Directorate Board Introduction: Xiao Yun Sim

Directorate Board Introduction: Xiao Yun Sim

Tell us about yourself and your role within the Commission.

Hello everyone! My name is Xiao Yun Sim, and my role within the Commission is  a member-at-large. As I am writing this post, I am in the midst of starting year 2 of graduate school at University of Nebraska-Lincoln in the Educational Administration -Student Affairs program. I’m an international student from Malaysia and I am excited to be able to serve in the Directorate Board and learn more about the efforts of international perspectives within ACPA. Currently I am shadowing our blog editor’s role as I am interested in transitioning to that position within the Commission in the future. We are working in reimagining our blog posts and video series which we are excited to share to everyone in the near future. I can’t wait to meet more people within the community and network!

You have studied and lived in the US before you started your graduate program. Did it make it any easier being an international student in your grad program? Tell us what it was like to be an international student in your grad program.

Having completing my Bachelor’s degree in US and in the same university as I am doing my graduate program, it definitely did help make my transition to graduate school a little easier as I am more accustomed to the American education, and the culture and community here. However I completed my bachelors in Music performance and Psychology which did not have anything related to higher education. When I started my graduate program in Educational Administration, there were another set of challenges that arise that I had to overcome.

Xiao Yun and her two cohort mates, Kali and Amelia-Marie presented at a conference in their first year of graduate school.

My graduate program is designed to have discussion based conversations rather than assignment based like undergraduate programs. I had to adjust to being comfortable speaking and facilitating discussions, and sharing my thoughts in a “brave zone”. The American Higher Education context is also another challenge that I face when I am in the program. All the contents were so focused on having the historical piece or in general context of U.S. that I had a hard time understanding at the beginning. I would highly recommend folks to check out articles from Inside Higher Ed. or The Chronicles of Higher Education. That is a good starting point for me to start reading and learning more about higher education/student affairs.

There are so many functional areas within higher education, which one are you most interested in and why?

This is definitely a tough question for me! I do have a list of Top 5 functional areas within higher education that I am interested in pursuing a career in, but currently the one that I am most interested in is Orientation programs. Orientation programs is what sparked my interest in deciding to pursue a Master’s degree in higher education, and my involvement with them has made me grow so much, and provided me with ample memories in college that I never thought I would experience. I want to be able to be that “person” that would be able to bring positive impact to students in the future, and if the opportunity is there to work in international orientation.

Xiao Yun and her colleagues working during New Student Orientation as professional staff

Even though my assistantship within the university is with Student Unions, my summer internship that I am currently completing virtually is with Orientation programs at Purdue University. I have come to learn that how different universities does their orientation programs differently, but they have the same goal that is to help incoming students successfully transition into life in college. This experience once again solidifies my intention to work in orientation programs in the future.

However who knows what will happen when I graduate in a year? I might have a change of heart when you next ask me which functional area am I interested in. No matter which area that I end up going into, what I know is that skills that I’ve developed and have will be transferrable into any areas, and that’s the beauty of Higher education / student affairs. My ultimate goal is to be able to serve students and set them up for success.