Léna Crain
For folks who are maybe listening to this, who are newer to CAS, the work of the standards revision committees, what they’re actually producing is a set of may and must statements that are kind of the standard for that functional area. So if you were to build a program from scratch, or want your program to to reach kind of a baseline, if you’re looking for a compass of sorts of what your programs and services should be, the standards committees are writing that and those merged with the general standards. So things that are true of all functional areas across higher education. Those things are what together comprise the CAS standards.

Heather Shea
Welcome to Student Affairs NOW the online learning community for Student Affairs educators, I’m your host Heather Shea. In anticipation of the release of the 11th edition of the CAS standards. We’re joined today by several members of the Council for the Advancement of Standards or CAS leadership, to provide an overview or introduction to this valuable resource in the field. Joining me today are the current CAS President Dr. Ralph Johnson, the member at large for research, assessment and publications, Dr. Dan Bureau, and the editor Dr. Lena Crain. Student Affairs NOW is the premier podcast and learning community for 1000s of us who work in alongside or adjacent to the field of higher education and student affairs. We hope you’ll find these conversations make a contribution to the field and our restorative to the profession. We release new episodes every week on Wednesdays, find us at studentaffairsnow.com on YouTube, or anywhere you listen to podcasts. Today, today’s episode is sponsored by Symplicity. A true partner Symplicity supports all aspects of student life with technology platforms that empower institutions to make data driven decisions. This episode is also brought to you by Stylus. Visit styluspub.com and use the promo code sanow for 30% off and free shipping. Stay tuned to the end of the podcast for more information about each of these sponsors. As I mentioned, I’m your host Heather Shea. My pronouns are she her and hers and I am broadcasting from East Lansing Michigan on the campus of Michigan State University where I work. MSU occupies the ancestral traditional and contemporary lands of the three fires confederacy of Ojibwe, Ottawa and Potawatomi peoples. The university resides on land ceded some what under duress in the 1819 Treaty of Saginaw.

Heather Shea
Thank you so much for joining me today for this episode of Student Affairs NOW, and welcome to all three of you to the podcast. Maybe each of you could start by telling me a little bit about your role on your campus and how you got involved. With CAS, we’ll start with our current president Ralph. Hello, Ralph Johnson.

Ralph Johnson
Hello, how are you?

Heather Shea
Good. I’m doing great.

Ralph Johnson
Excellent, excellent. as has been stated, I’m Ralph Johnson. And I serve as Vice President for Student Life at Washington Adventist University, that name right behind me. I’m very excited to be here because it’s part of my own faith and I’m working at a faith based institution that reflects personal values of my own. I really enjoy the opportunity to work with our students very much. And what I’m also excited about is that I’m able to bring to our institution, some of those good practices in higher education that we may not have used before, and introducing the whole CAS concept to my university community. I am the president of CAS as has been stated and I’ve been involved with CAS since 2006. So I’m one of those old timers have been around for a while but I enjoyed the work so much that I just keep coming back.

Heather Shea
Awesome. Well, welcome to the podcast. My other two guests have been on other episodes of Student Affairs NOW so Léna, welcome welcome back.

Léna Crain
Thank you, Heather. I’m glad to be with you and thank you so much for dedicating this episode to uplifting CAS. I am Léna Crain she her pronouns and I’m speaking from the unseeded lands in central Pennsylvania home of Bucknell University and also the ancestral home of the Susquehanna people. I honor the ways that we all benefit from the land and from indigenous wisdom, which plays also a significant role in in the CAS standards. And so, I am also committed to supporting nativepartnership.org. Check that out if you’d like to take action beyond naming the lands that we’ve played. In my day job in my primary role at Bucknell University, I provide leadership for aspects of the student experience that are connected to well being and I am the current CAS editor, I first came to CAS that as a campus user, and then was a longtime intern with the board where we’re Robin, Dan welcomed me warmly about 10 years ago, and then back again, more recently as editor.

Heather Shea
Awesome. Well, I know you know, these standards forwards and backwards probably as an editor. And I really look forward to hearing more about that role and all the things that you all do with CAS. Dan, welcome back. Also, I think Dan, you might be one of our super fans.

Dan Bureau
And I have my mic over there right there. In the background. Hello, my name is Dan Bureau. I use he him pronouns. I am the Assistant Vice President for Student health and well being at Louisiana State University, which is situated on the indigenous lands. And I am the immediate past president of caste and have served on CAS since 2008. And I am there because the association of fraternity and sorority advisors said you should do this and I did it. And so as with everyone else who serves on CAS, I’m a representative from an association and have really appreciated AFA, for me has served for the last 15 years on CAS.

