“When all think alike, then no one is thinking.” – Walter Lippman.

I really enjoy attending conferences.  I hear some interesting talks and chat with some impressive professionals.  At the same time I recognize how outdated their structure and format are.  Apparently other professionals have been feeling the same way (Check out Erika Thompson‘s delicious Stack with links to most of the conversation).  I might be a little late to this party but I  I wanted to throw a thought into the ring.

The conversation’s I read centered around reconstructing conferences to make them more nimble, up-to-date, relevant, thought provoking, and so on – all valid points.  For this post I want to focus on conference content disruption.  Joe Ginese remarked that sessions are not so much about innovation, rather repurposed ideas that are offered as “possibly” applicable to your campus.  I agree with that but I see it going a step further.  The session content itself may not be traditionally innovative but what professionals do with the content is meant to be innovative.  The content we offer attendees become the tools for future program growth, but if we offer sessions lacking depth and richness, then the outcomes will mimic.

I was an Interdiscplinary Studies major as an undergraduate – which I am pretty sure is the technical term for an academic mashup.  One belief that was hammered home that I still believe deeply in:  Innovation sparks when multiple disciplines are brought together to see what can be created. HigherEd conferences probably can’t be considered a mashup of discplines. This is not to say that innovation and great ideas aren’t created at these meetings of the minds, but when you bring folks within the same profession together every year… the outcome isn’t going to shift much. There needs to be a spark that brings a little disruption to our conferences.

Let’s tentatively call it the National Professional Exchange. I picture the system looking like this:  A HigherEd professional organization makes a connection with another professional organization, one outside of higher education but that represents applicable professions.  These two organizations strike an accord that allows 5 or so professionals to attend the other associations conference at discount price.  Think of it as an investment in the group and their ability to come back with applicable fresh and innovative ideas for their peers. The professional would be enrolled as a NPE Fellow and tasked to engage with participants, present, and then bring back new ideas to the conference and discussed in an unconference setting.

This type of AltProDev is burgeoning as can be seen with the BIGIdeas conference in New Jersey. The conference organizers are having professionals in outside industries lead presentations and discussions.  Simply put, I LOVE that. You can also find live streaming conferences andor twitter backchannels that can give a similar experience.  All in all there are a number of ways professionals can find accessible professional development.  Would a National Professional Exchange be a viable option for AltProDev?

Do you think this system could work? Would it add to the conference experience?

I first heard about Storify from a faculty member on my campus, Kim Knight. She used it to create a story which combined information from her undergraduate and graduate courses during the Spring 2011 semester. I was then reminded about the service recently by Joe Ginese when he used it to create a story about a recent Nichols College Alternative Spring Break trip to New Orleans. Gathering a few tweets from #ACPA12 seemed like a great way for me to try out the system for the first time. You can read the story here: http://storify.com/julieclarsen/acpa12-round-up

Now, we have talked about Storify before on the The SA Blog, but I wanted to also offer a few pros and cons about the service.

Pros:

• It’s fun. I loved being able to move the tweets around and add photos that related to my various categories. I felt that I was creating a mini “conference experience” for myself by selecting important information from sessions, group ideas, and following new folks.
• You truly can create a story. I liked the ability to group tweets regardless of the time or day they were originally sent. Now, I realize this feature could be questionable in some situations, but in this case, it allowed me to group pieces of information in a way that was meaningful to me. You are also able to add text within the story. I chose to add simple headings, while Kim used longer paragraphs to give context of class assignments.
• You can reply and retweet from the service. If you use your Twitter account as a log in, you can reply directly to folks from the tweets in the story. This will also work for stories that you are reading. An easy and quick way to make connections with someone who may share your interests/functional area.

Cons:

• The search function is a bit clunky, and for an event like ACPA where there are thousands of tweets per day for the hashtag, it was tedious at points. (This is why most of the tweets I gathered are actually from rather limited time frames.)
• I would love more control over the visual representation of the story, and be able to really group tweets according to headings/categories.

Overall, I think it’s a great service that I see myself using again. Enjoy reading my #ACPA12 story!

As graduate students, we had taken the time to figure out many cost saving measures. We flew into the cheaper airport, fit nine of us in a shuttle into downtown, and me and my three closest cohort friends shared a $99/night room in the Days Inn. (No, it was not one of the conference hotels.) The room was “non-smoking” yet we all had a slight stale smoke smell to our interview clothes, and I am still not sure if something of a questionable nature was rolled up in the carpet that sat at the end of the hall all week.

