The beginning of the summer is always filled with mixed emotions; you might be sad that students have waved goodbye, but thrilled at the silence of your empty campus. There is a stack of paperwork waiting for you, but your meetings with students are no longer on your Outlook.

How can you use this summer to rejuvenate and “reboot” your life so when August or September comes, you are revitalized?

First know how you “recharge.” 

Knowing if you are an introvert, recharging with your alone time is key. Extroverts need time with people, the more the better. (Granted there are exceptions and if you are “in-between” you are called an ambivert.) More information about introversion can be found in a great book called Quiet by Susan Cain.

Now for some tips. (E) for extroverts and (I) for introverts.

(E) Go to a conference out of your area. 

Extroverts need contact, but they might need a new batch of people. We tend to talk about college and college and college and then some college. I’ve found that attending conferences based on my own interests helps me meet a new batch of people who have never, ever heard of a Room Condition and Inventory form. You can find these conferences through word of mouth, Facebook and good ol’ Google.

(E/I) Get back to your interests.

If you have forgotten your hobbies and interests, you might be in some trouble. Write down a list of 10 things you love to do that have nothing to do with your job. So if you write down “Hang out with students in the dining hall.” you have to scratch that one. Don’t edit it. If you love folk art puzzles and Crossfit, that’s fine. But get back to what you like and aim for those.

(I) Catching up over coffee.

Take a look at some friendships that have drifted off and “caffinate” them with a coffee date. We tend to think we are connecting with people while on social media, but actually need real connection. Call your friends and ask them out just for coffee and talk about anything not higher education related.

(I) Start a blog. 

Introverts love to process by themselves over time and a blog is a wonderful way to do that. It can be for special interest (social justice, hobbies) or your personal blog highlighting what you have going on. You can create cheaper blogs at tumblr and blogger or you can have more professional blogs at wordpress.

(E/I) Travel.

When someone tells me that they don’t use their vacation like it’s a badge of honor, I roll my eyes (and I do it out in the open—I don’t care.) Get out of your college, your town, your state and even better, your country. There are a ton of ways to travel cheaply and you can head to chrisguillebeau.com to find out how about affordable ways to get out of town!

(E/I) Long Look at your Finances

Take ONE day, an afternoon or evening and find out these totals:

• How much money you have currently.
• How much debt you have currently.
• What is your exact salary.
• How many months/years it will take to pay any debt you have off.

I can’t tell you how many college professionals are swimming in debt and I find that debt will burn you out quickly. Get a handle on it and make a plan to annihilate that debt as soon as possible.

Ryan McRae has served on Western Association of University and College Housing Officals board, as a Western Training Institute scholar and an all around nice guy. He was a Resident Director at Cal State San Marcos for 7 years. He currently freelance writer which is a peaceful break from his year in Afghanistan. He can be reached at ryanmcrae@mac.com.

“What do you do with your summers off?”

I must admit that I get this from my friends and family that aren’t in higher education, but has anyone else been frustrated by this question?   I work at a large, urban, research university in the capital of Indiana.  We have over 30K students.  I am an advisor that works mostly with freshmen and sophomores.  So, my summers are the busiest time of the calendar year.  I’m one person in the small army who helps incoming freshmen get oriented and registered for the fall semester.  In the summer of 2012, we had something like 41 orientation days with the majority of those in June and July.  I’m on the academic side of things; I can’t imagine the energy for the student services side who keep everything organized and seem to handle the logistics fairly flawlessly.  And then there are the current students who are taking summer courses and have questions, need to drop the summer course, or now need to change their Fall schedules a bit because of having passed (or failed) their summer course.  It’s not unusual to also have a few students who decided to wait till the end of the summer to register for fall courses even though Priority Registration was mid-March who now can’t get into certain classes because they are full.  And then there is the email box which, more times than not, seems very unfriendly by showing me exactly how many unread emails I have received since I’ve been away at lunch for an hour and how I’m about to reach the mailbox’s limit in terms of data/megabytes…again!  There are still staff meetings and committee meetings or projects, but fewer of them.

I’m not sure about the rest of you that see summer as a shiny blur, but I’ll be taking a 30-minute nap when I get home from work, too!    Maybe you can help me figure out a kind response to the 14th person who asks me what I do with my summers off!

It’s no April Fool’s Day joke, after 195 people submitted 1,560 votes, we’ve finally finished counting all the hanging chads and are ready to announce the winners!