Heather Shea
Awesome. Well, welcome to all three of you. I thought we’d start this this podcast really today is an introduction to CAS and so let’s start with just kind of a basic overview of what the purpose and mission is of this organization. By broadly So Ralph, maybe I’ll start with you, we’ll just go in that same order that we just came in.

Ralph Johnson
I am not quoting our published mission statement from the heart. The main idea for CAS is to really create, update and promulgate one of the words that one of our past presidents love promulgated standards of good practice in higher education, so that we can make sure that our programs and services are truly assisting students in their overall growth, development and success.

Heather Shea
I love that word promulgate. I think I used it later or use it in the intro. Okay, so Lena, what do you what do you consider to be the purpose and mission of CAS?

Léna Crain
I will speak from the published division of CAS. And I love it because it comes back to students. So the vision of cast is to, to support promote, make better and best student learning, development and success.

Heather Shea
Awesome. I love that too. That’s great. Dan, how about you?

Dan Bureau
Well, when you go third, you have to take all the good responses. But what I will say is I bring up the idea of continuous improvement a lot when talking about CAS, which really CAS as a way to develop, implement, and assess and deliver high quality programs and services, but really wouldn’t eat those. So continuous. This is how we can do our work better.

Heather Shea
Yeah, that’s great. Yeah, I think of CAS in all the ways that you all mentioned that mentioned it, but I do really kind of go back to assessment and the usefulness of the standards and kind of understanding where my program kind of currently lives and maybe where it could be improving. So we’re doing this episode today, partially to hype the newest version, which is to be released April ish around there. We’re really I think we’re all really excited to see the 11th version come out. Lena, can you tell us a little bit about the new edition? What standards have been updated? What new standards are included? And then how might people access this document when it’s actually available?

Léna Crain
Yes, yes. Well, while I Everything is new, everything is exciting. I think whether folks are very familiar with CAS longtime users or brand new, I think they will really appreciate the content and format that perhaps the most user and reader friendly that that it’s ever been, for one, I think but CAS as an organization, and certainly with the publication’s, we’ve been really responsive to the feedback of campus users. And so users have increasingly requested that the CAS materials be in an interactive electronic format. And so to that end, the 11th version will be the first version released in ebook ebook format, only that ebook will feature significant interactive elements, significant aesthetic enhancements, for example, things hyperlinks that are clickable or writable PDF format, which we’ve been getting asked for for years, and years. And it will allow for individual printing for folks who also would like a paper product, the self assessment guide. So we’ve got the standards and the Self Assessment guides, the self assessment guides are the segues for sure. Those will be interactive PDFs, and also with significantly revised very user friendly directions. And to your question about, you know, what’s been updated that the general standards have been completely updated. And so every functional area standard has also been updated. You also mentioned that some are brand new, I want to look at Dan and Ralph to double check me on this. But we have a number of new functional areas, we are releasing those to be responsive to trends in the profession. And so one new functional area that you’ll see is eSports, which is so hot, so rapidly growing on campuses right now, and folks have been looking to us like, where is the standard? What is the standard? Well, I’m glad to say that it’s here. Also campus credential programs and services. That’s a new functional area standard, indigenous Student Affairs. That’s another new standard. I’m Dan Ralph, am I missing? Some others? I think those are the, the new few. But they’ve all been significantly revised, that were

Ralph Johnson
Oor created or created. And you know, I’m excited because I served on the committee that develop the esport standards. And I have to tell you, we had to learn quite a bit ourselves as we were pulling these standards together. And we’re not for the help of the experts in the field, which of course we use for all of our standards. We would have probably still been paddling around. We’re trying to figure this out. But we really appreciate all those folks who serve as experts across the spectrum of higher education who come together and partner with us to create an updated standards. Definitely.

Heather Shea
That’s all fair.

Léna Crain
I also want to call out, Dan, because I think, Dan, you were involved with the general standards revision. And there was an enhanced focus on equity and inclusion particularly and, and inclusion of international and indigenous voices. And so, because the the general standards are such a part of, of every single functional area standard and sag, and that’s a really important update for this version 11.

