Finding my place at ACPA

Finding my place at ACPA

By: Greg King

When I first started in student affairs I thought I was strange. I would sit at my desk and wonder what impact my job was having on my students. “What were they really getting from this program or that conversation?” “At this conduct meeting what actions could I take that would actually stop the person from repeating their bad decision or was there a way I could show recidivism?” “How does the entry of our advising office really encourage students to stay and speak to advisors?” Really, the questions were endless, but I could never quite figure out how to answer them to my liking. I dabbled, playing around with trying to solve them myself. I would rely on my graduate school training, ask too many questions in staff meetings, and create an absurd amount of questionnaires all dedicated to answering the whys, hows, and how do I knows of my career.

I never considered myself an “assessment person”. Honestly, I just wanted to know that I was making an impact and that my intentional programs and conversations were having their intended effect. As my positions changed and I found myself constantly asking people how we know what we know, I ended up being the person who everyone said, “well you tell us how we know what we think we know.” I thought I was just the person who asked the questions, but now I was becoming the person who needed to know how to find the answers, or at least ask the questions in a more efficient way that garnered useful results.

This is why I attended the ACPA Assessment Institute. I found people that were willing to teach me the “how” to ask the “why” or the “what”. Outside the sessions I found an entire area of Student Affairs bent on helping practitioners define what they know and why the know it. I found a place where I could “nerd out” on how to use usage data in a meaningful way and how to create systems where assessment was an automatic, rather than an afterthought. In the sessions I honed my ability to write outcomes, rubrics, surveys, and create “in class” or “in session” assessments to make sure my stated goal was the actual result.

My scholarship allowed me to find a fit in the field I love. It spurred me on to my own goal of furthering my education. It taught me the tools to be better at understanding the impact of my day-to-day interactions. In the end I found that I am, regardless of any stated title in my position description, an assessment professional. 

Greg King is an advisor in Student Activities and Leadership Programs at Portland State University and a future Ph.D. student in Educational Research and Policy Analysis at North Carolina State University.  He was a 2014 participant in our Student Affairs Assessment Institute and a current Commission for Assessment and Evaluation Directorate Board Member.  You can reach Greg via Twitter @gregorybjking 

Find more information about the 2015 Student Affiars Assessment Institute HERE