Region 8 members: You’ll receive an email from region chair Brett McFarlane soon. It going to be sent through the region email list. On it, you’ll learn we’ve extended our deadlines again. You have more time to submit your scholarship and awards program applications. Good news! We could all use more time, right? The new deadline for both these applications is December 7. The region leadership decided to extend the deadline to give you more time to get your applications in. These are great programs; we don’t want you to miss out on it.
All other recently posted deadlines are still valid: November 23rd for the Call for Proposals, December 24th for the early registration fee.
More information about the Technology Seminar is now posted online as well. This 1.5 day seminar will happen before conference (Jan. 24-25). Registration for the Technology Seminar can be made in conjunction with your conference registration, but space is limited to the first 30 registrants! Please note: This seminar is for advisors who identify as having an intermediate to advanced comfort level with technology. Participants will be expected to bring a Wi-Fi capable laptop.
NACADA has now posted the registration application form on the website. It’s a pdf you can download, fill out and submit (with your appropriate payment, of course) to the executive office. The pre-conference sessions are noted on the application:
- Advising and Retention ($25)
- Legal Issues with Technology ($25)
- Advisor’s Technology Tool Kit ($25)
- Advising as Teaching ($25)
- NACADA Leadership (FREE)
- NACADA Orientation (FREE)
You can register for as many pre-conference sessions you want to. Consider purchasing the All-Access Pass though. You’ll be able to attend all the pre-conference workshops for just $60. It’s a great deal! You can also register for the Technology Seminar ($75) that will be held prior to the conference (January 24-25).
Upcoming deadlines to keep in mind:
- November 16: Scholarship and Awards Programs
- November 23: Call for Proposals
- December 24: “Early registration” conference fees
As previously announced, a NACADA Technology Seminar for 30-35 participants will be held just before the regional conference in Seattle in January. Detailed information (including registration instructions) will be posted soon.
January 24th, 2010 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. University of Washington campus
and
January 25th, 2010 9 a.m. – Noon Hyatt @ Olive 8 (conference hotel)
The NACADA Region 8 Conference Technology Seminar will be a hands on, interactive advising technology experience with a focus on utilizing the latest web-based technologies including: Blogs, Wikis, Twitter, Facebook Pages, RSS/Content Re-purposing, MS Outlook Enhancements, Web Statistics/Assessment, Online Surveys/Forms and Social Bookmarking. In addition to learning how to use these tools, attendees will be given the tools to implement an academic advising-oriented social media communications planning framework.
This seminar is for advisors who identify as having an intermediate to advanced comfort level with technology. Participants will be expected to bring a wi-fi capable laptop.
Learning Objectives: At the end of this seminar, participants will be able to:
- Engage in hands-on experiential learning about technological tools for academic advising, specifically web 2.0 and social media resources.
- Evaluate various online tools and resources and their applicable uses for advising.
- Identify online tools and resources to implement for academic advising at respective institutions.
NACADA has posted the registration fees for 2010 regional conference in Seattle. The registration application form isn’t up yet but we’re sure they’ll post that soon. Hotel information and a reservation link is now also available. From the Hyatt Olive @ 8 website:
The city’s 1st LEED-certified (Leadership in Energy an Environmental Design) green hotel features 346 contemporary guest rooms, including 15 suites and is located in the heart of downtown Seattle’s dining and entertainment district. This full-service luxury hotel offers architecturally dramatic style with an eco-conscious 15,000 sq. ft spa and health club and restaurant featuring Washington wines and fare handcrafted from ingredients provided from local artisans. The hotel is walking distance to all downtown Seattle offers including fantastic shopping, entertainment and dining with easy freeway access to SeaTac airport.
Dining Facilities: Urbane, will serve true Pacific Northwest cuisine in a relaxed and comfortable neighborhood style setting. The restaurant will utilize regional farmers and resources to ensure only the freshest ingredients make it to the table.
Check-in: 3pm
Check-out: 12pm
Valet Parking available
Seattle, here we come!
We’re sure you’ve noticed by now. We’ve been telling you the Call for Proposals were due October 23. The main NACADA site had it posted as November 23 on one page, November 16 on another. We simply could not get it all to match up.
So, to give you all the maximum amount of time (because we want your great proposals for this conference!), the conference committee has decided to extend the original deadline and match it with NACADA’s November 23rd deadline. You now have about a month to get your proposal in. Instructions on how to do so are posted on the Proposal Submission site.
