UNIVERSITY PEER ADVISORS PURSUING CAREERS IN EDUCATIONAL ADVISING: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY EXAMINING THE INFLUENCE OF LIVED-EXPERIENCES ON

VOCATIONAL PURPOSE http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/948/

NACADA National Conference – Las Vegas, NVOctober 5, 2015 ~ Dr. Laurie L. Simpson

  

Purpose StatementThe purpose of this phenomenological study was:• to examine the lived-experiences of former university peer

advisors who chose to pursue careers in academic advising• to discover how those experiences may have contributed to

the development of vocational purpose.• to discover what, if any, epiphanic moment(s) contributed to

their determining their current vocation purpose?

Significance of the Study

• While a good deal of research addresses the positive impact peer interactions have on student outcomes (Astin, 1993; Colvin & Ashman, 2010; Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005), research is limited in the area of understanding the peer advising experience from the perspective of the peer advisor.

• Astin (1993) concludes that “the student’s peer group is the single most potent source of influence on growth and development during the undergraduate years” (p. 398).

Significance of the Study• Kuh (2005) submits that colleges and universities with

supportive campus surroundings are a result of high-quality student relationships with other students.

• Tinto (1993) asserts that student’s perception of his/her experiences within an institution plays a role on a decision to stay or depart from that institution.

• Branch, Taylor, and Douglas (2003) point out that peer advisors’ satisfaction, retention, and academic success can increase because of their sense that they matter to their institution (Koring & Campbell, 2005).

Research Plan

• Qualitative Study

• Phenomenological Design- What participants have experienced in terms of the

phenomenon?- What events or situations influenced their

experiences of the phenomenon? (Creswell, 2007; Moustakas, 1994).

• Participants- Former peer advisors, currently employed as

educational advisors

Research Plan

• Participants reconstructed their life experiences, in detail, from childhood, up to and including peer advising

• Participants reflected on the significance of those life experiences in relation to their current employment

After all interviews were conducted, a thorough review of the transcripts was conducted and emerging themes were identified.

Definition of Terms

Peer advisors - Undergraduate students trained to advise students in understanding options for majors, minors, common core, online registration procedures, and tutoring services - if needed.

Lived-experiences (Life-World) - A combination of feelings, thoughts, and self-awareness experienced by an individual at any given moment in time (Johnson & Christensen, 2004). Epiphanic Moments - “Interactional moments and experiences which leave marks on people’s lives” (Denzin, 1989, p. 15).

Theoretical Framework

• Psychosocial development during the college years has as much if not more to do with success in college and in later life than what is learned solely in the classroom (Chickering & Reisser, 1993; Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005).

• Hughey, Nelson, Damminger, McCalla-Wriggins, & Assoc. (2009) suggest that developmentally, students make career decisions while working through various aspects of their lives; specifically noting that career development is inextricably bound with development of purpose, values, relationships and identity.

Theoretical Framework

Theoretical Framework

Chickering’s work is among the earliest and most significant of psychosocial developmental theories to this day.

He advanced the notion that students’ progress through seven vectors (paths) of development during their college years.

In his initial theory, these vectors linked student college experiences to their personal development (Foubert, Nixon, Sisson, & Barnes, 2005).

Chickering specifically identified these vectors as, “major highways for journeying toward individuation” (Chickering & Reisser, 1993, p.35).

Vocational Purpose

• While there are three major components that comprise the sixth vector, this study focuses specifically on the element of vocational purpose.

• Chickering & Reisser (1993) suggest, “We discover our vocation by discovering what we love to do, what energizes us and fulfills us, what uses our talents and challenges us to develop new ones, and what actualizes all our potentials for excellence (p. 50).

• In an effort to more clearly understand the development of vocational purpose in former peer advisors, it is important to look within the context of academic advising.

Academic Advising

For the purposes of the current study, the split advising model at Westfield State was reviewed: a centralized advising office advises all undeclared students, while declared majors are assigned faculty advisors within their respective departments.   

   

   

Split Model; Source: Habley (1983).

Westfield State Academic Advising Center

• Westfield’s Academic Advising Center (AAC) has a defined role with undergraduate students; providing information on institutional policies, procedures, registration requirements, and many times graduation information, in addition to preliminary career guidance.

• Students who are undeclared, in-transition between majors, or seeking additional information also utilize the AAC’s services.

Peer Advising

For the purposes of this study, peer advising within an academic advising center was peer leadership program reviewed.

Peer advisors who receive training and supervision can greatly enhance the work done by professional and faculty advisors (Gordon et al., 2008).

Peer Advising

During the course of a peer advising placement, students learn professional conduct, communication skills and an understanding of working with students from various backgrounds.

Peer Advisor, Esther Dada, enroute to a job fair – she will be graduating in May.

Epiphanic Moments

• Denzin (1989) defined epiphanies as “interactional moments and experiences which leave marks on people’s lives” (p.70). He says, “to understand a life, the epiphanies and the personal-experience and self-stories that represent and shape that life, one must penetrate and understand these larger structures” (Denzin, p. 73).

• Chickering and Reisser (1993) note that some epiphanies are dramatic and sudden, but most occur gradually and incrementally. They submit that it may take years to understand how our experiences “started a chain reaction that transformed some aspect of ourselves” (p. 43).

Design In addition to understanding the experience of participants,

researchers search for commonality of experiences. The commonality of experience is known as the essence of the

phenomenon (Newsome, Hays & Christensen, 2008). The researcher must enter the participant’s life experience at a deep

level in order to truly understand that lived-experience from the participant’s point of view.

Research Questions

In this study, the central general question was: • What are the lived-experiences of former GNU peer advisors

who chose to pursue careers in academic advising?

