Professional Competencies Development at CMU.

Hi Everyone,

Throughout the next few posts, I will be discussing my experience with Professional Competencies Development at Central Michigan University (CMU). This is to help reflect on many of the skills and experiences that I have gained while in my Graduate Program.

First, let’s start out with Personal and Ethical Foundations, along with Personal and Professional Qualities.

Background – Personal and Ethical Foundations

The meaning behind Personal and Ethical Foundations is it involves the knowledge, skills, and disposition to develop and maintain integrity in one’s life and work. While working as the Graduate Assistant at Central Michigan University I have had the ability to work on these elements for the last 2 years.

Day to Day Life

Reflecting first on how I demonstrate ethics in just one part of my life. One of the activities that I like to do when I am not working is playing videogames. I choose this to demonstrate the ethical foundation that I have in my life because it is one of my passions. I network and have maintained relationships with people across the world because of this passion. I have also had the opportunity to have a volunteer staff team for some of the games that I play.  The ethical question that I ask myself is our decisions with our volunteer staff appropriate and fair. Taking into consideration other people’s feelings, making sure that we have explored other options before making decisions. This allows me to look at the bigger picture and make sure the decisions are fair, they may not be positive decisions but were they the ethical one to make?

Work

I have always held ethics in high regards as I think it shows what type of person you are. Are you going to bend the rules for one person and not another? Will you accept someone’s answer but not another’s? Are the decisions you make ethically sound? 

All these questions and so many others have helped me when working in the Admissions office at CMU. I believe one of the biggest aspects of work and life in general is communication. In terms of work it is not only are you listening to what people are saying but watching their body language, participating in active listening, and trying to understand the others viewpoint. Without doing these things how can you be sure the decisions you are making are ethically sound? When I must make a decision that regards massive change, like letting a person go. I make sure that their situation is well researched beforehand. Were other steps takin before letting them go is an option if possible. Working with that individual to see what circumstances that they are in that might be driving the behavior and trying to find a solution that they help come up with. After seeking out these types of engagement, then it is better to know that you have tried other solutions and have worked to resolving the problem rather than jumping to an extreme. Ethics is not only about the morals that you may have but about understanding the situation and applying the outcome fairly to all of those involved. My ethics have continued to evolve with the trainings, programs, and guidance I have received while working.

Background – Personal and Professional Qualities

The meaning behind Personal and Professional Qualities is that it involves the knowledge, skills, and attributes to manage conduct and applying these tools to work and life.

Implementation

I believe that these qualities go hand in hand in terms of day to day life and work life. This is because the qualities that make up a person do not just stop at the door when you get home. I have always considered myself to be a very open-minded person. I love learning the new perspectives of different people especially those from other cultures and backgrounds. I don’t believe that you must be in agreeance with someone to be open minded. However, you must be accepting of their ideas and way of life (unless these are on fundamental human rights). I consider this to be a part of lifelong learning and having the ability to understand and adapt to new challenges.

While working as a Graduate Assistant my role has allowed me to do a variety of different tasks and expand my skills. I have kept with my open-mindedness when it comes to working with undergraduate students and prospective families. Understanding where they are coming from to have empathy and help them along in their journey. I have had the opportunity to continue developing my skills as I have had to learn how the Admissions office operates. Looking at new systems, technology, and data to stay current in the office and be able to execute my duties. During the GA position I have repeatedly had the opportunity to continue learning and expanding my skill set.  

Thank you all for taking the time to read through this. There is so much more information that could be said about these two topics but for now this is where I will leave it.

Garrett Z

Committee on Committees

This year I was able to serve on the Central Michigan University’s Committee on Committees. This is a committee at CMU that provides a very essential function to the university. We are the committee that approves all other appointments for every committee at CMU.

This experience on the committee has allowed me to see inside the process of how things in business and higher education settings work. It was very interesting at first to learn the process of what people had to go through to get put onto their respective committees.

One of the things that each of us on the committee do is make sure that we research everyone who is up for an appointment. Usually the appointments at CMU are just one person requesting one spot. Which means that they are uncontested nominations. Usually when this happens, we can have meetings via email and letting everyone know our vote. I make sure that I am researching the person for each position and making sure that they are qualified before casting my vote.

