Developments, Volume 15, Issue 3 (Fall 2017)

FROM ONE DUPONT CIRCLE

The Strength of Us

Cynthia H. Love
Executive Director

Separately we are as fragile as reeds and as easily broken.  But together we are as strong as reeds tied in a bundle.
Inspired by the Talmud

I want to talk about the strength of us—as individuals, as a community of people dedicated to student learning and development and as ACPA—College Student Educators International, a long-tenured member of the Higher Education Secretariat in Washington D.C. I also want to talk about our fragility.  

For some of our members, our tenure as an Association (95th Anniversary 2019), our legacy as scholar practitioners (Journal of College Student Development since 1954) and our place at the Secretariat table denote strength, continuity, and strategic influence. For some of our members, these same attributes denote selling out to ...

FROM THE PRESIDENT

Stephen John Quaye
ACPA President

In late September 2017, the ACPA Governing Board and Assembly Leadership introduced our six Operational Truths regarding the Strategic Imperative for Racial Justice and Decolonization (SIRJD). As an Association, ACPA – College Student Educators International believes:

1.  All forms of oppression are linked.
2.  Racism and colonization are real, present, enduring, intersectional, and systemic forms of oppression.
3.  Racism and colonization have informed the experience of all of us in higher education.
4.  Advocacy and social change require us to work to dismantle racism and colonization in higher education.
5.  Our collective education, research and scholarship, advocacy, and capacity will create positive change in higher education.
6. We believe in and have hope for our individual capacity, ...

FEATURED COLUMN: ETHICAL ISSUES

Inclusive Excellence: What’s Missing

Matt Cabrera
California State University, Long Beach

Introduction

Since my undergraduate years, I have seen and believed that the ideas of diversity and inclusion have been the foci of colleges and universities. More recently, as a student affairs professional, I have been pleased to see these ideas packaged into what is now called “Inclusive Excellence”, a concept that has come to be woven into the work of our many professional associations. It is refreshing to also see many campuses begin to re-envision their mission, purpose, and core values with more intentional efforts towards inclusive excellence.

The Association of American Colleges and Universities (AACU) (Williams, Berger, & McClendon, 2005) defines inclusive excellence as a compilation of four primary foci: student intellectual and social development; development and implementation of resources to enhance student learning; attention to cultural differences ...

PERSPECTIVES

Mattering, Healing, and Sharing in the Process:  Working through the Trauma of Losing Black Lives (Part II)

Mahauganee D. Shaw
Shamika N.  Karikari
Miami University of Ohio

In the last edition of Developments, the first part of this two-part article appeared, sharing our personal experiences working through visceral reactions to news of Black lives lost at the hands of police officers.  We focused in on the deaths of Michael Brown, Jr. in Ferguson, MO and Samuel DuBose in Cincinnati, OH. These particular deaths are connected to our respective hometowns and thus provoked deep emotional responses from us. Oddly, it was the experience of feeling the impacts of these deaths on a deeper level that connected us to one another on the journey toward healing. In this second installment, we focus in on the lessons learned from our experiences of journeying ...

RESEARCH & ASSESSMENT

How Social Identities Affect Students with Autism for Transition to College

Edlyn Vallejo Peña
Jodie Kocur
California Lutheran University

In 2009, the United States Government Accountability Office reported that students with disabilities now comprise one in 10 college students. A more recent survey of four-year colleges and universities reported that nearly 15% of enrolled first-year students reported a disability (HERI, 2011). The enrollment of college students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in particular is projected to increase with growing diagnostic rates and more robust educational supports in the K-12 system. ASD is a developmental disability that can cause college students to experience challenges in communication, socialization, sensory processing, and restrictive and repetitive behaviors (Peña & Kocur, 2013). Today, 30% of students with ASD who complete high school attend college (Roux, Shattuck, Rast, Rava, & Anderson, 2015), rightfully making their way into postsecondary ...

INNOVATIVE IDEAS

Collaborating with Neighborhoods

Tracey Walterbusch
Ezra Baker
Ohio State University

Introduction

In this article, we highlight why collaboration was integral to the improvement of Ohio State’s annual Community Commitment event and how it aided two departments to meet their goals. First, we provide overviews of the Community Commitment event, the two key collaborators, and the theoretical framework that guided this work. Then we reflect on the effectiveness of the event including assessment, provide key information about the collaboration, and discuss implications for the future.

Background

Pay it Forward is a student cohort comprised of approximately 20 students. The goal of the program is to expose students to avenues of civic engagement through co-curricular service experiences (Pay it Forward, 2016). One of Pay It Forward’s flagship programs is Community Commitment, a single-day of service during the first week of classes in which over 1,000 ...