This blog post is for HEA624: Supervised Practice I
As an undergraduate student, I was able to learn about some of the professional organizations that are available for those that are working in student affairs, especially residence life. This is due to my time on the regional board for the Intermountain Affiliate for College and University Residence Halls (IACURH) which is one of 8 regional affiliates of the National Association for College and University Residence Halls (NACURH). Having the incredible opportunity of getting to take on a position within IACURH has given me a solid foundation to build my career and network through. That being said, I believe that I have always valued organizations such as NACURH and the several other professional associations that exist within the realm of student affairs. It will absolutely be necessary for my success to get involved in the associations that best fit within my goals and values. As I search for which groups to affiliate with, I am thinking through the specific areas and competencies that I need to work through and which I want to build on.
The first association I have an interest in exploring would be the Association for College and University Housing Officers (ACUHO-I). This organization is focused on residence life professionals in higher education, providing numerous opportunities for professionals to network and learn from each other such as conferences, webinars, internships, and much more. I have recently utilized their Summer Housing Internship program to connect me with an internship within residence life at a different institution for the summer. Being in this process allowed me to engage with the hiring process of submitting applications with my resume and cover letters, be in several rounds of interviews, and get to reflect on what I wanted to focus on this summer in terms of career goals to choose the institution that best fit those goals. This summer I am happy to say that I will be interning with the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) in the Assistant Residential Education Coordinator position for 12 weeks thanks to the ACUHO-I process! ACUHO-I is an organization that is focused on facilitating successful networking opportunities for seasoned and new professionals in the residence life world of higher education, this is an affiliation I will definitely be joining as a residence life professional myself.
Another residence life association that is of interest to me is the National Association for College and University Residence Halls (NACURH), which I have quite a bit of experience within already as an undergrad. NACURH is the largest non-profit, student-led association in the country and has ample opportunities for students to thrive in a supportive and engaging community as well as opportunities for professionals to get experience in advisory roles. I was involved in NACURH as a student leader for 3 years in my undergraduate career, but now as a professional entering the student affairs profession, I always envisioned myself reconnecting with NACURH in an advisor position at some point, so this could be a great opportunity. The only challenge would be the fact that in order to affiliate with NACURH, you need an active Residence Hall Association (RHA) and/or National Residence Hall Honorary (NRHH). Both of these organizations are student leadership groups that each institution is required to have established at their school for affiliation. That being said, in order for me to get involved with NACURH again, I would need to work at an institution with an active RHA and/or NRHH and serve as the advisor for one of the organizations. However, you can individually affiliate with NACURH and run to be elected to a professional position within the NACURH board. While this is an option, I feel that opportunity is quite limited in comparison to the other professional affiliations available, so this is definitely a good option for me to explore once my career reflects the necessary attributes of having established RHA/NRHH for me to gain the full experience of a professional role in the student-led NACURH world.
The American College Personnel Association (ACPA) is an organization of student affairs professionals that center their work and development around diversity and social justice, which resonates with my values in my role. I appreciate that on their website they are very clear about how high value history is and they try to de-mistify the history of higher education and highlight the several injustices that have occurred in the timeline. I am compelled towards this organization because of their central social justice mission, this affiliation would definitely create an opportunity for me to learn and grow with my peers. The ACPA also offers affordable prices for affiliation to graduate students, which I find to align well with their beliefs as they are making professional affiliations more accessible. The National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA), a large organization that has several subgroups and regions to support their shared mission of advancing higher education. Specifically I would like to get involved with Region II, which New York is in, and I would like to join the Asian Pacific Islander Knowledge Community. Finding community within your career is something that will strengthen your professional and personal development, so being able to connect with people who work within my region as well as people who have a shared identity as me would help me become an integrated part of those areas. I also have a good friend on the NASPA Graduate Association Program (GAP), he actually recommended me to keep an eye out for next year’s opportunity, so NASPA was already something I had on mind as a career goal. NASPA also offers a lot of professional development opportunities and volunteer options, both in-person and virtual, which I have a lot of interest in participating in.
After researching each of these organizations, I realized that I do have a bit of involvement in the affiliations surrounding residence life, but I don’t have much connection to the larger general student affairs areas, so a goal of mine will definitely be to work on strengthening my network by affiliating with one or both ACPA and/or NASPA. It is encouraging to be able to see the community that higher education professionals have built within the world, especially in the reality we live in today, community is important for us to stay motivated and vigilant. I am excited to get started on my future opportunities and to establish more connections through affiliating with these organizations soon.
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