Thank you to everyone for nominating some awesome individuals from our #SAChat community for the 2013 #SAChat awards. We’ve tallied your votes, and are pleased as punch to announce the winners. The #SAChat community continues to thrive due to the participation of these individuals, and everyone who took the time to share, vote, and tweet with the hashtag. We celebrate you all!

And now onward with the winners…

Best Original Content: @EdCabellon

Ed introduced me to twitter & how to learn outside my personal circles. He’s innovative in the way he engages people & technologies he uses.” – @ErinMorrell11

From supporting new professionals (#sagrow) to sharing the latest tech trends in higher ed, @edcabellon is innovative, encouraging & genuine” – @KateMCGK

 


 

Best Devil’s Advocate: @StacyLOliver

Stacy has the ability to balance her quick wit with thought provoking questions in ways that are unparalleled. Makes me laugh and think!” – @KMagura

Her blog posts and tweets challenge me daily to rethink my actions and work ethically as a professional.” – @lindsayrite

 


 

Quiet Hero: @kristendom

Kristen exudes a quiet strength and touches the lives of so many with whom she interacts. Her blog demonstrates vulnerability and humor. She has touched my life in direct and indirect ways and finds points of intersection that make our connections so meaningful. Just love her.” – @DSchmidtRogers

@kristendom’s words induce great self-reflection & by starting the #sareads group, she has brought #sapros together for the love of learning” - @njrobichaud

 


 

Funniest Tweets: @SAproblems

Posts by @saproblems are so funny because so many of us relate. And sometimes we have to find the humor in it to keep from going insane!” - @DMarie2484

“@SAProblems keeps it blunt!” – @BluntSAPro

 


 

Top Content Sharer: @ericstoller

@ericstoller challenges me to think outside of student affairs norms. As an #sagrad he invests in my future and keeps me informed of trends.” – @DanaRMcNulty

 


 

Embodies the #SAchat Spirit: @Oberbecca

She manages to convey genuine kindness and heart all while sharing AND creating great content for the #sachat community.” - @NotAnniebutanne

@oberbecca actively engages w/ folks to make them feel welcome and that their contribution to the discussion matters.” - @marthakcompton

 


 

Emerging Leader: @AmmaMarfo

@ammamarfo deserves her award because of her positivity, erudite insight into #SAChat issues, and a charming wit that could win over anyone.” – @thebigbabooski

Thanks to everyone who participated in our #SAchat focused on Why I am in Student Affairs. This week’s topic produced over 600 tweets from several student affairs professionals, graduate students and undergraduates interested or working in the Student Affairs field! Check out this blog post from Dana McNulty which prompted this topic.

View transcript on Storify.

What are some other topics you would like to see us cover? Please let us know your ideas and feedback to keep #sachat growing strong. Until next week, (if you haven’t already done so) please make sure to LIKE our Facebook Page. Thanks for your continued support!

Thanks to everyone who participated in our #SAchat focused on Breaking through Blanket Statements in #SA. This week’s topic produced over 600 tweets from several student affairs professionals, graduate students and undergraduates interested or working in the Student Affairs field!

View transcript on Storify <—- SORRY IT’S A BROKEN LINK RIGHT NOW. WORKING ON IT.

What are some other topics you would like to see us cover? Please let us know your ideas and feedback to keep #sachat growing strong. Until next week, (if you haven’t already done so) please make sure to LIKE our Facebook Page. Thanks for your continued support!

Thanks to everyone who participated in our #SAchat focused on Setting Boundaries with Students. This week’s topic produced 560 tweets from several student affairs professionals, graduate students and undergraduates interested or working in the Student Affairs field!

Full Transcript

View as a Google Document

What are some other topics you would like to see us cover? Please let us know your ideas and feedback to keep #sachat growing strong. Until next week, (if you haven’t already done so) please make sure to LIKE our Facebook Page. Thanks for your continued support!

What’s the most difficult thing you learned in Oakland?

During a teambuilding activity, one of my colleagues asked me this question. It caught me off guard, but it was a very impactful question. After four years in an urban school district, with time spent as a tutor, teacher, and administrator, I learned many skills and life lessons. But, I really had to reflect upon the lesson that impacted me as a person and as an educational professional. So, I answered her with:

The reward for suffering is experience.

