Re-piecing Student Affairs

The process of restructuring the Division of Student Affairs is scheduled for completion by July 1, said Vice President for Student Affairs Kaye Patten Wallace.

The restructuring seeks to situate about 100 staff members within the division into positions in a way that "maximizes [their] potentials, backgrounds, experiences and resources ... [with attention to ensuring] that students' needs are met," she said.

In order to better accomplish this, students are being invited into the process. By July 1, two student focus groups will have convened, and administrators will set in motion a series of other outreach initiatives to students, she said, adding that the student input will help shape the reorganization process.

In the wake of student protests regarding the release of six employees from Student Affairs in late April, Patten Wallace and Interim Dean of Students Michele Martinez decided to hold a student focus group over the summer to address concerns.

A number of students requested that another group convene before the end of the spring semester, despite the scheduling difficulties created by exams.

The first focus group met in May and consisted of 15 students who were invited by UT staff. It was facilitated by Great Lakes Marketing and lasted for 75 minutes.

According to a report generated by the consulting firm, nearly all of the students held senior leadership positions in student organizations, ranged from sophomores to graduate students and lived both on and off campus.

The report also noted the focus group members understood the need for budget reductions but saw problems with both the decision process leading up to the terminations as well as the nature of the terminations.

Students involved in the group said they recognized they couldn't have had a role in making personnel decisions, but could have offered "insightful, fair and informed suggestions for [the] restructuring" of positions before any division cuts were implemented, according to the report. These students said they were not consulted at all before staff members were laid off.

Another theme of the complaints in the report was a belief that the six employees lost in the cuts were taking with them an invaluable amount of institutional knowledge and experience. The students also asserted that the staff members were among the few "advocates for students" within Student Affairs.

Patten Wallace disagreed with the assessment.

"The [Division of Student Affairs] has a whole staff, so we want students to know there are multiple people here who can assist them in multiple ways with multiple things," she said.

"[Our] staff [is] trained in many areas with many backgrounds, but they all come from student development theory," she said. "So the point is, they have skill sets that can be applied in Residence Life, the Dean of Students Office, the Office of Multicultural Student Services, et cetera."

She said while not every staff member will have an answer to every question, they will be able to direct students to those colleagues or resources that do.

The focus group members said the absence of these six individuals creates more work for them and other students in organizational leadership roles on campus. However, they acknowledged more student involvement in the organizations would ease the workload on the student leaders. They attributed low student interest in groups like Student Government to marginalization by administrators, according to the report.

The lack of a clear plan for restructuring also worried the students participating in the focus group, especially since so many position eliminations occurred in such concentrated areas.

When focus group facilitators asked what the students needed to move forward, they offered a number of suggestions to administrators.

Among them was the development of a manual instructing students how to plan events or start groups as well as the creation of an organization chart to indicate which divisional staff member will work with each organization. The students also asked that training be made available for organization advisers to help them understand their roles and offer guidance.

The group asked that Patten Wallace better advocate for students, involve them in decision-making and attend student events to gain knowledge needed for her position.

The report ends by noting the students' fears that if these issues aren't improved, the consequences will include lower levels of student engagement and lower retention rates.

In response to these suggestions, Patten Wallace said her office will pursue a number of efforts to assist students, such as hosting monthly town halls to discuss matters pertaining to Student Affairs. These will be regularly scheduled, openly advertised and will be held at times and places convenient for students, she said. She also said she will attend Student Senate meetings at least once a month.

A Student Affairs Advisory Council, comprised of single representatives from each recognized organization on campus, will also be created to facilitate discussion between students and divisional administrators. Facebook, too, will be utilized as a means of correspondence between these administrators and students.

"The one thing that came across clearly to me [from the focus group] is the need to have ongoing input and communication with students," Patten Wallace said. "I don't think we ever want to have a plan [and regard it as concrete]. I think it is something that evolves, and [can] constantly be tweaked."

Finally, an organizational chart will be drafted and a greater focus on training organizational advisers will be exercised, she said.

Some students who first participated in the April protests responded positively to these plans.

"I think the attempt to increase methods of getting information to and from students is fantastic," SG President Krystal Weaver said. "I also think we need to remember that [collecting student input] doesn't mean anything if [administrators] don't value that information and take it seriously."