Emily Sandoval: And if you were here for the first Geek Ed panel, we talked about our hi heroes and villains era. And the work that student affairs professionals are doing to continue to support our students during external factors that are affecting all of our campuses. It’s in the news. There’s a lot of villains out there going after higher education and, and the work that we do with students and the community and the why really that a lot of us got into the field.

So underneath that is the staff doing the work, and it’s very normal and happening that a lot of us are burning out right now. For those of all of us who are in the field for well over 20 years as we decided to pivot.

Glenn DeGuzman: When do we start?

All right, everybody. Hi. Welcome.

Yes, everyone. My name is Dr. Glen De Guzman. I’m the Associate Dean of students and Director of Residential Life at the University of California Berkeley. I am also a podcast host for the Student Affairs Now podcast. So before we begin, just wanna do some quick logistics, restrooms outside just to the left.

We also wanna do a land acknowledgement, and, obviously these presentations, all the presentations today, were taking place on the traditional and ancestral lands of the Kuai people. We extend our respect to their elders. Past and present to all and to all the indigenous people. So we wanna make sure we send our respect out to that group.

In addition I wanna acknowledge our key supporters, obviously the Geek Ed Collective, please support them, continue to support the work that they do and the work on college campuses student affairs now. Thank you for supporting this as well. And to Comic-Con for continuing to support and create a space for education professionals like all of us and many of us.

To share stories and innovative ways to engage and enhance our learning. So with that, let me just start with my boring monologue, just to set the tone a little bit. I’m excited to be up here and moderating this. Phenomenal group of panel panelists who I think you’re gonna love enjoying hearing their stories.

At the heart of all of the, what we do is always our students. And today we’re gonna center our attention on this group, these unsung heroes because they have stories as well. They are the Professor X’s, the Oracles, and the Alfred Pennyworth of Higher Education. These folks go above and beyond and their professional career have done so much to support college students and they have dedicated their entire career to them.

But we’ve also come to realize that just like the mightiest heroes from Ironman to Wonder Woman. Sometimes they need a little leveling up. They need to recharge and they’ve gone through some serious battles of their own. So like many Cape Crusaders pop culture champions that we follow, these real life superheroes have had to hang up their cape, respect their skill, and recalibrate their missions on campus or even beyond.

And so today we’re gonna pull back the cow a little bit and understand their origin stories, their why for reshaping their path, how they continue to be heroes in new ways, and hearing their stories of self-discovery that even the most dedicated mentors, they need their own bat signal of self-care.

So let’s hear from them and end my boring monologue. And let’s get to know the panel was not Glen, was

Brian MacDonald: that was not boring. That not boring. Were you

Glenn DeGuzman: getting teary-eyed? A little bit? Yeah. So let’s meet this group. So I’m gonna go ahead and we’re just gonna go from this side to the far side.

Emily,

Emily Sandoval: thanks Glen. So my name is Dr. Emily Sandal. She her pronouns. I used to be an associate Vice Provost for student Development and engagement at the University of Southern California. So I worked in student life and my little boy is the audience. I used to work in student life for over 20 years at three different campuses, and I just ended my ninth month as a compliance and policy program lead at the University of Southern California.

So not student facing, no supervision and no crisis. And I think you also wanted us to mention a little bit about what we

Glenn DeGuzman: talked about. Yes. So we’re at ComicCon, right? Yes. Yes. So maybe for the panel also, maybe share a little bit about maybe your favorite fandom or maybe a favorite cosplay you’ve been dressed up at, but something just a little bit about yourself personally.

Oh my gosh. I

Emily Sandoval: have too many fandoms to list, but I’ll go with Star Wars Lord of the Rings. Buffy the Vampires Slayer O Jean Nintendo Super Mario Kart, super Mario Brothers. Yeah, and I’m big into Broadway musicals and I’m one of the founding members of the Geek Ed Collective. So just wanna echo that.

Thank you for continuous to support us.

Martha Enciso: Hi everyone. My name is Dr. Martha ciso. I use she, her and AIA pronouns, and I serve as an adjunct faculty member at the University of Redlands. Most recently administratively I worked as a, or I served as an Associate Vice President for Student Affairs at Cal State Fullerton. Faculty wise, I’m a little over a year in this particular role, so still student facing, but just in a different capacity and utilizing a lot of what I learned from a practitioner point of view now back in the classroom to utilize that as good examples.

In regard to fandoms, I would say echo with the, with my colleague here with Wonder Woman guardians of the Galaxy. And I’m wearing a al comic strip shirt, so that’s one of my, from way back in the day from my childhood. So rocking that, but happy to be here and be in community with y’all.

Sofia B. Pertuz: Hi, excited to be here.