I have seen in other areas the ways that CMU does not have representation where it needs it. There are many times that their are vacancies on committees that have not been filled for a while and it always makes me wonder as to why and how we can make that process better.

While the committee itself does not do anything outside of its role as researching and appointing the nominations. I have really apricated being on the committee and learning the inner workings of CMU. It has also really helped influence my view being a political science major and a business major on taking checks and balances into higher education as well. As the committee provides the check on other committees at the university.

SLS Board of Directors

One of the privileges that I have had this year is serving on the Board of Directors for Student Leadership Services. This is an amazing opportunity that I am so glad to have. I have worked with SLS for the past 7 years and it has been a wonderful journey.

First some background about SLS:

“Student Leadership Services, Inc. is a Michigan-based non-profit dedicated to ensuring our youth remain safe, healthy, and alcohol and drug free. SLS accomplishes this through innovative and evidence-based prevention programs within student-led, adult-supported chapters. Since inception in 1982, SLS fosters a safe, supportive, interactive, and engaging environment to cultivate interpersonal and peer resistance skills that will decrease alcohol, tobacco, and drug use (ATOD) among youths.”

Over the course of this year, I have worked with the SLS board to do a variety of initiatives. We have helped drive and shape the future of the organization. This is something I have been passionate about for a long time. I love the work that SLS is doing and how they are working in communities to promote safe and healthy choices for youth. It is a program that I have personally been involved with when I was in high school and I am glad that I have had the opportunity to help shape the future of the organization.

I have been an advocate for the program and helped to represent it throughout various conferences and events. One of the main events that I attended was the Student Leadership Services High School State conference. This conference had over 200 students attending and allowed for their peers to inform them about healthy choices and making an impact in their community. I was able to help mentor some of the Student Advisory Board members in their path and help shape their message to their peers. This experience has allowed me to really give back to my community and the SLS family that has been a big part of my life.

Kewadin Village

This year has been an amazing opportunity to continue my path in residence life. This summer I received the position of Kewadin Village Supervisor for the 2018-2019 school year. Kewadin Village is CMU’s family housing complex, located near the towers on campus.

In this position, I have been able to expand on what I did as an RA in Northwest Apartments last year. I am excited that I have been able to connect with different types of residents. Throughout programming and interactions, I have been able to meet a wide variety of CMU students and families.  Each one of them having unique experiences and sharing with me why they are at CMU and what they are hoping to achieve. This experience really has been eye opening and has allowed me to gain a deeper understanding of higher education, and what it means to people.

Throughout the year I hosted different programs in my community to build that sense of belonging and community among my residents. I tried to make sure that I was available for them and able to design displays that they would find beneficial. I also learned a lot about myself and self-care. It is very important with everything going on that people take the time out for self-care. I really learned this throughout my position by balancing my social, academic, and job responsibilities.

I am very grateful to have had this experience as it as help me grow as an individual and professionally.

Volunteering

One of the things that I have been very passionate about throughout my CMU career is volunteering with SLS. This past winter I was able to attend the SLS High School Conference, volunteering as a host and as a Conference Assistant.

Before the conference I was able to help the SLS Student Advisory Board prepare for it. Each year the Student Advisory Board (SAB) hosts the SLS High School conference at different locations around the state. The Conference is student lead and everything that happens at the conference is for the students and put on by the SAB. Before this year’s conference I was able to volunteer my time with the organization and attend many of their SAB meetings. I helped them prepare workshops and speeches that they would be doing at the conference. I really valued this opportunity because I was able to be a mentor role in an organization that I have been involved with for a long time. I was able to share what I have learned from the program with other students and help them.

This is something that is really important to me because of my leadership philosophy. “Inspire others to find their full potential & leave their impact on the world”. With this volunteer experience, I was able to help encourage the students to find out what they were passionate about. Then use that passion to help make workshops and speeches for their peers to attend at the high school conference.

During the conference, I was able to be in the background and help with the event. It lasted for three days and was a great opportunity to engage with the students and help them succeed. Myself and fellow CA’s stayed in the background for the most part, setting up, tearing down, fixing issues and so much more to help the students have a smooth and successful conference.

