Please share your personal and professional
experiences higher education and their connection to issues of meaning,
purpose, faith, and spirituality. What significant experiences led you to
become involved in this work and bring you to where you are
today?
Early
on, I spent my undergraduate years during the Woodstock generation at St.
Meinrad College, a small, private liberal arts college run by Benedictine
monks, where I studied French Literature, Philosophy, and Classical
Languages. Our conversations then were hardly ever about what sort of job
we were going to get; rather, we were mostly consumed with questions like,
What do you believe? What do you
value? To what are you committed? And while these questions didn't do
much for making career decisions, it was a very rich kind of experience
about what really counts that helped us frame our life
perspectives as young adults.
It
was during a time when we were living out our history in the midst of the
Vietnam War and other social turmoil within our country. We became
very engaged in being part of the solution through participating in
service to the local community from working with the elderly to creating a
program for literacy in rural schools. This work was a very influential
part of my undergraduate experience. It was during this time that I made
the decision to be a conscientious
objector and
contribute to a philosophy of nonviolence.
This
undergraduate background led me to accept my first education position -
teaching junior high school in Louisville, Kentucky, two years of which
quickly motivated me to figure out what else I could do with my life. I
then signed on with the Social Action Department of the Catholic Diocese
of Davenport, Iowa, where I completed two years of volunteer alternative
service as a community organizer for a low-income housing
project.
Both
of these experiences demonstrate the same thread of community values that
came from my undergraduate background where I was immersed in a
Benedictine monastic culture, where reflection and action went hand in
hand. From that exposure, I
knew that somehow my life's work was going to be in service to
others.
The
University of Iowa wasn't too far from where I was living at the time, and
following my stint at community organizing, I then applied to a master's
program in Drug and Alcohol Abuse Counseling and was accepted (but only on
the second try!). Within the Division of Counselor Education in this
program, students were required to choose a complementary area to focus on
as well, one of which happened to be College Student Personnel.
As
I became more involved in the program, I realized that substance abuse
wasn't an area I could sink my teeth into and, in turn, I became much more
interested in the higher education and student affairs piece. Once I
completed my master's degree, I pursued doctoral studies, which prepared
me for my first and only faculty position at Bowling Green State
University, where I have been now for 32 years.
In
this role, I have been teaching courses on student development, the design
and impact of campus environments, and the techniques of qualitative
research, among other topics. For the past ten years, I have also taught a
course on the spiritual dimensions of student development. My specific
interest in the area of education and spirituality was renewed about 20
years ago when I was invited to serve on the board of overseers at my alma
mater. Along with my current role as a trustee of Saint Xavier University
(IL), I found myself in institutional environments where I could ask
different questions than I could at the public university I served.
During
this time, I also reunited with a former classmate who had lived as a
Benedictine monk for as long as I have been an educator. We began asking
one another "what do you do all day?" Through our conversations, I became
introduced to the Rule of St. Benedict, a document that governs Western
monastic culture, and began to discover some very powerful parallels and
similarities between what he was doing as a monk and what I was doing as
an educator at a public institution.
As
educators - whether in a monastery or a classroom - we work to create community to enhance learning,
development, and growth through recognition, design, and implementation.
In this way, we are all learning to become who we are supposed to be in
the presence of others. To me, this principle is fundamental to the work
we do in higher education and to the lives of college students. The core
experience of education is about learning to make meaning of one's
experiences, and this is what I do as an educator both in and outside the
classroom. I view issues of spirituality as part of this framework of
meaning-making. In this way, I see my work as an educator and interest in
students' spiritual development as connected to the larger process of
learning, growth, and development.
How
and why is spirituality important in the work of Student Affairs? Please
discuss the significance of this work on our college campuses across the
country.
The
really is no reason to come together in the setting of a college or
university if all you are here to do is collect information; rather, the
experience of living in the presence of others is much more important -
and out of this experience, the true value of higher education is
realized. The more lasting impressions that come from a college education
are born out of communities
where mutual learning is most powerful.
The
work of student affairs revolves around the creation and maintenance of
learning communities, ranging from residence halls to student
organizations and beyond; combined with the classroom learning of academic
affairs, these co-curricular experiences provide multiple entry points for
genuine engagement and spiritual inquiry. Our role as educators is to
include, secure, engage, and invite students into these learning
communities (Strange and Banning, 2001). Building, recognizing, and
implementing conditions of community is what we, as educators, must
do.
Sharon
Parks' (2000) framework of "mentoring communities" describes this process
of belonging and the impact it has on young adults. Yet, building strong
mentoring communities doesn't just happen - it's a process that occurs
intentionally over time and the complex "glue" called culture holds it all together.