Dan Bureau
Now, a few years ago, when we revised them in the 2018 2019, we’re like, oh, this is done, this is the best we’ll ever do. And now after this last iteration, and under the leadership of Gavin Henny, who’s been a guest on this show a lot and is a stalwart in the Student Affairs assessment world. I mean, he just brought us in all different directions. And I think the access, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, social justice, it’s much more infused across all of our standards. I’m really excited about what we got with that, and the layout design that Lena and her team are doing, it’s just like, wow, it’s going to be so much better to see this thing only in digital, because you can just do so much more you have freedom from having to like only use two colors, you know, and it’s just the layout is going to be so much difference really exciting.

Léna Crain
So So think increased font size and the accessibility that comes with that, I think, color and font changes to demarcate you know, certain parts of the standards, all these things that user has asked for for years, but where we’ve been limited in some ways and doing only a print product. So that’s exciting. And then lastly, CAS recently entered a partnership with EBSCO, you’ve likely heard of or used EBSCO, if you have ever used your campus as electronic library. And so CAS will now be searchable through EBSCO library resources. And as always CAS 11 and all of our products and services can be purchased through cas.edu.

Heather Shea
Awesome, we will make sure we add that link to our show notes so that folks can directly go to the website, which is full of all kinds of great information as well as you know, accessing the product itself. I am really interested, though, because I know a lot of different units, sub units, functional areas within student affairs in higher education have their own sets of standards. Ralph, can you talk a little bit about that kind of interchange between standards and then how that, you know, those various populations have integrated into CAS?

Ralph Johnson
Well, we work we partner with several of those organizations that have over those functional areas that have their own standards. And while simultaneously using the CAS standards, that’s just much additional information for the professionals in that particular area to have in order to really know that they are doing a great job with their particular functional area in enhancing student learning, development and success. So there was generally a partnership where we work together on those certainly not a situation where the professionals in a given area have to choose one or the other, often going between the two, and pulling the best pieces out in order to do a comprehensive review that fits their particular institution and their particular situation.

Heather Shea
That makes sense. That sounds good. CAS I know has been around for a while. I mean, the 11th version, that doesn’t mean it’s only been once every year, right? It’s many, many decades. Dan, can you tell us a little bit about that history, and how you know, how it was established, you know, why people came together? And then maybe a little bit about the uniqueness of the structure as well.

Dan Bureau
Yeah, it is really a unique structure and CAS came together in 1979. It was really born out of ACPA and NASA. And for the most part, people the time wanted to create standards for preparation programs, because, you know, wasn’t quite doing it for Student Affairs, higher ed programs. And they really sought to have some kind of and they were really committed even at that point to self assessment. Not necessarily an accrediting body, but some level of self assessment. But how to ensure that those programs had high quality. Some of the early founders, there were eight original associations who founded CAS including NERSA, NASPA, ACPA, ACUHO-I and forgive me if I forgotten other ones, but But over time, we’ve grown to 43 different associations currently actively engaged in our work, and that’s only in 43 years of existence. And some have come and gone, you know, and then and some are really new. You know, Lena mentioned the campus credential NACU who joined us just three years ago, and already have a set of standard because of the diligent work of their representatives. But you know, the history of CAS is really Ralph mentioned this concept earlier about all partnerships. And ultimately cast exists in order to kind of bring these people together around this idea of common good practice good delivery of programs and services. So that’s really where we have on our half of the last 44 years now, Ralph is only the 10th, president of cast as well. So I mean, there were several early on Roger Winston, Don Kramer, Phyllis, Mabel, some of the real stalwarts of the field of student affairs, many of whom were asked ACPA presidents as well, you know, base her for a long time. And we’ve had a lot of longevity in CAS, it’s been a little bit different in that regard. But there have been people, you know that I’ve served in CAS a very long time. The thing about the modern day mission of CAS, I will say is that we talked about this earlier, but there’s really four key components. And we are unique, because we come together across professional associations. And that alone, that doesn’t happen anywhere else. There is no other body that can bring bring together and as much as their own standards, we can be a real voice for the field when we need to be as well. But the four things we do is we unite people, we create the standards, which are really frameworks for their practice, we focus on continuous improvement, which includes self assessment and ongoing attention to assessment and planning. And then as Lena mentioned, this commitment to student learning and development, which, while always part of Student Affairs, is really become in the last 20 years more build a core to our mission and purpose. And those are the things that we hold up. But I will say that CAS as an organization, very much relevant today, we contribute a lot to the higher education environment, we welcome all of our associations, we actively engage our associations, and this idea of working together towards common standards that will really benefit higher education really is such an important contribution that we are making to the field of higher education at large.