My first Comic-Con here. I’m Dr. Sophia b Perus, and I am the founder of Mainstream Insight, LLC. I do executive coaching, training, development, and team. Facilitation. So what brought me there was my role 25 years in higher education. My last role was associate Vice president and dean of students. I was at Hofstra University in New York, but I did work in several campuses and then I took a bit of a detour and got recruited by the Judd Foundation, which was still focused on higher education and education in general, but from a mental health suicide prevention perspective.

So it’s still connected. And then I took another leap of faith. Three years later and took on a role working in the sports and corporate world with Billie Jean King Enterprises talk about working with a superhero. She truly is. So I would say my, and so my current role is I launched my own company and been doing that for a year.

So it’s been a really amazing superpower to have to realize that all the skills I learned along the way I can use right now in so many different ways. And of course. I’m representing DC today for Wonder Woman, although as I, that’s my favorite character, although I do love the Marvel Universe. Maybe there’ll be a cross somewhere, somebody, y’all no, that’s not happening.

But I love Steven Universe was mentioned a lot today, so I appreciate a lot of the lessons there, so I will turn it over.

Brian MacDonald: Thank you. Thank you Glenn and Panel. I’m very humbled. I feel. I just wanna get over here and listen to you all speak. But Brian McDonald, I use, he, him pronouns and the executive director.

Of communications for UCLA Student Affairs. And it’s funny because this is my, first of all, just contextually, this is my, I think, 24th year in higher education. It’s my 20th anniversary of coming to Comic-Con, and Emily and I have done these panels for quite some time together. I’ve been on Glen’s podcast before.

And Emily, I joked like, why are we still nervous about these? And it’s because I think this topic is. Both very important. They, all these topics are very important, but it’s very personal to me too. And it also forced me to go very deep into not only my fandoms, but also revisiting your why.

So I just appreciate the opportunity. And so you’ll hear more about my fandoms and my journey, but I will just say like very quickly. About four years ago my, another part of my story is that, I had a family a little bit late, right? So I didn’t have my first kid till I was, 40.

That’s late for, by some standards, not everybody, but my daughter is six. My son was just about to be born four years ago. And I had a job offer for a number two at a Cal State and Student Affairs and just continuing on in that executive leadership. And I had to turn it down because my son was about to be born and we didn’t want to, we had, amazing situation at UCLA Health with their midwives and just made a choice and was fortunate to be able to pivot into a communications role. And, the issues of student affairs have become the issues of higher education. So having that communications lens with the things that we’re dealing with now was just an opportunity.

And so you’ll hear more about that as we go. I’ll share my fandoms as we go on, but I will say I had a tough decision to make. I had my Crip keeper shirt and then this Hello Kitty cafe shirt, and I was like, I need to show up for my kid. My son, he still shows up for the different trash cans in the convention center.

I think a part of some of our stories, at least for me with children is it’s not about me anymore. And for, my daughter, her favorite shows right now, it’s funny, it’s PeeWee’s Playhouse and Punky Brewster. Wow. Those are two shows that she’s really into right now, in addition to Hello Kitty and San Rio, but.

I think like flipping, not making it about me is a big part of the different threads that you know you’ll see as we go through. So excited to chat with my colleagues

Glenn DeGuzman: here. Let’s get a chat then. So let’s set the context. And Emily, I’m gonna direct this question to you to kick us off.

What is happening in education, right? Why are we even having this conversation on professionals, hired professionals, I would even say K through 12 pro professionals as well. Superheroes like yourselves. You’re rethinking your mission, your career path. And some of you’re even leaving and many are leaving the field.

What’s going on?

Emily Sandoval: Thanks, Adam. This is a big question because I want to set the context that all of us have left roles, but it’s not the issues at USC or Cal State Fullerton or Hofstra or UCLL. You’re still at UCLA and I’m still at USC, but so it’s not an issue there. It’s an issue nationwide with student affairs, student life professionals, just being exhausted.

And if you were here for the first Gee Ed panel, we talked about our hi heroes and villains era. And the work that student affairs professionals are doing to continue to support our students during external factors that are affecting all of our campuses. It’s in the news. There’s a lot of villains out there going after higher education and the work that we do with students and the community and the why really that a lot of us got into the field.

So underneath that is the staff doing the work, and it’s very normal and happening that a lot of us are burning out right now. For those of all of us who are in the field for well over 20 years as we decided to pivot. And we’re gonna talk more about that, but that takes courage. That takes self-reflection because many of us, and I know I was told, oh, Emily, you’re gonna be a vice president of student affairs someday.

You’re gonna be this. I’m like, that’s great. You’re writing my story for me, but I’m my own author and I’m telling you, no, I don’t wanna be a vice president of Student Affairs. Thanks for thinking so highly of me. I was happy as a number two. But then that became too much and realizing that a lot of us are choosing to find new work life rhythms.