As student affairs professionals, we deal with a multitude of crises students will face. Issues like sexual assault, mental illness, alcoholism, abusive relationships, financial concerns, and cultural pressures are some of the things students bring to the table. Unfortunately, we may have (or already have) to deal with real threats of on-campus shootings and other acts of violence. It is a part of the culture we exist in, and being in a helping profession, we have a front seat to the world students are coming from.

To explain my quote, I told my colleagues a story of a student I worked with during my graduate school assistantship. He was very intelligent, soft spoken, insightful, and creative. However, he was facing strong family pressure to move and study closer to home. He truly enjoyed his time on campus; he was involved in many leadership programs and was doing well academically. We talked often about the stress he was facing and the strategies he could use to manage his situation. It was the first time I was able to see the connection between theory and practice. It seemed that he was doing better and finding a path towards creating a future for himself and explaining his feelings to his family. Sadly, right after I graduated and moved to my first job, a friend called to tell me that he committed suicide during summer school. When I heard that news, it was an absolute shock to my system. It was the first time in my life I felt like an utter failure that I couldn’t help him, and I truly felt like I had abandoned him.

From that experience, I learned that I had to give myself grace and remember that despite my feelings, there was a family that was grieving a loss of its only son. I had to keep things in perspective; I did what I could, I provided him with the resources at my disposal, and I communicated through my chain of command what was happening. There are some situations I can’t solve, and I need to understand that. I had to allow myself to question, to grieve, and eventually move forward with his memory forever in my mind.

Those lessons were put to the test in Oakland, where I was dealing with students in gangs, writing child abuse reports, watching students get arrested in the middle of class and working with homeless families to secure stable housing. I wasn’t satisfied in saying “that’s not my problem”; I referred to outside partners and organizations that had the skills and knowledge to help. I would assist in follow through and guide people through paperwork and other arduous processes. And, I would continue dialogue with colleagues and friends who understood the stress and trauma I was enduring. Don’t get me wrong; these situations took an immense mental and physical toll on me (calling Child Protective Services to report abuse cases is something that will trouble me forever), but I had to remember that I can’t solve every situation. I can only do what I can, and I need to do what I can to the maximum.

In the transition back to student affairs, I found that my experiences in crisis situations has helped me become a better professional, and to some extent a better person. I have developed into a humanistic and resourceful professional, willing to work hard to help someone yet remember that I can’t solve every problem. It has taken going through some very traumatic situations to learn this, but there are lessons that can’t be learned from a textbook or cited in a journal article. It has been through these many challenges I feel that I am growing into the student affairs professional I hoped to become.

Our next Final Question post comes from Kyle Hickman who shared is FQ, “As #SApros, how do we approach these issues with students while remaining #Authentic and #Vulnerable? What’s the gray area?” during our 11/15 #SAChat on Self-Care during Peak Times.

Before we speed into this topic, let’s take a second to consider what indicates a higher education/student affairs professional who is great at developing relationships (outside of knowledge and experience). I cannot pretend to know everything there is know to know on the subject, but I imagine if you asked a student or a professional that question, the list of answers would not be as extensive as you might think. What do you think you would hear? That person is relatable… they “understand” me… they are a good listener! Surely, any of us can think back to our undergraduate experience or a memorable graduate experience and think of that one person who stood out from the rest. You know, that person who always seemed to have students around their office at every hour of the day. Are there any similarities between these types of individuals? Let’s see…

I want to make the case that those individuals who we thought of just a moment ago exemplify an extraordinary level of personal proficiency in being authentic/genuine and in treading a safe line of vulnerability. In my limited experience working as a professional, it seems that authenticity and vulnerability have been scary propositions for some. Why is that? Well, when you examine what it takes to be a truly authentic professional who can be sufficiently vulnerable, that requires quite a bit of courage, discipline, and training. Unfortunately, many of us do not receive the training needed to tread that line of professionalism. For others, courage and discipline are not core values and/or not natural strengths. Therefore, as professionals, we are told (on many occasions) to consciously separate our personal and professional lives. In fact, when I was introduced to my current position as a graduate assistant, the online training module specifically stipulated that I was to separate those two entities from one another.

Why do we do this? Why are we so afraid of showing who we truly are?

