A student body president's work involves addressing emerging crises and challenging institutional decision-makers to respond to the cost of higher education, campus sexual assault, mental health, free speech, and student safety (Student Voice Index, 2018). This phenomenological study unearths the experiences of individuals who previously served as…

New student affairs professionals are critical for higher education and yet institutions continue to suffer attrition rates as high as 60%. Using cross-sectional survey, this study measured relationships between wellness and intent to leave the profession. Results showed wellness levels were considerably lower than the general population and, as…

Assessment is a core competency in student affairs, but scholars in the field of higher education and student affairs know little about how practitioners perceive and approach learning about assessment. In this study with 20 students in a student affairs master's program, I found they perceived assessment as the "wild card" and had…

This study examines how Chief Student Affairs Officers (CSAO) make sense of their role engaging with fundraising at small, private, liberal arts institutions with endowments below the median endowment size of $140.2 million. Specifically examining how they make sense of engaging with fundraising and how they have gained knowledge or experience in…

This qualitative study explored student affairs knowledge-sharing influences through Clark and Estes's (2008) knowledge, motivation, and organizational (KMO) influence framework. The study was conducted at a 4-year higher education institution involving a diverse group of participants. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews to…

The student activities professionals we work with and have spoken to for this article are busy people who argue that they hardly have the time to slow down to use theory to guide and direct their work. However, what they do not realize is that they use theory in most situations and in virtually, all aspects of their work. The theories they most…

This position paper reviews four intersecting trends impacting the burnout and turnover of clinical staff in counseling centers in the 2020s: ever expanding service demand, mismatched clinical models, the emergence of third party vendors, and uncompetitive salaries. The authors provide a framework and make recommendations for institutions to take…

Institutions must adequately support Latinx first-generation professionals if we are to make significant progress in our racial equity work. While in the Educational Leadership doctoral program (CANDEL) at the University of California, Davis, my personal and academic experiences led me to conduct qualitative research on the experiences of Latinx…

Student affairs practitioners in higher education have been leaving the field at an alarming rate (National Association of Student Personnel Administrators, 2022). As personnel working on the front lines in efforts related to student success and retention, early-career incumbents in these positions experiencing such high rates of attrition…

Approximately two-thirds of Latinx college students attend Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs). Despite the growing number of HSIs, these institutions often fail to result in better educational outcomes and success for Latinx students. As such, more research is needed to explore factors that may hinder HSIs in their ability to support Latinx…

Student affairs practitioner-scholarship has the potential to transform higher education and improve the lives of students; however, it is rarely cultivated on college campuses. Instead, many practitioner-scholars struggle with systemic barriers to their success, much of which can be linked to the influence of neoliberalism in higher education. In…

The purpose of this study is to examine Student Affairs Professionals' (SAPs') experiences with campus racial climate at predominantly white institutions (PWIs) including how SAPs make meaning of racialized incidents on campus. This study employed the multi-contextual model for diverse learning environments (MMDLE) and critical incident technique…

Twenty years ago, I began a project to learn about the professional and personal lives of 130 deans of women who were practicing in their careers between 1903 and 1922, and who laid the foundations of what is now called student affairs. The collective group shows both trends and diversity in the identities, professional lives, and personal choices…

The purpose of this paper is to explore tertiary student development in Trinidad and Tobago (T&T), with an emphasis on the intersections of two dimensions likely to be particularly relevant in a collectivist context like that of T&T: interpersonal and intrapersonal development. A multiple case study approach was used to emphasize the…

Vice Presidents of Student Affairs (VPSAs) lead in a context nuanced around race that conflicts with their duty to enact the student affairs profession's espoused values of social justice and inclusion. This paper summarizes findings from a critical qualitative case study conducted with 10 VPSAs from a diverse group of institutions located in the…