I forgot pajamas, packed uncomfortable shoes, and spent more time agonizing over what sessions I should go to instead of actually attending the sessions. I can honestly say, my conference experiences have only gotten better as I have spent more time in the field. As I started planning my conference season, I thought it would be useful to solicit advice from others in the profession to share with those attending their first conference this year. Thank you to all who shared, I think we have a great collection of wisdom to pass along. If you didn’t get a chance to share your tips, please feel free to add them to the list!

My own advice from the D.C. conference years ago? 1) If you are able to, splurge on a conference hotel. Being in a comfortable space really makes the conference more enjoyable, and being in the midst of all the happenings gives you a chance to make some great connections. 2) Pack snacks and bring a reusable water bottle. 3) Take some time to explore the city and sights around the conference location. It’s a good mental break, and a great way to find good restaurants and unique souvenirs. 4) Everyone around you may be a potential colleague or supervisor. Be kind, be courteous, and don’t get too crazy at the regional receptions.

I wish you all a successful and fulfilling conference season!

Earlier this year, I was honored to be invited to attended the inaugural #140edu conference in NYC which brought together several hundred educators for two days to talk about the future of education. Modeled after TED, each person was given roughly 10 minutes to talk about his/her topic. My topic was on leveraging social media to increase student engagement outside the classroom. You can watch my keynote here.

After the first day of the conference it was clear that the focus of my talk was different than almost everyone else. While everyone was involved in education some how and had a desire to improve it, almost all the topics involved how to make “in-classroom” learning better, while my focus was on “out-of-classroom” learning. In higher ed this is often an area managed by a Student Affairs department.

I’ve attended dozens of education reform/revolution type conferences over the years, and I always end up feeling like the lone wolf talking about the “out-of-classroom” learning space. The informal learning moments that happen in-between classes.

Higher education analyst, Thomas G. Mortenson, revealed that a typical student will spend 15% of their day in class or working on classroom work and 35% of their day sleeping. That leaves 50% of the day for working or hanging around the campus community.

According to a UCLA national study of college seniors 4 out of 5 seniors say their most significant learning moments happened outside the classroom.

Academic researchers Astin, Tinto, and several others, conclude that the more socially involved a student is within the campus community, the higher his/her retention and graduation rates are.

With such strong data to support the work I’m doing, why do I always feel like an outsider at the education reform conferences where the conversation is dominated by in-classroom learning?

James Fowler’s keynote address at the #ACUI11 conference this year stirred up quite a discussion after he made the claim that online relationships had little influence over behavior. As expected, our friends in the #SAchat community quickly expressed concern for the statement through the Twitter backchannel and afterwards in the hotel lobby as they’ve experienced a great deal of influence exchange through #SAchat. In talking over the keynote with Jeff Lail from UNCG that night, he brought up the idea of weak ties verses strong ties within relationships. In-person connections are more likely to build strong ties whereas online connections are more likely to result in weak ties.

Over the past year, it’s been interesting to watch this concept play out within the micro world of Student Affairs. The #SAchat community on Twitter is the most active hashtag for Student Affairs professionals to connect, learn, and grow from each other. However, within #SAchat there are many sub cultures such as Residence Life, Orientation Leaders, First Year Experience, etc. These subcultures have tried, several times, to create and maintain a hashtag to connect their members together. But most of the hashtags have faded away. Why?

Let’s start with #SAchat. The original group of people who started #SAchat knew each other in the real world. There were strong ties within the inner core. This meant that if no one else participated in the conversation, there would still be a longer term commitment to the conversation between the people in the inner core because they shared strong ties. As it happened, other people did join the conversation and over time it grew. If it were a dance floor, the total number of people on the dance floor increased through weak ties, but the number of people with strong ties in the center of the dance floor stayed the same. The critical shift in the community happened last year during conference season when #SAchat members hosted meetups at each conference. They wanted to meet their weak tie online friends IRL (in real life) and thus turn them into strong tie friends. The results were amazing, the #SAchat community grew exponentially. Back to the dance floor, not only did the overall number of people on the dance floor increase, but the number of people in the center of the dance floor increased as many of the weak ties were converted into strong ties. Each meetup repeats this process.

During conference season this year, I made it a point to connect with as many #SAchat people as possible IRL because not only did I want to get to know them better, but I also know how strong ties are what keep people engaged in the community longer.

