for cell phones. This will include text messaging, instant messaging, email, and . . . oh yes, facebook.

And not just any method messaging - it will also include something that is called "Pulse" which includes Facebook status and . . . hard to tell from the screen shot. . . perhaps feeds from other services that know where you are, and perhaps some full fledged geolocation (if the phone has GPS or uses something else) .

Even if Yahoo doesn't get it right, the iPhone is soon to allow anyone to develop software on it (and you can be sure there will be aggregation services, IM's and facebook integrations) and other cell phone makers are catching up rapidly. (Don't think the iPhone type functionality is only for geeks, if it follows the RAZR price curve, there will be free versions with plans sometime next year.)

So the question for Student Affairs professionals: as students increase their connectedness by communicating on the fly through multiple methods on their cell phones, and, as they expose their own whereabouts and activities to their friends, will Student Affairs plug in to this? Can/Will/Should Student Affairs be a "friend"?

Before the jump to personal / professional separation kicks in, keep in mind students look at this differently. Much of their communication is limited to friends (as defined by facebook behavioral norms) it's kind of a "you're in or you're out" sort of thing.

Email, at the moment, is the preferred communication method for universities as it's established and easy. It's a recognized problem that students don't check email (especially official school email) and we can expect email use to decrease further compared to other channels that are getting increasingly convenient, mobile, and socially driven.

What about assessment?

How convenient to track GPS to figure out who went to what in orientation. What if the students didn't care? What if they actively published their location and status information to their friends and were fine with letting the university follow their digital foot prints?

Sound far fetched? Not so much.

Well anyways. Here it comes. And here come the issues:

Communication Needs
Unexpected Consequences
Context
Privacy vs. Transparency
Assessment vs. Invasion [Note: Context switch ; )]
FERPA (signed and written consent! sign a cell phone?) and lawywers (duty of care) [Note: This link is sarcastic.]

Good times!

The Gap Between Faculty and Student Affairs

A recently added post on The Chronicle of Higher Education website discussed the opinion of a few faculty members on the effectiveness (or in their view, lack of effectiveness) of student programming. In fact, they were not only making the case that student programming is not effective, but it is counter productive, and hurts, their classroom work:

[H]alf my time is spent unraveling the messages, axioms, and truisms of the diversity trainer when students must confront, again intellectually, difference, power, and oppression. Some conundrums cannot be ended with a group hug, unfortunately.

The biggest voice of opposition, or citation, for the post is blogger, Oso Raro. I'm not completely clear if O.R. is blaming the problems on the type and quality of student programming or the gap between faculty and student activities. This quote tends to lean toward the latter:

[T]he Student Life professional represents a new cadre in the academy, one imbued with considerable power and influence over the structuring of students’ social lives and, consequently, some of their relationship to the dynamics of the classroom.

O.R. seems to think there is a power struggle between the two sides and student affairs is sided with the administration:

They are a competing power centre in the institution, and they tend to be allied directly or indirectly with the concerns of administration..

The belief in a limited pie that everyone is grabbing at is dangerous in education. In the end, the goal should be 100% focus on the growth of the students. It does sound hookie to say win-win, and to increase the size of the pie, but that's the ideal situation.

O.R. makes a great point about how student affairs rarely reaches out to the enormous amount of faculty knowledge and experience:

Parallel Programming— At a former institution there was quite a strong student centre for LGBT students, run by an efficient and well-organised Student Life professional who was also gay. However, any connection or co-programming between faculty who taught in these areas and the student centre were practically non-existent. In fact, there seemed to be a mild antipathy between faculty and Student Life around any co-programming. Once, I met with the Student Life professional who ran the student centre to offer my help in whatever events my presence could be relevant. The Student Life professional was courteous but guarded, declaring at one point that attempts to connect faculty to programming had been met in the past with disinterest, and hence dropped. So, this incredible social resource for students was effectively divorced from whatever might be going on in their classrooms. This same Student Life professional later directed a disgruntled student in my class to the Dean, bypassing both either a conversation with me or with my chair (and therefore university policy as well), underlining an open antagonism towards faculty that I found bothersome at the time, but had I been more vulnerable would have been much more dangerous.

How often do you dip into your faculty to run a diversity training or leadership retreat? I don't think the problem is student activities programming, or lack of faculty interest, but instead the real problem is the gap between the two parties.

Student activities should extend the branch first and invite the faculty to take part in events. This will not only allow us to utilize their skills and save money, but it will also get greater understanding from faculty that we are all working together for the same cause.

The article cites another blogger, Jonathan Sterne of Super Bon!, who reiterates the missed opportunities from the gap:

[P]rogressive faculty probably have a whole group of allies in this other wing of the university of whom we don’t even know to avail ourselves. Having once worked in academic advising, I, at least, should know better.

