Using the Oblique Strategies

October 25th, 2007 | Posted by Del Suggs in Uncategorized - (0 Comments)

The
"Oblique Strategies" is, first of all, a deck of cards. More importantly, they are a fascinating collection of words and phrases designed to stimulate the creative process. Perhaps I should explain.

In 1975, musician Brian Eno and painter Peter Schmidt found that they shared a common problem of creative blocks. As professional artists, they often would be faced with deadlines for new works and be stuck for inspiration. Or, somewhere during the creative process they would get distracted and lose their focus. Both artists also had a similar way of getting their creativity back on track– some guiding principles that would lead them back to their original creative process.

Together, they assembled the
Oblique Strategies. Composed of a deck of cards, each card is about the size of a standard business card. Originally printed privately in 1975 in a signed-and-numbered edition for their friends, they revised and reprinted them in 1978 and 1979. Peter Schmidt died in 1980, ending their collaboration on the Strategies. Eno once again revised them in 1996 for a special printing by computer guru Peter Norton. You may occasionally find them for sale in galleries, or on Ebay at a hefty price.

The purpose of the Strategies is to make you look at what you’re doing from a different perspective. Each card in the deck contains a statement. It may be a single word ( such as "Water") or a full phrase ("Look at the order in which you do things").

There is no real instruction manual for these cards. When you are stuck for inspiration or blocked in the middle of a creative moment, you may use them as an Oracle– pull one card for advice. Or, you may use them as a suggestion list– shuffle through them until you get an idea.

I find them to be insightful. I keep a deck on my desk, and pull out a new card each morning. When I’m working on a project, I’ll often pick up the deck and thumb through it seeking a spark that will fan the creative flames.

If you’d like to read more about the Oblique Strategies, you can check out this website. There is also a free version available in PDF format from Matthew Davidson here.

Student Affairs and Technology Leadership

October 21st, 2007 | Posted by Kevin Prentiss in Technology and Programming - (0 Comments)

I’m in a lot of conversations about technological change and higher education institutions. We have slides that help in the conversation.

First, the makeup of the institution:

MSFBStaffTRaining10:8:2007.003.jpg

Technological change comes from the bottom of this pyramid. The students tend to be the early adopters because they don’t have old habits to unlearn. They use what makes sense to them, starting fresh.

This trend pulls the base of the pyramid out from underneath the upper layers. Something new comes along, like Facebook, and about a year later, we have this:

MSFBStaffTRaining10:8:2007.005.jpg

The gap between the faculty / advisor level and the students is a problem. How can we advise about a world that is changing in ways we don’t understand?

MSFBStaffTRaining10:8:2007.006.jpg

The gap between the administration and the students is much larger.

MSFBStaffTRaining10:8:2007.007.jpg

Many administrators who sit in on the talks say that their knowledge of Facebook or Myspace is primarily from their own teens at home. The problem with this is that budgets are being approved for the wrong things – things that students have moved past, i.e. expensive email systems at small community colleges, big web portal projects, or restricted, school only social networks. There is also a lack of coherent policy around new technologies, which leaves individual practitioners guessing and crossing their fingers.

The graphics are designed as a conversation piece. It exaggerates to make the point. Clearly most administrators heard of Facebook a long time ago, but they generally don’t have a “feel” for it yet.

For the middle layer, there are differences depending on how close the particular faculty / staff segment is to the students. This brings up a surprising and interesting new dynamic in higher education:

The closer a faculty / staff segment is to students, the more likely they are to be in a technological leadership position at the institution.

Student affairs folk, typically, have more exposure to students than your average professor. Student affairs personnel worry about engagement and call it marketing. They don’t get to “require” students to read flyers, or check email, so they do what works. They go where the students are.

This has Student Affairs folk out front with the “Should faculty be on Facebook?” conversation. Most Student Affairs professionals have already made some sort of peace with the pros and cons and made the jump.

Students are the early adopters. Student Affairs folk are the early followers. This is an institution leading position.

What about IT?

IT departments have their innovators. I’ve met a number who are playing with the new tools and trying to figure out new models and techniques. (The dept. at University Minnesota – Crookston and Augustana come to mind.)

In my experience this fall, they are the exception.

Most IT folk at small schools are focused on basic infrastructure. At medium to large schools they are focused on liability with peer to peer issues. They are hamstrung by lawyers and competing demands. The last thing in the world they want is another arena of responsibility.

And, importantly, most IT departments don’t work closely with students! They don’t have the daily exposure that Student Affairs does.

Increasingly, it’s not technical aptitude, but conceptual openness that puts one out front.