Ralph Johnson
And if I could just add real quick, and I know Dan has alluded to it, but I want to be very intentional about using the word consortium, because that’s what we are all conglomerate consortium, a grouping of professional associations that are committed to creating these standards, that they invest resources in sending representatives to our meetings, and giving them the opportunity to be in partnership, one with the other to make sure that I from varying perspectives of the field, and a profession, look at the standards to make sure we’re closing gaps, we’re looking at various ways to interpret so that we, when we come away from a set of standards, that it really would have been vetted quite well.

Dan Bureau
Well, and that interdisciplinary approach row, it really is nowhere else, because, you know, while not every representative looks at our standards equally, right, because there are some that people just can’t get around to. But for the most part 42 Different organizations have the ability to get feedback on any success standard, whether it be eSports, or cannabis credential, or LGBT program and their residence life or whatever. I mean, that ability to get input that kind of approaches this, like we’re all in this together, we can all focus on these shared goals, while also respecting the unique things that we do in our functional areas. That’s a really cool thing to contribute to our profession.

Heather Shea
I can also imagine just the the networking and opportunity to kind of work across associations is a phenomenal place, right? I mean, I, I feel like sometimes, you know, when it becomes conference season, you know, we all go out in those spaces. But I can imagine every single CAS meeting is this opportunity for this to be really rich space for generative, engaged learning across across various functional areas. So I love that. Ralph, maybe you could talk a little bit about the unique kind of structure with Association membership, because like, as I’m really familiar with ACPA, right, we have members who are individuals who work on campuses, but member associations and CAS is a really different kind of structure. You know, talk a little bit too about how the individuals who represent those organizations are chosen to serve in that capacity.

Ralph Johnson
Well, let me just say that, that is that varies from one organization to the next. Each organization has its own way of identifying who will come to the cast Council. I represent the Southern Association for college student affairs, and we identify individuals, you know, in a way that’s different from a AFA, you know, I jokingly say to my association and to the CAS Council, I was a cheap date. We were looking around for someone who was close to DC because most of our meetings were in DC. I happen to be in Maryland like, well, if you’re in Maryland, why don’t you represent us okay? So I’m like, Okay, and so I went to the CAS counselor as a result of that, and then that just got there and just became absolutely excited about the work that I found at that CAS table. And different associations will sin, and I happen to be a past president Saxa. But that wasn’t the reason I was asked to come. Whereas in some associations, that’s exactly why some are asked to come get their past presidents, some are asked to come, because they have a specific role on their governing structure, their particular association. So the reason is very why people come to the, to the CAS table. But what I’m excited about is that generally speaking, those individuals who do come are committed to in helping their association, and helping students and to make sure that their associations are indeed, helping students with the overall development. The other thing that I think is important to mention relative to how we, how we work, is that each association can send up to two representatives. So I’m sending once I’m sent to, and those representatives can be there for as short as a year or two. And some are veterans like Dan and myself who’ve been around for more than a decade. And so this intergenerational experience around the table is also very exciting. But we see very young professionals coming in, and they tolerate those of us who’ve been around for a while, who think we know everything, but it’s very exciting when we all put our minds together in order to create a set of standards.

Heather Shea
That’s great. Lena, Dan, anything else you’d add about kind of the uniqueness of the association structure?

Léna Crain
I really appreciate that. It brings together folks both individuals in their roles and associations or functional areas, big picture that may never or rarely interface in their campus work. I was I was trying to think of like two areas for whom that that might be the case like, think like campus food programs and, and campus police, there’s an answer to watch in the CAS that setting where they understand and bolster one another’s perspective. And it’s really neat to see that happen.

Dan Bureau
Yeah, I think there’s so much opportunity to and I think that people look at us as the of standards and frameworks for practice. And also those are big in the assessment world, right. But I do think that we’re uniquely positioned to convene around really tough discussions about what’s happening in higher education. And I feel like to some extent, we’ve been able to engage people in ways that other groups can’t do. That’s not our primary purpose. I’m not trying to encroach on anyone’s space in terms of what they’re responsible for. But in at least in that period of time, when you have people like, you know, speaks at our meetings, pay Karen Solomon, who works for the Higher Learning Commission and speaks to our meeting. And I do honor the fact that this is a real privilege position for me to be in. I mean, we only allow two people from every Association. But as a result of those to people, we can go back to our respective associations and help them say, Hey, this is what they’re doing over here. Or if we really want to be more aligned with a senior student affairs officer, maybe you want to attend to what’s happening over in this association, those kinds of things. So really, associations use their reps? Well, we are empowering their members with information that they probably would not get just from the distinctive functional area that they’re working. But

Heather Shea
I love that. Yeah. And I think that’s what we need, right? We need that kind of cross collaboration, boundary crossing opportunities, and then taking what we’re learning in those spaces back to the places, whether it’s our campuses or their associations to kind of really foster that. Lena back to you just for a moment because I am really curious, this this job of being the editor, how did you get that job? And what is the process by which you revise I can only imagine like the the time intensive work that that’s engaged in.

