Widening the Academic Conversation to Include Support Staff: Wabash College Extends a Common Classroom Experience to its Entire Campus Community

COLLEGE SUPPORT STAFF MEMBERS often have an important, if sometimes unrecognized, impact on students' lives. For example, in the late 1960s on the campus of a small Methodist college, Kathryn Jones worked as administrative assistant to the dean of the college. At Lambuth College (now Lambuth University) in Jackson, Ten-nessee, Mrs. Jones served as liaison for students, staff, and faculty who wished to see the dean. Nervous individuals awaiting the dean were soothed by Mrs. Jones's calming voice and willingness to converse on any topic. When Mrs. Jones, Philip's grandmother, passed away in 2001, a Lambuth alumna told Philip that Mrs. Jones had been a powerful influence on her and that she deeply admired all his grandmother had accomplished at Lam-buth College. Several other Lambuth alumni echoed similar sentiments in the following days. That these former students remembered a secretary thirty years after they had graduated, and that a person with such short-term contact with others could have such a long-term impact on their lives, came as a surprise.

Peg Bonebrake, a fraternity cook at Wabash College in Crawfordsville, Indiana, demonstrates just how much influence staff members can have on students' lives. Fraternity members commonly refer to Mrs. Bonebrake as their “house mom” and frequently debate with her about the country's role in war or the existence of God, or simply discuss relationship problems. In the aftermath of one recent debate, students in the fraternity collected enough money to purchase flowers for her, to show how much they appreciate her concern and frankness. For these students, Mrs. Bone-brake is more than just a cook; she is a part of their Wabash family.

These staff members, and many others like them, can matter a great deal to students. Many are support, administrative, or maintenance staff; secretaries, cooks, or janitors—and yet they are much more than that. Regardless of their job responsibilities, these individuals generally care deeply about the academic environment and the institution in general. When these individuals demonstrate to others how much they care, they are helping to build a sense of campus community and pride.

Interactions between staff and students can come in the form of intellectual engagement, as it did with the house mom and the Lambuth secretary. While these interactions may happen serendipitously, the challenge is to intentionally create opportunities for this kind of engagement and to make clear that support staff do contribute directly to students' academic and intellectual growth. In this article, we highlight an initiative that has helped bring staff more actively into the academic and intellectual life of a college and that encourages these kinds of staff-student connections. Wabash College, a small 850-student liberal arts college for men, now invites staff to become engaged at the heart of the curriculum and the campus's intellectual culture by participating in the college's core course, Cultures and Traditions.

Cultures and Traditions (C&T) is a yearlong course that is required for all sophomores. This course explores ancient Western and Eastern cultures in the fall semester and modern European, African American, and Mexican cultures in the spring semester. The course is devoted to reading and discussing texts in sections of fifteen students, with occasional lectures for the entire sophomore class. Because faculty from every department teach the course and all sophomores are required to take it, virtually all students and faculty at Wabash have experienced C&T. The course plays a key role in the college's intellectual life; amazingly, juniors and seniors in the residence halls and fraternities look forward to discussions with sophomores on issues raised in C&T. Many faculty draw on C&T as background for other courses, and interdepartmental conversations among faculty often address the content and pedagogy of C&T. This course, more than any other aspect of college life (including, we believe, football) provides a common culture and a shared tradition that shapes students' and teachers' intellectual and academic experiences while at the college. (For some faculty who were trained almost exclusively within a discipline, teaching the course provides an opportunity to experience a bit of the liberal arts education that they missed in undergraduate or graduate school.)

But an important college constituency had been excluded from this experience: our support staff. Inspired by Earl Shorris's Clemente Courses in the Humanities, described in his book Riches for the Poor, English professor Joy Castro launched an effort to offer C&T to our staff. Over the first three years, thirty-six staff members, spouses, and visiting professors accepted the invitation to become students in C&T. (We decided to expand the course in 2004–05 and invited local community residents to participate as well. The initial section filled a month before classes started.) Knowing that most staff members cannot leave their jobs for three hours a week during the work day and sensitive to the fact that many who haven't been in a classroom for years might be too intimidated to speak in a regular section, we set up a special section, C&T for Staff, that met in the evenings, after the typical workday was over. Professors who were currently teaching the course volunteered to staff this section, sharing teaching duties so that staff members could work with a number of professors. Finally, to ensure that the course would be as low-stress as possible, no papers or grades were assigned; the course was devoted to reading and discussion; and all books and materials were provided free of charge.

