Linking Theory to Practice

Case Studies for Working with College Students

Frances K. Stage, Steven M. Hubbard, Frances K. Stage, Steven M. Hubbard

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351762113
• Edition: 4
• Topic: Pedagogía
• Subtopic: Educación general

Framed by an overview of theories that guide student affairs practice, the cases in this book present a challenging array of problems that student affairs and higher education personnel face on campus, such as racial diversity, alcohol abuse, and student activism. This revised fourth edition contains 20 new cases reflecting current campus issues, including identity, study abroad, social media, bullying, housing and food insecurity, student activism, and other perennial campus issues. An excellent teaching tool, this book provides a comprehensive and realistic set of challenges to prepare aspiring student affairs professionals for the increasingly complex college environment.

Features include:

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• A structure that sets the stage for case study methods and links student affairs theory with practical applications.

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• Cases written by well-known and respected contributors set in a wide variety of institution types and locations.

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• Over 35 complex case studies reflecting the multifaceted issues student affairs professionals face in today's college environment.

Chapter 1

The Role of Theory in a Practical World

Frances K. Stage

Theories focusing on college students have grown in number and have become well defined and differentiated as well as more complex in recent years (Bilodeau & Renn, 2005; Crethar & Vargas, 2007; Dillon, Worthington, & Moradi, 2011; Hardimman & Keehn, 2012; Kim, 2001; Ortiz & Rhoads, 2000). Nevertheless, in student affairs literature authors describe the difficulties of linking day-to-day issues on a college campus to theory and the related research to practice (Bensimon, 2007; Evans, Forney, Guido, Patton, & Renn, 2010; Hurtado, 2007; Pope, Reynolds, & Mueller, 2004; Schuh, 2011; Torres, Howard-Hamilton, & Cooper, 2003). This remains true despite an explosion of knowledge about student development, campus environments, organizations, and characteristics of diverse college students. While these are all requisite components in the education of student affairs (Schuh, Jones, & Harper, 2010), professionals also require practice applying this newly acquired knowledge to the reality of a college campus.

Years ago individuals with a variety of educational backgrounds who liked the campus atmosphere and who worked with students decided to enter the student affairs profession. Usually, they were given entry-level jobs in which they worked closely with administrators and learned the ropes. Under the protective environment, the fledgling administrator was shielded from making serious professional errors and—perhaps with occasional minor slipups—was guided along under the watchful eyes of his or her mentor.

Today few student affairs divisions have the luxury of providing new employees with this kind of mentoring. Given the state of postsecondary education budgets, such a luxury will probably never return. Instead, the expectation is that new professionals, even at beginning levels, will be able to work independently and solve complex issues knowledgeably and with skill and integrity. In other words, student affairs has moved from an apprenticeship profession to one with a strong theoretical base. Increasingly professionals in student affairs have graduated from a student affairs preparation program.

Difficulties in applying theory often stem from difficulties inherent in studying concepts in the abstract atmosphere of the classroom or meeting room. Therefore, student affairs preparation programs typically include components of practical application. Internships, field work, and graduate assistantships all contribute to the increased sophistication of today’s new professional. Nevertheless, most students have only limited experience. Such preprofessional experiences are necessarily limited to only one or two types of campuses. There is no guarantee that those campus settings will closely match that of the new job setting. Case study analysis can provide an additional and necessary method of linking the student affairs knowledge base with practicality across a broad range.

In addition, within student affairs curricula, in sessions at professional association meetings, and in staff training, the focus is frequently on developmental theories, campus environments, organizational theories, and student characteristics—usually one theory at a time. Interactions of a particular student at a certain stage of development for a given theory in a specific campus setting are considered. Rarely, however, are aspiring professionals given the opportunity to consider and choose from many theories, possibly in combination, within a general, more holistic and honest context.

Finally, litigation related to students on college campuses is growing. As U.S. citizens become more consumer oriented and more willing to litigate, so too the college “consumer” as well as his or her parents. Often, at the start of the new millennium, student affairs professionals are involved in a legal defense of themselves and their colleges. Student affairs professionals must continually weigh decisions in light of the culpability of themselves and their institutions. Case-study analysis can provide a format for considering the legal implications surrounding campus decision issues.

