Committee Members From This Past Year

• Jennie Glynn (Co-Chair)
• Julie Amon-Mattox (Co-Chair)
• Mike Stoll (Member)
• Audra Pretty-Smith (Member)
• Delaney Deisig (CSAL Graduate Student Member)

Vacancies for F21/W22

CSAL Graduate Student Position (1 year term)

As the inaugural committee, what things did you learn as a group?

At the beginning of the 2020-2021 academic year, the LAAN Executive Committee met with the Standards Committee to initiate our committee formation and provide our expectations for the year. At this time, we were tasked with tackling the work of assessment of academic advising at GVSU. All members of our committee had no prior experience with assessment work, so this was a new challenge and learning area for us all.
Much of the fall 2020 semester was spent learning about the University Assessment Committee and the assessment timeline at GVSU. Throughout the semester, we met with members of UAC to learn more about the current ‘Co-curricular and Advising Task Force report’ and recommendations. By the end of fall semester, it was determined that our primary role as a committee might be to act as a liaison between the Advising Centers and the University Assessment Committee, in an effort to make assessment more accessible, approachable, meaningful, and easily reportable.

What accomplishments did your committee achieve during this past academic year? Projects and initiatives worked on?

In February 2021, two members of our committee attended the virtual NACADA Assessment of Academic Advising Institute. During this 2.5 day conference, we learned several best practices for assessment, including ways to create meaningful student learning outcomes and how to easily collect data for those outcomes. As part of the conference, we also met with one of the faculty members within NACADA to create a specific plan of action for our committee moving forward. During this meeting, we determined that our immediate next steps should include bringing other stakeholders at GVSU into our conversation, to ensure our future work aligns with the needs and expectations of the Senior Leadership Team and Advising Center Directors.
We have since met with Suzeanne Benet, Associate Vice President of Academic Affairs, to review our current shared student-centered outcomes, and discuss ways that our assessment work can support retention and graduation rates at the University. In addition, we have met with Julie Henderleiter, UAC Chair, to review ways that our work can be meaningful to advisors, but also manageable and consistently reported between centers. Our next step will be speaking with the Advising Center Directors at the May 2021 University Academic Advising Leadership Council meeting. During this time, we hope to review our current shared student-centered outcomes, and determine if these are worth keeping for the next strategic plan cycle, or if new outcomes should be created. As a committee, we will bring ideas for alternative shared student-centered outcomes.

What work will you carry over that was unfinished to the next academic year?

Following our UAALC discussion, we hope to provide 1-2 shared professional development opportunities to LAAN members about assessment, during summer and/or fall 2021. Since assessment can be a daunting and foreign task to many, we plan to provide one session that provides a basic overview of what assessment is, what the timeline and process looks like, and why it should be important for all academic advisors. As a follow up, we hope to provide a second session that will focus more on creating student centered outcomes and ways to measure and collect that data. The details of these two sessions are yet to be finalized, and may differ based on conversation and recommendations from the UAALC meeting.
Looking ahead to the 2021-2022 academic year, we strive to serve as a resource to all Advising Centers for assessment work, and act as a liaison between UAC and Advising Centers. This will ensure our work is meeting UAC expectations and that centers are receiving the guidance and support they need to efficiently and effectively do the work.

How did COVID-19 impact your committee work this year?

This year, COVID-19 primarily impacted the way our meetings were conducted. While we’ve all worked remotely, we have been able to meet several times throughout the semester via Zoom. As our committee membership is spread through all GVSU campuses, Zoom has allowed us to meet easily without travel. In addition, the fact that the NACADA Assessment Institute was virtual allowed us to attend and receive funding, as physical travel was not permitted this year.