Keith Edwards:
Hello and welcome to Student Affairs Now. I’m your host Keith Edwards. Today, we’re talking about orientation, transition, and retention. Today’s episode is an edited version of the NODA leadership State of NODA session at the NODA annual conference and the following Q and A session that I hosted on October 27th, 2020. There are some great insights, perspectives, concerns, and possibilities for all of us in higher ed.

Keith Edwards:
Student Affairs NOW is the premier podcast and learning community for thousands of us work in alongside or adjacent to the field of higher education and student affairs. We hope you find these conversations make a contribution to the field and are restorative to the profession. We release new episodes every week on Wednesdays. Find us at StudentAffairsNow.com or on Twitter.

Keith Edwards:
Today’s episode is sponsored by Anthology. Is your goal is to engage in effective assessment, boost data fluency, and empower staff with strategic data collection, documented analysis, and use of results for change? No matter where your campus is in the assessment journey Anthology (formerly Campus Labs) can help you figure out what’s next with a short assessment. You’ll receive customized results and tailored recommendations to address your most immediate assessment needs. Learn more about how Anthology’s products and expert consultation can empower your division with actionable data by visiting campus labs.com/SA-Now.

Keith Edwards:
As I mentioned, I’m your host, Keith Edwards, my pronouns are he, him, his. I’m a speaker, consultant, and coach. And you can find out more about me KeithEdwards.com. I’m hosting this conversation today from Minneapolis, Minnesota, which is the ancestral home of the Dakota and Ojibwe peoples.

Keith Edwards:
And now I’m going to turn it over to the NODA leadership. Executive director, Joyce Holl will kick it off. Invite the rest of the NODA leadership to introduce themselves and lead this first part of the conversation.

Joyce Holl:
I’m Joyce Holl, the executive director. Let’s start with the introduction of our fabulous NODA executive leadership.

Heather Kovanic:
Hello everyone. My name is Heather Kovanic. My pronouns are she, her ,hers. And I currently serve as your NODA president. I proudly serve as the director of the office of orientation and transition programs at the University of Delaware.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
My name is Karnell McConnell-Black. Pronouns are he, him, his and I serve as the vice president for student life at Reed College. And I am currently your president-elect.

Melanie Payne:
I’m Melanie Payne and my pronouns are she, her. I am serving the NODA association as past president and my current role outside NODA is as the director of the office of first year experience programs at Indiana University.

Lizette Rebolledo:
My name is Lizette Rebolledo. I serve as the equity and inclusion officer within NODA, the director and associate Dean of Students at Virginia Tech for new student and family programs.

Chris Verhaeghe:
I’m Christopher Verhaeghe. I’m the assistant director of orientation at the University of Wisconsin Madison. And I serve as your secretary and treasurer.

Joyce Holl:
First, I’ll start with the three presidents ask you to answer this question. What would you have said was the stage of orientation, transition and retention pre COVID-19 and what were their hot topics and emerging trends and how has that shifted now that we are deep in the pandemic?

Heather Kovanic:
Thanks Joyce. I can get us started. Prior to the pandemic, I think one of the trends we were seeing was the resurgence of concern for students’ mental health and how to address it within our orientation, transition and retention programming with awareness, stigma, and support being reemerging concerns. These concerns have since only increased with the continued impact of the COVID 19 pandemic on students’ college experience and has been even further amplified, at least within the United States, given the racist violence and divisive rhetoric occurring across our country. How we as practitioners, work with our partners and campuses to address these issues, particularly through student’s initial transition to college will be critical to their overall retention. We have to consider how to meet students’ needs in a virtual learning environment, providing ample opportunities for creating meaningful connections with their peers, faculty, and staff, and enabling them to develop a sense of belonging, even if they’re not physically able to be on our campuses.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
So I would say I would kind of character or characterize this in terms from a VPSA institutional level decision. I would say generally VPSA’s or senior senior student affairs officers focus was more on the physical campus experience and its impacts and that it alludes to some of the things that even Heather stated, but I’m thinking about it more from enrollment decisions that impacts the profile of an incoming class to a focus on transition and retention efforts and its connection to institutional budgets. And I think that during this pandemic, I think we have VPSAs and senior student affairs officers have probably been more focused on how our students are experiencing the transitions to our campus, where you are seeing most likely your vice presidents or senior student affairs officers, more focused in how and in the weeds of how you are actually doing that work.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
And probably because they want to make sure that that experience is going to be solid for the incoming incoming class. And I think there are more questions. I think that needs to be asked around the expectations of more support beyond the classroom and the impact on student success. And does this mean that we’re going to change what we offer to students? But one of the things is that I would caution institutions to focus and to make some critical decisions as we can’t be all things to all students. And so what is our focus and what is our responsibility as OTR professionals? I think another piece of this is really thinking about the value of a college degree. Is it worth it? Yes, to me, it’s worth it. But is it worth it to our students to continue to navigate the college landscape year to year and beyond in the way that we are currently experiencing it? So that’s a little bit of my thoughts.

