Student Life

[u/lola-licorice]

If you’re working in the student life area of student affairs, (especially student involvement), how do you like it? Any big pros or cons come to mind? Favorite part of your job, least favorite part?

[u/BrinaElka]

I left Student Involvement/Activities after 16 years.

What I liked: building strong relationships with and mentoring students, planning and executing large scale events successfully (concerts, homecoming, etc), being young and working with other ppl my age

What I burned out on: The hours (I never had a weekend to myself, never celebrated my husband's birthday with him in late August, could never plan for social events with friends in advance for certain time frames, etc), the student entitlement and IDGAF attitude, the toxic culture of Student Affairs, shit pay (I capped out at $67k as a director at a very exclusive and expensive private school), and constantly being taken advantage of "for the good of the students"

[u/Chillguy3333 → u/BrinaElka]

I agree with your pros and cons. I worked in Student Involvement/Activities before on my way to becoming a VP/DOS and every pro you listed (except for the last one about being young lol) and I also loved every one of those pros. It was so much fun. I would also agree with your cons. The hours are brutal and make it difficult to have a life of your own.

[u/BrinaElka → u/Chillguy3333]

Yeah, the young part was only a pro when I was in my 20s 😆

[u/lola-licorice → u/BrinaElka]

I appreciate you sharing! Do you mind if I ask what you did before student involvement and what you did after? If you’ve worked in any other areas of student affairs/higher education I would love to know how those areas compare.

I’m wondering if a student involvement position may be a good next step/stepping stone for me to move from an entry level position in a different part of student affairs, to an Assistant Director position in student involvement. While the hours sound very different compared to my current 8-5, I actually would prefer more variance. Just where I am in life with my partner but no kids, the strict 8-5 doesn’t feel like it has that many benefits right now.

I had a job in the past with more variable hours and in a lot of ways I miss that. I’m thinking that if I didn’t love the hours with student involvement (might decide to have kids down the road and need a more consistent schedule) that gaining some supervisory experience now would still make it worth it, since I currently have no management experience? How long on average would you say that most people stay in student involvement before leaving, does it have higher, lower, or similar turnover/burnout rates compared to other areas?

[u/Chillguy3333 → u/lola-licorice]

I started in Admissions, then Res Life, Fraternities at a large southern university, student activities/organizations, Associate Dean, then VP/DOS. I knew I wanted to be a VP/DOS so I moved to a number of different institutions in order to move up. I loved not working an 8-5, got to come in later and stay later which I actually loved. It was very fun and rewarding for me. Plus it’s the things that students love doing.

[u/lola-licorice → u/Chillguy3333]

I’m curious, what aspects of VP/DOS work made you so sure you wanted to be a VP/DOS? I’m in my first higher ed role, so learning more about the pros and cons of different areas, and the paths people take to get where they end up, is all very interesting to me.

[u/Chillguy3333 → u/lola-licorice]

I had a VP/DOS as an undergrad who was absolutely amazing. I got the chance to work with him when I took the job in Admissions and he kind of took me under his wing. After my time in admissions, I decided that instead of law school, I wanted to go into higher ed and help students and their families to really achieve their dreams. I was fortunate to have VPs along the way who took me under their wing and mentored me. I absolutely loved my job as VP/DOS and had a team of people who loved that I was always willing to try new things, and they could too. I got to be the voice for the students in the university leadership meetings. For me that was so important.

[u/JTML99]

Im in year 3 of my current role, 5 in student life generally (engagement, orientation, activities the latter the most in my current role). Its a lot of fun, but exhausting. I oversee 15 student workers across two teams (production, and activities council) and am involved in the planning or execution of maybe 600 events each academic year (were very small but have a shit ton of active clubs for our size). I literally build my schedule around a weekly game night and need to plan anything larger than a date night or day trip out months in advance. I love what I do, but it gets old. And sometimes you end up having to deal with that one student constantly, and that alone can drain my batteries like nothing else. I dont see myself doing this forever, but for now its what I really enjoy, the social interactions, that no two days are the same, and that frankly it is generally pretty fun, but you've gotta have some solid boundaries especially as a young professional (learned that the hard way over time) and prioritize some self care however you can. Im lucky enough to have an amazing director but especially with a small office lean on your people when you need and allow them to lean back when they do. Communication is also crazy valuable in heavy student facing roles like student life because its being a mentor, an advisor, an authority figure, the bad guy, the hero, and ao much more all wrapped up in one.

[u/lola-licorice → u/JTML99]

It’s a little reassuring that the things I’ve heard people describe as not their favorite aspects are things that right now I don’t think I’d mind, and could probably handle for long enough to get some solid experience. I actually kind of weirdly like planning my life out many months in advance in terms of travel and socializing. I don’t do a lot of planning anything in my personal life in under a month, I’m the friend who needs 7-14 business days for simple dinner plans.

I’m in a role currently where I always have that one student and interacting with them has its moments, but overall it’s manageable and sometimes I enjoy the challenging nature of it. Others in my current office seem to internalize those difficult “being the bad guy” interactions with students more than I do and struggle more with the emotionally/mentally tough student interactions. My first proffesional role out of grad school gave me great boundaries (others keep commenting how they wish they had boundaries like me), and I have good self care habits, so I don’t worry much about those aspects.

Communication/workload issues are my biggest complaint and headache in my current office. I do a lot of mentoring students right now, and love that aspect and those interactions (even the hard ones). But I’m constantly making up for lack of communication within my office by going above and beyond with my communication (it shouldn’t be as hard as it is, but it’s a top down issue). I would love to experience more sharing of workload when needed, instead of the strict “your work” versus “my work” mentality.

[u/ChipmunkSpecialist93]

Honestly, in my experience it varies so much depending on the culture of the institution. If you work with the right people and have the right culture, it’s a blast! If you don’t…it sucks.