On the flip side is #FYEchat. I started the #FYEchat community to mimic the success of the #SAchat community. But it has never quite worked [yet] even though I see the value it could provide to First Year Experience professionals. The difference is I started the community on a foundation of weak ties so the commitment to keep the conversation going wasn’t there. So it fades in and out.

Another example is the #WLsalt community. The community started online with a collection of weak ties but has since grown to a dedicated group. The critical difference between #WLsalt and #FYEchat was that soon after a collection of weak ties were created online, they hosted a meetup for the community at a conference to convert those weak ties into strong ties. The strong ties thus formed the inner core of their dance floor.

In terms of weak ties and strong ties, there are two options to creating and maintaing an online community. Either start with an inner core built on strong ties that are dedicated, or convert your weak ties into strong ties quickly. Once the inner core is established, and the community norm of inclusion is practiced, you’ll watch your community grow with little effort from you. Weak ties won’t have as much influence over you as strong ties whether online or offline.

#LEI10. That simple six character term has completely transformed my perspective of what it means to be engaged at a conference.  It is the Twitter hashtag for the 2010 Leadership Educators Institute. The conversation started in late October by @NASPATweets and Chris Conzen (@clconzen) with reminders for registration. The Twitter stream then went silent until the end of November when the conference was just a week away. Then December arrived and #LEI10 came alive.

Think about how you’ve connected with fellow conference-goers before a service like Twitter. Perhaps you posted it on your Facebook profile status or sent an e-mail to a listserv asking who else was going. In both of those cases, you were throwing up a signal flare in a forest and hoping someone not only saw it but responded to it. With Twitter, that hashtag becomes a lighthouse, or the North Star of the conference, not just a flash in the pan call for help. The hashtag serves as a beacon to guide participants to a place where lively discussions are happening in real time and, as a result, connections are breaking through the barriers of the virtual world and being made in real life. In the days leading up to the conference, Twitter allowed me to connect and be aware of what “tweeps” were going and who I’d get a chance to meet in real life. This may seem frivolous but you can’t tell me that when you go to a party and do not know anyone else that is going your anxiety level isn’t heightened just a bit. With Twitter, a conference where you are surrounded by strangers from all over the country became a conference where you and a group of your tweeps can meet up. This made the conference not only a professional development opportunity to learn new skills but also a chance to deepen friendships and strengthen your network. It is organized, sponsored, and supported by the association running the conference (in most cases) which adds legitimacy and purpose to the usage of it.

On the first day of the conference, the backchannel provided fellow tweeps a chance to locate each other right from the start of the keynote speech with tweets like this one from @LeslieMPage:

During the opening speech 55 tweets were sent responding to questions posed by the speakers, posting resources the speaker had shared, and sharing quotes that struck a chord. A perfect example from @OberBecca:

Now, I have followed a backchannel before for other conferences so I had an idea of what types of tweets would be most helpful and what would hopefully engage those, who are not in attendance, to contribute. What I did not expect was the amount of effort and time it takes! Contributing to a backchannel can turn into a part-time job while attending a conference. You can find yourself so involved in your tweets and other participants’ tweets that you forget that you are in the room with the person providing the information. My analogy for this is going to a concert and focusing on the screens on the side of the stage that give you a close up of the performer, rather than looking at the actual performer. How is that any different than watching the performer on TV? If you are in their presence, pay attention to them! With Twitter, your mobile device can turn into that screen at the concert right in your lap and in place of being a participant of a conference, you are now a bystander. So, as great a resource as this could be, remember to be mindful of the presenters and be careful not to be rude.  Educate conference-goers of what you’re learning by tweeting resources, quotes from the presenter, or questions posed by the audience. Do not tweet that the lunch spread looks delicious or that the room is chilly.

The first day of the conference backchannel rendered 152 total tweets of which I contributed 31. The backchannel had sucked me in. It was exciting, it was fun, it was leading to more connections, more resources, and had me more engaged in a conference that I had ever been before. I’ll get into my experience of the second day of the conference in my next post which will highlight the explosion of the backchannel (over 400 conference tweets!), what happened when my phone died resulting in being cut off from the backchannel, and an epic tweet-up.

Sound great?

Hasn’t happened for me yet, either.

Sure, our students had some great presentations and excellent experiences but nearly always my student groups struggle to accurately communicate the true picture of what they experienced.  They struggle to not use too many “inside jokes” when describing their time at the conference and nearly always ended up engaged in a conversation about “why can’t we send more people next year?”  Given that our travel funds are not likely to increase anytime in the near future, we needed a new plan.