Joyce Holl:
Thanks, Karnell.

Melanie Payne:
Technology related access and tools that we get have clearly been on our list of hot topics and trends during the pandemic use of digital media and technology to broaden access to critical information and resources was a hot topic. Well beforehand we’ve seen more and more systems products and tools being developed and offered many from our very own associate members to assist us in our work, how we navigate what works, what is sustainable and what fits our needs and serving our populations continues and is a trending topic. I’d also like to mention a couple other things though, as important trending or hot topics prior to the pandemic, but also more so even now, equity and access in our programming, in our priorities and in our long-term planning we’re cognizant of the world around us and how important the access and equity is more so now than ever also the role of orientation in the yield process, just where do OTR related offices and staff fit at our institutions who truly is responsible for the transition and retention of our students. And of course the increasing cost of higher education and as Karnell mentioned, the perceived value of that degree.

Joyce Holl:
Great. Thank you. So Lizette and Chris. I’d like you to talk about what should be the top of the mind for NODA members as they prepare for the academic year in order to stay relevant on their campuses, not only this year, but beyond I think we all know that the pandemic is going to be with us for a little bit longer and how engaging with NODA their association can help play into that. Lizette, do you want to start us off?

Lizette Rebolledo:
Sure. Thank you. Joyce. I think similar to years past, we need to, as was mentioned by our presidents, prove our work in more ways than one to our campus community and ensuring that they continue to understand that at NODA and there’s orientation and transition retention professionals, we know that orientation is not a one-time singular event, that it is a process. And then we ensure that our students are being successful. As Melanie mentioned, we’re part of the yield process, but we’re also part of the full transition and continuing into that retention. And so how is it that we’re engaging our orientation team members to continue to be peer leaders in the landscape

Lizette Rebolledo:
that we’re currently experiencing? How is it that our staff is engaging with our students? How is it that we can connect with faculty to better understand the orientation and transition experience in the virtual world? How is it that we work with our academic colleagues and many of us had not done academic advising on our campuses in the ways that we had to during the pandemic in a virtual setting. And how is it that we involve that and can work collaboratively to create a more seamless transition for both our students and working with our advising colleagues to do that and ensuring that there’s individualized attention and that it is needed and wanted by our students and knowing when we also think about involving the families and how is it that family members are getting the information that they desire and need. I think that I can speak to our institution here. We saw a decline in the number of families that were involved in orientation, but we also see that many of the family members are contacting us with concerns right now. So how is it that our association and our members can continue to think about the family aspect and how important it is and how is it that we provide them information in their orientation and transition process to higher education with their students.

Joyce Holl:
Thank you Lizette. Chris?

Chris Verhaeghe:
Yes, I would add that this new modality and a budget crisis will signal to some leadership that it can be done at a low cost. So it’s important to share the assessment story of the impact of orientation, transition and retention and the positive and negatives of online programming is critical. Additionally, we have more, we need to be more intentional about how we work with our academic affairs and specifically our advising colleagues to help them and understand the connection with orientation, transition or retention and how this is part of their work as well. The impacts of online advising impact our impact OTR and our overall yield.

Joyce Holl:
Thank you, Chris. One more question that I want to check in with for Heather and Karnell, what is a practice that OTR professionals should be engaging in right now? Heather, do you want to start us off?

Heather Kovanic:
Sure. Thanks Joyce. I think both Chris and Lizette articulated this, but I think assessment is now more important than ever as we evaluate the impact and effectiveness of our virtual efforts to determine how we enhance orientation, transition and retention programming moving forward. In addition, I think the incorporation of more digital engagement with new students and families has the ability to increase equity and access for all of our students, to the programs and initiatives we offer. And so it will be critical to demonstrate using data, how we can bolster student success through our efforts as Lizette that mentioned earlier in particular, it will be critical for us to tell our story, articulating the value and necessity of orientation, transition, and retention work.

Joyce Holl:
Thank you. Karnell. Do you have anything you’d like to add?