So think about your upcoming events and retreats, and think about how you can include faculty members beyond hoping they give extra credit to their class for attending an event.
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Update - Take the time to read the comments under O.R.'s post. They are fantastic!

Fifty Low-Cost Program Ideas in Fifty-minutes

It started out with the ambitious goal of soliciting 50 low-cost program ideas in a little less than an hour.  Fifty minutes later, the delegates at the APCA National Advisors' Summit in Las Vegas had suggested 91 ideas!

Ashley captured these for you, and I wanted to make sure they got posted.  If you weren't there, then some of the ideas may sound odd (or make no sense at all).  If that's the case, drop me a note and I'll explain it to you.

Fifty Ninety-One Ideas in Fifty Minutes

1. Grocery Bingo

2. Medallian Hunt

3. Life-Size Monopoly

4. Game Hunting

5. Pot Luck Dinner

6. Video Gaming

7. Iron Chef Dorm Room/Ramen Noodle cook-off

8. Game Show Contest

9. Poetry Slam

10. Day of the Dead

11. Dark Side of Oz (Pink Floyd & film)

12. Walk-in movie

13. Dive-in movie(pool)

14. American Idol

15. Talent Show

16. Bed Race

17. Bean Bag Toss

18. Themed Dances

19. Halloween Contests

20. Live Haunted House

21. Campus Ghost tours

22. Halloween Casino

23. Recycle plastic bottles into planters (Arbor day)

24. Leadership retreats

25. Water World  (slip ‘n slide)

26. Movie on the Lawn

27. Bonfire & S’mores

28. Themed movies

29. Stress-Free Spa Day

30. Chair Massages

31. Oreo Stacking (Guinness Records)

32. Star Gazing (astronomy club)

33. Leap Frog

34. Twister

35. Reflective Movies

36. Commit a Random Act of Kindness

37. Family Fest

38. Canned Food  Sculptures

39. Food Bank Drive

40. Frozen turkey bowling

41. Campus Fear Factor

42. Photos with Christmas mascot

43. Easter Bunny Pictures

44. Dogoween (pet costume contest at Halloween)

45. Scavenger Picture Hunt

46. Campus Idol

47. Parking space lottery

48. Campus Safety (self-defense)

49. Sleep-out

50. T-Shirt relocation (collect rival school T-shirts and take to Salvation Army in another city!)

51. Clothesline project

52. Women’s forum

53. Cultural showcases

54. “Get Into Your Genes”; Too small Blue Jean give away

55. Campaign for real beauty (acceptance of normal bodies)

56. Mary Kay (or Avon) day

57. Financial Education

58. Monster.com (Free financial planning)

59. “Girls” or “Guys” Night out

60. $2 Movies in town

61. Mock weddings

62. YouTube Contest

63. Hillbilly Olympics

64. Human auction

65. Mentoring

66. Study night with pizza

67. Midnight Breakfast   

68. President for a day

69. Parking ticket raffle (pay your fines)

70. Pre-release movies

71. Unhomecoming Faculty King and Queen

72. Kiss the Pig (Spam loaf)

73. Pageant and formal dinner auction

74. Pie a professor

75. Hot topic lunch

76. Glow in the dark easter egg hunt

77. Pie your RA

78. Recycle drive with prize

79. “Big dog on Campus” Fun Olympics (Bulldog is school mascot...)

80. Cinderella project (Prom Dresses for high school girls)

81. Graffiti party

82. Change drive into mosaic

83. Car show

84. Speed dating ideas

85. Cow patty bingo

86. Mardi Gras Sidewalk Parade

87. Art festival/contest

88. Nametag Day (everybody wears a name tag)

89. Parking lot sale (like rummage sale)

90. Pumpkin Carving Contest

91. Holiday Window Decorating

Don't Forget About Night Time Programming

Palomar College reviewed their current programming and realized that almost all their student activities occur between 10am and 2pm. The problem is 5,000 to 7,500 of their students strictly take evening classes.With a FTE of 30,000, night goers make up nearly 25% of the student body, but yet were receiving almost 0% of the student activities.

To curtail the imbalance and to seize the opportunity:

The college's Associated Student Government hosted its first "Coffeehouse Night" last month, during which students heading to class in the twilight were treated to coffee, cookies and the sounds of an acoustic guitar, as played by a fellow student.

"People drop by, grab a cup of coffee and listen for a little," said Jesse Lyn, student government president. "Many night students come straight from work, so they need an opportunity to unwind before class."

More than 100 students stopped by within the first hour of the event and were "thrilled" by the break from class, Lyn said

Commuter campuses, like Palomar, are known for their large percentage of evening or non-traditional students. Sherry Titus, interim director for student affairs, said:

"They get here after work, take a class and get home to get dinner
started," she said. "They have no buy-in (to the college) besides the
educational one."

