Theme 3: Faculty members do not understand the role of Student Affairs and
are often unaware of student affairs’ activities, programs, and initiatives. After asking
each faculty member interviewed to describe his or how own role, the researcher asked
each faculty member to describe the student affairs unit and what he or she felt the role of
student affairs was on campus. Responses varied somewhat among faculty participants;
most had a general sense that student affairs was in charge of the experience of students
outside the classroom but also confessed some ignorance as to what, specifically, that
operational unit did. The most commonly named roles of the student affairs division
were:
Residence Life
People in charge of retention (student engagement, comfort, academic
success)
The people who plan events and run the student center