The Center of Inquiry in the Liberal Arts at Wabash College has supported this program and coordinated its assessment. Our interviews with participants provided a number of insights into how to nurture meaningful staff-student interaction. First, the C&T for Staff program gave staff an opportunity to understand firsthand what students experience in the classroom. Second, participants became more likely to engage in intellectual conversations with students whom they encountered in their daily jobs. Finally, the experience gave staff a stronger sense of community, a stronger appreciation for the academic environment at Wabash, and an enthusiasm for engagement in intellectual conversation. As one staff member put it, “You understand better how the students learn and how you make them think.”

When staff members better understood typical assignments, their respect for students increased dramatically. Most of the staff did not realize that students had so much to read or write. One participant's thoughts capture this sentiment:

Along with a new appreciation for students, staff members found they had more frequent (and more interesting) interactions with students. A few staff members commented that since taking the course, they had spoken with students about specific texts they read while in C&T. The campus café, where faculty and staff converse over lunch, also became a place where staff and students could casually mention something like “How are you? Did you read Gilgamesh last night?” or “Wow, the Malcolm X reading was pretty long, wasn't it?” Sometimes these initial comments would launch a longer, deeper conversation. Programs like this can get the community involved and increase intellectual stimulation—something the participants in the program all noted as personally important. Again and again, we heard how excited participants had been, as they put it, to “massage” their brains.

In addition to an increased appreciation for students, staff now had something more in common with them and additional topics worth talking about. One participant said she feels much more comfortable talking with students (particularly sophomores) after having completed C&T for Staff. She imagines how students might respond if they knew that she has been a part of the C&T for Staff program:“‘Oh man, she understands what we're doing, and I can actually talk with her, even if it is about why I owe [the college] so much money.' It gives a good footing there, I think.” A good footing may be exactly what staff members need to grow intellectually so that they can help students grow as well.

On the other hand, some participants' perceptions of students were unchanged by the experience. One indicated that she had always believed that the students were an amazing group. In contrast, another mentioned that C&T for Staff had given her a negative view of students' habits: “But going to the lectures and seeing the students sleeping through the lectures, I guess that was a poor reflection to me that they were sitting there snoring, or whatever…. You know, I wanted to kick them or poke them or something and say, ‘Wake up, you know, it's not that early, nine o'clock.' So, that was kind of disappointing to see that.” The majority of the participants, however, reported that their perceptions had changed and that they found themselves impressed by the level of responsibility students bear.

Finally, with an appreciation of student work and common ground shared with sophomores, staff participants in the program said they feel much more connected to Wabash College. It seems that divisions between students and staff have been reduced and, more important, that a sometimes elitist attitude on the students' part has also been challenged. Students can now see these staff members as active thinkers who care about students because they understand what students have to do to succeed in school and because they have shared an important part of their college experience. One participant, an admissions officer, echoed this theme strongly:“We take a lot of pride in our sense of community. And I think that the college can continue to benefit as we share more, as we have more common experiences—for the people who took that course now understand better what goes on in C&T and what goes on in the classrooms at Wabash…. They extensively understand our primary mission. I think we can take more pride and distribute better information. We have more of a sense of belonging.”

Programs that explicitly bring staff into the intellectual mission of a college offer good opportunities to strengthen and deepen these individuals' impact on stu-dents—and in turn, on the college community as a whole. We think again of Philip's grandmother and the Wabash house mom and others who have contributed to the social and intellectual environment on campuses across the country. From one vantage point, the Mrs. Joneses, Mrs. Bonebrakes, and others have already gone the extra mile to involve themselves with students' personal and academic lives on campus. From another, campuses can take further steps to facilitate engagement. C&T for Staff and similar efforts contribute to a strong community and engage staff in new ways. It gives admissions officers, fraternity cooks, and other staff members additional opportunities to contribute to a common mission—student learning and success.