Webinar: Supervising Gen Z: Intergenerational Communication

Have you noticed changes in your students (Grads and undergrads) in the last few years? You may or may not have realized – a whole new generation of students have come to college. Gen Z students have different attributes, expectations, behaviors, and experiences. We will review research on what makes this group different from previous generations and learn how we can meet Gen Z student employees where they are at while helping them build capacity, resilience, and have the best employment experience possible.

The Great Resignation: Imperfectly Navigating Change & Burnout

Low staff morale, burnout, restructuring, and more are just some of the effects that many departments are facing due to the Great Resignation. Come join us as we discuss how people can try to retain staff, and their sanity, in the face of this tidal wave of resignations. Join Maria Moreno, Interim Director for Student Involvement & Leadership at Manhattanville College, as they present their experience and ways to support staff and provide space to navigate balancing the job market.

Using Self Determination Theory to Advocate for Your Staff

Self-Determination Theory (SDT) is a framework for understanding basic human needs. According to SDT’s authors, Ryan and Deci, humans have three basic needs: competency, autonomy, and relatedness. We can use this framework in higher education to make decisions about our units’ cultures to make sure our staff members and colleagues find their work place to be satisfying and rewarding. We don’t have to make huge changes, sometimes small, dedicated moments can make huge differences at work. Chelsea O’Brien has worked in higher education for about ten years, beginning at a private university and is now at a rural community college. Her background includes a bachelor’s degree in political science and master’s in higher education administration. Chelsea is currently the Coordinator of Tutoring and Academic Support, supervising a team of about 15, and is also a PhD student at UAlbany in their Curriculum and Instruction program. Her research interests include learning strategies, metacognition, supporting returning learners, and remedial education.

LinkedIn Level Up: Telling Your Story

You have a LinkedIn account and tons of connections, maybe even solicited a job interview using the chat feature. But, is your LinkedIn telling your full story? Join marketing and communications professional Jackie Vetrano to discover ways to bring your LinkedIn to the next level in a new way, uncover your personal brand, and get helpful insights on your LinkedIn presence. This workshop is built for attendees who are already comfortable with LinkedIn and its capabilities.

Webinar: Trauma Informed Leadership

We as a society have experienced collective trauma over the past few years. This session will explore the effects trauma has on the body and how we can lead in a trauma informed manner. During this session, participants will do a deep dive into Polyvagal Theory. Afterwards, the group will discuss paths to safety and participants will be given the opportunity to reflect on their own paths to safety. We will wrap up with final tips and consideration for taking this information back to campus.

Teaching and Training Students Effectively in Online Spaces

The past year has caused faculty and staff alike to dramatically rethink their modes of teaching, training, and facilitation. The adaptations that faculty and staff have made often utilize a variety of innovative online applications, but which are most effective? This session will provide an overview of a variety of exciting digital tools that help create community among students, aid discussion, and incorporate a feedback loop to instructors, trainers, and facilitators. The online applications of Poll Everywhere, Padlet, and Yellowdig among others will be highlighted.

Navigating and Leveraging Successful Partnerships Across Campus

Navigating and leveraging successful partnerships across campus isn't always a skill you learn in graduate school but is essential to success as a higher education professional. This has been true in the presenters' experiences across a variety of institution types and career levels. These partnerships have been even more important during the COVID-19 pandemic year and have evolved during our remote working environment. And as we emerge from the pandemic these partnerships may have evolved so maintaining and evaluating them is more important than ever in our post pandemic environment. Join these presenters who will share wisdom from a combined total of more than 30 years of experience in higher education to jumpstart conversation and help you strategize how to navigate and leverage partnerships in your current role and institution.

Implementing MBTI with Student Leaders

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) can be a great tool for student leaders to learn more about themselves and others. It is also easily applied to help teams develop synergy and work through various issues. This session will provide a brief overview of MBTI concepts and theory and also present several activities that can be done with student leaders to help them understand themselves and how they work within a team environment.

Graduate & New Professional Panel

Our panel of recently hired Higher Education Graduates and New Professionals will discuss the tips and tricks they used to get the most out of their grad programs and find jobs even during a pandemic!

My Campus is my Canvas (How the Creative Process Turned my Career into a Work of Art)

The word “creativity” is often associated with the visual and performing arts, but what if the vulnerable act of self-expression could be applied to creating a culture of equitable access in higher education? My personal journey with drawing has taught me how to rethink what is essential when addressing challenging student cases, practice empathy and perspective-taking when meeting with students (and parents), and develop strong relationships with faculty so that access becomes a shared responsibility. Come learn how you can not only discover your inner creativity, but also use it to enhance your work from a transactional process to a transformational practice.

Student Leader Training

We changed a lot for 2020 student leader training due to the COVID-19 pandemic but in 2021 we retained some of what had changed. Come learn about how our approach shifted and what pandemic silver linings we carried over to future student leader trainings.

Leveraging Technology Tools for Student Engagement

This session will share a variety of free and inexpensive technology tools that can be leveraged to enhance student engagement and learning! Together we will explore solutions that help students, student employees, and professional staff improve communication, collaboration, and productivity. Attendees will expand their tech literacy through demos and case studies of popular applications.

Improving Student Achievement in Higher Education

The emerging field of student success relies on an integrative partnership between academic affairs and student affairs. In this session, attendees will see how an institution assessed its system of academic and student support and implemented high-impact and best practices to better serve the student community.

Learning Our Past to Leverage Our Liberation

Through a unique Student Affairs/Academic Affairs/community collaboration, the Ithaca LGBTQ Local History tour was developed by students, alumni, and staff of the Ithaca College Center for LGBT Education, Outreach, & Services. It is the first initiative to comprehensively document historic sites associated with Ithaca's and Tompkins County's (NY) LGBTQ community. To our knowledge it’s also the first of its kind created through extensive campus/community partnerships. The goal was to document and contextualize this history; make it available in an engaging, free, easy to use format; and amplify one of the most active and sizeable, but still underserved and marginalized, communities in our area. Public spaces and educational, religious, and business establishments have been sites of LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer) history, resistance, and resilience for decades. But many of the people and places that make up our shared past have been forgotten, erased, overlooked, or ignored. Ithaca, New York, home to Ithaca College, holds unique and meaningful roles in local LGBTQ history and culture, as well as the national LGBTQ rights movement. Our LGBTQ Local History tour initiative sought to preserve this rich heritage, in order to share diversity, inclusion, and equity themed historical knowledge while illuminating multiple intersections across our institution’s curriculum in social movement theory, politics, sociology, economics, religion, gerontology, culture, and communications. The project's impacts extend more deeply to support student success and engagement, providing significant opportunities for students to not only build their knowledge but also increasing student belongingness and a sense of connection while reducing social isolation.

Launching a Student Leadership Development Program: Lessons Learned & Implications for the Future

In the 2020-2021 academic year the Office of Community Engagement at Purchase College launched a leadership development program for students called the Purchase College Leadership Institute (PCLI). The PCLI provides students with an opportunity to sharpen their leadership skills and abilities by participating in seminars with faculty and staff from across campus. Our goal is to teach students how to become positive, effective, and innovative leaders in their community. This session will explore what was learned from launching a leadership development program during the COVID-19 pandemic and what lessons may be useful for those seeking to begin their own leadership development program on their campus in the future. We will discuss the value of leadership development programs and explore potential implications for the future of such programs.