Thank you to my friend Grant who helped me coin that. So I don’t think work life balance exists, but there’s a work life rhythm and you have to define what rhythm is right for you and make that decision to still hopefully do work that impacts students. And I’m still doing that at the compliance and policy level, but now it’s with staff and faculty as well and university level.

But they can still be my why, but I need to take care of me. So I think this is what’s happening. Wow.

Glenn DeGuzman: Are you noticing for the other panelists, are you noticing any other shifts in rhythm at irrespective campuses?

Martha Enciso: Something else that’s popped up is either. Folks are hanging up the cape or the cape is being hung for them.

So folks are having to have these pivots. There’s unfortunately a lot of updates, at least on my LinkedIn feed, where I consistently see folks stating that they’ve either stepping away or having been told that they need to step away. So it’s really figuring out what’s the next step really taking the time to evaluate life personal.

Choices and things. What do you really value and what do you really want out of this one life? Time is the greatest gift that we can give and that we have, and we only have so much of it. So how are we gonna use it to our advantage?

Emily Sandoval: And I do wanna add that Martha’s the one who approached me about this panel.

We bond over our love of goofy, and if everyone could live their life with that much joy as goofy and a carefree life, I’m like, this is what I think both of us are striving for right now. So I wanted to give her a shout out for that. Thanks.

Martha Enciso: We’re trying. I would add

Brian MacDonald: Glen too. I think that there’s two things I would add.

One is we’re speaking from the perspective of folks with a good number of years in the field, but I think that this isn’t particular to. Just senior level, executive level. I think that the pressures that folks feel across the entire organization in terms of entry level, mid-level, and executive level. And I think there’s a couple reasons.

One, I think that for a long time we as a field, and not just student affairs, not just higher education, but probably many helping professions all were able to operate on. Oh, you show up for the Y and it’s the right thing to do. And I think that got a little bit exploited. And I think the labor movements of last summer showed that of yes, I care about my job, but I need to pay the bills.

And that’s become not possible for a lot of people in helping professions. And so I think there’s frustration. I see the frustration. Why doesn’t Gen Z just show up and stay? And it’s because they’re trying to pay the bills. They’re trying to make ends meet. And I, so I think that’s an important aspect to this conversation.

I also think. Especially for universities that are in like big media areas, but probably everywhere is that doing the job can sometimes come with, even in your best efforts, like being in the newspaper or having to contact your local legal counsel way more than you ever thought you would. And so there’s a, there’s an inherent risk that I think also is tied in that has become hard to bear for a number of folks in the profession.

Glenn DeGuzman: That’s a good point, Brian. You’re right. It’s all levels, and it’s, I think we’re also seeing, I, for me, I think about where I work at uc, Berkeley, I have seen it was like, I think 7, 8, 9 years ago, I had the first person who needed to take a break, like literally took a leave of absent, but I’ve now seen three in the past year.

So we’re starting to see folks really focusing in on them, on their own wellness and self care. And so at this point it’s a good transition. Let’s dig into your stories. ’cause I think that’s why we’re here. We want to hear your journey. And I’m gonna tie in a little Captain America here.

So for those who saw the movie, right? We know that Steve Rogers had a moment he walked away for the the Avengers. For very deeply personal and emotionally resonant reasons. He wanted a life with Peggy Carter. I hope nobody, everybody’s seen the movie, right? No, it’s right. I’m hoping there’s no spoiler here, your Honor.

So my question for the panel, what were the internal factors and the backstory behind your change? Was it personal reasons or as mentioned earlier, is it the changing higher education profession? And Brian, I’d like for you to kick us off.

Brian MacDonald: Yeah. It’s funny because when I think about Steve Rogers and the MCU, and I think about our current times, part of, I think that the pressures on higher education is this demonization of what we dub as bureaucracy.

And that, that actually, it’s like the staff and the people behind the scenes that actually keep these large organizations going. And when I think about the sacrifices that were made in the MCU, I think about like Phil Colson. If there’s a bureaucracy in the MCU, it’s shield. And he paid the ultimate price early on and is an unsung hero I think in a lot of ways.

But for me, I think Steve Rogers is a great example. It makes a lot of sense for me in terms of my pop culture upbringing, about 30. Seven years ago, 9-year-old, Brian convinced his mom to take him to the movie theater to see a movie called Robocop. And if you’ve seen the meme, like dude died, still had to go to work.

I think it, it popped into my brain where like you had a officer who was so committed to his field that he left his wife and kid home alone and marched right into the worst police precinct in the city of Detroit. And in his like dystopian future and was in an organization that didn’t have his best interest in mind and walked into, the headquarters of Red Foreman from that seventies show and all the other, bad guys from that film.