Karnell McConnell-Black:
Yeah. So I will also think about this this moment in time, because we’ve been inundated with lots of things around self care and community care self care for ourselves, but community care and how we can set up you know practices that really allow us to take a moment to pause. So we thought we were connected all the time. Now we are truly connected all the time in this virtual in-person blend of our work. I think we’re meeting with students and in the evenings because they, they have other obligations during the day now classes are asynchronous. You know, the traditional workday has really gone out the door more formally. So building practices of articulating your boundaries when you need to disconnect and not considering everything an emergency. You know, I have this philosophy around poor planning on your part does not necessitate an emergency on mine. So I really think it’s important that we really set clear boundaries. And then, and then the other way is to actually hold yourself accountable to those boundaries. And when you’re asking for something that, that doesn’t really require, you know, someone to shift their whole schedule or move something about, or, or whatnot, like really being mindful about what you are even asking of individuals on your team or your cover up or your colleagues. So this idea around self care and community care, I think is really important.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
I would like to add one more thing if you don’t mind. And it is is to remind our members is that, you know, we have in this moment, we’ve, again, we’ve, we’ve leaned back on best practices and things of that nature. And we’ve leaned on the research and things of that nature. And I think moving forward, what’s going to happen is that we’re going to have to really be innovative and critical about the ways that we have been doing things. And so I know our NODA members are so talented around thinking outside of the box being innovative. And I think this is a time where I know folks have like their back pocket of all the innovative ideas pull all those out, because that’s what we need to look at right now. Because again, what, what was the climate we were in prior to this?

Karnell McConnell-Black:
We could be like, Oh, well, here’s the box. Here’s where we have to stay in the lines. I will say your VPSs, your, your senior student affairs officers are looking for innovative and new ways, and I’m willing to take some major risks. And this is a time to just put it out on the table. So I would encourage, I would encourage our members is if you have that creative idea that didn’t get approved last year, but it could actually be something that works now, this is the time to put it out there. So take, take, take the step.

Keith Edwards:
For this next part of the conversation. I hosted a Q and A with questions from the participants attending the NODA annual conference virtually. Enjoy.

Keith Edwards:
It was really great hearing your all’s conversation. Talking about what NODA has been doing, the state of NODA, everything going on, and these vast complexities of intersecting major issues in higher education or culture or society from COVID to racial injustice, to economic issues, to what’s facing our students on campus. And one of the things that was really striking to me in hearing some of your comments was about how COVID is playing out in orientation. And as I talk with my orientation colleagues around the country, one of the things I, I continue to hear from them, even in the middle of March, when they knew right away, they’re going to be shifting before maybe anybody else did was we really don’t want to go to virtual.

Keith Edwards:
We love the in-person. We love the in-person. We don’t want to go to virtual. And what I started hearing from them at the end of summer and after the opening was some of this has been really better. Actually, some of this was not a sacrifice. Some of those were really great. Some of the things we can’t wait to get back to. And I’m just curious to Melanie, I love to hear you talk a little bit more about what some of these shifts to virtual and technology have meant. What have been some of the innovations that are really exciting and what have been some of the challenges of this.

Melanie Payne:
I will invite my colleagues to also share innovations and cool things they’ve heard, but I think I’ll have back up to, to your point when all of this started happening. I think every orientation person’s world went a little, like jump in the heart, you know, pulls on the stomach. And you’re like, Oh my goodness, what do we do now? Not because we’re afraid of technology. I would like to acknowledge. And I believe that all of us who think about these things all of the time would say that technology has been an issue for us for a long time that we have, have talked about how do we incorporate, how do we use technology? We were just never faced with, it’s not an option. Right. And so, so just trying to figure that out and figure it out weekly. Some of our colleagues around NoDa have had already started taking reservations for orientation.

Melanie Payne:
Some of our colleagues have already started planning their first year on some of our colleagues, some had already communicated with students what orientation was going to be like. So it caused a whole lot of different ways of thinking. But you’re right. I think most of us, whether we had in-person pieces or were totally virtual and how we started marketing our, we started with, although orientation is not what we expected or we’re not in the place we would like to be. That became kind of our mantra. Yeah, of course we had some opportunities in, and of course there are things that we learned that I’ve heard colleagues all over the place saying, you know what, we’re going to keep some of these things, even if we were to go back to one it’s opened up some possibilities for accents.

Melanie Payne:
Like it’s opened up some possibilities for maybe affordability of getting to campus and orientation. All of that though is a caveat of yes, but. The yes, but I think we all acknowledge that it is not the same experience in boxes. It is not the same experience when you’re staring at a computer. And in what, what we know is has orientation, transition and retention professionals and staff, is that so much of the experience experience of connecting with a place and with people is that in-person field. And so I think we mourn a little bit and we still do for the inability to help students touch and help students walk through campus and feel a part of something, but using tools, many of which are available through our associate members, using canvas, using home grown, I’ve seen amazing videos. I’ve seen the gamification of components. I’ve seen whether it’s use of social media or quizzes and, and, you know, in different styles we had to get creative and, and our NODA membership is very creative and, and made some really cool things happen. But I still want to go back to having the in-person piece because we have that connection for sure.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
Can I jump in here real quick? It’s so interesting because I was just thinking about when we were, when we were writing the core competencies, what now three, four years ago. And one of the things that I remember having in the conversations was about technology and how we use technology and moving beyond face-to-face like, it’s. So it’s really interesting how I think this has come full circle. That that’s even, it was part of our core competencies before we even got to this place of like, we have to really switch the way we do things, but we were already starting to have the dialogue and the conversations and doing the trainings to be able to get to this place. And I think we’re just now more competent in doing, you know, the…

Melanie Payne:
Little did we know right?