Léna Crain
It’s definitely a team of teams approach if if you know the the model of a team of teams that is hyper true of CAS. I personally I first became acquainted with CAS as a campus user I participated in internal program review and then while in my doctoral program, I worked with the then executive director of CAS on the board for about three years and you mentioned just a moment ago the the idea of cross functional interdisciplinary being so important, I remember being part of those early conversations around what’s now the multifunctional and cross functional standards and supports and, and then you know, after leaving my role with CAS at that time, I became an external reviewer and I stayed tuned. Now as someone who in my campus role is leading multiple units and using CAS. So when CAS editor Dr. Jen walls she served in the role for about 10 years and she is remaining very involved, very influential through this transition. And when she announced that transition, it felt logic Well as as a user and someone attuned to big picture trends and needs, and I remember speaking with Dan about some of the potential these ideas for, for new CAS programs and services and and so that was kind of what called me back to CAS. I think the same is true for assistant editor, Dr. Kelly Dixon, and she has been super active in campus assessment. She’s now a faculty member. But was it like a director of assessment on a campus and also a, an external reviewer. While we’re naming because I also want to shout out the editorial team, Noah Henry Darwish, Associate Editor and more CAS designer, they are exceptional, they are stars in their primary roles, and the profession is better for their service on on this editorial team, so that there’s one team, but how we get the standards and how we create what you’ll see as the ebook and sags. They’re each functional area and the general standards, I has a team that over the course of in some cases, several years, revises that set of standards, they are compromised sometimes of content area experts and folks who are CAS experts that is experts in in creating usable standards. And so they also consult and include heavily functional area kind of content experts, and they produce that set of standards and then move it forward to the to the editorial team. Dan, I think you have been of this call the one to have most recently participated in in the standards review. So what did that look like for your, your team? before it got to the editorial team?

Dan Bureau
Well, there is the every I approach it a little bit differently. When I’m chairing standards, I think it’s really important to talk about the general standards or when I have chaired functional area revision, I think the ladder right. Properly. Yeah, I think that for me, I really rely on the experts a lot. And I think that well, it’s really important that and to be clear, the chair of a standard revision committee is never representative new association. While that person might sit on the committee, we really depend on this interdisciplinary approach. So for example, I came up through fraternity and sorority life, one of the areas we would work with was Student Conduct. I served as a student conduct chair, while the people from ASEA sat as the expert on the committee. But like, I would never be the chair for the fraternity and sorority life programs revision, some

Léna Crain
checks and balances, and it helps the standards revision from becoming an echo chamber.

Dan Bureau
Yeah, yeah. So bringing in experts using the casts committee, also representatives, the cows, the council will review all the sets of standards on calls, which is phenomenal, Heather leaves to sit in a room and go line by line, when you’re reviewing standards, like 12 years ago, it was as bad as you might think it is. It’s what it was, what it was at the time that we have the knowledge in other ways in order to kind of make that better. And way by the end, everyone has an opportunity to be engaged in that work and get feedback and get a standard management committee. And I’m not sure this was actually the question you asked. But I mean, the process really is it varies a little bit by person. But I know that we’re turning these processes around, it’s called 18 months on average. So a lot of work to be weighing we do three to three to five revisions a year.

Ralph Johnson
No three to five revisions for a council meeting, actually some instances. Yeah.

Dan Bureau
Yeah. So I mean, we’re revising a lot of standards in general standards. And boy, when you’re getting ready for this 11th version, Lena. All the things you’re doing revising contextual statements, doing all the parts, all the things?

Léna Crain
It’s a it’s a happy really, though, it’s a happy really Yeah. For folks who are maybe listening to this, who are newer to CAS, the work of the standards revision committees, what they’re actually producing is a set of may and must statements that are kind of the standard for that functional area. So if you were to build a program from scratch, or want your program to to reach kind of a baseline, if you’re looking for a compass of sorts of what your programs and services should be, the standards committees are writing that and those merged with the general standards. So things that are true of all functional areas across higher education. Those things are what together comprise the CAS standards.

