Student development theory has been an important guide in practice; however, few theories focus on both the individual and the influence of the environment. Spencer's (1997) Phenomenological Variant of Ecological Systems Theory (PVEST) examines the individual, the environment, and the role of environmental feedback on self-perceptions, with a…

Civic learning and democratic engagement (CLDE) work has become a central piece of higher education's mission, woven in daily tasks. This chapter explores how the community engagement professional (CEP) role can be reimagined across institutions and the opportunities, challenges, and next steps for moving forward. The strategic positioning of…

From over a decade of collecting data, we know that students who are peer educators experience significant gains as a result of their role as peer educators. The purpose of this chapter is to discuss the student learning outcomes student peer educators derive from being involved in these applied learning experiences.

This chapter examines how senior capstone experiences can be intentionally designed and delivered to provide structured opportunities for reflection, integration, and applied learning, giving students an opportunity to recognize the kinds of learners, thinkers, and doers they have become through the sum total of their educational experiences.

The many complex challenges posed by learning analytics can best be understood within a framework of structural justice, which focuses on the ways in which the informational, operational, and organizational structures of learning analytics influence students' capacities for self-development and self-determination. This places primary…

This chapter reviews models, theories, and cross-national data on student learning and development and explores these within their context.

Offered as a case study, this chapter shows how Lansing Community College intentionally combined efforts to redesign eight high-risk courses with efforts to create clearer guided curricular pathways for the college's students.

This chapter explores the ways faculty and staff work with students to support their activism as well as the way students tap faculty and staff to support their movements.

The dominant paradigm in the literature of college student development reflects a cognitive or psychological bias when considering the effect that college has on students. This chapter offers an alternative perspective by recognizing college as a social process and subsequently examines students' identity formation from a sociological…

This chapter applies the concept of narrative identity to college student development. The authors describe a narrative interview method that can be used to promote the development of a purposeful life story in the college years.

This chapter explains the meaning of meaning-making for the quarterlife generation. It describes what is called the meaning-quest--consisting of nine core meaning-making questions--and offers two examples of the pedagogy that the authors use in working with students.

This chapter examines the existing literature in two major areas. A review of literature related to higher education's mission to educate for personal and social responsibility provides a rationale to refocus our collective attention on this important area of student learning and development. The chapter also reviews the current understanding…

This chapter examines the importance of culturally relevant imagery and representation and identity development curriculum for college students. It calls for higher education institutions to embrace cultural strengths as an asset rather than a deficit.

This chapter provides guidelines and suggestions for assessing student development using autoethnography, a qualitative research method. Autoethnography guides students in examining the nexus between personal and professional identities, including skills, challenges, values, histories, and hopes for the future.

Over the past twenty years, economic conditions, deteriorating public support, governmental and societal demands for accountability, and greater numbers of students from historically underrepresented groups have increased pressures on colleges and universities to provide a meaningful education to students while meeting ever increasing expectations…