From the President

Hello ACPA Colleagues! You helped make ACPA history! On July 1, 2006 your votes for the Bylaw amendments passed this important item by a significant margin! In early July, I worked at International Office in Washington, DC to begin planning the first steps of our Association’s collective next chapter. In mid-July, ACPA held its annual Summer Leadership Meeting for approximately 70 Association leaders. So you can see that this summer has been busy. In addition to work at the International office I had the chance to attend several conferences around the country and visit with many ACPA members.

I spent time this spring and early summer interacting with many ACPA members. I want to highlight some of my travels and the unique and special volunteer leaders who I have had the chance to work with and for during the past several months. In April, a few short weeks after the Convention I had the opportunity to visit the South Carolina College Personnel Association conference in Charleston. My hosts were President Bob Hanley and Boyd Yarbrough. I also want to acknowledge the work of Jason Cassidy, Beau Seagraves, Eric Fisher, Mac McArthur, and Adrienne Middleton. It was also great to co-present with Lynn Willett and Boyd Yarbrough on involvement in professional associations. The conference was well attended and featured excellent programs and included a poster session by several graduate students at Clemson University led and mentored by the late Ed Grandpre, Pam Havice, and Tony Cawthorn.

In June I had the opportunity to serve as a keynote speaker and presenter at the Caribbean Tertiary Level Personnel Association conference in Nassau, Bahamas. I’d like to thank my hosts, President Theolora Reynolds, President-elect Jacqueline Austin, Merritt Henry, and Marine Cunningham for a wonderful professional development activity and eye-opening lessons as I learned about student services from an international perspective.

My next ACPA trip took me to Atlanta for the Association of College and University Housing Officers-International (ACUHO-I) conference this year. I was a guest of President Alan Hargrave, ACUHO-I Executive Director Sallie Traxler and former President Eddie Hull. I also want to extend my best wishes to incoming ACUHO-I President Connie Carson. I met with several ACPA potential and current vendors and prospective corporate partners/friends. It was also another opportunity for me to interact with our members to answer questions about the governance task force and by-laws vote.

The Pennsylvania State University once again served as a wonderful host and back drop for the ACPA/Penn State Assessment Conference in June. Jacqueline Skinner Jackson, ACPA’s Director for Educational Programs and Publications, spearheaded our efforts to coordinate a great line up of nationally known speakers and faculty members. These renowned assessment experts included Peggy Maki from Peggy Maki Associates and Pat Terenzini, Bob Reason, Suzanne Bienert, Shaun Harper, Brenda Lutovsky-all from The Pennsylvania State University. Alice Mitchell, University of Maryland – University College and Gavin Henning, University of New Hampshire, chair and chair-elect of Commission on Assessment for Student Development and Ann Groves Lloyd, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Director, State and Intl Divisions were also presenters. Thank you and congratulations to all of our participants and faculty members who assisted with this effort!

At the end of July Washington University in St. Louis, MO hosted the ACPA Summer Leadership Meeting. All ACPA leader groups (Commission Chairs, State/International Presidents Executive Council members and ACPA International Office Staff) are invited a four-day meeting to be oriented to ACPA, the organization’s strategic plan, and to learn how to maximize their leadership roles in ACPA. Topics included Sustainability in Higher Education by Dr. Debra Rowe, Chair of the Higher Education Association Sustainability Consortium, Legal Issues and Leadership in Non-Profit Boards facilitated by our legal counsel, Peter Wolk, and the new governance structure. In addition, each leadership group met individually to set their agenda for the coming year. Special thanks to Peter Brown, Jenny Garcia, Jacquie Skinner Jackson, Mariama Boney, and Greg Roberts for their assistance with this very successful leadership meeting.

At the Summer Leadership meeting, in addition to the traditional planning sessions for the upcoming year, we spent a great deal of time listening to all constituent leader groups to better understand what each of them needed from the Implementation Taskforce and ultimately the new governance structure to be successful. The Implementation Taskforce was approved by the Executive Council at this meeting as well. The group’s charge is to establish processes and procedures to operationalize the recently approved ACPA bylaws by July 1, 2007. The Implementation Team (I-Team) consists of Patty Perillo, University of Maryland-Baltimore County as chair and the following members:

In addition, I will be working with Kristan Cilente, Standing Committee Chair for Graduate Students and New Professionals to have a member of her constituent group also serve as a member of the I-Team!

The fall is my favorite time of the year. It has been no matter whether I lived in Wisconsin, Ohio, Massachusetts, Maryland and now New York. It, for me, signifies my most favorite day of the year–the day when resident students move into their residence hall and when both commuter and residential students attend campus orientation. It is a day of promise and pride, of fear and confidence, and an opportunity for us as college student educators to welcome and celebrate the next class of students and ultimately our world’s leaders. My second most favorite day of the year is the first day of the annual ACPA convention, but that story I’ll save for a future edition of Developments. As I hope you know this year our annual meeting will be the joint meeting with NASPA in Orlando from March 31-April 4, 2007. For more information, please visit http://www.2007jointmeeting.org.

In the meantime I wish you good luck with all of your orientation and opening activities. Thank you for all that you do behind the scenes to teach, mentor and serve as role models for our students. I am proud to be in this noteworthy and distinct profession with you. Until next time, take care.