I really value this opportunity because each year I learn more about myself and I am able to encourage those around me to find and use their passion in the world.   

I Love CMU

Central Michigan University. I have honestly gained so much by coming to this university. From my involvement, job opportunities, friends and so much more. So one of the best ways I knew I could give back to CMU is by being a CMU Campus Ambassador (CA).

This year marks my third year or 6th semester being a CA and I honestly love the organization more and more each year.  For clarification to start, I should share what a CA actually is. So, a Campus Ambassador at CMU is that we are apart of an organization through the admissions office. We each give our time to give tours to prospective CMU students and their families. Each year we give over 400 tours to prospective students, and along the way we all hope to encourage them to chose CMU.

This year we brought in outside resources to look at our program, and I did a lot of self-reflecting on it as well. I began to ask myself what would I want to hear on tour, what would make me consider CMU. This led me to think about those answers and I knew what I was going to say.  I wanted to give tours this year that were more than why they should choose CMU, but why I and others chose CMU and why they should consider it too. I made an effort this year to go above and beyond when giving tours and making sure that they didn’t feel like just another campus tour, but that they felt special. I am proud to say that myself and others have gotten the highest compliment of all, which is “you are one of the reasons I chose to come to CMU”. That makes being apart of the organization and putting in hours upon hours of time worth it.an just the cookie cutter answers, but that encouraged students to come to CMU.

I have learned so much about leadership through this experience because I have been able to challenge myself to speak in front of strangers on the experiences that I have had. I spoke on

Percistance Pays – RA

When I first walked down my hall freshmen year at CMU one of the first people to greet me was my Resident Assistant (RA). They were one of the people who truly made me feel at home. I knew from that first moment that I wanted to give the same experience to others, I wanted to become an RA.

I have applied to be an RA my freshmen year but I did not receive a position. I did, however, get put on the free agent list. Which basically meant I could be picked up at any point in time. This added a lot of stress but mostly excitement for the future.

I didn’t let the first round stop me from developing my leadership and trying again. Last year I served as a Desk Manager for three different halls at CMU, overseeing 25 employees. At the end of the year it came time to apply again, this time I felt so ready and so confident in getting a position.  I tried my best and came into it with an open mind. I was met with the same letter again, no position available for me but still a Free Agent. I say this because while it did hurt to not be picked, I learned a lot from that experience. Within a few weeks, I got a call from Jarrod the RHD of Northwest Apartments and he offered me a position. I can not express how happy I felt at that moment, I was literally jumping up and down as I told him I accept.

This opportunity provided to be a life changer. I have learned so much from my experience of being an RA. We are provided at the beginning of the year, a training that details all of the policies and how to respond to situations. It’s an extensive week-long training that covers almost everything. While this was informative and great training that I went through, and am far more able to deal with situations, it did not highlight being an RA.

I quickly found that the best thing about being an RA was making those connections with residents. We came into a community that has never had RA’s before and we wanted to bring that community and build a foundation. Since many of our residents have lived in Northwest before we did face some pushback. I learned so much from this though. I learned that we have to be able to be real people with those we want to connect with. Being myself was the only way I was going to get residents to engage.

 

When you think you are there to teach your residents things, but they end up teaching you… it’s one of the best things that has happened to me. I have learned so much more about other cultures and traditions that I would have ever expected by developing connections with people around the world. I have worked with a wonderful set of RA’s to create a foundation that will last for future RA’s.

I have learned that if you really want something you have to keep trying for it. I got free agented twice for a position I wanted for so long. However, I kept true and kept trying to do what I knew was right. It paid off in the end. This experience is something that I will be forever grateful for. I am looking forward to where being a Summer RA takes me and how next year will look.

 

LEAD Team? Why?

Each year we are asked to participate in a Lead Team with the Leadership Institute (LI) at CMU. This year I was selected to be apart of the Special Events Lead Team. This whole year has been a rollercoaster with my lead team.

I say it was a rollercoaster because we had very successful events and then some that were not as great. One of the best events, in my opinion, was our BALLROOM BASH.

