Learning Outcome Narrative - Strengths

Running head: LEARNING OUTCOME NARRATIVE: STRENGTHS 1

Amy Bergstrom

SDA Program E-Portfolio

Learning Outcome Narrative: Strengths

LEARNING OUTCOME NARRATIVE: STRENGTHS 2

Strengths (LO 2, 5, 6, 7, & 8; Artifacts C1, C3, D, E, F2, G, & J)

Through my time in the Student Development Administration (SDA) program, I have

come to understand that one of my biggest strengths is curiosity. When I took the Gallup (2014)

StrengthsFinder assessment, my top strength was identified as Learner, and the description of

that strength resonated with me: Whatever the subject, you will always be drawn to the process

of learning. The process, more than the content or the result, is especially exciting for you

(Learner, para. 1). Of course, the content also interests me, and overall, I think my inherent

curiosity about the field of student development will be a great asset as I move forward in the

field. Systematic inquiry, identified by Blimling and Whitt (1999) as an important practice in

student affairs, is fed by curiosity. This concept encompasses how I learn about students and

adapt services, develop leadership in myself and others, and synthesize the story.

Learn About Students and Adapt Services (LO 2 & 5; Artifacts C3, D, & J)

This dimension of my strength is a combination of SDA learning outcomes (LO) 2,

understanding students and student issues, and 5, adapting student services to specific

environments and cultures. Before the program, I had no experience with college students,

although I did spend many years mentoring junior high and high school students. I did not realize

all there was to know about college student development, and I had a narrow understanding of

higher education based on my experience as a traditional-aged, highly involved student.

I have come to realize that understanding students and student issues means

understanding students broadly, understanding specific populations, and understanding the types

of issues students may be facing during college. Although I am skeptical of generalizing theories

that were formulated around studying one population, often White men, to all students, it is

important for me to understand the foundational theories of student development such as


Chickering (1969), Perry (1968), and Kohlberg (1981, all cited in Evans, Forney, Guido, Patton,

& Renn, 2010). But in addition to learning these, the Theory course helped me to take a critical

look at them and to seek opportunities to learn about specific student populations, whose

experiences might not be represented in traditional theories.

Many of my projects throughout the program have focused on this aspect of

understanding students, particularly from a cultural wealth (Yosso, 2005) perspective. I

developed a workshop about students of color on campuses, examined the experiences of student

athletes in service-learning, and completed a project on adult students who have other

marginalized identities. In the Best Practices course, my group focused on what institutions do to

support traditionally underserved populations (Artifact C3). This has been among the most

important parts of my experience in the SDA program, as I have come to better understand the

multitude of experiences students are having and what my role can be to support them.

Integrated with understanding specific populations has been growing to understand the

issues these various students face in college. In all of the above examples, my focus has been not

only to understand intellectually but also to determine actions and behaviors that can best serve

students. During my summer internship in the Center for Service and Community Engagement

(CSCE) at Seattle University (SU), I had an in-depth experience guiding a group of students, and

our conversations were particularly fruitful to my understanding of student issues, as shown in

my internship seminar (Artifact D). One of my biggest takeaways from helping students through

the vocational discernment process was that their biggest expressed need was not in finding

answers to their big questions but in figuring out that not knowing could be an acceptable state.

Understanding students helps to inform my adaptation of student services to different

environments and cultures (LO 5). This includes getting to know the institutional environment


and culture, discovering the unique needs of students within that environment, and creating

appropriate student services. My internships were instrumental as I grew in this learning

outcome. I had to be strongly rooted in my context at SU for the internship with the summer

fellows (Artifact D). The missional heart of social justice was very important in our discussions,

especially as the students wrestled with what they want to do in life and what the world needs.

Additionally, one of my internships was at Cornish College of the Arts, where I spent the

summer learning about art students, whose academic identity affects how they experience higher

education. I had many conversations with my supervisor about how art students understand and

express leadership, and these conversations helped me to adapt the training I developed for the

orientation leaders (Artifact J). For example, I wanted art to be incorporated into our training,

and I also wanted to find out more about the students and how they understood leadership. I

asked the orientation leaders to participate in an activity in which they explained leadership

through whatever art form they chose. It was a great way to get to know the students, and it was

a unique activity specific to the context we were in. It will be important for me to continue to

learn about students and adapt my services dependent on the institution I will be working in.

Develop Leadership in Myself and Others (LO 6; Artifacts C1, D, & J)

Curiosity about myself and others is crucial to my understanding of LO 6, developing and

demonstrating skills in leadership and collaboration. During my formal education before SU, I

participated in many co-curricular leadership positions as well as completed the Presidents

Leadership Program at Colorado State University. After I graduated, though, I was not in

positions of leadership in my work, although I did volunteer as a youth group leader. Overall, my

understanding of leadership centered on the idea of positional leaders, an understanding which

shifted a lot during my time in the program. My leadership classes, both Leadership in Education


I and Developing Leadership in Sport, have changed my focus to thinking of leadership as more

of a process and that anyone can be a leader. This latter idea is especially influenced by the

Leadership Identity Development model (Komives, Longerbeam, Owen, Mainella, & Osteen,

2006), a framework I now use when working with students as leaders.