Case-study analysis provides a means for consideration of the interactions between many elements of campus life and beyond. The broad perspective of a case study gives students and administrators a realistic opportunity to use theory in action before attempting to apply it in the work setting. In addition to considering students, the case-study analyst must take into account interrelationships among faculty, administrators, and community members in particular campus settings with specific histories, traditions, norms, and values. The idealism of the classroom is suspended while the analyst vicariously enters the college environment of the case study.

This chapter presents case-study analysis as a useful tool for connecting discrete theory and topics studied in student affairs classes to the aggregate reality of the college campus. This book is not intended to be used in lieu of other materials on college students, their growth and development, organizations, and campus environments. Rather, it is intended as a supplement to be used with other sources for the education of those who work or who hope to work with college students. In the remainder of this chapter, some of the difficulties of applying theory in practice are discussed. Then, an argument is made for the use of case studies to link classroom learning with the realities of various campus settings.

A GAP BETWEEN THEORY AND REALITY

A hypothetical example illustrates how creation of theory and research can result in this paradox: Professor Thompson wants to learn about student experiences in the first year of college. She wrote a proposal and was awarded a modest amount of money to conduct a qualitative study of students at the end of their first year of college. From her research she develops a theory of college student satisfaction.

She conducts two, hour-long interviews with 40 students. The format is open ended with a handful of questions forming the basis for information gathering: “What were the most positive aspects of your year on campus?” “What were the most negative?” “If you could choose all over again, would you still choose this college?” “Would you tell a friend to come to school here?” “What would you change about this campus if you could?”

As a result of her study, Thompson has a wealth of information about college students. Consider elements gleaned from three interviews:

Marcus was the first in his family to attend college. Early in the semester he had trouble with his roommate. He now has a new one, and they get along fine. He thinks his family doesn’t really understand how hard college is and how time-consuming the homework can be. He relies on his friends and resident assistant for support. He makes friends easily and particularly enjoys talking to faculty after class about things in which he is interested. Toward the end of the semester he started running out of money and got a job to cover expenses. His grades went down because he couldn’t spend as much time as he needed studying.

Katharine is a basketball player majoring in chemistry. At the beginning of the year she had a hard time making ends meet but began working at the local community Girls’ Club. A month after she came to school her 10-year-old cat died. She almost left college then. Sometimes she feels out of place in her classes full of mostly men, especially when she has to go to lab right before practice and has her warm-ups on. First semester, she had a lab instructor who seemed to like her and who encouraged her to “stick it out” when she was thinking of quitting college. Though she enjoys basketball and has lots of close friends on the team, her athletic obligations take time from her studies. After a rocky start, she earned a higher GPA than she expected first semester.

Chris is a Black student who was admitted to an historically Black college but he decided instead to go to the state university that was closer to home. Sometimes, especially at first, he felt lonely when he was in a class or at an event and he was the only Black student. He soon learned that other Black students were friendly, even if they didn’t know him. He got in the habit of looking for them whenever he was in a new setting. After the first month of school Chris joined a service club. Now, when he is not studying, he is usually involved in community projects like working with kids at a Community Center. The advisor of the club was helpful to him when he needed someone to talk to and didn’t want to worry his parents. He is thankful that his parents provide him with 100% financial support; he has other friends who struggle to pay their expenses. Sometimes, however, his parents expect him to go home on weekends for family occasions and special events at his church. Then he has trouble catching up with his work. He is proud of the fact that he earned a B+ average first semester.

In formulating her theory, Thompson examined what she learned from these students and from 37 others. She looked for commonalities among the findings and carefully noted similarities in students’ descriptions of their first year. Not surprisingly, she developed a theory that revolved around four elements: grades, finances, friends, and relationships with faculty and student affairs professionals.

The process in this research project is not dissimilar to the ways in which many theories of college student behaviors, experiences, and interactions are formulated. The researcher or theorist asks a variety of students to talk about the aspects of college life that were important to their satisfaction, intellectual growth, or other successes. In this case four common elements were mentioned by students over and over again and emerged to form the basis of a theory that would be generalized to all college students. Individuals reading the report would agree that Thompson’s four elements were important to college success. However, readers also would have to agree that important elements of these individual students’ college lives were missed.