Heather Shea
You teed up my next question perfectly, which is really about how do we use these right? How do we use the CAS program standards for development, or for connection for whatever we’re going to try to create? And so Dan, can you talk a little bit about this? I understand you just gave a guest lecture this morning at a higher ed progressive so like you could you could give us the short version of that, but I’m definitely really interested in hearing how how we use them What’s the application?

Dan Bureau
So there’s five primary primary ways one might use the CAS standard one is to design new or enhance existing, like, kind of re envision or design new programs. The other one would be more of this idea of like, how do you take existing programs that make them better. The third one would probably be this idea of continuous improvement or self assessments, which is both a internal process but when you apply external reviewers, it might turn into more of a programming model on many campuses have such a model, including their division of student affairs, or whatever we’re calling that division of students services on our campus, or the fourth one really would be kind of like a personal development tool. I think that particularly how these standards are used in graduate preparation programs, and they’ll have their instructing yours, and you use the standard and your courses, you know, just the opportunity for someone to sit there and go, Hmm, I think I can do this, I mean, these three standards right here, I could really knock out of the park, but maybe these ones, I need to enhance my competencies in order to be a little bit better. Like, I think these are really a reflective tool and a tool for not only continuous improvement of departments and divisions, but also a professionals, I would align these very closely to ACPA, and NASPA professional competencies are a functional area specific competencies in terms of creating a professional development plan. The last thing I’ll say in terms of a primary use, I think that’s very important. I’m a big framework person, I think everything is like, you know, I could whether it be student development theory, or cultural competence, or assessment, whatever, I think you just have to have a framework in mind. And I actually think that for our folks that want to create learning and development outcomes, I think we why recreate the wheel, we have six domains of learning and development, we have probably, across those 6 Probably have what Lena, like 23 different dimensions of learning. There’s some slight modifications we’ll make in this next version, another good reason to pick up the next version, when we do not pick up but you know, by the link, or we’re going to call it now later, but But I mean, I think they’re learning development outcomes are timeless. And they really represent the broad kinds of things we’re trying to do with our programs and services. So, you know, create new, enhanced programs, self assess program review, use as a reflection tool to enhance our professional competence. And then kind of as a framework for student learning and development are the five things that I kind of promote out there. Lena, do you have any other thoughts on those?

Léna Crain
I would say beyond those I frequently use and refer folks to the contextual statements, the contextual statement is the pages of texts that are before each standard. And it is a thorough summary of the history, the background, kind of the why, and also the trends and anticipated future directions of each functional area. And so if you were newly learning about higher education, or new to a functional area, I like them as both a time capsule. It’s neat if you look at them over time, and also as a compass. Incidentally, I think CAS will be publishing a compendium of those contextual standards as a separate ebook in the near future. And I think it will be a terrific resource for folks coming into the field, grads and such in particular,

Heather Shea
I think that will be hugely beneficial. I mean, partially because we see folks who aren’t coming in through traditional student affairs, Master’s and Doctoral professional prep programs, like how do we help communicate what the work is that we do and, and why this like a suite of offerings on our college and university campuses are a part of this much larger unit. The other example I had, and I appreciated what you said about personal development. I know one of the things I did at one point in my career, probably about 15 years ago was I was applying for a job in a functional area that I didn’t have a lot of knowledge around. And that campus, you know, office had been around for a while. So I’m like, Surely they must be paying attention to the standards, right. So I pulled open the the CAS standards, a it helped me understand, you know, what are the things that as a candidate for the directorship of that office, I needed to be able to demonstrate, and then to it asked, it allowed me during my on campus interview interview to ask some really great questions about the ways in which that campus had either paid attention to or taken up the CAS standards or or just was doing some of the work that is in some of those may or must statements on on on that campus. So that was somewhat of I thought at the time, a unique way of using CAS at the individual level. But do you have other examples of things that you’ve heard people say, Oh, I pulled up the CAS standards for that.