Moreover, students never experience true community unless they become
engaged and involved, taking on significant roles as active participants
in their communities.
Within
the fundamental human experience still remains a deep question of, "Who am I in the presence of others?"
Ultimately, the sense of understanding, "I am a worthy being and have value in
this world" is foundational to the experience of being part of a
larger community. As they
engage with others, students must ask, "Do I feel like I belong?" and "Is my identity a source of risk in
this setting?" Both of these questions point to the basic level of
security students must feel as they discover a place where they belong.
The first step toward community then, is to welcome students by
communicating that they are accepted for who they are.
Once
students are satisfied and fundamentally connected to the setting, they
must have something of significance to do - that is the role of engagement
and involvement. Yet, involvement in itself, although necessary, is not
sufficient to achieve community. It's the ongoing investment of time and
energy to a common purpose that leads to an experience of community, where
it becomes possible to explore the spiritual questions that exist in the
hearts and minds of our students. In this way, we invite dialogue and
meaning making into the heart of the learning
enterprise.
There
are many fundamental questions that students begin asking themselves in
college: "Who am I? To whom/what am
I connected? Where am I going and who do I want to become?" Additionally, certain questions
are connected to the deeper, spiritual side of their lives: "Am I a worthy human being? What does
it mean to be faithful? What community am I drawn to? For what would I
give my life?"
Being
aware of spiritual questions in students' lives is what we need to pay
attention to, along with the other big questions they are asking. As
educators and student affairs practitioners, we need to be open and
available to listening to and reflecting with our students to help them
process these large concepts that they are pondering and struggling to
understand. Many opportunities exist for engaging students in spiritual
dialogue and inquiry to promote spiritual literacy within student affairs
and the larger academic setting.
At
Bowling Green, we have a set of core values that we espouse, including
intellectual and spiritual growth, which is unique for a public
institution. We recognize that the physical environment we create for
students has a large impact on how students are able to engage in these
communities and begin exploring these spiritual questions. For these
reasons, a proposal is being considered to create a new living-learning
community to engage students in these spiritual questions and to support
their development in college. Titled S.E.A.R.C.H. (Students Engaged in
Active, Reflective, Caring, and Holistic Learning), this residential
community is designed around the characteristics of mentoring communities
as articulated by Parks. The
overall goal of this community is to increase students' literacy about
spiritual questions in their own lives and how differing people in this
world address such questions.
Similarly,
residential communities at other institutions can use this as a model to
help students explore their spiritual identities, connect with others, and
search for deeper meaning and purpose during their college years.
Moreover, there are many inroads with educational programming where such
issues can be addressed to help support students' spiritual development.
Spiritual questions that are asked by residential advisors and hall staff
can contribute to a larger sense of belonging and create safer, more
supportive communities on campus.
In
addition to the context of residential communities, within the area of
career planning, there are many avenues to explore vocation and calling,
beyond just focusing on students' interests and skills. Asking, "What are you called to do?" is a
vexing question that requires support and permission to explore without
having all the answers at present. Often with non-traditional students,
this question is what brings them back to school because of changes within
their own life path and personal calling.
There
are also many entry points within the domain of service-learning. The
whole idea of learning to give rather than get as a basic human motive,
while learning to serve others, is a fundamental spiritual experience.
Similarly, the work done within student activities and leadership
development also provides valuable contexts where spiritually significant
communities can be formed and experienced. Various goals drive students'
engagement with others within these communities, such as learning to be a
stronger leader or a good citizen. All of these experiences provide
opportunities for meaningful engagement and create learning communities
where students can interact, learn, and grow as they begin pondering these
spiritual questions.
What
current challenges and opportunities exist within the landscape of higher
education that impacts this work?
In
our question-filled world, we rely mostly on empirical processes to
provide us with answers, and this is especially prevalent in an academic
community. Consequently, many faculty are quite suspicious (or fearful) of
any effort to do otherwise. Educator and author, Robert Nash (2001), talks
about this phenomenon as religiphobia in his book Religious Pluralism in the
Academy, and how such an attitude is deeply imbedded within the modern
academy. It takes about five
seconds to get from spirituality to religion to fundamentalism, which, in
turn, closes off conversation because it becomes about answers, not
questions.
This
common reaction to anything spiritual comes out of scientific positivism
and the focus on empirical examination of anything as a source for
knowing. We tend to take these spiritual questions and we either ignore
them or treat them as special cases, not having a real place at the table
in the academy, mistrusting them. More often than not, people want to
point to the abuses, rather than the benefits, that these questions bring
to the table.