And was killed and then came back and became property of the organization of OmniCorp. And so he had to he had to, like that element of that particular story as well as for me. Sarah Connor is another one that rings true, and I think this is a big part of my journey to get your question is many of us in Gen X are caring for multiple generations, and Sarah Connor was literally doing that for the same person in multiple generations, right?

And so I’m, I’ve managed my dad’s care from 3000 miles away for his transition onto public assistance and his disabilities and things like that. And so to have children and to have my father start to have those issues at the same time. And we as a family were coming out of COVID. We were the poster children for the triple pandemic.

So kids going back to school, everybody getting sick. I think no blame on, leadership and supervision, but like everyone was dealing with their own stuff. And so at that time it was just, we were just on our own and navigating. And for me even though I had transitioned to this new position, I was failing at work.

For really the first time. And I just had to let balls drop. And just deal with family issues. And I think that was a very difficult situation to go through. But having gone through it, I think it has created a level of empathy that I just didn’t have before for folks who are doing caretaking and the degree to which I think about how for new professionals and emerging professionals how to better prepare them from the most times come because I do think those.

Those issues are going to get more substantial, especially caring for elders in our family. So those, I think Sarah Connor Alex Murphy, Robocop. And then also I think the Mandalorian going from having the helmet on to opening up the Harth for Grow. I think is another one that rings to.

For me.

Sofia B. Pertuz: I’ll chime in and agree with Emily. When you have this path, when you enter student affairs, especially, in higher education, there’s almost a path they make for you. Oh, you’re gonna be vice president one day. I see it in you. I believe in you. You might even be president. At least that’s what my mom thought.

What are you not president yet? You’ve been there 20 years. It’s that’s not how it works. So I had to reconcile that with myself first leaving higher ed. And going, okay, now what? How do I try this new thing and believe in myself and leave the safety of Thera, the island of Wonder Woman wondering and go into this world of corporate and non-profit and things I hadn’t really learned too much about before.

But I really relied on the network that I was leaving behind. I, that was the saddest thing. I’m like, how do I, can I still go to naspa? Can I still show up at the student affairs conferences? And they’re like, heck yeah, you’re here to help us. It’s awesome ’cause you have a new perspective and you realize that you didn’t have to stay in that frenzy of the grind.

And I remember my first year having left a dean of students position where you’re on call 24 7 responding to stuff at all hours, and you are literally thinking, I need to run into every situation and go full speed ahead when you have a network of people. And that’s one thing I wish we, we could emphasize more, that we have a whole bunch of us.

Out here that are heroes that can all help each other out. We don’t have to be the only one. So when I first left and was in this position where it was truly a nine to five, I didn’t know what to do with myself After five. I was like, what fires can I put out? Meanwhile, I have two kids, I’m like, why don’t we work on them and figure out what they need?

They’re about to go to high school and, in grammar school and stuff. So I was like, wow. I can actually dedicate, I can relate to what you were saying, Brian. It’s almost like a weird. No, but you need to dedicate yourself to this profession. And if you have kids, good for you.

But figure that out.

As opposed to we should be able to nurture this with each other and not have people go, have to go on medical leave eventually when they completely burn out. I don’t wanna add any more references to it except to say I was so grateful to stay connected, though that higher ed is a really friendly environment that I never really left.

I was still able to coach. Consult, do training and work really closely and even teach, I never really left because I’ve been on dissertation committees where I’ve been helping people get their degrees because now we know that’s a requirement. As you do move up, it’s all these different things that get in the pipeline of requirements, and now.

More and more degrees is there. So no wonder we’re burning out ’cause we’re trying to do our full-time job and it’s oh, if you want that a VP position, if you want that vp, you also have to go and do this other degree in addition to your two or three masters that you already have. So I, I even started working on that and that was an eye-opener for me because when I went into corporate, not that they don’t care about those degrees, they do, but they care more about the results you show.

And the outcomes you have. And I just feel like in higher ed, that was one thing that I remember going, yeah, we set a lot of goals, we set a lot of KPIs, all this stuff, but no one ever really tracked them well. We were just grinding, right? So when I think about the now and the way I con I connect the skills that you learned along the way and the people that you support, I can still do it from the outside without it being so frenzied and crazy.

It’s just like a different pace and a different. Way of looking at support in a much more healthy way than I’ve ever thought before. So I have no regrets. I’m sad because I did have that dream of the VP or president and maybe it’s not too late, but I also know if I want that I have to contend with the other things that are all these villains coming at higher education.

So I’m supporting from the outside happy to do that, but also still like nostalgically looking at maybe I want that still.

Martha Enciso: So that’s a bit of my backstory. For myself, it’s reevaluating the work and the time.

I started to notice that it was affecting my health was the other big key thing.

