Mattering: A Tale of Understanding the University Machine

I started out this course expecting to learn about the American college student, but I ended up learning about myself. I graduated from Cal State Long Beach roughly a year ago and there never is a gestation period to reflect on the college experience. Maybe people look back fondly at graduation photos, if they could afford them. Prior to this class I had only remembered moments in classes or a book I might have actually read for a course.

Universities are focused on retention rates and making students aware the reasons to continue their higher education. This is why there are often mandatory University 100: Introduction to the university courses. There is never University 500: You've graduated! Now what? course.

It goes without saying that everyone's college experience is unique and everyone learns different life lessons while there. However, there is a commonality in the types of lessons people learn and what sort of traits an engaged citizen has. College might not be the only place to learn these lessons, but it is a place that encourages that those lessons should be learned, which is why the college student is worth research investigation.

This class in particular focused on the development of traditional college aged citizens and provided me with many theoretical lenses to improve how I can interact and teach, college students. I have learned that although my experience is unique, it does not mean that other students did not develop in a similar parallel way. I learned that because I have a unique perspective that I should share that with other students, teachers, and student affairs people to best address the needs for as many students as possible.

In many ways prior to this class, I have felt like I have been betrayed by student affairs professionals. They were the people that always had to tell me "bad things," or if I ever had to talk to them it was to take care of a "bad thing." Now I realize that people enter this field because they do have a genuine interest in helping students. I was just a particularly stupid and self-involved one. I also realized that maybe since this course is offered here and not necessarily everywhere that my disdain for this profession could be based on mattering. If the student professionals had been mindful of Schlossberg than I might not have felt so alienated by the university system. When we covered mattering and marginality I had a hard time listening to people tell me how significant they thought that was and I realized that they probably felt like their university made them feel like they mattered and I had not had the experience until recently.

So, I guess my Aha! moment, as awful as this may sound, would be gaining the respect for the student affairs professionals at universities. They are not evil pencil pushers at a desk, they are the first people to talk to the students that I will have to teach. They get to send home the acceptance letters and decide the student makeup of the university as a whole. I had always thought of it as a more computer generated process. There are people that do these things! The university is not some enigmatic SkyNet robot, I feel comfortable enough making a Terminator reference at this point in the semester, that is pulling all of the strings. There are people, that genuinely care about the students and their well being. Its more important than I had ever bothered to consider or imagine.