December 15, 2007

Student Affairs Leader - December 15, 2007 - Full Issue PDF
…

How to Take a Fresh Look at Your Learning Community
By Barbara Leigh Smith
Learning communities have become part of the vocabulary of higher education. They come in all shapes and sizes at over 600 campuses. Some are new, while others have been in place for nearly 20 years. Some simply link courses and put students in a cohort; many go considerably beyond that to build a learning environment around core practices known to promote student learning.

On-Campus Report Capsules
CCSSE 2007 Survey: Of particular interest in the 2007 Community College Survey of Student Engagement (www.ccsse.org) are the top five strategies that can “provide important returns in terms of strengthened student engagement and improved student outcomes.”

Case Study: A New Approach to Assessment for Improvement in a Learning Community
By Barbara Leigh Smith
Too often, program assessment is done too late in a project to improve program performance and there is too little feedback to the participants. We decided to address both of these issues by placing a rich and extensive formative assessment practice at the center of our initiative with the Enduring Legacies Project with Native American students.

The Biggest Challenge Nobody Ever Mentions: Coping with Stress, Criticism and Pressure
By Art Sandeen and Margaret Barr
After nearly three decades in the profession, I recently started a new position as a vice president of student affairs. Over the years, I’ve attended dozens of conferences and have received good information on nearly every relevant topic except for the one that is most important to me now: coping with the stress, criticism and pressure that come with a prominent position. Some days, it seems that everyone’s a critic...Am I alone? Am I the only one who is looking for some advice in this area?