By Melanie Rabine-Johnson, Academic Resources and Retention Specialist

Has anyone ever asked you “where do you see yourself in 5 years?”

It’s one of those classic icebreaker questions or interview questions I think I’ve heard a million times in my life. So many people have asked me. And folks seem to want to hear stuff like “oh! I see myself with a family, and my dream job, and maybe a beach house somewhere off a coast” blah blah blah. It’s a question for dreamers and planners and go-getters. And if I can be totally honest with you now, it’s one of my least favorite questions to answer.

Maybe you can tell by my tone, but I’m not a dreamer – I can’t remember a time I ever actually was. I’m more of a pragmatist – a down-to-earth realist who looks one foot ahead so I don’t trip, so you could say. I did like to play pretend when I was a kid; “Let’s pretend we live in a cabin” I’d say to my little sister. “We forage for berries and we have to make dinner before the sun goes down.” Lots of Little House on the Prairie content at my childhood home. I was good at imagining myself in another time, but I’d always go backward – prairie homes, castles, living in the wilderness. I didn’t really look far into the future that much, and I still don’t. Looking forward requires faith, hope, and confidence.

I may be a grown-up by all social metrics; but I still struggle with faith, hope, and confidence. Most days, the future scares me – I can’t see it, I don’t know what will happen along the way, and I struggle when heartbreak or disappointment cuts me off on my path. It’s not inspiring to say this, but I’ve experienced a lot of tragic chaos in my life – stuff that shows up with now obvious trail of “well, I did this so this happened next, now I’m stuck with this.” When surprise sadness or loss or diversion or roadblock thunks down in front of you often enough, it’s hard to feel safe committing to a plan that depends on consistent success and achievement. Thus far, I’ve just preferred making sure I know what’s happening around me and that I’m safe, happy, and content.

I mentioned a few episodes ago that my freshman year in college was the start of a great recession in American society – this was a time when daydreaming and planning sort of just ended up looking like “how do I become as nimble, adaptive, and amorphous as possible so I’m not confined to an industry or job that might cease to exist once I get there?” That sort of mentality doesn’t inspire a lot of hope and confidence (chuckle). When you don’t have much faith in the future, it’s hard to make a plan for it.

But I do like to know where I am – I observe everything around me. I like to know the rules of a room, the customs of a group of people, and the expectations of my participation. Some people call this introverted behavior – I wanna know what’s going on before I play. I want to know how to be prepared for my doctor’s appointment tomorrow. I want to know what to wear to my friend’s wedding in 6 months. And I want to know when I need to get the oil changed in my car before my engine croaks on me. All of these plans are things I crave and know how to handle. In order to make sure I feel safe, happy, and content, I don’t like to dream about 5 years from now; but I like to know what I need to do right now to be okay for tomorrow.

A sort of kin-activity to this drive I have to be okay “in the now” at the college level is knowing what classes I need to take – making sure that I’m following the rules or achieving something as I sign up for classes and pass them. It’s making sure I know what I’m doing now and that it’s setting me up alright for next year’s classes and that those classes set me up okay for the next year and so on.

In our academic advising office, we call this “degree planning”; academic advisors aim to help students make informed choices about degree and graduation requirements. That means we can help clarify curriculum, course content, and right-for-you course sequences. We also walk students through the many types of educational experiences they can have that make their college experience as rich and fulfilling as they want. These sorts of activities help students feel focused, grounded, and safe.

For instance, instead of thinking far out about your future and imagining what house you want, what city you want to live in, or what car you’re going to be driving, you can focus on which science class is best for you according to what your major requires and where your interests lie. I was an English major in college – I was responsible for taking A LOT of reading and writing classes, but I also had to finish the general education requirements at GVSU; so, I had to think about some other kinds of classes too. For me, honestly, I didn’t want to take a science class – I avidly avoided them when I could in high school. So, I decided to take two science classes that my advisor recommended to me as “you know, science classes for people who don’t like science that much.” I thought “perfect! That’s exactly who I am.”

And then when it came down to picking classes within my major – all those reading and writing classes – it was almost a challenge to figure out how to fit all the classes I wanted. I knew I couldn’t afford to take all the classes I wanted; I didn’t have the time or money for that. So my advisors would help talk to me about what my interests actually were so we could filter the courses out that didn’t match as much as others.

And when it came down to thinking about graduation, my advisor helped me imagine what final things I’d like to accomplish before I had to leave school, which brought us to a conversation about studying abroad. I had never traveled before and definitely hadn’t dreamed of traveling – it was expensive, unaffordable, and something rich people did…which I certainly never was. But my advisor talked to me about the tuition costs being the same as tuition at GVSU, the travel costs being covered by my financial aid, and that some programs are only 6 weeks long, so I can try traveling without risking severe homesickness, since it was my first time away from home. In order to pull off studying abroad in this way, I had to talk to my advisor about applying for financial aid, knowing what courses to sign up for in the system, and making sure that the classes I’d be taking overseas were still interesting and meaningful to me. And it was a thrilling plan to design.