Dan Bureau
I liked that. You mentioned that too. You, Heather, and we actually have resources for graduate students about how to incorporate CAS into your job search. And you know, some of these resources will pass on to you. And you can link them in the show notes and all that kind of stuff that you all do. But the thing I will add about Last Train of Thought there, oh, the idea about determining priorities in limited resources, both human fiscal, fiscal whatever, I think that has to become a helpful framework as we seek to do less better, to make better decisions about the work that we do, to figure out what really our priorities, you know, if some people say, wow, there’s a lot in here, which we do in a lot of things, well, when it comes down to it, maybe maybe not. And I think it’s important to note too, that there’s no CAS police. It’s not an accrediting body, no one’s gonna bust you if you’re not killing it on all the standards. If anything, we hope this is a reflective tool that someone might use and say, you know, when you go through the process, at the end of it, the accountability is really up to you. So if there’s a message of like, well, we need to do better, great. If there’s a well, these aren’t priorities right over here. We’re context, culture, whatever it is resources, we just can’t do all these things fine. Or maybe you go through the process, and you’re like, wow, as we’ve done this, I think it’s really important that we start tackling these things, doing these kinds of programs and services. Maybe we should redirect resources over here. So we can actually do this better and better serve our students.

Heather Shea
I would love to hear Yeah, go ahead, Lena.

Léna Crain
Sure, I’m sure some campus users can use, take what you need from the CAS standards, but use that to justify or explain to broader constituents why something is a priority. For example, I came up through Student Conduct and Conflict Resolution, and there are certain very specific standards, for example, around privacy, and the same is true of the clinical counseling, the counseling standards. And so if you, if somebody says, Okay, you can do your work, you can be just fine in this big open cubicle area, you can turn to the standards to say, Absolutely not, it is a must, that we have spaces that preserve the privacy of students. And so that’s an example of, you know, to Dan’s point where we can very specifically justify the the allocation of resources and help us prioritize by using CAS as a compass.

Heather Shea
yeah. When I started my current role, several years ago, it was a brand new office, and it had been in his existence before, but there had been a hiatus and, you know, shift in divisional reporting line. And I think the new division was like, we’re gonna hire a director, and then not really think about, like, what does it mean to operate an office and, and so I, I pulled up standards and started writing in my annual report, the CAS standard said, we must have this, this is going to cost this and then was able to make the case for you, I can’t see because I have a background on but this lovely office suite that my my unit now is housed in, because it’s really vital, to be able to tie back. And so it was a voice of, at least in my institution of voice of authority, that these are important things that we must be taking into serious consideration if we’re going to better serve students. Right. And and that was a really nice way to make that direct connection. I would love to hear about upcoming sessions at ACPA and NASPA, what are the ways in which people can kind of improve their understanding and better utilize CAS in their various in their various roles?

Léna Crain
Sure, sure. The broadest advice I would give I would say start somewhere start anywhere. I say that anytime we talk about assessment it I think people get a little bit overwhelmed by the idea of a full assessment cycle, or they think the idea of assessment is ambiguous and scary start anywhere specific to cast, you can chip away at a self review. If you feel overwhelmed, you can squirrel away evidence over a year and then go back and apply that to a self assessment guide. There is no pristine, precise way of doing it start start anywhere, and we are here to help. But the other thing I would say is that just like good consumers and good producers of research, good consumers of CAS help us to be better producers of CAS. And so tell us what you think in need, and we will make things happen. That has certainly been true leading up to this 11th version and will continue to be true. Your question about ACPA and NASPA we have generous presence in both spaces this year, I think three or four sessions at NASPA four or five, maybe it ACPA including a pre conference Okay, consult is scheduled for both of those, I know that we will be there also in the exhibit hall space where we will be showing some, some, some sneak previews of CAS 11 in taking pre orders as well.

Heather Shea
I love it. That’s great. Dan, what else would you say advice to practitioners to improve their understanding?

Dan Bureau
Like Lena just nailed it in so many regards. And I just really think it’s important to emphasize that there’s no wrong way to use these, pick them up, read them, get closer to the work that you’re doing, improve your practice, figure out how to implement things, integrate cast, in some ways, possibly do a self assessment and possibly do a program review. And, you know, the question about other professional standards, you know, I supervise director of counseling at my previous institution, and they were ACPA accredited. I wasn’t going to get them to do cas. And that’s totally fine, too. I have said about once with her and kind of talk about some of the alignment between the standards so that she understood that as well. But you know, I think whatever you can do, just to become more familiar with and incorporate them into your practice, I think is important. And yes, we are going to be very present at those conferences. But we’ll have a president at the success and higher education conference this summer, the assessment Institute, we’re happy to do webinars or like, all in for classes, just let us know if you need our help in terms of their planning CAS, whether it be in your unit and your division, or whatever. So

Heather Shea
That is great. Well, as I said at the beginning, we are this is part one of a two part series featuring CAS. On our next episode, we’re gonna spend some time kind of digging more into program review. Because I think that’s one of the tangible ways that many people think of of CAS as a tool for assessment. I think I think we’re almost at the end of time. And for those who are listening, not watching, Ralph had to leave us to go to a student event. And so Ralph, we miss you, we will not be hearing your final thoughts. But I would love to hear from both Dan and Lena. As you know, this podcast is called Student Affairs NOW, what, after this conversation or just in general, are you thinking about pondering questioning? kind of curious about about now? And so, Dan, I’ll start back with you.

