Where's the Theory?

Many sayings abound about higher education and higher education practice: it’s the foremost vehicle of socioeconomic mobility, the “great equalizer,” where individuals go to learn how to learn and think critically, etc.

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Still, having worked in higher education for nearly 5 years, I’ve noticed that sentiments toward higher education, reflected in such sayings, are often more critical than complimentary: it’s the “ivory tower,” a bastion of liberalism, where faculty and staff are so far removed from the “real world” that they can’t possibly impart anything germane to life outside of academia. However, for as disparaging as these critiques of higher education are, perhaps none are as fault-finding as the ones higher education professionals generate themselves. The most prolific of these criticisms often underscore what higher education and higher education professionals are failing to accomplish: the development of even basic competencies like critical thinking and quantitative literacy (e.g. Arum and Roksa’s Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses), the dismantling of institutional oppression, and the application of theory and research to inform and enhance educational practice.

For my part, I can see and support all of these perspectives. The favorable, perhaps romanticized, notions of higher education are what drew me to work in this field to begin with, and it’s what keeps me working in higher education now. At the same time, I cannot deny that higher education has its share of problems, and my experiences as an intern at WPU’s Center for Student Success are no exception to this. Indeed, of all the aforementioned grievances against higher education, the absence of clear theory and research used within the functional areas the Center for Student Success comprises – retention and first-year experience, academic advising, and academic support services – is perhaps my greatest source of uncertainty.

I have yet to encounter any mention of the theories and/or research that my higher education instructors have assured me are continually referenced among postsecondary professionals (e.g. student development theories, Astin’s Inputs-Environments-Outputs model, National Center for Education Statistics datasets, etc.). I haven’t even so much as heard higher education scholarship discussed among my colleagues.

The list of best practices for mentoring students I prepared for my supervisor, who then distributed it to the instructors of WPU's freshmen seminar.

The only time I was asked to search and review existing research was to compile a brief list of best practices for mentoring students, which my supervisor distributed to all of the instructors teaching WPU’s freshman seminar. This was a last-minute addendum to the robust training materials my supervisor had already prepared, however, rather than something essential to instructors’ preparation.

Still, perhaps this is to be expected at a small institution like WPU. While I haven’t been privy to the institution’s operating budget, my sense is that most offices and departments are simply trying to fulfill their day-to-day obligations – with minimal funding and very limited staff, I might add. Most offices and departments consist of 2-5 individuals, for example, and many are overseen by just one person. In fact, two of the three offices that make up my internship site, WPU’s Center for Student Success, are managed by one staff member: The Office of Retention and First Year Experience and the Office of Academic Support. I’ve worked closely with the directors of both offices, and they seem to have more than enough on their plate simply managing the daily responsibilities of ensuring their office’s services are provided to students.

This isn’t to say that my impressions are an accurate representation of these offices, however. As a temporary, part-time intern working only 10 hours a week, I have no doubt that there is much more I’m unaware of. Perhaps higher education scholarship is in fact being used to inform the work they now do. Or, if higher education scholarship isn’t being routinely referenced, perhaps it once was, and WPU simply has yet to revisit and/or update the research it uses.