So thinking about what’s really important and what do I still wanna do? I’m a big fan of kind of le leaving it up to the universe too, to see where. Where I’m headed and what it has in store for me. So I’m really open and I know that’s helped me so far. So I’m like, eh we’ll keep at it. I think back too to star Lord and Peter Quill, how he also thought about his time and things, spending more time with family.

So that’s been a big thing for me. Spending more time with family. I use Disneyland as my gym, so I get my steps there, finding the joy, walking around the park. Definitely ’cause Goofy’s there, right? Emily? Yeah. So going there. But yeah, really centering, what brings me joy, what makes me happy, and how can I get more of that during this special time that I know is a privilege to have and to be able to do and live my life this way.

Emily Sandoval: I’m actually very similar, Martha, what you were saying, just I think the, for some of us, we didn’t realize that the stress we were carrying in these roles. ‘Cause some of us were dealing with life and death situations, with situations that were very traumatic for students. Students care very passionately, you cannot help them solve all of their problems.

There’s a lot there to work with. A lot of us here are first gen students. Some of us are professionals of color and there’s just a lot of weight to carry and I didn’t realize that my work, although I care deeply about it and I still do was affecting my health and my wellbeing. So making that decision.

I’ve joked with Martha, even when we were talking about this panel even Giles stepped away from the Watcher’s Council.

So I can still be there to support my friends and colleagues, the professionals that are doing the work from the outside. I still volunteer for the Western Association of College and University Housing Officers ’cause I’ve been active in that housing and Res Life Association for many years.

So I can still do that work and still be present for other professionals who are doing excellent work for students, even though I’m not the one. Doing the work anymore.

Glenn DeGuzman: Did any of you on the panel reflect on the shift or the changes that you’ve made? Like a, a Neo and Morpheus like conversation or a Yoda, Luke type experience?

Was there someone in your life could be a friend, a partner, maybe like a Virginia Pots and Tony Stark type thing? But someone who, who just helped you? Rethink or reaffirm the choices you were making in your career?

Emily Sandoval: I will say that at one point I had a therapist and a professional coach at the same time.

And even with that I needed and appreciated the validation from some of my outside circles. Yeah, I had friend, like my friend Alex and my friend Lisa Vid from Semester at Sea Annaly, that we are both very close with, where I’d pick up the phone and call and they would just listen to me and I almost needed them to say it’s okay to step away from the job.

’cause you are not the job. You are a person first. And similar to Brian, I was 40 when I had the little guy in the background that broke out into laughter a few minutes ago. I know that he is my why, but in order to prioritize him, I needed to prioritize me because you have, what’s that metaphor?

You have to put the oxygen mask on yourself before your kid. We all hear it every time we get on an airplane, but it’s so accurate. I was not taking care of myself, so I was not the best mother or the best partner to my husband. And I needed to be better for myself and those people helped me. Yeah.

Martha Enciso: I would say I continue to have folks say, you look a lot happier.

Glenn DeGuzman: Yes.

Martha Enciso: So that’s a continual validation of I did the right thing. So you, I, for myself, I think I did the right thing, but it’s good to hear friends, colleagues and then you mentioned we’re still connected in higher ed, still highly involved in professional associations.

Still can do all the things, but it just looks a little bit differently. And I think that having other folks say that, yeah, they can see that change in you too. For myself, it reaffirms that it was a good decision. You did the right thing. Yeah. And it doesn’t mean like what our title says that we can’t go back to it if we want to.

So similar to Sophia thinking back like, ah, do I really wanna do this or that? The option’s still there. Just at this time

Sofia B. Pertuz: choosing to do this a little bit differently. I think having stepped away, you can have a different perspective about setting boundaries in a very different way that I think you didn’t know you could do.

Like I, now, I had a coach. Who was like, but you can say no, it’s a complete sentence, but you can set those boundaries. I’m like, but I can’t. ’cause I was taught to just do what I have to do for my students. They’re my babies. My kids. It’s no, they’re not. They’re gonna leave in a couple of years and you’re still there, so you need to take care of yourself.

And I find myself on the other end of it, where I’m coaching folks who are like, yeah, but I don’t wanna leave that because my children, my, they’re not your babies. And when you keep thinking of it that way. One it takes away their agency for, what they need to learn. And that idea of challenge and support, bringing back some old school schlosberg theory, but you gotta challenge them.

You gotta support them, but not at the cost of your own wellbeing. So when they get that aha moment of you’re not right, you’re not your job. And one exercise I help folks with is let’s rewrite your bio without saying the first thing as your title.

Glenn DeGuzman: That’s right.

Sofia B. Pertuz: And once that they undo that, it’s you are not your title, you’re not your job.

You can do many different things. And if you just name yourself by the skills you have instead, then you can see yourself go out of that. And until I learned that from some of my elders, people ahead of me in the field, some of them, I would watch them and they’d leave early. And I remember being so mad at, when I was an associate dean, my dean of students would just leave.