Chris Verhaeghe:
Well, and many members do it well already. There are many of our two-year partners and others that were already experts in this space. And, you know, for us in person, residential campuses, we lagged behind because we could. But there were definitely people I learned from that have blazed the way and taught us best practices to start.

Melanie Payne:
You know, that’s a really good, good point, just real quickly. One of the things that we have always known about NODA and we have always bragged about regarding NODA is, is known to member share information and know to members learn from one another. And, you know, even years and years ago, we used to kid about, Oh, borrow, steal, get other ideas. Well, we saw evidence of that. Steal is a kind of a hard word, but no one remembers, how did you do this? What did you know? And what can you share? So we definitely saw that and I hope, I assume that continues because that’s always been a part of who we are, but that was kind of fun to watch note alerting from NODA.

Keith Edwards:
Yeah. I really appreciate that. And folks chiming in there as Chris pointed out, there are so many models of this. People have been doing virtual and online long before some of the rest of us have been doing it. And how do we learn from what worked and what didn’t work and how do we pay really great attention now to what is working better? What do we never want to go back away from? And what are we eager to go back to? Heather talked about you know, mental health has been a rising issue, not just since March 13th, but for years coming up too. And now we see the needs and the ability to assist students with their mental health. Could you talk to us a little bit about what you’re seeing and hearing on your campus and for mothers about how we can help students with their mental health, their wellbeing, and fostering the sense of belonging? That’s so critical both through summer and welcome week orientations, but also in the ongoing transition for people who are arriving as transfer students, people who may be arriving in January because that is key, not just to the retention which we care about, but also to their literal survival, right. And ability to, to be well not just for college, but for life.

Heather Kovanic:
Yeah. I think I appreciate that, Keith, I think, you know, as we’ve seen our students are struggling in different ways. And as we talked about in the panel, I think this has been a really traumatic year for some of us as professionals for some of our student populations and also navigating the experience of college for the first time as the new students, trying to understand your own identity is connect to a campus and connect with peers. It’s just really challenging in this environment. And so I think, you know, as I think about the work that we’re doing at the University of Delaware, trying to be really intentional about constantly putting out what are the ways that we can provide support for students, making them readily visible in all of our communications. I think campuses we’re already doing that, but there’s even more impetus to really intentionally talk about what’s happening and in some real ways and create some real spaces for students to process what’s going on for them, whether that’s related to mental health challenges that they’ve experienced leading up to college, or that are a result of the pandemic, the systemic racist racism and violence in our country right now, I think there are just so many things that people are trying to process and manage.

Heather Kovanic:
So the more that we can do as campuses to incorporate that self-care is a critical piece of student success, that in order to be academically successful personally successful, you really need to check in with yourself and think about what do you need, what resources can we offer and provide to you as a campus. And then I think the critical piece is that sense of belonging, right? Like as, as we talked about with the technology, you know, we’ve, we’ve seen some amazing things that campuses are doing in their orientation and welcome week programming. And I think as I teach a first-year seminar and interact with my first year students, I do think there is this sense of I’m just going to wait till I’m coming to campus. And the University of Delaware is a pretty traditional residential campus and I’ve encouraged them like, don’t wait, this is your moment. This is, these are the ways that you can start to connect with others because that’s what will help you feel that, you know, as Melanie said, there’s not that physical connection to campus. So how do you create this virtual connection that makes you see, or that helps you see your stuff

Heather Kovanic:
In the spaces on campus? And I think some students have jumped right in, you know, and, and taking advantage of opportunities like informal gatherings during a welcome week or jumping into and involvement fair, and those sorts of things that happen virtually. But I think we need to be really intentional about how we create spaces and that we engage our student leaders in that process too, because I find as an administrator, there are lots of great ideas that I think I have, but without that component of our student leaders and our graduate students who can really connect with students on a different level and help them be authentic in those spaces and talk about what’s going on for them, I think those are critical pieces to continue to incorporate and even amplify further. So that students see wellbeing as just a way of life and not necessarily only in crisis or only do I reach out and take advantage of some of these opportunities?

