Contested Issues in Troubled Times: Student Affairs Dialogues on Equity, Civility, and Safety

Contested Issues in Troubled Times provides student affairs educators with frameworks to constructively think about and navigate the contentious climate they are increasingly encountering on campus.The 54 contributors address the book’s overarching question: How do we create an equitable climate conducive to learning in a dynamic environment fraught with complexity and a socio-political context characterized by escalating intolerance, incivility, and overt discrimination?Rather than attempting to offer readers definitive solutions, this book illustrates the possibilities and promise of acknowledging multiple approaches to addressing contentious issues, articulating a persuasive argument anchored in professional judgment, listening attentively to others for points of connection as well as divergence, and drawing upon new ways of thinking to foster safe and inclusive campuses.Among the issues this volume addresses are such topics as sexual violence; historically underrepresented racial and ethnic groups; transgender and undocumented students; the professional skills, knowledge and/or dispositions needed to thrive and facilitate systemic change in contemporary higher education organizations; the implications of maintaining personal and professional identities via social media; and self-care.In this companion volume to Contested Issues in Student Affairs (whose issues remain as relevant today as they were upon publication in 2011), a new set of contributors explore new questions which foreground issues of equity, safety, and civility – themes which dominate today’s higher education headlines and campus conversations.The book concludes with calls to action, encouraging student affairs educators to exhibit the moral courage needed to critically examine routine practices that (un)knowingly perpetuate inequity and enact the foundational values and principles upon which the student affairs profession was founded.

Table of Contents:
Foreword—Lori D. Patton Preface—Peter M. Magolda, Marcia B. Baxter Magolda, and Rozana Carducci Acknowledgments Companion Social Media Opportunities—Nick Rathbone Part One. Introduction 1. Why Is It So Hard for the Student Affairs Profession to Foster Inclusive Environments for Learning? • Bonding and Bridging for Community and Democracy—Penny Rue • History Matters. Against Romanticizing Student Affairs' Role in Inclusion—Dafina-Lazarus (D-L. Stewart 2. How Do Student Affairs Educators Help Students Learn to Engage Productively in Difficult Dialogue? • Learning Dialogic Skills for Effective Campus Conversations—Kelly E. Maxwell and Monita C. Thompson • Systemic Integration of Dialogic Skills. An Opportunity for Student Affairs/Academic Affairs Partnerships—Jeannie Brown Leonard Part Two. Cultivating Inclusive Learning Environments. Equity, Civility and Safety 3. How Should Institutions Address Student Demands Related to Campus Racial Climate? • To Address Today’s Student Demands for Racial Justice, Institutions Must Shift From Multiculturalism to Polyculturalism—Ajay Nair • Critical Considerations in Advancing Social Justice Agendas in Higher Education—Samuel D. Museus 4. What Are the Responsibilities and Limits of Student Affairs’ Roles in Preparing Students for Political Activism? • Student Affairs Educators’ Brokering Role in Political Activism—Sandra Rodríguez • Brokering Students’ Political Activism. Expanding Student Affairs Professionals’ Views—Cassie L. Barnhardt 5. What Does It Mean for Student Affairs Educators to Establish Safe and Just Responses to Campus Sexual Violence? • Moving Beyond Policy to Address Campus Sexual Violence—Chris Linder • Abating Campus Sexual Violence Requires a Multifaceted Approach—Frank Shushok Jr. 6. How Do Student Affairs Educators Navigate the Tension Between the First Amendment Right to Free Speech and the Expression of Ideas That Create a Hostile Campus Climate? • Free Expression, Civic Education, and Inclusive Campuses—Rafael E. Alvarado • Balancing Free Speech and Inclusive Campus Environments. A Worthy Yet Complicated Commitment—Naomi Daradar Sigg 7. How Should Institutions Redefine and Measure Student Success? • Student Success as Liberal Education Escapes Definition and Measurement—Laura Elizabeth Smithers • Redefining Student Success to Foster More Inclusive Learning Environments—Molly Reas Hall 8. What Are the Risks of Assuming the Sharing of Proper Pronouns Is a Best Practice for Trans* Inclusion? • More Than Pronouns. Problematizing Best Practices of Trans* Inclusion—Kathryn S. Jaekel and D. Chase J. Catalano • What Happens to a Dream Deferred?. Sharing Proper Pronouns as an Act of Gender Self-Determination—Z Nicolazzo 9. How Should Institutions Support Students With Marginalized Identities? What Practices Are Essential for the Establishment of Safe and Inclusive Learning Environments? • What is Equitable?