This is both an opportunity and a challenge for Student Affairs. The opportunity is to build credibility and respect for the profession by bringing effective change to the institution.

The challenge comes with the conceptual backlash. When faculty members push back against the idea of being on Facebook, or when the IT department tries to kill new initiatives brought forward, Student Affairs might find itself on a political balance beam.

It’s a fascinating development.

A new student affairs technology vanguard is starting to develop. It’s coming together at APCA, NASPA, ACUI and on Facebook itself. It’s building partnerships in the institutions. (Often with the librarians, who, as a general rule, are conceptually all over web 2.0 technologies.)

I’m very curious to see how this trend continues as students keep moving farther forward!

As if Student Affairs needed more, add technological leadership to the hat rack!

Clipart/Stock Photos = Cheap

October 18th, 2007 | Posted by Tom Krieglstein in Creativity | Marketing - (0 Comments)

vs. or vs.

No matter how cute the clipart puppy is, if it’s on a piece of marketing material for an event, it screams cheap. Many schools use clipart because they think it’s the only free way to use images. Not really true. The web has many great resources for you and your student leaders to get free, high quality images that you can use for your marketing. Here’s a brief list:

Sxc.hu is the largest free photo site on the web with millions of images. I use this one all the time as my main source.
Stockvault.net has over 8,000 royalty free photos for personal and education projects.
Openstockphotography.org is a search engine that goes through all of the Wikimedia Commons images, which as of April 2007 was over 1.3 million.
Flickr.com is run by Yahoo and has millions of photos uploaded by amature photographers from around the world. The trick with Flickr is each photo has a different set of copyright settings attached to it, so you’ll want to read about Creative Commons before you grab the photo you love.

Here’s to happy photo finding and better looking marketing materials for campus events.

Regional leadership Collaboration

October 18th, 2007 | Posted by John Spranza in Leadership Training - (0 Comments)

If your state is anything like mine, there are a number of colleges and universities within an hour’s drive of each other. Several years ago, six schools in the northwest Georgia area came together to try a new collaborative project in student leadership development that we called the Northwest Crescent Leadership Alliance. All six schools can be found in the geographic crescent-shaped arch in the northwest Georgia area — Georgia Highlands, Berry, Shorter, Dalton State, Kennesaw State and Reinhardt — six schools that are a mix of two-year and four-year, public and private, large and small enrollments.

Each school selects five or six students to participate in the program (usually through an application process), and then we each take a turn hosting the group on our campus for a segment of the leadership development curriculum.

The program spans both fall and spring semesters but are limited to just five meetings. We have normally held two meetings in the fall and three in the spring, with each meeting rotating to a different campus location. The first meeting is an overnight retreat of sorts where the students perform on a ropes course, and then each successive meeting builds on each other.

For the first several years we used the "Seven C’s" model of leadership development before changing to a model developed by Kennesaw State’s Seigel Leadership Institute, and now we use a model that bridges several theories and formats. Which ever campus is hosting the meeting handles the instruction of that session’s topics.

The main point with our Northwest Crescent Leadership Alliance is that we are using the resources of other institutions to train some of our students, while at the same time expanding our students’ outlook and network to colleges that are within a short drive of each other! The overall cost for each school to participate in the program is just $600 apiece, so the entire program is accomplished with less than $3,600 (and that includes the overnight retreat, ropes course, t-shirts, materials and food).

We are now entering our fifth year of the program and the benefits have been seen at all the campuses. There have been several other collaborations between the colleges or participating students’ organizations that have been born from the program and even a few romantic relationships have sprung from the cross-college meetings!

Does anyone else have any collaborative projects with close-by neighboring schools?

Advisor Sessions/Handouts from APCA Northeast 2007

The Association for the Promotion of Campus Activities held it’s Northeast conference just last week in Syracuse, NY. 30+ Schools attended from across the Northeast region. The conference highlighted entertainment acts as well as a series of ed sessions on various topic related to Student Affairs.

APCA conferences offer a separate learning track of ed sessions for advisor. Due to the extermly tight schedule of the two day conference only three hour long sessions were provided for advisors.

Here is a list of the sessions and handouts/slides(pdf):

1) Creating a Course on Student Activities – Jason Enser (Hilbert College) – jenser@hilbert.edu – handout

This session will discuss how college Student Activities Directors can go about offering an academic credit-bearing course on Student Activities Programming Theory and Application. We will begin by reviewing the 3-credit course that is currently offered at Hilbert College. Other staff members will then have the opportunity to share any courses they have taught related to programming. Suggestions will be provided on how Activity Staff can look to implement a course of this nature at their institutions.