Dan Bureau
I just sat for two days with the Chief Student Affairs officers and kind of their AVPs from the southeast area. So not just SEC school, but a number of schools in the southeast, and we meet annually. And I kept going back to this idea, you know, all the issues we’re trying to deal with right now, where does Student Affairs, continuous improvement efforts kind of fit into our strategy. And I keep thinking about student affairs assessment, as almost becoming if it stays the way it was 10 years ago, less than less relevant. And I think that as VPs of Student Affairs and leaders within our divisions are looking at that position, I would hope that they’re really trying to find ways to make it more about continuous improvement and integrating of services and planning and those kinds of things. So I think for me, the future of the chief of the Student Affairs assessment professional is on top of mine. And I know that Sal and other people’s Student Affairs assessment leaders and others are committed to evolving that role. But I hope that we can do better in order to make that role more important within our field.

Heather Shea
Interesting, I love that. That’s, that’s a good final thought to leave us on. Lena, what about you?

Léna Crain
I agree with a different spin. My thoughts are also about continuous improvement, but specifically about quality of life being compatible with quality of work. visa vie, the 21st century report on unemployment that came out of ACPA and so that’s one part of it.

Dan Bureau
So Lena for that one,

Heather Shea
oh my gosh, another dream

Léna Crain
team but but I keep thinking about it. Yeah, lunch part connected to what Dan shared about, we need to do better and now we have an idea of how so that’s part of it. And then for students I keep coming back to how to empower them to make healthy decisions and to increase their comfort with navigating conflict like internal and external I am just so struck by the way students are turning away from their own wellness including healthy discourse and healthy conflict and Dan and I in our primary roles, both do campus wellness work and so no surprise that that that is also on my mind.

Heather Shea
Yeah, you You both are naming things that are definitely on my radar and something I am thinking about particularly related that 21st century employment report has to do with what do we what do we do with this information through the lifespan of the professional. Right. So how do we create sustainable careers and Student Affairs? And there’s, there’s a great book there. But I think it does begin with kind of thinking through some of these larger issues, and then the ways in which white supremacy is embedded in there. So Lena, fabulous, absolutely fabulous contribution to that project.

Dan Bureau
Thank you. So there’s some also some past Student Affairs NOW episodes that deal with sustainable workplaces and all those topics we talked about. So check out the the archives, right?

Heather Shea
Yes. Yes, yes, yes. Yeah, our sustainable we featured that book, I think, on a couple of different episodes, but and then the to the ACPA. President, and then the taskforce lead for the employment piece that episode. And it’s so interesting that you brought that up today, because literally this morning, I was in a staff meeting. And I was like, Well, you know, there’s a report that just talked about this. And I keep, like, giving it to folks and sharing it. So this was great. Thank you both so much for all of your time and for your contributions to CAS to version 11. To the profession. I look forward to seeing you both at ACPA next month in New Orleans, and thank you so much for your contribution to the conversation.

Heather Shea
I am so grateful for everyone’s time today on this episode exploring CAS. Thank you so much. Sending also heartfelt appreciation to the dig dedicated behind the scenes work of our producer Nat Ambrosey. Thanks Nat. If you are listening today and not already receiving our weekly newsletter, please visit our visit our website at studentaffairsnow.com and scroll to the bottom of the homepage to add your email to our MailChimp list. While you’re there, check out our archives. Thanks to today’s sponsors of this episode. Symplicity is the global leader in student services technology platforms with state of the art technology that empowers institutions to make data driven decisions specific to their goals, a true partner to the institution Symplicity supports all aspects of student life, including but not limited to career services in development, Student Conduct and well being students success and accessibility services. To learn more the symplicity.com or connect with them on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn. Our other sponsor today is Stylus publishing. Stylus is proud to be a sponsor for the Student Affairs now podcast, browser Student Affairs, diversity and professional development titles at styluspub.com. Use promo code SANow for 30% off all books, plus free shipping. You can find stylists on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter at styluspub. Please take a moment to visit our website and click on the sponsors like to learn more. Again, my name is Heather Shea thanks to all of our listeners and to everybody who is watching. Make it a great week.