Keith Edwards:
Well, and you’re reminding me of Brené Brown talking about the difference between fitting in and belonging, right. Fitting in is changing yourself so you fit the surroundings in the community and the people, whereas belonging as being accepted for who you are and your authenticity. And you tipped us to, to one of our questions from our attendees around student leaders. And I’d love to hear from many of you who want to chime in on this. Addison, I think who’s a senior start leader is that’s at least how you’re showing up for me is asking how do I, how can student leaders help lift up other student leaders in this virtual orientation role? You pointed to that. Any other folks want to chime in here about how we’re, how you’re seeing, or how student leaders help support other student leaders and not just the students who are in the orientation and, and how do they support each other as leaders,

Karnell McConnell-Black:
You know, I will say. And I think it’s just a, again, alludes to some of what Heather has shared is that, you know, how can we create spaces for students to be able to have the conversations with each other? And it, and some of this every one of the things at Reed we’re trying to do and continue to do is yes, when we know we’re in a virtual environment, but we also are trying to create in-person opportunities during this time in the most COVID safe way. Because I think what we’re finding that students still want to connect with each other. And, and obviously there are, some of them are doing their classes online, or they may have all their classes online. But they’re still craving that, that personal human connection that doesn’t always come across as well through a virtual format.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
So I’ve, again, I’ve seen students do things like, you know, we have, we have a group of students who are doing our pin pals. So we’re going back to the old days, like pen pals is like writing a, actually writing a letter and not having to send it to, you know, it’s surprising you get a, you get a handwritten letter and you’re like, Oh my gosh, like we know the intention that went into writing that handwritten letter. Or just being able to say, if you’re stressed about something, let’s go take a walk. Again, building in some, also these wellness pieces into those conversations. So students themselves can have, have the opportunity to connect. So for me, I’m seeing it more of creating the space for students to be able to come together in a way that is still safe during COVID, but recognizing that we’re going to have to get even more innovative and creative with the ways that we’re offering programs and services to students, to be able to make those connections.

Heather Kovanic:
I think the other powerful piece, just if I can jump in is student leaders sharing their story. So, you know, putting yourself in a vulnerable space, right. And sort of embracing that vulnerable vulnerability, because I think normalizing that this is hard, and this is hard for me as an established student leader, but these are the ways that I’m committed to supporting you. You know, when I think about my orientation leader team this summer and the work that they did to say like, yeah, this isn’t how we wanted to do it either, but we’re in it. And you know, this is how we’re going to be a community of Blue Hens at the University of Delaware. And so I think they were really honest about some of their own personal challenges and then the ways that they’ve navigated or used resources to help support them. So I think the more student leaders can really share their own story and that I think that’s so compelling and can really help students feel like, okay, I can do this too.

Keith Edwards:
Yeah. It’s a wonderful way to you know, as leaders and as educators I never want to take a physics class from a Nobel prize winning physicist, right? That sounds scary. But someone who failed their first year and is now in teaching physics, you know, how can we share some of the mess and show how we came through it, I think can be really great. And Karnell you’re, you’re pointing to not just, you know, we’re talking about students and how we help students, mental health and wellbeing, but we all need to be doing this. Lizette, I want to, I want to come to, you were talking about belonging versus fitting in and some of these issues and we’re, we’re seeing in our world and our society I’m in Minneapolis. This conference is kind of in Minneapolis where George Floyd was murdered by police officers at the end of May and witnessing all that came from that. And I think we all feel this renewed sense of urgency around addressing systemic racism and white supremacy and other forms of oppression. How are you seeing this new environment? Not just, COVID not just virtual, but everything that’s going on in the context of a world, how are you seeing folks translate that into doing real equity work on campus?

Lizette Rebolledo:
I think that it’s happening in a multitude of ways and we continue to have to be responsive to the day-to-day concerns that are happening around racial justice in a lot of ways, the challenge of people’s humanity and the fact that with the recent Supreme Court confirmation, we need to be thinking about the folks who are going to be severely impacted by that, and that it is not just about racial justice while at the forefront and most necessary for us to address it is also about our identifying individuals, women, and our identities and how that’s being challenged by the Supreme Court justice as well. I think that the ways in which we have to continue to address and challenge, what our programming is on our campuses and how we do that is multi-layered. And so I think that it is more than just doing the checkbox and saying, Oh, we did this program and it worked.

Lizette Rebolledo:
It is a lot more than that. And in the racial justice conversation, you’ll hear a little bit more about that later today, but I think it’s, it’s being critical. Is your program meeting the needs of all of your students or is it just meeting the needs of a majority of your students? And so how is it that you’re thinking critically about that is the staff that you’re hiring reflective of the students that are coming to your campus and the needs that need to be met by that? Are you using technology in ways to Melanie’s point that help with access, or is it creating additional barriers? Have you considered that there are students that based on a multitude of reasons, whether that is regional location, social, economic status, et cetera, that cannot have access to internet. And that may be you oversaw that in your planning process.