2) Technology and Activities: Current & Future – Swift Kick – sk@swiftkickonline.com – handout

Student Life is changing faster than ever. Advisors are expected to be on the cutting edge, and often find themselves drowned in paperwork and procedures. This session discusses the most current trends in leadership development formats. Listen, share, and discuss best practices with other advisors. In the pre-conference survey, “understanding and using technology” was the number one priority for advisors for the next 3 years. Come find out some of what the next 3 years holds in tech. In this session you will learn about the key trends (in a non-techie way) plus see some of the brand new options in technology that will make your job so much easier! Technology has always promised to allow you to do more with less, come get your hands on the new tools to do just that. We will also cover some new emerging orientation and assessment methodologies and discuss what it means for the future.

3) Organizational Networking Session – APCA – apca@aol.com – handout

It is all about getting to know each other! This Conference is proud to offer a great selection of education sessions for you. HOWEVER, we are all educators and we know that learning in communities and learning from peers is a much more powerful and effective way to create real transformations. With that knowledge in mind, we present our favorite community building energizer, “It’s About Time.” Join us as we kick the off the Conference with the best getting familiar, information exchange, comfort zone creating activity that is out there. See you for “It’s About Time”!!

A Vision of Students Today

October 16th, 2007 | Posted by Tom Krieglstein in Technology and Programming - (0 Comments)

I love the creativity! This video was made by the same folks who made "The Machine is Us/ing Us."

I am not sure I agree with the statement at the end of this video when it says "Technology will save us." To me it sounds too bionic world like. I think it should be more something like "Our lack of adaptation to a changing world will kill us." But maybe that is too morbid, or wouldn’t fit on a piece of paper. What do you think they mean by "Technology will save us?"

Two Great and Cheap Programs

October 9th, 2007 | Posted by Del Suggs in Low Cost Programming - (0 Comments)

I’ve run across two really fun and inexpensive program ideas that I wanted to share. I know that everyone is searching for those supplemental programs– those events that fill up the holes in the program calendar after the budget is spent. Perhaps these will help.

A Car Show: Host a car show on campus. You can choose an Antique Car Show, a Classic Hot Rod Show, or a combination. There is likely local car club with whom you could co-sponsor, or just do it yourself.

It may sound hard to believe, but the owners of these special cars will actually pay a fee to put their car on display. You could include a competition– because every car owner wants to win a "Gold Medal" or "Best In Show." If you’re not familiar with the categories, you’ve likely got some "motorheads" on your program board or in your community to help with categories and judging.

I won’t go into all the details, because you know them already from other shows and events. Reserve a parking lot or green space for your car show, create the signs, to direct people there, and publicize both on and off campus. It’s a great family-oriented weekend event, and a great community outreach. You will be amazed at how many people will come and look at cars!

Of course, don’t forget to sell refreshments– hot dogs, burger, soft drinks, and popcorn. You might provide some "kid activities" too, like face painting.

A Spa Day: You can host a Spa Day on your campus. While this initial concept is targeted at women, you could certainly modify it for your men students, too.

You can contact your local Mary Kay dealers, or Avon, and they will send out associates to do make up and "make overs." Of course, they will likely want to sell their products.

If your campus has majors in physical therapy or sports medicine, you may be able to get students to offer chair massage as a part of spa day. Find a source for nails, and you’ve got most of a full Spa Experience. And you can do it in the ballroom of your student center for next-to-nothing.

Your Facebook Network(Tips and Tricks)

I’m sure by now you are fairly familiar with the Facebook interface. Many users don’t use all of Facebook’s features.

The Network page can be a very powerful tool, but the Facebook interface does not allow the Network page to reach it’s full potential. The reason? The only way to access your network is by clicking the network link at the top of the page.

It doesn’t really jump out at you. I think it would be a lot more effective if the News Feed dedicated a portion of the page to list Network Activity.

So what does the Network Page do?

The Networks page lists
Shows all the upcoming events in your network.
Shows all the recently posted items in your network.
Shows all the recently active groups among members of your network.
Shows all the items in your networks marketplace
Shows network statistics such as top music, movies, and Interests, TV shows, Books, and also displays percentages such as sex, political views, and relationship status
.
Shows nearby Networks
Provides a discussion board and a wall.

So what can I do with all this?

Let’s start with the groups.

While searching through the active groups in your network you may stumble upon one titled Fall 2007 Freshmen, or something of the sort. This is a great place to promote, and Recruit. Tom recently posted a blog discussing this The Strange Power of the Go Getter Freshmen.