—Engaging the Four Is of Oppression to Support Students of Color—Jonathan A. McElderry and Stephanie Hernandez Rivera • Intersectionality, Culture, and Mentoring. Critical Needs for Student Affairs Educators—Julie A. Manley White 10. What Role Should Student Affairs Educators Play in Supporting Undocumented Students in the Current Political Climate? • Confronting Anti-Immigration Rhetoric on Campus. A Student Affairs Imperative—Susana M. Muñoz • Emphasizing Institution-Wide Strategies to Support Undocumented Students in Higher Education—Maria Sanchez Luna and Mei-Yen Ireland 11. How Does Social Class Influence Student Learning and the Work of Student Affairs Educators? • Social Class Complexities in Curricular and Cocurricular Learning. Options Do Not Mean Access—Sonja Ardoin • Disrupting Educational Privilege. Partnering With Students and Communities to Create True Inclusion—Angela Cook 12. What Is the Role of Student Affairs Educators in Helping Students Whose Learning Is Complicated by Experiencing Trauma? • Navigating the Complex Space of Supporting Student Survivors of Trauma—Tricia R. Shalka • A Focus on Relational and Narrative Aspects of Trauma. Challenges and Opportunities for Higher Education—Kelli D. Zaytoun 13. Why Is Religion a Difficult Issue In American Higher Education and How Should Student Affairs Respond? • Balancing Competing Interests Through Principled Practice—P. Jesse Rine and Brian D. Reed • Supporting Interfaith Climates and Outcomes. Considerations and Practices for Student Affairs Educators—Benjamin S. Selznick 14. What Is the Student Affairs Educator’s Role in Navigating Tensions Between Legislative Action and Institutional Policy? • From Guns to Transgender Students’ Rights. When Policy and Personal Positions Do Not Align—Amelia Parnell and Jill Dunlap • Passion and Policy. How Student Affairs Educators Navigate Their Roles in the Face of Legislative Restrictions—R. Bradley Johnson Part Three. Cultivating Professional Capacities to Foster Inclusive Learning Environments 15. Given the Complexity Associated With Fostering Equitable, Civil, and Safe Learning Environments, How Should Graduate Preparation Programs Prepare Students to Work in Higher Education? • Advancing Power- and Identity-Conscious Student Affairs Graduate Programs—Rosemary J. Perez • A Systemic Approach to Enacting Equitable, Civil, and Safe Learning Environments—Jessica C. Harris 16. What Professional Development Opportunities Are Necessary to Ensure that Professionals Have the Capacities and Competencies to Make Good Decisions When Faced With the Unknown? • Trust Your Instincts, Pack a Compass, and Never Hike Alone—Cynthia H. Love • Professional Development as a Healing Community Practice—Michelle M. Espino 17. What Responsibility Does Student Affairs Have to Help Graduate Assistants Navigate the Ambiguity Between Their Student and Professional Roles? • Navigating Two Worlds. Supporting Graduate Students in Their Dual Roles as Students and Professionals—Jessica Gunzburger • Caught in the Middle. A Stable Anchor for Graduate Students Amid a Discursive Struggle—Hoa Bui 18. How Should Student Affairs Professional Preparation Programs Address Discrimination and Bias in the Graduate Classroom? • No Struggle, No Progress. The Complexities of Pre-Tenure Minoritized Faculty Addressing Bias, Discrimination, and Oppression in Student Affairs Graduate Preparation Programs—David Pérez II • You Are Not Alone. Graduate Preparation Programs’ Responsibility and Commitment to Addressing Discrimination and Bias in Classrooms and Beyond—Bridget Turner Kelly 19. What Is the Value of Student Affairs Research as It Relates to Issues of Equity, Civility, and Safety? • The Value and Disconnect of Student Affairs Research Related to Equity, Civility, and Safety—JoNes R. VanHecke • Considering the Practical Usefulness of Higher Education Research and Theory in Promoting Equity, Civility, and Safety—Nicholas A. Bowman 20. How Can/Should Student Affairs Educators Use Assessment to Improve Educational Practices Related to Equity, Civility, and Safety? • Using Deconstructed Assessment to Address Issues of Equity, Civility, and Safety on College Campuses—Gavin W. Henning • Assessment as Power. Using Our Privilege to Center the Student Voice—Abby C. Trout 21. What Would It Take for Student Affairs Educators to Facilitate a Personal Learning Design Approach That Enhances Equity, Civility, and Safety? • Pursuing Equity, Civility, and Safety Through Personal Learning Design—Taran Cardone • A Personal Learning Design Approach. Are Student Affairs Educators Ready?—Matthew R. Johnson 22. How Do Student Affairs Educators Integrate Personal and Professional Identities in Digital Spaces/Social Media? • Orchestrated in Harmony or Forced With a Disconnect—Josie Ahlquist • Speaking Up. How Student Affairs Professionals of Color Navigate Social Media with Authenticity—Julia R. Golden 23. What Does It Mean for Student Affairs Educators to Maintain Self-Care in Turbulent Times? • Practicing Self-Care Is a Radical Notion in Student Affairs and It Shouldn’t Be—Tiffany J. Davis • More Than Consumption. Creating Space for Self-Care in Higher Education—Shamika N. Karikari Part Four. Epilogue 24. What Is the Promise/Potential of the Student Affairs Profession to Foster Inclusive Environments for Learning? • Putting Potential to Work—Susan R. Jones • It’s the Means, Not the Ends. Incorporating Humanity Into Our Practice—Craig R. Berger Contributors Index