Is Student Affairs Relevant for the 21st Century? Tony W. Cawthon ...

Is Student Affairs Relevant for the 21 st Century?
This monograph attempts to provide readers with thoughts and questions about the
relevancy of student affairs in the future. As we began our work on this monograph, we struggled
with how to approach it as none of us has a crystal ball nor can we predict the future. In addition,
a number of recent publications have addressed this same topic. The final report of the Task
Force of the Future of Student Affairs, Envisioning the Future of Student Affairs, (ACPA &
NASPA, Task Force of the Future of Student Affairs, 2010) and the report provides excellent
information on the future of student affairs. More recently, the Journal of College and Character
offered two articles on the mission of student affairs. The first article Does Student Affairs Have
an Enduring Mission (Sandeen, 2011), investigates if it is possible to agree on an enduring core
mission and purpose of student affairs. The second article Redefining Our Mission: What Does
Higher Education Need from Student Affairs? (Porterfield, Roper, L., & Whitt, 2011) focuses on
the premise that student affairs’ ability to remain relevant is reliant upon our ability to redefine
our mission, structures and best practices in conjunction with the needs of the institution.
To begin our work on this manuscript, we began by identifying four questions we hoped
to address. The questions used to frame this manuscript were:
(1) In the last 10 years, how has the state of the economy, politics, and other social
variables changed the mission of student affairs?
(2) How will the mission of student affairs change in the next 10 years in the following
areas?
-Will our organization structures remain the same? If not, then how do you predict
Student Affairs will be organized in 2020?
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