Coffeehouse events give these students an
opportunity to become a part of the Palomar community, even if it's
just for a few moments, Titus said. Students are entertained by their
peers or can use the venue to showcase their own talents, including
music, poetry and dance, she said.

So don't forget about your night time students. How are you servicing them with the same student activities fees that everyone else is paying?

A Response to "Students Today": Professors Today

"A Vision of Students Today", done by the Digital Ethnography folks at the University of Kansas has been making the rounds for a couple of months.

Today, they posted a thoughtful, plaintive response from a UK lecturer. The full post is worth reading - a few of my favorite peices:

What is it like being a lecturer today?

66% of my students

Bother to come to the lectures

I spend all Sunday carefully preparing.

I spent five days researching and preparing.

A carefully considered reading list

Of which my students read

20% of the items.

I spent the summer

Creating an online learning environment

Full of amazing study resources

That only 30% of my students visit

And she ends simply:

Of what school teachers earn

I spent 5 years writing my last book

Which was well reviewed

And got me interviewed on TV

But I only made £50 in royalties

So you have to ask

Why I do this job?

And my answer is

Because I believe

all that stands between civilization and barbarism

is education.

Students Today" suggests that students are dissatisfied. This lecturer's response answers in kind.

Chicken and egg?

I love learning. From books, from experiences and most of all from people. I think this is normal.

I had trouble with my engagement while in formal education settings. This is common.

I've been both the bored student and the frustrated lecturer.

That their is so much annoyance on both "sides" seems a little pathetic. We can do better.

In this conversation about education reform the frustration can be a motivator initially. Over time it's hard not to become overwhelmed, by the sheer size of the idea of education reform, or the pace of change, or the politics of any given institution.

I think communities are the solution. A combination of blogs like this, conferences, and even Facebook groups, to get like minded people to break down this frustration into small task lists. Small steps with a bigger vision in mind.

Your Facebook Network(Tips and Tricks)

I'm sure by now you are fairly familiar with the Facebook interface.  Many users don't use all of Facebook's features.

The Network page can be a very powerful tool, but the Facebook interface does not allow the Network page to reach it's full potential.  The reason?  The only way to access your network is by clicking the network link at the top of the page.

It doesn't really jump out at you.   I think it would be a lot more effective if the News Feed dedicated a portion of the page to list Network Activity.

So what does the Network Page do?

• The Networks page lists
• Shows all the upcoming events in your network.
• Shows all the recently posted items in your network.
• Shows all the recently active groups among members of your network.
• Shows all the items in your networks marketplace
• Shows network statistics such as top music, movies, and Interests, TV shows, Books, and also displays percentages such as sex, political views, and relationship status .
• Shows nearby Networks
• Provides a discussion board and a wall.

So what can I do with all this?

Let's start with the groups. 

While searching through the active groups in your network you may stumble upon one titled Fall 2007 Freshmen, or something of the sort.  This is a great place to promote, and Recruit.  Tom recently posted a blog discussing this The Strange Power of the Go Getter Freshmen.

There may be other great active groups in your network you can promote with.  Take a look, just don't over advertise, because nobody likes spam, and overuse of these groups will begin to look like spam.

Let's move on to the people in your network. 

Near the top of the Network page six random members of your network will be displayed.  Above these six members will display how many people are in your network, and a couple links to search or browse within your network.  I don't see much use with the browse feature, as it only displays ten random people in your network.

Click the search link, and then continue on and click the advanced link.  I'm sure you have seen the advanced page before, but have you ever used it for student affairs networking?  The advanced search page allows you to search within every portion of a Facebook profile.  From the basic info to contact info, personal info, education info, and work info.  If you are looking for any particular characteristic to promote, or recruit  from you can easily search it from here.

Have you ever wondered which staff and faculty members have signed up for Facebook?  Well it's fairly easy to find out.  Scroll down till you see education info, and in the school status drop down menu you will see staff, and faculty.  select whichever one you would like to search, and click the advanced search button at the bottom of the page

What do your students like to do? what are their interests?  Sounds like you need to put out another survey.  No not at all, Facebook already did the Assessment for you!!  Check the Network Statistics page and you may find what you are looking for.  The best part is you can click each particular interest and get a list of the people who have added that interest to their profile.

How can you use this?  Look at each category, is there something that jumps out at you that you can create an event about?  perhaps if there is a particular type of music that is popular you can have a dance focusing on that type of music.  Maybe under interests you see a sport such as ultimate frisbee, why not host a tournament.  Look under the movies category, why not play one of the top movies for your students?  Be creative, and you can put together a great event.

Does anyone else have any networking, promotional or recruiting tips or tricks that they use with Facebook?