The job of the theory builder and some kinds of researchers (like Thompson) is to ignore the finer details of students’ lives. However, the student affairs professional’s job typically is not to ignore those details. This discrepancy is a major cause of the gap between the researchers and theorists and the practitioners.

In addition to the discrepancy described above, student affairs professionals must deal with relatively discrete bodies of knowledge (human development, campus environmental and organizational theories, and college student characteristics) derived almost exclusively from two disciplines—psychology and sociology. Differences in assumptions across the two disciplines also make theory-based practice difficult. While these obstacles to applying theory in practice are formidable, they are not necessarily overwhelming. Case-study analysis provides one means for overcoming these difficulties.

Case-study analysis can provide student affairs staff and students in professional preparation programs with experience in weighing such contextual considerations. Diverse characteristics of students along with other particulars such as characteristics of a specific institution, personalities, and considerations all play a role. Efforts to reach a decision take you, the analyst, from the abstract realm of the classroom or workshop to the concrete domain of reality.

BENEFITS OF CASE-STUDY ANALYSIS

Case-study analysis benefits student affairs administrators as well as students in professional programs in four ways: challenges conventional habits of administrative thought and action; promotes consideration of multiple perspectives; promotes consideration of unique campus environments; and manipulates problems with realistic legal, institutional, and political constraints. Lessons learned along each of these dimensions provide an advantage to the professional who uses theory.

Challenging Habits of Administrative Thought and Action

Administrators cannot easily change their habits of action. Argyris (1976) called such habits, the underlying guides to professional behavior, “theories in use.” Earlier in this chapter was a discussion of some of the difficulties of translating formal theories and newly acquired knowledge into theories in use or personal theories of action. A second difficulty is simply habit. For some administrators, habits of action become second nature. In a crisis situation, they react almost without thinking in a manner that has served them well or adequately in the past. These administrators may not even recognize their behaviors as habits. Beyond that, changing those reactions, even when one wants to, can be difficult (Argyris, 1976). Case-study analysis is an ideal way to begin to challenge and modify theories of action or, in the absence of theories of action, to cultivate positive ones.

An individual’s consideration of a case, examined thoroughly alongside the analyses of others, reveals the value of flexibility in approaching issues. Through rehearsal, student affairs professionals develop the characteristics of a responsive administrator (one who listens to others and “reads” the environment), rather than develop into a reactive administrator.

For example, suppose in a case study an advisor to the student senate is presented with a decision issue. A Pro Life group of students has sought funding for their organization, and it appears that the request will be voted down. The Dean of Students Office has received several calls from politicians and community members who are in favor of the organization. One parent threatened to sue the university if the organization is denied funding.

Perhaps the case-study analyst’s own typical approach in advising student groups is “hands off” except to advise on institutional policy and procedural matters. The analyst, however, must weigh her or his typical response or habit of action (hands off) against the other reasonable alternatives from other analysts that might be more responsive to the campus environment.

Questions that may help challenge negative habits and create positive responses to issues include the following:

What is my first impulse on this issue?

What are the positive implications of that first impulse?

What are possible negative implications of that first impulse?

Are any theories available that might apply to the situation?

By working through issues in several cases, the analyst will gain practice holding impulses or habits of action in check. As such, that habit or impulse will become just one of many options weighed for a more deliberate, less reactive style of administration.

Considering Multiple Perspectives

A student affairs professional advancing to increasingly responsible positions of administration experiences ever-expanding realms with which to be concerned. At the earliest levels, a student affairs administrator is most often concerned with students, a few subordinates, peers, and supervisors. Moving up the hierarchy, he or she experiences not just numerically more, but more complex relationships.

At the middle levels of administration, one moves further away from links with students, and becomes more focused on the student affairs division as well as the web of peer administrators at other campuses. Supervisors remain important and, as a manager, the professional recognizes broader, campus-wide implications of administrative decisions. A chief student affairs officer must consider, in addition to students, not only a host of subordinates and institutional peers (the chief academic and business officers, academic deans, and those in other parallel positions), but also a cadre of regional and national chief student affairs officers. Finally, the president, board of trustees, and key politicians must not be forgotten.

The ca...