I’m, I gotta go, I gotta get my kids. I’m like. So upset. Oh but we’re still, we still have work to do. We have things, we have meetings. And she was like, no. And I remember being mad at the time and it wasn’t until later when I had distance to come back and think about it and go she was teaching me boundaries.

She was teaching me, but I didn’t see it at the lesson. I was just mad because I was still stuck in my own way of working. ‘Cause that’s what I thought I was taught. So I think back now and I’m so grateful when I think about her because I think of the eyes of everyone who’s still in it. Yes, and that distance.

Now I’m like, okay, now we can rethink this. And you can control and think about a way of working that will not put you in the hospital, that will not make you take a medical leave because of how hard you’re working and not because you are the one that like you can control that. You can, but I’ll say this, we also have to let our senior leaders know that they need to be better at helping people set those boundaries too.

So I’ll leave it there.

Brian MacDonald: Now I’m just thinking, that’s spot on. Brilliant insights and gets me thinking about just this idea, not just for higher ed and student affairs, but career as an identity is a relatively new thing for humanity. And I think we’ve been poking holes in that since COVID and where you saw a lot of career executives and high performers just quit their jobs because they realized when they stopped doing it they were happier.

And we’re trying to come back into balance. Now, as far as the question Glen of the mentorship piece, honestly, the people who helped me the most through some of this was actually former students who I think considered me a mentor and mentorship’s. Interesting. I mentorship. For me, going to college in the late nineties was something that you referred to in the past tense.

And it was a relatively new movement of we realized having a mentor was a good thing. So then people were in the market for mentors and like a future thing. And that was new. And now I see almost a commodification of mentorship where if you’re approach, if you’re only approaching the students on the front line of the protests and trying to mentor them, so they won’t be as mad at you in the student newspaper, it’s not mentorship.

And I think that’s one of the issues that I think we’re starting to see too is like this rapid. Movement of like, how do we manage these crises on our campus in as fast a way as possible? How do we push all the resources into the students who are upset with us? Don’t push me out of my job and I’ll give you good reference.

There’s some weird negotiations that are happening and faculty saw this, a couple decades earlier with balancing. Engagement and connection to academics on our campuses too. But to the question, I actually leaned on a lot of people who, 10, 20 years ago were my mentees and said, you can phone it in for a little while.

You, you gave people plenty. So just take care of you. And that really also helped out is like leaning on people who I thought I was there to support. And having them come back without any expectation actually really helped me. Get through some of those harder times.

Glenn DeGuzman: It’s fascinating that you mentioned that.

’cause for me, and I’ll just add to that, it was people who had, who were not in higher education, who kinda shared their stories of self-care and wellness and I would share what I do and then they’re looking at me like. Yeah, that’s nonsense. That’s crazy. Why are you doing all that? And so it had me rethinking a little bit about my values and the choices that I’m making and hearing how they self-care allowed me to say, can I do that too?

And it took a while, but obviously finding happiness and finding wellness is critical. Emily, I wanna end Brian. I’ve known both of you for a very long time. We alluded to it so far, but we go back decades and we knew each other when we were new professionals and all of us, all three of us.

So this is a residential life question for those who are in residential education or residential life, but. At one time, we all held significant leadership positions in res life. I still do, and at our respective institutions. And it requires significant connection to many first year students. We all know.

And I know you both love mentoring students and new profess. But how do you stay focused on that as you took on these new roles? Because it is it was our calling card, right? That’s what drew us into the field. Like how do you stay connected to that knowing the toll and the burden it can potentially have.

Emily Sandoval: So I think it looks different now clearly, but, I still love the student experience. I was on campus a little over a week ago having coffee with a colleague, and it was the end of a first Sure orientation session, and I got to hear the spirit of Troy play for all the incoming students. And I ran over there to still take a picture and a little bit of a video clip and realize this still excites me.

This still excites me. For the first time in 13 years at USC, I didn’t know. When move in was, it’s August 20th, is the big date now, but I, that was weird for me. Like my favorite day, I worked at three institutions. My favorite day of the year was always move in that energy, the unknown, just the excited families, friends, all just nervous to start their university experience.

Like I still love that, but. Where I’m not directly working with students, the work I do in compliance and policy does impact students. It impacts the entire university. But we’re here for students. But what I really value is working as part of a healthy team. And I’ve been lucky that in every situation I worked in at every institution, even the team that I left in student life, we laughed together.

We had fun together. And institutional compliance is part of our office of Cultural Ethics and Compliance, and I have found fellow geeks there. So I don’t have an office anymore. All my pop figures are in boxes. I have a cubicle, a workstation, but I have all Star Wars and Disney art around my workstation.