Even now as I’m thinking about my days doing that, I realize that degree planning for me was a way my pragmatist-brain could handle hope – I get excited thinking about being able to design my life around stuff that matters to me. I feel inspired by the security of a plan for 6 months from now.

Whether you feel like a dreamer or a pragmatist, I think it’s safe to say that degree planning makes space for you – it’s an activity that can be as small as you need or as big as you want. For me, it was a “one to two years at a time” thing – which was perfect. Just enough planning to feel achievable and just enough looking down to feel like I could make it out okay. But just like every other way your advisor is here to help you, it’s supposed to be your way and to suit your needs.

For me, I needed safety. For you, you might need inspiration. Regardless, making a degree plan with your advisor will help you chart your own path and know what your next steps are to achieve your dreams. It might look like taking one step at a time – one foot in front of the other — but each step is one more step toward that distant future where we sometimes can’t picture ourselves five years from now. 

Hosted by Melanie Rabine-Johnson, Academic Resources and Retention Specialist

Jennifer Torreano

Jennifer Torreano (she/her) is the Director of the Knowledge Market for the Grand Valley State University Libraries. She earned her Master’s degree in higher education at GVSU. Jennifer is responsible for the Library Research Center and the coordination of the Knowledge Market, a collaborative partnership between the Library Research Center, Digital Creator Lab, Writing Center, and Speech Lab. Her research interests include peer learning, student development, and the intersections of cognitive bias and information literacy.

Contact Jennifer

Adult Learning and Cognitive Dissonance

There is a unique component to learning for adults than it would be if we were working with children -- the fact that many adults have prior knowledge, beliefs, and biases. All of our students will have come from past learning experiences that have informed how they view the world, how they take in new information, and how they decide what to focus on or reject. As academic advisors, we are involved in the environment of adult learning, and it's helpful to understand the relationship between adult learning and cognitive dissonance.

What is cognitive dissonance?

Cognitive dissonance is a psychological term that describes the discomfort or tension that arises from holding two or more contradictory beliefs, attitudes, or behaviors simultaneously, or when there is a discrepancy between beliefs and actions. This theory was proposed by psychologist Leon Festinger in 1957.

Cognitive dissonance becomes very important when someone is learning something new, especially when it challenges something integral to their sense of self or reality (Verywell Mind).

How does cognitive dissonance relate to academic advising?

Your advisor is trained to be able to sit with and accompany you through your cognitive dissonance -- when you are experiencing new information that is in conflict with your prior belief, attitude, or behavior. At this point in your educational journey, you could either accept the new information or reject it. You can learn something new or can reinforce something from before.

As an academic advisor, they should do the following things to support you:

• Offer compassion and empathy -- it is difficult to learn something new, and it is uncomfortable to experience the tension that can come along with it.
• Encourage growth -- learning new things is hard, but it doesn't have to be painful. Growth can come from new information.
• Model critical thinking -- offer strategies for knowing what to do with new or old information. Not all information is the same, and critical thinking helps us make informed, ethical, personally fortifying decisions.
• Don't force it; Inform -- pay attention to the student's behavior and mood. Learning is important, but it doesn't need to happen at your pace. Allow for the student to understand the boundaries, realities, and rules around the new information (if necessary), and then allow them to move at the pace they determine.
  • **We all know that finishing assignments on time positively impacts a student's grade. Sharing the realities of the situation is providing information that will help a student make their own decision. Don't force them to do their homework. Let them know what's at stake if they don't do their homework.

Want to learn more? Browse these!

• Mintz, S. (13 June 2022). "Leveraging cognitive dissonance to enhance student learning: How to strengthen students' critical thinking skills and metacognitive abilities. Insider Higher Ed. Online
• **Torreano, J. (2021). "How research consultants can encourage student intellectual development." Books and Contributions to Books. 29. https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/library_books/29

By Melanie Rabine-Johnson, Academic Resources and Retention Specialist

When I decided to go to college, it was 2007. The world looked a bit different from what it does now – I had a flip phone and a yahoo messenger account. The iPhone just launched, and Blackberry didn’t know what was coming. My friends and I ripped music from YouTube and Limewire. We had MySpace accounts and Xanga pages and Facebook had just opened to non-college students – we didn’t have SnapChat, TikTok, or Instagram. Gas was under $2 a gallon, and nobody was talking about gluten. But some things weren’t so different – There were two Michigan seasons: winter and construction. Stuff went viral on the internet. Survivor was on TV. There was war in the middle east, long presidential campaigns, economic distress, and a looming recession.