This was a great event that we spent many hours planning to make sure that we got everything right. We kicked off the fall semester by having this ballroom bash where we invited everyone who was apart of the LI. We wanted to make our events not just LAS students but anyone who was participating in leadership with the LI. This event may not have brought a giant crowd, but the people who were there loved it and were talking about it. I believe one of the ways you can judge the success of your even

 

t after it has taken place, is by seeing how people reacted to it. Do people keep talking about the event after it’s over? Do people wish they would have been there based on others stories? Did they have fun and was it great overall? All of this things happened at this event, and I am super proud of this.

 

We tried to keep this up and opened up the LAS on Ice to everyone in the LI, so it was LEAD ON ICE. This event was great because we got to just have fun, and get to know others who were being leaders.

The rollercoaster starts when we started to take on to much and push ourselves. We put on many great events but we quickly learned that people have to want to attend events and towards the end of the year that quickly drops. We learned a lot about planning and advertising at the right times.

 

I have learned a lot throughout this LEAD Team experience. I am very glad that I was apart of making changes with my LEAD Team members in making our events for the LI and not just LAS. We have grown our Lead Team and I hope that it will continue to grow each year.

 

 

Board of Director

What does being on a board mean? What do you actually have to do? Why even do it?

This past year I have been serving as the Student Leadership Services Inc. Board of Director Member.  So first what is Student Leadership Services?

“Student Leadership Services, Inc. is a Michigan-based non-profit dedicated to ensuring our youth remain safe, healthy, and alcohol and drug free. SLS accomplishes this through innovative and evidence-based prevention programs within student-led, adult-supported chapters. Since inception in 1982, SLS fosters a safe, supportive, interactive, and engaging environment to cultivate interpersonal and peer resistance skills that will decrease alcohol, tobacco, and drug use (ATOD) among youths”

Each month we meet and discuss what is currently going on in the organization and how we are going shape its future. This has been a great learning experience for me.

I have been able to provide my insight on an organization that I have been involved with for 7 years. I have believed in this organization and have worked to make sure that others believe in it like I do. Being on the Board of Directors has allowed me to shape the future of the organization that has such a powerful mission.

I have learned how to communicate with other professionals on a high level. I have been able to share my thoughts and opinions on matters that help to change and shape the direction that we are going in. I know that this organization will continue to save lives around the world and I am honored and proud to be one of its Board of Directors.

 

For more information or how to get involved visit http://slstoday.net.

Students Leading Students

One of the most important organizations that I have ever been apart of is Students Leading Students (SLS).  This year I got a wonderful opportunity to volunteer with this organization at there High School State Student Leadership Conference. 

Before I go deeper into the organization, I would like to first provide a little background on what they do.  Students Leading Students is apart of Student Leadership Services (both SLS).

“Student Leadership Services, Inc. is a Michigan-based non-profit dedicated to ensuring our youth remain safe, healthy, and alcohol and drug free. SLS accomplishes this through innovative and evidence-based prevention programs within student-led, adult-supported chapters. Since inception in 1982, SLS fosters a safe, supportive, interactive, and engaging environment to cultivate interpersonal and peer resistance skills that will decrease alcohol, tobacco, and drug use (ATOD) among youths.”

So, this year I was able to volunteer at the High School Leadership State Conference. This conference is put on by different students from across the State of Michigan to any leaders who want to attend, primarily being highschool SLS chapters. I was able to help these student leaders prepare this conference and practice beforehand.

We got to the conference very early that morning and set everything up for the students. We went through all of the media, and presentations and practiced it all. During the whole conference, I was running around helping in different areas. However, my main job was to run the sound and make sure that it was great. I am beyond proud of each of the student leaders I worked with to make the conference a reality. They put their heart and soul into each moment of the conference. They planned speakers, workshops, speeches, all of from opening to closing. It was amazing to see these student leaders inspire their peers to make a difference in their communities. With topics on mental health, relationships, procrastination and more.

Volunteering for this program was a great refresher on why inspiring students is important. These student leaders are going out and inspiring their peers to do more, to do better in their communities and be the change.