There may be other great active groups in your network you can promote with. Take a look, just don’t over advertise, because nobody likes spam, and overuse of these groups will begin to look like spam.

Let’s move on to the people in your network.

Near the top of the Network page six random members of your network will be displayed. Above these six members will display how many people are in your network, and a couple links to search or browse within your network. I don’t see much use with the browse feature, as it only displays ten random people in your network.

Click the search link, and then continue on and click the advanced link. I’m sure you have seen the advanced page before, but have you ever used it for student affairs networking? The advanced search page allows you to search within every portion of a Facebook profile. From the basic info to contact info, personal info, education info, and work info. If you are looking for any particular characteristic to promote, or recruit from you can easily search it from here.

Have you ever wondered which staff and faculty members have signed up for Facebook? Well it’s fairly easy to find out. Scroll down till you see education info, and in the school status drop down menu you will see staff, and faculty. select whichever one you would like to search, and click the advanced search button at the bottom of the page

What do your students like to do? what are their interests? Sounds like you need to put out another survey. No not at all, Facebook already did the Assessment for you!! Check the Network Statistics page and you may find what you are looking for. The best part is you can click each particular interest and get a list of the people who have added that interest to their profile.

How can you use this? Look at each category, is there something that jumps out at you that you can create an event about? perhaps if there is a particular type of music that is popular you can have a dance focusing on that type of music. Maybe under interests you see a sport such as ultimate frisbee, why not host a tournament. Look under the movies category, why not play one of the top movies for your students? Be creative, and you can put together a great event.

Does anyone else have any networking, promotional or recruiting tips or tricks that they use with Facebook?

Pinching Pennies at a small school…

October 6th, 2007 | Posted by Brian Root in Uncategorized - (0 Comments)

If you’re like me, you work at an institution with less than 2,000 full-time students. In fact, the number at my institution is floating between 1700 and 1800 right now. To prevent my other readers from losing interest in this blog, let me preface by saying, "Hey, this might apply to you, as well!"

Anyhow, some of us work at smaller institutions and are oftentimes challenged to overcome significant budget shortcomings year after year. Because of our already small budget, these "shortcomings" are truly noticeable and downright frustrating at times.

So, how do we battle these shortcomings? How do we pinch our pennies, so to speak?

1. We co-sponsor. A few months back I blogged about the importance of co-sponsorships with events on our campus. Co-sponsorships enable our students to plan great events and assures that we’ll have the money available since the cost is being split between more than one group’s budget. At my institution, we are soon holding a very large Casino Night event that is pooling resources from four different organizations – the Alumni Association (paying for food), the Student Activities Board (paying for the casino games & prizes), and our Resident Student Council and Student Government Association (splitting the cost for live entertainment/band).

2. We "create" our own events. Instead of paying expensive agencies to come in and host large-scale events, such as game shows and other such events, we do our best to create our own. A colleague of mine at another small institution has gone as far as creating his own "cheap" – but effective – versions of Wheel-of-Fortune, Jeopardy, and Deal or No Deal.

3. Take advantage of community events & community partnerships. Many times this will depend on your location and seasonal temperatures. Anyhow, if your town has an annual Festival of sorts – let’s say, a pumpkin/fall-themed festival – take advantage of this "FREE!" activity. Perhaps, all you need to do is promote it to your students and provide transportation… and, viola! – a very low-cost event. Plus, very minimal effort on your part.

What else do you all do to "pinch pennies"?

How to Prepare your Campus for a Crisis

October 1st, 2007 | Posted by Tom Krieglstein in Risk Management - (0 Comments)

Karine Joly of Collegewebeditor.com wrote a short blog with five steps for preparing your campus for an crisis. Here is a repost of the five tips:

Make sure the chief communication officer of your institution is part of your emergency team.

Include in your crisis plan your institution response to different possible scenarios. Define the type of communication channels to be use for the different situations and prepare the notification templates for each. In case of a crisis, you’ll be able to update and send these templates in minutes.

Practice, practice, practice. Train your emergency team to assess, evaluate and make decisions. Review and edit your crisis plan with what you learn from your drills.

If a crisis happens, send your alert notifications via several communication channels (phone, cell phone, email, text-messages, loud speaker, PA systems, etc.) and post the notification on the homepage of your website.

Use your website as the main hub for your communications with your campus community, parents, media representatives and the rest of the world throughout and after the crisis.

My 2 cents on this would be what about also having a Facebook app that flashes red when an emergency at your school is announced?