Coming back to that original question, the HESA professionals who seem to connect so well with students and other faculty/staff are the ones who develop deep, meaningful relationships and can relate with students. I’m not sure many people would argue that. Therefore, what does it require to develop such a powerful connection with someone else? First off, it asks you to consciously empathize with another person, allowing them to confide in you and build mutual trust in the process. Deep, meaningful relationships revolve around a significant level of trust and understanding. That trust never fully develops unless both parties are being sufficiently authentic and vulnerable. Obviously,
there are always topics that we should not be sharing with select parties. I would make the case that this “gray area” is exactly what persuades some professionals from being as authentic or vulnerable as they would like to be. And of course, there have been individuals who have failed in the attempt of being authentic and vulnerable, further destroying a potential relationship with a student or professional because they have revealed a lack of personal credibility. But, just because a few people have failed in their attempt to be authentic, does not mean that we should avoid it altogether. The power of these types of transformational relationships (whether they are a mentor/mentee situation, a genuine professional respect for one another, etc.) can profoundly change the life of another person and/or significantly elevate our profession.

If you are a working professional in Higher Education & Student Affairs, remember that you are in your position for a reason and it is not through divine intervention. Instead, you have a unique set of traits that have allowed you to be successful. Plus, you are absolutely unique from any other person in your profession. Own it! Utilize it! Many of us got into this profession because we love to help students do great things. If you can be TRULY authentic and TRULY vulnerable, then you will be amazed as to how many great relationships that you can make and how much more effective you can be in helping students to excel. More than anything, remember that you were a college student not too long ago yourself and that you probably took part in many of the same activities that you now address with students. For example, once upon a time, you were certainly just as stressed as they are about tests and papers, you might have been overwhelmed with responsibilities of campus organizations and you were probably consumed with a number of personal issues as an undergraduate. Take that as an opportunity to be vulnerable authentic in your conversations and interactions. If you can leverage that responsibility, the channels of respect and trust will flow naturally with your students. Not to mention, if a student would list you as an inspiration to them, I’m not sure that happens without you being truly authentic and vulnerable. After all, are we not in the business of inspiring students to do great things?

Kyle Hickman is a graduate student at Texas A&M University-Commerce. He is currently completing a Master’s in the Higher Education – Emphasis in College Teaching program and is the graduate assistant  for the L.E.A.D. program (Leadership Engagement and Development).

I’ll take this term over ‘research’ any day.

A recent #sachat on ‘Beginning Research in Higher Education’  uncovered many different definitions of research. Many participants defined the term to a point where they could not see themselves engaging in research, making it something that others in the field do with more resources or time.

I’d like to challenge that assumption.

Research, in higher education at the very least, is not something that always leads to a publication, or requires hours in the field. It is not always about annotated bibliographies and APA style and reviews by the ethics board.

Research is creative inquiry. Quite simply, research in higher education is what happens when we have the courage to ask questions and to seek out the answer. At times it is systematic, but the search for knowledge is more often messy. Just as there is no one set path to success, the same applies to the answers we seek. Any time we seek insight, information or ideas we are doing research. Simply by being curious, we are researchers.

via Elementary Education

There is also a level of responsibility that comes with this creative inquiry. Just as we are bound to be lifelong learners, there is an equivalent duty to be lifelong teachers. Knowledge gained through creative inquiry is not meant to be hoarded or hidden, but rather shared. Creative inquiry is in part a call to action – we are charged to communicate what we have learned, to add to the wider network of knowledge we all draw from and, in the process, to help guide others in their own journey. Just as we teach community building in our work with students, so too must we act as contributors to the knowledge network. I prefer ‘network’ in this case to ‘knowledge economy’ – knowledge being distributed, reviewed and refined rather than consumed after being sold to the highest bidder.

Of course, as one rocket scientist once said “Research is what I’m doing when I don’t know what I’m doing.” (Wernher von Braun). But isn’t that the point? Creative inquiry by its very nature starts with not knowing – if we knew the what, the why and the how it wouldn’t be research now would it?

Thanks to everyone who participated in our #SAchat focused on Beginning Research in Higher Ed. This week’s topic produced 581 tweets from student affairs professionals, graduate students and undergraduates interested or working in the Student Affairs field!

Read the transcript as a google doc.

What are some other topics you would like to see us cover? Please let us know your ideas and feedback to keep #sachat growing strong. Until next week, (if you haven’t already done so) please make sure to LIKE our Facebook Page. Thanks for your continued support!