Student affairs practitioners shared personal practices and examples on ways to confront inequities within the student conduct process at this year’s NASPA virtual conference.
Creating a more inclusive environment begins with individual work. Moving from denial to recognizing that biases exist in everyone, said Dayna Ford, director of community standards at the University of Texas-Arlington.
To address those biases, one must understand and learn how their own identity, background and life experiences impacts the way others are perceived. Catching those thoughts prevents action from occurring that could negatively impact students.
“What we don’t want to have happen is have those biases creep into how we are treating the students,” said Ford. “Creep into the structures, processes, procedures and policies that we are putting together because we don’t want to have that disparate impact on people.”
Conversations about bias must also happen at an institutional level.
During training sessions, Ford will provide participants with scenarios that could “illicit a stereotypical response” to get participants to think through their own biases such as “what does a 4.0 GPA student look like compared to one who holds a 1.5 GPA?”
For some students, receiving a misconduct could reiterate their feelings of not “belonging” on campus, according to Dr. Jill Dunlap, senior director for research, policy and civic engagement at NASPA. To increase student success, administrators involved in the process can serve as a resource and provide frequent check-ins.
