u/Makshak_924

I’m a student affairs professional (6-ish years of experience) and I’m interested in presenting at a conference at this point in an upcoming year. The last time I did that was during my time in grad school, and that was done in collaboration with my advisor, so it was a much more guided process.

I feel a bit paralyzed with just this feeling of “where do I even start,” because it’s been very long and this would be much more led by me. My specialty areas include student involvement and leadership, residence life, honors programs. I also have a bachelors in human development and family sciences and still feel comfortable calling back to that within my research as well.

I would welcome any advice here- regardless of your discipline- on where to even begin with this. I have a list of folks in my back pocket to connect with over the next few weeks, so I am going to chat with them as well. Thank you :’)

Hello hello!
I’m wondering how many of you work at universities that implement some form of summer/common read, whether it be a university-wide initiative or just within one college program.

I’ve done both a university-wide common read and am currently working somewhere that it’s just our academic college doing it. Overall, it’s received well (depends on the book, of course!!), but it’s the logistics of it that really start to get to me. For those of you working at schools with a common read:

1. How are you getting the material to the students? Are they responsible for getting it themselves or is it something your department/university pays for?
2. Are you going with physical books, ebooks, audio books, or something else?

We have been using Amazon Bookshelf for years now and overall I’m not impressed. The issues we have reported over the years have still to be fixed, the overall UI is clunky, and everything goes to shit if the book changes cost, which happened to us over the weekend. Now, I’m spending an entire day individually revoking our previous voucher and trying to get one with updated book costs out there- it’s well over a thousand vouchers that need adjusting for our students, and this Isn’t the first year this happened to us.

I just don’t feel like there is any streamlined way to get summer read books to 1,000+ students and it… makes sense? Like, Amazon bookshelf is really bonuses friendly haha. I want to find a way to be able to cover the cost for students, be able to edit the voucher list en masse if a problem pops up, etc.

Do any of you have experiences and resources you’d be able to share? Please tell me the perfect summer reading platform is out there, and I’ve just not found it yet😭

quick edit: I accidentally submitted this post because my needy & greedy cat was bumping his face against my phone for pets LOL. Apologies!

Hi all! My partner & I just learned that we are able to take a small vacation from around June 30 (or night of the 29th) - July 4/5. I am hoping we can get a few nights away as a little unexpected summer vacation surprise :)

I’m not originally from Corvallis/the state, so I’d love some recommendations. We’re willing to travel to all four corners of the state, by car, but I’m not sure what all is manageable to do or check out during that stretch of time of the summer.

Thanks for any suggestions!

Hi all!
I’ll be needing to get a hotel for one night in June for a show at the Wonder Ballroom, which I’ve not been to and I’m not familiar with the surrounding area. Are there any hotels (or general street areas) you’d recommend we look at? We are open to either something walking distance from Wonder Ballroom OR taking the TriMet in/out, assuming the timing works. I also am happy to hear about where NOT to stay. Thanks so much!