Based
on the current context of university, I look at this whole challenge of
spirituality within higher education as an opportunity to promote literacy. How we recognize and
respond to spiritual questions in our own life and the lives of others is
a basic component of spiritual literacy that we must develop in order to
serve our students, and ourselves, better.
Out
of literacy comes the idea of questions and understanding, rather than
just focusing on answers; this framework squares up nicely with the whole
framework of an educational institution. Once student affairs
practitioners and faculty recognize literacy as a valuable mechanism for
development, they are more likely to engage in this
work.
I,
personally, have found it easier to approach spiritual questions this way
at public institutions rather than at private ones, because many such
religious schools (especially those of an evangelical nature) specifically
express their viewpoints as the norm; as a result, their narrower focus
often tends to hinder broad spiritual inquiry as alternative views are
silenced, either intentionally or inadvertently. As a result, students
might be driven underground, so to speak, because of a tremendous cultural
pressure to be and live the standard such institutions might promote.
Whereas,
public institutions promote freedom of expression around matters of speech
and religion, perhaps providing greater opportunities to speak openly and
to consider diverse perspectives about spiritual issues. We need to be
aware of an institution's mission and how it is actualized to support all
students' search for meaning and purpose, without silencing spiritual
dialogue.
In
order to open the doors to spiritual inquiry, we need to promote spiritual
literacy within our institutions, no matter what the type (public,
private, religiously affiliated, etc.). To come out of an undergraduate
experience with no facility for either understanding the nature of
spiritual questions in people's lives in general, let alone their own,
puts our students at a huge disadvantage in this world. Religion and
spiritually-related ideas are major drivers in our society and motivate
many to action for both the good and the bad. Therefore, not being able to
understand these questions or potential ways of responding to them makes
for an under-prepared citizenry.
Whether
we like it or not, students will have to face spiritually-related issues
in our global society, so we might as well be part of helping students
question and understand deeper issues as educators. Student affairs has
many opportunities within our institutions to integrate spiritual
questions to help develop literacy among students, staff, and faculty
members, who can all be partners in this venture. The opportunity is here;
we just have to take the risk of engaging in spiritual dialogue to begin
this important work.
What
research and current work has been done in this area? Please describe any
practices that you have been involved in or considerations that student
affairs practitioners should be aware of as they interact with
students.
We
have seen a dramatic upsurge recently in work related to spirituality,
especially as it relates to supporting students' development in college. I
am drawn to many of the insights of Sharon Parks (2000) as she weaves
questions of faith development into the fabric of young adulthood and the
purposes of higher education. I also really appreciate some of the work
that Robert Nash has been doing at the University of Vermont. I use his
various narratives often in a course I teach on "Spiritual Dimensions in
Student Development" to help illustrate spiritual questions and religion
to my students. Nash (2001) talks a lot about creating conditions of moral
conversation to promote critical inquiry and dialogue around these
questions.
Parker
Palmer's (1987) notion of the importance of creative conflict in his
article "Community, Conflict, and Ways of Knowing" also helps us better
understand what we do both in and outside the classroom as a community of
learners. I have used his work in my teaching and work with student
development to show students how to sustain relationships through creative
conflict to produce new insights and learning as a result. His work
demonstrates how epistemology and ethics are intimately connected,
allowing students to engage deeper questions, while capitalizing on the
benefits of differences.
I
am also currently conducting a study on the differences of spiritual
beliefs and religious practices of roommate pairs to better understand how
residential communities impact spiritual growth and development. Though
this study, I am trying to understand if different narratives lend
themselves to different expressions of belief and how these spiritual
concepts relate to overall satisfaction.
Additionally,
many campuses are engaging with inter-faith work through dialogue groups
and other approaches. The work around religious dialogue that is happening
at the University of Michigan, in particular, demonstrates well how to
engage students and others within the higher education community in
spiritual questioning and offers other institutions models for creating
similar structures on their campuses.
Moreover, the work happening at Harvard in their
Religious Pluralism Project under the leadership of Dianna Eck, shows that
the encounter of religious pluralism is one of relationship, not one of
agreement; in this way, open, safe dialogue that explores spiritual issues
and questions to promote relationships and communities on our campuses
teaches students how to relate across fundamental differences.
All
of these examples suggest that campuses can no longer ignore the impact of
spirituality on students' developmental processes. Research and engagement
around spiritual questions has gained ground in the past decade, yet there
is much more that needs to be done in order to fully integrate
considerations of spirituality into higher education. While much of this
work can start within student affairs, it takes the buy-in and commitment
from the entire campus learning community to make positive and lasting
change occur. With a renewed desire to engage students around spiritual
questions and create positive mentoring communities, we have an open
invitation to entertain these deep questions as students make meaning of
their experiences in college toward a larger life
purpose.