So that has become a new conversation point with my colleagues. So I’m still finding those connections. And even more important to me is I actually have the time. To have valuable connections with former employees. So now I have the time to connect over conversation and there’s two staff members I’m thinking right now who are starting their doctor of Education programs at USC next month.

And shout out to Diana and Cynthia ’cause they’re gonna be amazing someday. But getting to see their progress, support them as they start their journey. Like I actually have the time and the energy to be a good cheerleader for them, and that makes me happy.

Brian MacDonald: I would say one of the fulfilling pieces of this journey now, a few years post my Robocop moment is I have amazing communications colleague.

At UCLA and they truly are like in a lot of ways res life people without onc campus departments responding to it’s, it really is professor X being connected to every thought across a giant spectrum when it comes to, caring about the university. And so I’ve discovered this whole second professional family and and being able to help fix a student affairs lens, I think.

Student affairs is almost like how people say if you do standup comedy in the entertainment industry, you can do anything. And I feel like if you can do student affairs the experiences I’ve had teaching in in humanities departments and doing other things like the ability to be in student affairs and just figure it out and do so many different really different skill sets to make, to just accomplish the mission has been really helpful.

And then, so a fixing. A student development lens to a broader university communications perspective has been incredibly rewarding because I think, and again, this is like really inside baseball. Apologies if you’re not like in higher ed in this room. But I think student affairs used to be an afterthought in broad based communications in newsrooms.

And then it was like five years ago, man, why are these people bringing so many crisis to our door, to our story? And through working through that. Now these, in my experience, is an understanding of the richness of what we do in student affairs. That now is like front page news, not just the protest and the mental health crisis, but some of these other pieces.

So that has helped in terms of being really rewarding and rewarding. And then I have continued to find every once in a while you find that like first year student who somehow is just born 20 years too late and their favorite movies are like the thing in Gremlins and you’re like, alright, you’re, we’ve actually had some of them on these panels before.

Think you, Jason, last year. But I think that those, you still find the ways to connect with those students. And what’s funny is, every year invariably I will do these panels and I’ll get a random email from a parent whose kid is considering UCLA,

Glenn DeGuzman: right?

Brian MacDonald: And whether they attend or not, you end up with those random spontaneous, serendipitous relationships with people who just need to get from point A to point B.

And if they come back into your life after, great. And if not, that’s what we’re here to do. So I think I just still try to embody that aspect of our work is just like helping someone find where the restroom is. Helping someone find just point A to point B is still really valuable to me.

Glenn DeGuzman: We are starting to run outta time, and we have we have one question left.

So every, if the panel can take about two minutes each to answer this. It’s a, it’s like a Jedi to padawan time. So it’s if you are giving advice to newer professionals in our field many in our. Field, obviously are gonna resonate with your stories today. What advice do you have for others grappling with similar identity shifts or career shifts?

Is there, and if you want to add a bonus, is there a character or storyline in your personal fandom that resonates to you in your own journey? And Martha, I’m gonna kick it off to have you start.

Martha Enciso: Sure. So I would encourage folks to go ahead and. Think about all the uneasiness and entangle, the internal struggles that happen.

So there’s a lot of healing that’s involved in making the switch like it’s been mentioned before, just the goals that you originally had for yourself that other people had for you. Also looking at identity. So a lot of, like it’s been mentioned before I encourage my students to think of themselves as people and not the career.

So you serve as, so that means other people are gonna come in after you, so that role can be there or maybe not. But there’s gonna be people that come in, so it’s a placeholder at the time. It’s okay to say no to things and to use that time in a different way. Encouraging folks to, as Sophia mentioned, no is a complete sentence.

Being able to spend that time for myself more with family, friends and really cherishing that ’cause it’s, it helps a lot with the shift, but also that healing. And seeking out some support that way. So shout out to my sister, Megan for being there through the whole thing.

Sofia B. Pertuz: I’m gonna bring in Wizard of Oz.

All right. As we think about, you already have it in you. There’s a lot of times when we don’t. Feel courage or we don’t feel like we have the heart for empathy or we don’t feel like we can do the things and we don’t have the tools. But I find that once you start asking really good open-ended questions, and that’s one thing I will love and appreciate forever about student development theory and some of what I learned early in my career, being in residence life, living literally living on campuses.

Working through really challenging situations with folks that they were just having existential crises or were trying to find themselves. I say you, you have it in you to figure it out. It’s just really great when you can have people around you who can reinforce that for you, ask the good open-ended questions, and then once you figure out that path, say, okay, here are a few different ideas and here’s other people you can talk to about it.

But back to what Martha said about, but those are not. Who you are. Those are just choices you can make along the way. And everything you learn along the way is valuable. It’s nothing is wasted when you say, oh, I took this position. I only spent a year in it. It was the worst place ever.