The general sub-question was: • What, if any, epiphanic moment(s) contributed to the students’

development of their life’s purpose?

Participants

• Four participants were interviewed.

• Creswell (2007) says that he has seen the number of participants range from 1 to 325.

- He suggests, “The intent in qualitative research is not to generalize the information . . . but to elucidate the particular, the specific” (p. 126).

Setting

• Westfield is a public institution of higher education, founded in 1838 and is located in south western Massachusetts. The total undergraduate enrollment exceeds 5,000 students on a campus of 256 acres set in a suburban area of western Massachusetts.

ProceduresResearch Interviews

There were three, in-person, 90 minute interviews conducted with each participant over the course of a three-week period.

First interview - reconstruct their life experiences in primary school

Second interview - reconstruct their life experiences in secondary school

Third interview - reconstruct their life experiences in post-secondary years

In each interview, the focus was on educational, social (friendships) and familial experiences.

Procedures

Research Interviews

Questions were asked that addressed the intellectual and emotional connection of their lived-experiences as they relate to where they are now in their lives.

This interviewer sought to have participants look at factors in their lives that they interpreted as meaningful to where they are now.

All three interviews saw the participants trying to make meaning of their life’s experiences to this point.

I was not looking for answers, but to have a better understanding of the experiences of peer advising participants and how those experiences may have influenced their decision to pursue careers in educational advising.

Personal Biography

• Participants in this study were all peer advisors who worked in the WSU Academic Advising Center (AAC).

• As Director of the AAC, I was responsible for training and supervision of all personnel in the center to include peer advisors.

• As a result, I brought a personal knowledge to this study based on experiences as peer advising supervisor, and, as well as personal experience gained through my own experience in the advising center as a graduate assistant in the 1990’s.

Thematic Label One: Educational advisors experience a positive childhood environment. Former peer advisors had been brought up in an enabling environment that supports and cares about their interests in fun learning, activities with their friends, classmates, and school educators. These childhood experiences exposed the former peer advisors to qualities that could shape their interest in pursuing an educational advising career.

Thematic Label Two: Educational advisors developed qualities that match the requirement of the educational advising vocation. Eight qualities were relevant in determining future likability of an individual to pursue the educational advising profession.

Thematic Label Three: Educational advising careers are offered to individuals with vocational purpose. Vocational purpose was determined by the innate qualities of the individual that were shaped by his or her childhood and adolescent experiences with family, friends, and school teachers.

Thematic Label Four: Epiphany of the former peer advisor. Former peer advisors exercised interest and independence in pursuing their commitment to providing students’ assistance and that made this realization essential in their decision to pursuing a career in educational advising.

Limitations of the Study

Purposely narrowed the focus of this study: • Study confined itself to gathering data from former peer

advisors at one university in Massachusetts.

• Focus solely on former peer advisors who are pursuing careers in academic advising.

Limitations of this study:• Data, data analysis and implications of the data were based

solely on the participants’ perceptions of their experiences

• It was not possible to demonstrate that the findings of this study were applicable to other populations.

• It was not possible to demonstrate that the findings were applicable to other populations. However, a detailed description of the phenomenon of interest and the step-by-step methodology used to conduct the study, may allow others to compare to their own situations and find similar results.

CONCLUSIONS AND ANECDOTAL EVIDENCE• Family, friends and teachers• Interpersonal characteristics

• Self-development• Epiphanic Moments

Questions???

REFERENCES

• Astin, A. W. (1993). What matters in college? Four critical years revisited. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

• Branch, K., Taylor, A., & Douglas, J. (2003). Identifying the merits of sophomore involvement in new student orientation. The Journal of College Orientation and Transition, 11(1), 18–26.

• Chickering, A. W., & Reisser, L. (1993). Education and identity (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

• Colvin, J. & Ashman, M. (2010). Roles, risks, and benefits of peer mentoring relationships in higher education. Mentoring & Tutoring: Partnership in Learning, 18(2), 121-134.

• Creswell, J. W.  (2007) Qualitative inquiry & research design: Choosing among five approaches (2nd ed).  Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.  

• Denzin, N. K. (1989). Interpretive biography. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.

REFERENCES

• Foubert, J. D., Nixon, M. L., Sisson, V. S., & Barnes, A. C. (2005). A longitudinal study of Chickering and Reisser’s vectors: Exploring gender differences and implications for refining the theory. Journal of College Student Development, 46(5), 461-471. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/195181877?accountid=12085

• Gordon, V. N., Habley, W. R., Grites, T. J., & National Academic Advising Association (U.S.). (2008). Academic advising: A comprehensive handbook. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

• Hughey, K., Nelson, D., Damminger, J., McCalla-Wriggins, B., & Associates (2009). The handbook of career advising. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

• Johnson, B., & Christensen, L. (2004). Educational research: Quantitative, qualitative,and mixed approaches (2nd edition). Boston, MA: Pearson.

REFERENCES

• Koring, H., & Campbell, S. (Eds.). (2005). Peer advising: Intentional connections to support student learning (NACADA Monograph Series No. 13). Manhattan, KS: National Academic Advising Association.

• Kuh, G. D. (2005). Student success in college: Creating conditions that matter. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

• Moustakas, C. E. (1994). Phenomenological research methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

• Newsome, D., Hays, D. G., & Christensen, T. M. (2008). Qualitative approaches to research. In B. T. Erford (Ed.), Research and evaluation in counseling. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

• Pascarella, E. T., & Terenzini, P. T. (2005). How college affects students (2nd ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

• Tinto, V. (1993). Leaving college: Rethinking the causes and cures of student attrition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.