Sorry for the confusion!
Dates: January 25-27, 2010
Location: Olive @ 8th, Seattle, Washington, USA
Theme: The ART of NACADA: Advise, Retain, Teach through the use of Technology
Call for proposals deadline: Oct. 23, 2009 Nov. 23, 2009
Scholarship and Award Programs Application deadline: Nov. 16, 2009
Tie-in: NACADA’s Technology Institute, January 24-25, 2009.
The 2010 conference planning committee is working behind the scenes on all the pieces of the puzzle that make up a regional conference. A small team did a site visit to the hotel last week. The consensus is that it’s a nice hotel conveniently located close to shops and restaurants. We understand some of you are eager to get your travel proposals in before budgets run dry or get frozen. We hope the conference and hotel registration information will go out this week. These notices are distributed through the NACADA executive office so we can’t tell you exactly when the information will come out. Keep your eyes peeled.
In the meantime, the call for proposal deadline is just around the corner. Please consider submitting a proposal and encourage fellow colleagues to do the same. On some campuses, having a proposal accepted can help convince the “higher-ups” to fund your trip. Directors, associate deans, deans, vice-provosts, etc. appreciate positive representation.
Well, all good things… Both the Convention Center and the Grand Hyatt (and all the other conference hotels, we’re sure) have bid goodbye to most of the 2400+ NACADA attendees and have started saying hello to the next event. A handful of attendees are still around enjoying San Antonio’s hospitality a little longer; some to visit with friends or family, some to play tourist.
As we all travel back to our respective campuses, no doubt we’re processing what new nuggets the past few days have brought. What new thing can we try in our own advising offices to help us improve our services? What steps of positive change can we begin to implement? What hard questions do we need to ask of ourselves, our supervisors, our staff and/or our students?
As we unpack, we’ll no doubt find the business cards we received from colleagues from around the country (and maybe even the world as the conference played host to advisers from non-North American countries as well). What follow-up phone calls will we make? What questioning emails will we write as we continue the conversation that started at the conference. What ideas and suggestions and feedback and advise will keep going back and forth long after the “Welcome NACADA participants” signs have been taken down and (hopefully) recycled?
Annual and regional conferences are not the end; they are the beginning. These give birth to ideas, spark conversations and form connections and collaborations that benefit us and our institutions.
Here in Region 8, now that our receipts have been turned over to our office and/or budget managers, we turn our attention to our next impetus of conversations, connections and collaborations: the 2010 regional conference in Seattle (Jan. 25-27). As we keep at eye on that upcoming event, we also glance ahead to the next annual conference, to the next time our larger community comes together to share, inspire and collaborate: the 201o annual conference, Oct. 3-6, Disney World, Orlando, Florida. (Yes, my friends, advising is about to meet the Mouse.)
Don’t forget: the proposal deadline for Seattle 2010 is Oct. 23, 2009. Scholarship and awards applications are due Nov. 16, 2009.
“Because I knew you, I have been changed…for good.” The NACADA choir sang the “Wicked” favorite to start the morning. They set a nice tone for the day. Incoming NACADA president Jayne Drake of Temple University re-enforced that notion when she introduced this year’s theme, “Reaching and retaining students.” Advisers, she reminded us, play a powerful role in student retention. We teach. We teach students to navigate the academic maze. (Insert collective group hug and pat-on-the-back.)
If you haven’t been to a conference like this, you may not have this sense yet: There are other people on other campuses who do what you do. They face the challenges you face. They are demanded to do more with less like you are. If one takes nothing else away from the conference, he/she should at least take that. As we face our day-to-day challenges, it good to remember, “I belong to an association that is made up of people who do what I do, with people who understand my student/faculty/staff/colleague/dean/provost/vice-president/boss/supervisor/employee challenges, with people who experience the same thrill you experience when a student looks you in the eye and says, “Thank you. You’ve really helped me today.” You may be one in your office or one of few on your campus but you are part of a community that shares your commitment to student success. And we get your degree audit jokes.
Keynote speaker Sarita Brown, president of Excelencia in Education, is new to NACADA but she immediately embraced us as an ally. While she appreciated all we do, she challenged us to join her in the efforts “to do much more and do it faster.” Her organization works with Latino education initiatives but her message rang true for all students on our campus: fight the stereotypes and provide the services when and where the student need it. Latino students don’t always take the traditional path toward a college degree, she said. Understand that. Adapt to that. And don’t judge that. If it takes someone 12 years to complete a bachelor’s degree, focus on the fact that they earned the degree, not the fact that it took so long.