The Strange Power of The Go-Getter Frehsman

Students use Facebook for communication more than e-mail. Anecdotally, I hear about students deleting official institution e-mail all the time. They just don't think it is relevant.

So what do you do to get a quick message out to all your incoming freshmen?

You could try to friend them all, but this would take forever . . .

At every school on our fall tour there has been a "Class of 2011" group on Facebook.

Just like this one:

This particular freshmen group has 239 members (roughly 70% of the entire freshmen class - it's a small school):

What do they talk about? Well, all kinds of stuff. Sure, there is party talk, but there are also bright spots, such as random peer tech support:

And students taking student activities organization into their own hands:

The activity on these groups, it's possibilities and limitations, deserves its own post.

For the moment, I want to focus on this person:

Because of the way Facebook works, the creator of the group can message everyone in the group through Facebook. That means that this person, this one, random freshman who happened to start the "class of 2011" group at their school first, is the only person who can message most of the freshmen through the medium they use most.

This one person has their finger on probably the most effective communication delivery mechanism currently available to schools.

This is hilarious.

In a non-scientific sampling, these folks are diverse. Sometimes they are geeks/ computerish folks. Sometimes they just got accepted early to the school and happened to be bored one night.

I think that you as an activities advisor should makes friends with this person.

Of course, you could perhaps talk them into spamming everyone for the school, but that wouldn't do that kid any favors. Being a stooge is no good for anyone's rep.

Some creativity is needed. Maybe that kid becomes the editor of the once a month freshmen news letter? And you as the activities department get a good shot at including your info . . .

Point is, if you use the student to spam the group he or she created, you will make everyone look bad.

If you can empower the student to see the power they have (most don't realize it) and make positive use of it, then the student can be pulled into the student leadership position and everyone wins.

Either way, at every campus across the country, there is one person that can Facebook the majority of their class. This is a strange power lying dormant.

Learning Reconsidered - Dave Leenhouts' Slides

When Dave Leenhouts is not playing the role of Director for Student Life at Coastal Georgia Community College, he presents trainings on Learning Reconsidered for the Association for the Promotion of Campus Activities.

For those of you unfamiliar with Learning Reconsidered, it's an "argument for the integrated use of all of higher education's resources in the education and preparation of the whole student."

Click here to download (as a PDF) Leenhouts' latest slides.

Emergency Text Messaging Part 2: Who should I choose?(A comparison analysis of four services)

This day and age it seems like everyone has a cell phone, many schools are beginning to tap into that technology, and use text messaging to inform students when needed.

Since the Tragedy at Virginia Tech, many schools are trying to get an emergency contact system in place.  What better method than text messaging.  Individuals usually carry their cell phones around with them, and a text message can deliver an immediate detailed message.

Many companies offer features that allow organizations, and clubs on a college campus to sent out updates, announce meetings, or advertise upcoming events.

This comparison analysis will compare and contrast some of the top text messaging services.

The Services

E2Campus

Costs $1 per user per year, is a good deal for smaller campuses, but can get pricey with a large population.

Offers unlimited groups. Which can include emergencies, events, sports teams, and can even include different campuses of a college.

Allows for unlimited group admins

Access to the E2Campus application is available from your PC, mobile phone, or a PDA

 
Informz

Has a one time setup fee of $300

Annual Licensing fee is $2,000

Text messages can be purchased in blocks, and range between 6 and 8 cents depending on how many blocks you purchase.

 

With all the setup fees this product can get pricey, It may be efficient for a larger campus to afford this, but may be way out of the budget of a smaller school.

Gives you the option to purchase a dedicated short code for $14,000 a year, which means you will get your own 5 digit number to be texted.

For $1200 a month you can purchase a custom vanity code, which allows you to chose a short code so it is easier to remember.

 

Mobile Campus

Offers a free service, but will spam you with text message advertisements which will burn out the medium very quickly, and may result in negative effect on text message alerts from your students.

 

Jyngle

Offers two services.  The Standard "Free" service is designed for smaller groups.  The standard service does have a banner at the bottom of the text which says"Powered by Jyngle".  This banner is designed to spread the word of the service, but a representative at Jyngle informs me that it may be used for ad space in the future.  Still for being free I would not complain about the tiny ad at the bottom of the message.

The second service Jyngle offers is the Enterprise service.  This is a pay per message service, and does not contain the banner at the bottom of the message.  The rates for this service are $0.03 per voice message and $0.06 per SMS.  Jyngle offers the Enterprise Service to schools for free for emergency use.

Pricing Comparison

This chart compares pricing of the four services.

This chart compares each service prices based on the size of a student population.  Note Informz block pricing is based upon 10 texts per student.

There are other services available which I was unable to acquire the pricing for.  Some of these include

Rave

clearTXT

PromoTXT

If you have any experiences dealing with any of the vendors mentioned, or any vendor not listed above please share them.