This study collected information on the professional development of 177 senior student affairs officers (SSAO) at higher education institutions in the United States. The purpose of the study was to identify the professional development activities that these SSAOs engaged in to prepare for the role and the perceived effectiveness of those…

Evidence demonstrates work intensity is on the rise and can lead to higher rates of burnout. The UK Higher Education professional services sector has been under-researched in terms of work intensity levels and experience of burnout. This research measured these levels and sought evidence of whether high-performance work practices (HPWPs) moderate…

Addressing working conditions in higher education is crucial to retaining student affairs professionals. This study explores the current state of working conditions in the field and the influence working conditions have on professionals' turnover intentions. Perceptions of psychological contract fulfillment is a factor that can interact with…

This article explores the concept of Student Affairs and Services (SAS) as a global profession, how it is positioned and positions itself in the context of what it means to be a profession and reflects on the ways in which SAS has and can professionalize. The literature related to professionalization is presented along with a discussion of the…

Women comprise most of the professionals in student affairs in higher education in the United States. They are tasked with supporting students and campus communities with complex challenges and needs. Women student affairs leaders simultaneously manage multiple roles and responsibilities, both personal and professional. The work of women student…

More than 17,000 professional staff live where they work in Residence Life and Housing (RL&H). Those staff members live in the dorms with the college students whom they serve, as has been the arrangement of RL&H staff members since the inception of colleges in the U.S. in the 1600s. However, there have been recent shifts in the ways in…

Higher education institutions can often serve as sites of growth and possibility. At the same time, trauma in varying forms permeates higher education across institutional types. The authors define trauma as the short- and long-term direct and indirect response to deeply distressing events. Students, faculty, and staff all experience various…

This qualitative study explored how supervisors in student affairs describe their supervisory learning journey. Supervision is an important facet of the student affairs profession, yet there is an apparent lack of intentional supervisory training and development for these professionals. This study endeavored to understand how supervisors in…

The principal purpose of this doctoral study was to investigate how intersectionality is understood and utilized by practitioners within the field of student affairs in North American higher education. Additionally, the study explored how intersectionality is applied to student affairs practitioners' student development and identity development…

In a recent study conducted by the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA), Pritchard and McChesney (2018) identified three key challenges to student affairs professionals: increasing student diversity, higher costs and reduced funding in higher education, and business-model pressures for efficiencies. The same report…

A vocation is an individual's sense of being called to pursue a given profession. Vocations are typified by passion, absorption in work, a desire for prosocial work, and a tendency to sacrifice for the vocation. Vocations have been linked to both advantageous and adverse effects, including the propensity for vocational workers to suffer workplace…

Housing and residence life as a functional area serves as a major entry point for careers in higher education and student affairs. With the majority of annual job postings within entry-level, live-in housing roles, the future of the field may well be predicted in these high-impact, high-turnover positions on college campuses. As these functional…

This paper explores the experiences of nonbinary and trans (NBT) facilitators of Safe Zone workshops, what we call LGBTQ+ social justice educational interventions (SJEIs). Despite their prevalence in higher education for over 3 decades, there remains a paucity of research about them and those who facilitate them. This research focused on 33 NBT…

The study of student development has long been considered a cornerstone of the higher education and student affairs (HESA) profession. However, perspectives on what constitutes student development have evolved as scholars continuously embrace more critical frameworks to implicate systems of power and oppression--what scholars have termed the third…

Student affairs professionals help students who experience trauma. Repeated and prolonged traumatic exposure has significant adverse effects on other helping professionals; burnout is one consequence of trauma exposure. Burnout as a construct has not been quantitatively researched in the student affairs profession recently. This study provides a…