Blogs

Earlier this week, UERU launched its new website and upgraded online community. With this upgrade, we now have a blogging feature. Although I’m not a blogger, I thought I would give it a try by sharing my reflections on the University of Pittsburgh’s 7^th annual Mentoring and Advising Summit last Friday, March 8. This virtual summit convened more than 2,500 mentors, advisors, coaches, and administrators from 130+ institutions/organizations around the globe. There was truly something for everyone at this event, as the sessions ranged from “big picture” strategy to the minutiae of advising practice. Dr. Amelia Parnell, VP for Research and Policy at NASPA kicked things off with an engaging keynote on current trends in the field and how to better use data to evaluate the process and outcomes of our initiatives. As costs rise, capacity becomes strained, and enrollment projections become more unpredictable, university leaders will need to make more data-informed choices about how to allocate scarce resources. We then took a deep dive into student-informed research conducted by Higher Ed Insight, with Dr. Donte McGuire and Dr. Tashera Gale sharing the results of their evaluation of the University Centers for Exemplary Mentoring (UCEM) program. Not only did the UCEM program have strong outcomes in terms of retention and graduation, but many students also noted that UCEM was a space where their identities as Black, Latinx, and Indigenous students were truly valued. I encourage everyone to read their research report with full results and recommendations for graduate programs. In the breakout sessions, speakers and panelists noted how student success is a collective responsibility. The shared/hybrid advising model, highlighted multiple times throughout the day, is one way to leverage all the university’s strengths by fostering collaboration among faculty, professional advisors, and leaders. An interesting insight from one of the sessions included a documented relationship between faculty and staff interactions with students about their mental health and decreased job satisfaction and wellbeing among those faculty and staff. I also attended a fascinating session on support trans and nonbinary students, which challenged some of my assumptions and generated helpful ideas for communicating about and documenting gender identity during advising interactions. As someone who has been in higher ed a long time, but not in an advising role, I found it incredibly valuable to hear directly from advisors and mentors about the challenges they’re experiencing in their work and how they’re innovating to better serve students. Everything I heard linked back to the overarching “equity/excellence” imperative, articulated in the Boyer 2030 Commission report – we have to deliver equitable outcomes for students, but those students must also get what they came for: a quality credential that will help them meet their career and personal goals. Mentoring and advising is clearly evolving to meet that challenge, and the passion and commitment of participants made me feel inspired to help support this transformation. I hope everyone else who attended enjoyed the summit as much as I did! I look forward to seeing what the University of Pittsburgh comes up with next year.

#Advising