In 2007, I was graduating from high school and choosing a college. And for me, college was about opportunity. I grew up in a modest suburban West Michigan town with two blue-collar parents, a driveway and a yard, small-town festivals, and conservative politics. The idea of going to college was sort of taboo in my household – there, it was considered a waste of money with no realistic application to the kind of life ahead of me – my parents hadn’t gotten college degrees and saw more value in entering the workforce right away. But all around me, people like my parents were getting laid off, losing their jobs, losing their homes…and college seemed like, at best, a way forward…and at least, a delay, of sorts. If I could just sit on the side of life for a little while, maybe I’d find a way out – a way to protect myself from what I saw my parents going through at the start of what would be a terrible recession.

See, in my small modest conservative town with front yards, cheap gas, and limited tech, the people I saw who had the most safety were people with financial security; these folks had white collar jobs and college educations. My parents were hard workers doing what they loved, but that seemed risky to me – what if the work wasn’t there next year? What if the job market shrunk until people like my parents were left out in the cold?

In my mind, college was my escape from poverty which meant getting that elusive white collar job I would have to prove I deserved despite my background.

And if you can relate, maybe you can relate to how much pressure I felt – I felt like the weight of my future was on my shoulders. My finances, my job, my family…all of it depended on me being successful in college so I could find safety and security for my future.

And being successful in college, to me, was a continuation of what success in high school looked like to me. It meant getting good enough grades to not just graduate, but to demonstrate to future employers that I had an aptitude to learn – that I could be trusted with great responsibility because “See! I can work hard at something and do really well! It doesn’t matter that I am a first-generation college student – I am smart, and hard working, and got good grades in college!” In my mind, it was imperative that I be successful in college so that I was better set up to feel safer in life than what I saw my parents going through.

In my mind, if I could just get good grades, pick the right major, and graduate on time, then I’d be fine – but, I didn’t understand college very much. I had done high school, so I understood that. And in high school, I did my homework privately at home, went to class every day, paid attention to my teachers, and took the tests I needed to take when the teachers told me to. I sort of did it all on my own. And those were the skills I brought to college – I did my homework alone in my dorm. I went to class every day and listened, and I took the tests I was supposed to take. But I was feeling very stressed, and if I'm being super honest, I was feeling really depressed too.

And I felt very stressed and depressed for about three years. I was working almost full time, going to school full time, getting As and Bs in every class, but I was out-of-my-mind-stressed-out and truly feeling empty and lost on the inside.

And then, I sat down with my Faculty Mentor in the English Department who told me about a student success opportunity at the GVSU Writing Center. Now, when I was an undergraduate student, I had a faculty advisor who was an expert on my major. And this man sat me down and told me that the “real world” was so much more than just what grades I was getting in college. He told me that I had an opportunity in college to try things, meet people, and discover more about myself than just performing good grades for my transcripts. He told me that he noticed my joy when talking about writing with my peers in class. And then, he told me that I should apply for a job at the Writing Center because it would give me a chance to do work that I seemed to be good at – which is talking to people about writing.

And he wasn’t wrong – I did like talking to people about writing. But I didn’t see working at the Writing Center as being something that related to my future career…mostly because I saw a job on campus as a means to an end, and I already had a job like that at my local ice cream shop. But he said something that really stuck out to me – he suggested that I try doing something that was connected to what I enjoy. He asked me to consider maybe not looking too far ahead right now and just look around at where I was – to look at who I was. And where I was and who I was at that time was stressed and depressed. I was lacking joy.

He introduced me to the idea that being successful in college was not just about how my activities affect some hypothetical future…success was also about discovering and engaging with what I want right now that feels fulfilling, exciting, and joyful.

See, up to that point, I had defined academic success as “good grades = good job = good future.” But what I needed to hear – what made more sense for me, was thinking about academic success as the stuff that helped me feel confident and curious and fulfilled in the now.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), working adults in the United States change jobs about 12 times in their lives. Being successful in college can be the stuff you choose to do that sets you up for future career success – like, getting good grades, networking with community professionals, joining clubs, or doing projects related to your future. But it can also look like self development. No matter how many times you change jobs, you will be you. I had to learn that a successful college experience for me was the activities I did to develop my core beliefs, my passions, and my sense of fulfillment. 

So, I did end up working as a student writing consultant for the GVSU writing center. And I felt joyful, and fulfilled, and excited about what was going on in my life in the present. And you know what? It wasn’t just a means to an end – working at the writing center was not just a personally fulfilling job, it was also where I made lifelong friends, where I found a new major, and how I got set up for a career in higher education – which is where I find myself today.

I look back on how much pressure I felt in my Freshman year back in 2007, and I just wish I could go back there and hug the young me. I wish I could tell her that the amount of external weight she was carrying, worrying about good grades and a good job, would be supported by a core of joy and passion and community – all the stuff I discovered when I decided to change how I viewed academic success when making it my own.

Maybe it’ll be different for you – but in the end, if I can share one thing with you, I’d say – keep an open mind about what success looks like for you. It might be different than what you expected.