So, my insanely talented staff member (that’s you, Matt!) says, let’s try blogging.

Our office now requires any students traveling to conferences sponsored by our department to blog each day while they are there.  We create a blogging site for the group’s travels and make each of them the authors. I love the fact that those of us not attending the conference can keep track of their experiences and that we can comment and have dialogue while they are there. We also send the site around to our student affairs colleagues and division leadership so that they can get some insight into student experiences.

This has enabled us to document these travel experiences and now see, in writing, what we already knew about the impact of spending time with other students who are similarly committed to common goals.  As one of our student orientation coordinators posted, “I don’t think I ever got completely used to everyone actually understanding ‘Orientation Speak’ and being able to have in-depth conversations about different aspects of their programs.”

The use of blogs has enabled our students to do more active reflection on these conference experiences and has allowed us to use the sites to help other students understand what the experience might be like the next time around. We get pretty active commentary from participants about what they like and don’t like about the conferences and, when warranted, our structured reflection topics allow for some time for them to pause during a busy conference and make meaning of this experience that the university has offered to them.

For our department, we reported themes communicated in these blogs as part of our annual report in hope of illustrating the impact that off-campus professional travel has on our student leaders.  Themes of increased pride in our university, increased confidence in their own leadership efficacy, and enhanced sense of community with other student leaders certainly made this student affairs professional proud.

If you’d like to take a look at one of them, here’s a link to the blog from our delegates at the National Greek Leadership Association conference in Hartford, CT this year.

http://bscgreeksgotongla.blogspot.com/

And just for fun…check out the Wordle the blog for our Student Orientation Coordinators’ trip to the regional NODA Conference (at the top of this post) and the Wordle for our Program Committee’s travels to the NACA regional conference (2) pasted below.  Looks to me like they had a good experience…and had some fun along the way!

So, how do you facilitate reflection when your students travel? Any interested in blogging?  If you are, let’s correspond and if our students attend the same conferences we can cross-promote their sites!

For those not accustomed to your northern neighbour, think of  CACUSS as our NASPA/ACPA and adjust for the fact that student affairs in Canada:

• Is primarily comprised of publicly funded institutions
• Has around 1/10th the population of the States but has 4/10th the comedians  and  8.66/10th the hockey players
• Doesn’t require a graduate degree to hold an entry level position (though the placement exchange system is really, quite amazing and kinda energizing/intimidating); and
• Can actually fit our conference on a campus which means a large group of  us can relive our residence days…

The Shine theme was quite appropriate, not only for the 19 hours of brilliant daylight during the summer solstice, but also for the illuminating opening keynote – Susan R. Komives.

Now, Dr. Komives needs no introduction to this crowd, being a Legend and all but her comments were timely, thought provoking and worth sharing (plus, I tweeted a couple of posts which seemed to resonate).

Key Komives Comments Condensed

1.  Why do we do what we do?

Clearly we want to help students grow and learn but in the realm of the institution, what do we own and how intentional are we in relation to this?  Further, how does this impact the impact the student experience: after all, we call it curricular and co-curricular, students simply call it college.

Dr. Komives noted that one of the roles for student affairs is to proactively build upon collaborative leadership that is future thinking oriented thinking (such as our aboriginal peoples who consider decisions  that will impact 7 generations).

Student Affairs and its role with sustainability is a good example of this.

2.  Paradigm Paralysis and Positive Psychology

Given our role as dashboards for our institutions, we have an ongoing responsibility to encourage/force reflection amongst our departments.  To this end, we need to be able to abandon old practices/ideas.  A good method for this is to create a ‘going out of business list’ which identifies core functions vs. supplemental activities.

Another method is to adopt some good ol’ positive psychology and shift the concept of “doing more with less” to “doing more with more”.  This made me think a lot of Roger Martin’s Opposable Mind concept and the shift of thinking from conventional to integrative.

3.   Key Komives Questions

Dr. Komives asked us to consider a number of reflective questions:

a)      What capacities do I need to focus on for development and what capacities do I need to park for development?

b)      What are you doing to ensure your organization is a learning organization?

c)      How healthy is your workplace – what is your role to ensure it is healthy

d)     How would you rank yourself in relation to other areas  on your campus

e)      Where do you think your President would rank you?

f)       How do you know your ranking – what are your key indicators?

So, with all of this in mind, what are your thoughts on the comments and questions raised?

Ross McMillan is Assistant Director, Student Community at York University, Toronto