Lizette Rebolledo:
So have you thought about different pipelines to that? Are you in whatever role that you’re in addressing policy at your institution that creates systemic barriers in higher education as a whole? Are you addressing that? And I think, you know, connecting to the wellness piece is important for us to know that our individuals who have all of the identities that are currently being attacked in so many ways in our society, are they finding a place where they can go to someone who is able to acknowledge that and to allow them the space to grieve what is happening to process that, or to even acknowledge that they’re going through something. And so when we think about wellbeing, we often focus on our students and we forget about our staff members who also need that to be able to give to the students. And so how are we thinking about all those different things and how it does play into how we show up and the fact that for some of us just being on the screen and having the identities that we have is taxing, and how do we make time to sit with that and to create space for individuals to feel validated?

Keith Edwards:
Go ahead Melanie.

Melanie Payne:
Wouldn’t you also say that one of the, one of the things that we have been faced with and reminded of is the importance of certainly intentionality, all of those things Lizette just said, but at the same time we and our staff in particular, our orientation leaders, our students staff, our frontline staff, are being expected to address, address all of these things and be intentional and, and create these spaces. They’re also going through what, what they’re going through with, with fear and anger and confusion, and trying to figure out how they feel or knowing how they feel, and maybe not fitting in with how others feel and trying to do the right thing, but not knowing what the right thing is. All of that was happening and it’s happening at once. So I think that complicates things even more and exacerbated by the fact that we do all of this in this kind of setting, things would have been a little bit different. Had we been able to gather in person and, and support each other in those ways and in brainstorming, processing, reflect and take action, but we’re doing it in a setting that is not what we’re used to, and that we’re, you know, you can get on people, whether it’s technology or COVID, you can,

Melanie Payne:
Right. You’re so very right, Melanie. And I think what’s important to remind ourselves in that too, is that we can not make this, the work of our students all the time. And so I think that some, we know that the greatest workforce of OTR is our student leaders. They are on the front lines in ways that we can not be. And so we also need to be mindful that we are not using them in the ways that are concerning. And again, the taxation of human capital in the work of social justice is something we need to keep in mind. And so our students also need to have multiple spaces and we need to show up for them and honor what it is that is happening.

Keith Edwards:
But I think you’re both pointing to, I mean, Lizette was that as you were talking about all the things to consider, so rightly it also can be overwhelming. Like how do I consider all of these things on all of these things, all of these things. And I think one of the things that really gets in our way in diversity equity realm is this fear of not getting everything right. And then we don’t do anything. And so how do we get in there? How do we do our best be as conscious, be as intentional being as well as we, and when we mess up, then try, learn, and try and do better. And just the, the notion that perfectionism is, is a part of white supremacy culture. So how do we get past that perfectionism and having to have it all right. Have the answers all figured out before we do anything and not be, be stuck in that point?

Keith Edwards:
Karnell, we’ve got a question here from Jonathan Tunwar about the future of OTR staffing, budgets and program development during COVID and post COVID. So we’d like you to prognosticate out the future when will COVID be done, when will we be past this, and then we’ll be back in person. I’m hearing so many campus folks say, you know, we really want to do our assessment, which we’ll get to here in a little bit, so we can plan for September when things are back to normal. And I’m saying, you think? I’m not so sure. There’s a whole bunch of things that are going to – there’s so many unknowns and uncertainties, so what’s your sort of prognostication into the future?