But guess what? Some of the worst supervisors are the best teachers. Yes. Because then you go, I will never be like that. I won’t do this. Or, here’s what I learned from that situation. So I don’t. Any choice I made switching from one job or one institution to another. But one thing I do appreciate is that every single thing was a lesson.

So that’s what I would say. You have it in you and you get to the Wizard of Oz and he says, what are you here for? It’s you already know what you wanna do. I’m gonna bring in matrix too. That’s true. You already know you, you do, but you just need maybe some guidance or leaning on the people that support you and love you, and find those people and just ask.

Always ask for help. You’re never on your own.

Brian MacDonald: I think previous Brian, Malcolm Reynolds made a lot of sense. Just aim to misbehave, be nomadic, have a bunch of troublemakers with you, but it’s actually Nathan Ian’s more recent character, officer Nolan from the Rookie. In terms of, both jobs like career change, but also family, his commanding officer pulls him aside in season one and doesn’t tell him that he thinks he’s gonna be a bad police officer just because he’s older.

He’s just, his younger officers are too dumb to be scared. And Nathan Filling has too much experience. He knows what could go wrong in every single situation. That’s actually a liability. And so I, that aspect of both parenting, but also looking at and giving advice to I’m try, I always try to remember not to burden, especially newer professionals with all of my experience.

But the one thing that I have felt for a while, and it’s very evident now, is. I still believe that taking hundreds or thousands of whatever demographic goes to college and put them into this situation we call college, is a really good thing. But if you look at the data of, the the benefit of having a college degree and not in terms of the predictability of getting a job is vanishing.

Unemployment among recent college grads is lower relative to non recent college grads than it’s ever been. And we do need to rethink what we do. Because just ask recent grads who were hoping to get a degree in coding or engineering, like those jobs are disappearing by the thousands every day.

And so I think it’s also a question of my personal journey of having to switch and pivot and change and adapt, I think is something that I think about for our whole field as we think about what’s next in the face of all the changes and questioning higher ed. So

Emily Sandoval: I would add there’s.

A type of professional out there that as a student, they were overachievers. That was me as a professional. I was an overachiever. I said yes to challenges, yes to projects, yes to this project I wanted to do for the student experience. ’cause I wanted to create the best experience ever for students. And I was enthusiastic about that too.

So thinking back, I would’ve been like, you cannot do it. All people told me that. But it is really true. You cannot do it all. You have to learn to say no is a superpower. And my kid is running outta the room right now. But I would say I think it’s no secret that Buffy the Vampire Slayer is one of my favorites.

And similar to the last panel I had to grieve the, I don’t talk about the creator anymore and I’m so excited that Sarah Michelle Galler is rebooting Buffy the Vampire Slayer with an all producer and creative team. So I can own that again, but the series ends with her sharing her power. And that’s a reminder.

You could look at it as student affairs professionals are expendable. I don’t think we are. ’cause each of us are unique and bring value and special talents to a team. But the work will continue even without us there. So that’s what I would say. Don’t overachievement. You cannot do it all. Save yourself.

Say no. And share the work.

Glenn DeGuzman: And that’s a great way to end the, for the panel section. We’re out of time, but really quickly, I do want to say a few things. One, just send shout outs to the Geek Ed collective, Emily, Brian, Alfred. Alex, I know that, and Alex is not here, but is with us. Always with us and all the common Con educator plan planners and presenters today.

The the auto visual staff, the staff, the Shipley Special Event Suite, and the public library. The team of student service Now, Gretchen, where are you? Thank you for recording for me. I just wanna close with as educators, we live for the moments that challenge us, that transform us and push our narratives forward.

Whether it be from the pages of a graphic novel that we just read, or on a college campus, transformation is the heartbeat of greatness. And, I grew up watching WWF as the late Hulk Hogan once said, quote, without change, there would be no growth. So I hope you all live here, not afraid to change but be be hungry for change.

Use this fuel to shape your stories, your art. Your commitment to students and yourselves. So thank you everybody.

GeekEd Collective: https://www.geekedcollective.com/

StudentAffairsNow Episode:  Geeking Out in Higher Education Episode October 7, 2020

(https://studentaffairsnow.com/geeking-out-in-higher-education/)

StudentAffairsNow Episode : Geeking Out in Higher Education Episode II: Student Affairs Goes to Comicon August 16, 2023  (https://studentaffairsnow.com/comiccon/)

Emily’s dissertation link-below. I pulled it from the GeekEd website 

https://www.geekedcollective.com/s/Creating_Opportunities_for_Eng.pdf

How to Reimagine the Second Half of Your Career

https://hbr.org/2020/08/how-to-reimagine-the-second-half-of-your-career?tpcc=orgsocial_edit&utm_campaign=hbr&utm_medium=social&utm_source=linkedin