I think of LO 6 as being about growing as a leader myself, participating in the leadership

process, and helping others to understand themselves as leaders. Leadership in Education I was

highly influential on my understanding of my growth as a leader, as shown in my leadership

philosophy paper (Artifact C1). Learning about the different foundational leadership theories and

frameworks helped me to understand how my unique personality can be present in the process.

For example, I connected with the human resources frame of leadership (Bolman & Gallos,

2011) and appreciated how a focus on empathy can be understood as a strength.

Both of my internships were important for me in participating as a leader myself and in

helping others to understand themselves as leaders. Developing the orientation leader training

schedule and manual for Cornish (Artifact J) was a complex process, especially as it was

important for me to balance providing the information the team needed, teaching the skills they

would need to demonstrate, and bonding as a group. Developing the training as well as

facilitating it was a big part of the leadership process for me, and I think I was able to help the

students understand themselves as leaders. In my CSCE internship, I was supervising students as

they planned projects, as well as facilitating group dialogue, meeting with the individual

students, and overall managing the program (as seen in slide seven of Artifact D). It is a complex

program that required me to demonstrate leadership as well as teach the students skills in

leadership, particularly as they planned their projects.


Synthesize the Story (LO 7 & 8; Artifacts E, F2, & G)

A final important aspect of curiosity is for me to be able to take the things I am learning

and share them with others. In particular, this has come through LO 7, utilizing assessment,

evaluation, technology, and research to improve practice, and LO 8, communicating effectively

in speech and in writing. My background is in journalism, and I think I have always been an

effective communicator in writing and, to a lesser extent, in speech. However, I had very little

experience with assessment, evaluation, and research (although I do have a strong background in

technology), and I had not thought much about using those tools to improve practice.

Utilizing assessment, evaluation, technology, and research to improve practice means

having skills in all of those areas, knowing when to use the different tools, and most importantly,

taking what is learned to develop better practices. For my service-learning project in Counseling

Across the Lifespan (Artifact E), we were asked to develop an assessment tool. Working on this

project helped improve my research skills as we learned more about the childhood

developmental stage and how we could create an effective assessment tool. The tool also needed

to involve technology, both at the request of our community partner and because our research

revealed how important technology could be in creating an effective tool.

One of my most valuable experiences in using assessment to develop better practices was

through the process I participated in at Cornish. I worked with the assessment from start to

finish; I wrote the learning outcomes, developed the survey, analyzed the data, and wrote a report

summarizing the important points and making recommendations for future events (Artifact G).

This is also a demonstration of LO 8, communicating effectively in speech and in writing. This

learning outcome involves understanding the audience for the communication, understanding


how to best reach the audience, and then using what we know to create speech and/or writing

that is most appropriate.

I believe many of my artifacts demonstrate effective writing; however, my Cornish

assessment report is a particularly important example of effective communication. This is

because I needed to create a formal report that was also easy to read, gave explanations for the

data, and offered suggestions for improvement. The audience included my supervisor, but the

report had the potential to be shared with many others within the institution, and I needed them

to have a thorough but not lengthy report. It was a useful exercise for me to sharpen my

communication skills. The letter from my colleague Michelle Lee (Artifact F2) also

demonstrates my communication skills, as she discusses my ability to share my ideas in the

classroom and to engage in thoughtful conversation.

Continued Growth

One of the great rewards of having curiosity as a strength is that it will continue to serve

me as I move forward in the profession. My challenge will be to continue to foster this in my

work. Graduate school is a natural place for curiosity and learning to flourish; I have many

opportunities to learn new things. As I move into my first professional roles, I will need to be

intentional in creating space for reflection and in seeking out new information and understanding

about students, about developing myself as a leader, and in using skills such as assessment and

research to make me a better practitioner.


References

Blimling, G. S., & Whitt, E. J. (1999). Good practices in student affairs: Principles to foster

student learning. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Publishers.

Bolman, L. G., & Gallos, J. V. (2011). Reframing academic leadership. San Francisco, CA:

Jossey-Bass.

Evans, N. J., Forney, D. S., Guido, F. M., Patton, L. D., & Renn, K. A. (2010). Student

development in college: Theory, research, and practice. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Gallup, Inc. (2014). Clifton StrengthsFinder [Online assessment]. Retrieved from

https://www.strengthsquest.com/

Komives, S. R., Longerbeam, S. D., Owen, J. E., Mainella, F. C., & Osteen, L. (2006). A

leadership identity development model: Applications from a grounded theory. Journal of

College Student Development, 47(4), 401-418. doi:10.1353/csd.2006.0048

Yosso, T. J. (2005). Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community

cultural wealth. Race Ethnicity and Education, 8(1), 69-91.

doi:10.1080/1361332052000341006

Documents

Learning Outcome Narrative - Strengths