Karnell McConnell-Black:
Well, I mean, everything is going to go back to normal, right? It really is. It’s like, can we just come? You know, we’ve got a few more months, we’ll get through this and we’ll be open. No, not really. But you know, my, my sense of this is that, you know, we’re going to be with this for a while. And I think for an institution and a, for awhile, I’m meeting a couple more, at least a couple more years, even after we get a vaccine after we get off, I mean, we are going to live with the experiences that we’ve had, because again, we’ve had impact on enrollments. We’ve had impact on the ways that folks who maybe have delayed their decisions to go to into higher ed folks who have staff members and faculty members who have been laid off things of that nature.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
And that’s not all going to change overnight. It’s not gonna all change over in a year. And so we know that the, the ways that higher ed works, you know, we are in these cycles, whether it’s a two year, you know, for our two year colleges, or if it’s four years, you know, you live with your class for four years. Or so there’s just so many other, so many elements that we have to think about as we engage in this. And I think, I think what’s going to be really important is that we have to make some really strategic decisions to think about where we are going to invest for the future while also at the same time, recognizing we may be constrained on resources. And so a big part of this too, is helping I think campuses in and folks at really all levels of, of the organization to understand what the priorities are, helping people focus a bit more.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
I think that’s a fitting for our conference. Like we have to focus and we can’t do all things right now. And so we’re going to have to really be very thoughtful about what are the major impacts. And what is it that is core to who we are as institutions. And even as we have these conversations as as NODA, like we are having these conversations, like, what is core, were we getting ready to start doing strategic planning? So even in that people are like, why aren’t we doing strategic planning now? Well, actually we will be out of this, but we asked the situate ourselves for what it will look like on the other hand. And I think that’s very that will be similar to any institution. And again, that gets back to the place of like, if we don’t make any decisions and just stick with what we’re, where we’re at right now, that’s not the, I don’t think that’s the smart decision to be able to situate ourselves as organizations, as individuals to just stay and say, say, okay, well, this is where it’s done to be.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
And this is how it’s going to be when we finish. The reality is the higher ed landscape is going to be very different. It is already different. And so if we’re not acknowledging that and then planning to see what that will look like in the future that that’s something that we, we will, it will be a missed opportunity, right?

Keith Edwards:
Yeah. And that’s so hard because as I work with folks on campus I’ll send an inquiry. And for seven months they’ve been saying, you know, Keith, it’s a great question, let us get back into two weeks. And two weeks we’ll know a lot more. And then two weeks they’re like, we need just in two weeks, we’ll know a lot more from opening to choices, to social distancing. We’re in this time of like uncertainty just continues to go and with a presidential election and protests and whatever incidence in our culture happened. We’re just this increasingly uncertainty, which is so hard to plan when you don’t know what the knowns are. I think when I’m working, particularly coaching presidents and senior leaders, there’s feeling so much pressure to make decisions because there are people want you to just tell us what we’re going to do.

Keith Edwards:
And they’re saying, give me the inputs, tell me what the budget is. Tell me what enrollment is going to be. Tell me about the vaccine. Tell me about what’s going to be effective. Tell me what state appropriations. If you give me the inputs, I’ll make this decision, but all of this is unknown. And so we’re in this context, Karnell of so many unknowns, but we can’t wait. As you’re saying, we can’t wait. We can’t just pause. And then wait, we’ve got to, we got to live in this moment and have this be alive time, not dead time. And so how do we do that? How do we tend to our people? How do we tend ourselves? We talked about mental health and wellbeing and self care and community care so that people can make good decisions about what our priorities are so that people can make good choices about where we’re going to let go what we’re going to focus here, but not here and be innovative and creative. How do we create these?

Karnell McConnell-Black:
You know, what’s so interesting because I want to point a little bit to this idea around self care versus community care, self care is the onus is on the individual community, cares. The honest is on the organization collectively. And so for me, when I think about this idea around community care acting, that’s where we can start this conversation about, okay, what can we do as an institution? What can my supervisor do? What can my VP do? What can my colleague who’s right down the door do to help provide support? How do we help each other out collectively? And so yes, self care is that I think an important piece of this, but if we’re thinking about it from an organizational cultural piece, we have to start to think about how we are embedding, whether it’s policies or practices and things that really help elevate our, our professionals.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
And so when we started thinking about, okay, what does this mean as relates to you know, the elements of like we, decisions need to be made and folks are stressed out and because we don’t have a decision made folks are – I realized that I think there’s a point of saying, and it’s maybe easier to say than to do, but to give grace and, and patience during this time. And I think folks are, are, are trying to also plan their livelihood. That’s the reality. And so whatever we can do, whether it’s little nuggets as we go to be able to, to help folks navigate their kind of day-to-day life knowing that there will just right now, there’s just the reality of uncertainty. Just acknowledge it. Yes. There’s, there’s things that are going to be uncertain. This is when we expect to have things.

Karnell McConnell-Black:
If it doesn’t come when it’s, well see we fall back up and say, Hey, it didn’t happen the way we wanted it to happen. We got more information or we made a decision based on what the information we had at the time, while we actually have to change that decision now, because we have new information. And I think a big part of that is the sense of going back to like, we have to get it right, right away. I think we’re in a time where we have never been in this. So we don’t know what we don’t know until we are experienced in it, but to do it collectively and collaboratively. I think it’s really important.

Keith Edwards:
I love this. Just acknowledging, not pretending, not wishing it was different, but acknowledging what is, and how do we live into that and how do we navigate that? Chris, I want to come to you around assessment. A lot of what we’ve been talking about has been around massive change. Some of which was probably some bad ideas, some of which turned out to be brilliant and way better than we ever expected. And in your comments earlier, you talked about assessment and the role of that, what are you seeing or what are you suggesting around assessment for? What’s working what our priorities should be as Karnell is pointing us to and what should, what should we forever keep and what should we let go of and how do we navigate this unknown territory? So we’re learning as quickly as we can for our students.