We’ve already made the point that there are so many concurrent sessions to choose from. Today was no exception. It was another full day of the attendee shuffle. A modest proposal for the next NACADA conference: Instead of free water bottles and pens, see if you can get Hogwarts and the Ministry of Magic to provide Hermione Granger’s “time turner” device to each attendee. That seems to be the only way to make sure you don’t miss a thing.
One last day tomorrow. A half day. Most everyone will leave sometime tomorrow. Thank you San Antonio. You are and have been a gracious host.
What a full day! Poster sessions, breakout sessions, region business meetings, and lots and lots of “Hi, my name is…” Attendees were traipsing back and forth from the Convention Center to the Grand Hyatt all day. Nice facilities but, as you can probably imagine, 2,400 attendees on the move jam up the escalators and elevators every hour. Good excuse to strike up a short conversation with someone new though.
The breadth and depth of the program is staggering. Every hour, you had to choose one of 25+ concurrent sessions to go to. How do you choose? It’s good if you’re here with other colleagues from your institutions. “Divide and conquer” is a good strategy. But, if you’re the sole representative from your office (or even your institution), what do you decide to bring back? It’s an interesting balance between your own personal professional development and the advancement of your office/institution.
The Region 8 business meeting was at the end of the day. It was nice to meet up with colleagues from around the region. Those who work in quarter schools expressed their frustration that the annual conference often falls in the first week of the term. There’s no hard data but it does seem that Region 8 has more schools on the quarter (late September – mid-June) system. It’s hard to justify leaving your campus during the busy first week, especially in these resource-challenged times. This feedback has come out of our region for several years in a row now. Region Chair Brett McFarlane promised he would relay this concern again.
As expected, we talked quite a bit about the upcoming conference in Seattle. More information about the Technology Seminar tie-in will be coming soon. Watch this space. The details are being finalized right now and word will go out once all the (ahem) ducks are in a row. We also learned a little more about the 2011 regional conference. Mark your calendar for April 2011: we’re headed to Calgary!
This blog was also a topic of conversation. We are the first NACADA region to do a blog. It’s taking baby steps right now but we believe this is a good tool for the region to keep its members in the loop. We’d love your feedback. And suggestions. And comments. And ideas for posts. Talk to us. Tell us what you need from us.
It’s another full day tomorrow. We’ll start with another keynote speaker in the morning. Then the “attendee shuffle” begins every hour again: more concurrent and poster sessions. And maybe a check-in in the Silent Auction room to place a bid (or a rebid). The Best of Region 8 presenters from the University of Oregon present at 2 p.m. Think a good thought for them and the other presenters tomorrow who are probably rehearsing in their pajamas tonight.
To bed… More from the annual conference tomorrow.
Just got back from the opening keynote and dessert reception. If you are a frequent or even just an occasional conference go-er (even if it’s just the regional conferences), it’s amazing how many familiar faces you see even in the sea of 2,400+ people. The thing about our profession though, is that even if you don’t know the person sitting next to you, sooner or later the polite smiles and casual hellos turn into conversations about advising structures, workloads and commiseration of how we’re all doing more with less.
A clear picture was painted tonight. NACADA in its 30th year has grown by leaps and bounds. The organization has developed past its “national” reach. Sure, our Canadian colleagues have been with us for awhile now but this year’s conference sees representatives from 20 different countries. You may have already heard this scuttlebutt but NACADA has now added a tagline, “The Global Community of Academic Advising.” Watch the main site up a new logo soon. Oh, and start saving your pennies. An annual conference in Dublin, Ireland is around the corner.
“Our foundation is strong,” said Charlie Nutt, praising the current and former leadership. But he also extended the credit for that strength to the members – you and I – who serve in elected and/or volunteer positions. “We are NACADA,” he said of us members who give the strength of participation and dialogue and ideas and suggestions.
We end this take-away with a quote from the keynote speaker, Dr. Ricardo Romo. “Someone who paid attention (to me) changed my life. That’s what y’all do.” He then challenged us to find the hidden talents in our students. Challenge them, he said. Help them stretch. Help them go that extra mile.
It’s a full day of poster sessions, concurrent sessions and business meetings tomorrow. More to come from San Antonio.
Good night y’all!