Chris Verhaeghe:
Yeah. I think really looking at assessment in multiple iterations. So you’re assessing right after events, you’re doing long-term cultural assessments and program reviews and looking at assessing at every level of the institution and of the programs to really get as much data as you can. And really thinking about how are we telling our story and how are you, how was OTR professionals, are we advocating for our needs and our students on our campuses? We know, and Lizette has said this many times at the board table, others are starting to tell what, what is the best practice and what is should we be do some of our associate members and other organizations are, are leading the way and putting information out there. And we are still the experts in this field, even though it’s a different modality, we know what a student needs, the student’s needs never changed how we’re delivering. It obviously has over this last year, but…

Keith Edwards:
That’s such a great point. Chris, say that again, say that again,

Chris Verhaeghe:
The students’ needs never changed that our, our modality changed. And we just need to figure out what’s what we’re doing to, to help enhance our programs and what w what went well, and what can we return back to and that’s going to take a lot of planning. There’s going to be years, as Karnell said of this kind of in-between and, and where we’re at and the impacts of, of this pandemic. So I also see a question about what is noted doing. I know our research committee is looking at our data b and really thinking about what questions are more relevant this year and how we can assess those and get information from members. And then also I would put it out to the membership, do research published in the JCOTR, get involved, share information. We’d love to hear from you. We have some great publications and put that out there so others can learn.

Joyce Holl:
In fact, if I can interject we just finished the board meeting yesterday, and one of the suggestions was to do a special edition of a JCOTR. That includes everything related to COVID and how we’ve, how I hate that word pivot, but how you all have changed and evolved in your work and start sharing some of that research. So if your thinking caps on, we want to hear from you when this announcement comes out, because that’s the only way that we’ll be able to share this information is as Melanie pointed out earlier, is that you all are learning from each other. And it’s really important that, that you share your experiences good, bad or indifferent. We learn from everything that is happening right now in this pandemic and in definitely the association is as well. So watch for that announcement,

Keith Edwards:
Right? Yeah. I love that. And I just want to briefly tie back to what Chris had mentioned, that, you know the things that were important to orientation last year are more important this year. Relationships, belonging, equity, wellbeing, those were probably things that you were focused on in 2019, and they’re not less important. They’re more important, but how do we do them in a different modality as Chris said.

Keith Edwards:
And then as Chris and Joyce are pointing to, how do we learn as quickly as we can, all these things were shifting in this changing environment, how do we learn as quickly as we can, what’s working, what’s not working so we can do better. What’s working, what’s not working so we can do better. And, and on your campuses. And I love Joyce bringing in how do we share those things and share your failures? You can learn so much for them, but share your successes because there’s a lot to learn from those too.

Keith Edwards:
Joyce, we’ve got some questions for you about NODA. We’ve heard from this awesome panel about the work on campuses, and people have some questions about how notice supporting that. You’ve already mentioned some of the assessment and bringing that together and sharing that out that we have a question here about how, how does the NODA, from Wadad Yusef, how’s NODA really leaning into this global future and serving the global members of the association. Could you speak to that a little bit?

Joyce Holl:
Sure. So we have we have a global initiatives committee that is helping us spearhead this work. NODA is represented in an international associate student affairs association. And what we’re hearing internationally is what we’re hearing here in the United States. The feelings and the the operatives are not different. And so we’re, we could learn a lot from each other from the international landscape and vice versa. So we don’t, I’m very careful not to say this is the Western way, and everyone should follow what we’re doing. I mean, we even know some of the language is different than how we use in term orientation compared to some other countries. So we have to, we as an association recognize that, and are starting to have conversations about that. Becky Rowe, who’s the chair of the global initiatives committee has put together a great guide. How we use orientation in the United States might be a different term in another country. So those are some things that we’re doing.

Keith Edwards:
Thank you so much to the NODA leadership for letting us share these great conversations as this student affairs. Now episode, thanks to our sponsor Anthology, formerly Campus Labs. There was lots of mission of the importance of assessment during this episode and Anthology (formerly Campus Labs) can help you out. You can receive reminders about this and other episodes by subscribing to the student affairs now, newsletter or browse our archives at StudentAffairsNow.com. Please subscribe to the podcast, invite others to subscribe, share on social or leave a five star review. It really helps conversations like this, reach more folks and build a community so we can continue to make this free for you. Again, I’m Keith Edwards. Thanks again to the fabulous guests today, and to everyone who is watching and listening, make it a great week.