2021 Elections - Candidate Materials Board of Director Position President-Elect

Name Christina Parle

Why do you want to serve as the President of ASCA Board of Directors? I want to serve as the ASCA President because this is an opportunity for me to continue my service to the Association. There are not enough words to communicate what the Association and members have given to me. I joined the Association as a first-generation college student (undergraduate and grad-school) working in the Penn State student conduct office, because accountability had been my life. Prior to my graduate assistantship, I had no context of student conduct as a functional area in student affairs. However, I had previous experience in loss prevention, as a teaching assistant, and as an officer in many student organizations during my undergraduate career. These experiences aligned closely with student conduct, which drew me to attend the ASCA Annual Conference and to continue my membership. ASCA is my professional home, and I have had the privilege to serve on the ASCA Board of Directors since 2018 and have worked tirelessly to advance the work of student conduct and the Association. I have served as the Director of Membership (no longer a Board role) and am the current Director of Equity and Inclusion. I have also served in many volunteer roles focused on developing structures that have assisted ASCA in cementing and continuing its place as the voice of the student conduct profession. I have had the opportunity to work with the absolute best our Association has to offer. since My organizational knowledge and experience make me an ideal candidate for ASCA President.

The leadership attributes I would bring to the presidency include an objective perspective, a strategic and growth mindset, and the ability to create a collaborative and productive environment. I plan to work alongside Board members to determine gap areas and identify additional members to support different initiatives. I operate from a direct and authentic space and hope to inspire that in others. As president, I will represent and lead the Association by staying in tune with the needs of our members, the ever-evolving nature of higher education, and the areas of improvement within ASCA. In my time on the Board, we have made significant progress and there is much more to do. If elected, we would continue making strides in the areas of equity and inclusion, utilizing the Knowledge and Skills developed in 2020, and creating educational opportunities outside of Gehring and the annual conference. I am passionate about creating an ASCA experience that is accessible and inclusive for all.

Why did you become involved in the association, and what has your involvement looked like over time? I became involved in ASCA because I was a graduate student in an office where membership was a part of everyone’s professional journey. As a first-year graduate student, I was ineligible for full financial support to attend the annual conference. I applied for the Diversity Scholarship (now the Tamara Greenfield King Scholarship) and was fortunate to be a recipient. I remember being nervous that I was too young and inexperienced, but what I ended up experiencing was familial. I remember attending programs, meeting people, enjoying karaoke, and playing late night card games in what would eventually be named the Wakanda space. In my second year of graduate school, I was selected to serve as a Presidential Graduate Intern and served on the Leadership Development Committee. In 2018, I assumed the Director of Membership role. I currently serve as the Director of Equity and Inclusion and have served as a program reviewer and presenter for the annual conference. As the Director of Membership, I oversaw our previous states and regions and served as the Board liaison to the Membership Committee and the Fraternity and Sorority Life Community of Practice (CoP). I oversaw a project to update our membership categories, which are still in use today. Additionally, I led a Presidential Task Force to overhaul the state and region structure. This work included collaborating with two working groups and consulting with other Associations, and ultimately, resulted in our current region structure. In my current role, I volunteered to lead two Presidential Taskforces while serving as the liaison to the Equity and Inclusion Committee, Women & Student Conduct CoP, Gender & Sexuality CoP, and the Historically Underrepresented CoP. I assembled a team for the Knowledge and Skills Taskforce. This project had been discussed years prior and to be able to be a part of the group who imagined, developed, and completed an essential resource for our membership, is the highlight of my ASCA experience. I could not have done it without Kateeka Harris, Dr. Patience Bryant, Pam Malyk, Dra. Reyna Anaya, and Alan Acosta. This group took what many Associations said was a multi-year project and completed it in less than one year. I also led the Equity & Inclusion Taskforce consisting of a team of individuals who have been involved in the evolution of ASCA’s commitment to equity and inclusion. This team quickly developed a plan to centralize our efforts and the proposal was accepted by the Board.

Share any relevant professional or lived experiences that may speak to your ability to lead the association.

The most directly relevant experience I have are my years of service to the Association both in and outside of the Boardroom, and my lived experience as a Black/Biracial younger woman. This has allowed me to learn more about what the new generation of student needs in a conduct process and what our members need to be successful in our work. Additionally, I think my experience as a former campus-based conduct professional and my current position as a Fraternity Headquarters conduct staff member exposes me to the accomplishments and challenges of our Association and field in a unique way. I have served in volunteer roles for multiple non-profit organizations within the educational space for many years and have seen the best and the worst of organizational leadership. I aspire to lead the Association with a growth mindset and team-oriented approach. I will support the Association by promoting the things we already do well and finding new ways to provide services for our members. The past two years have taught me that we can and need to operate differently as our profession and world continue to change. We have such a unique experience right now to reimagine how we deliver services, specifically education. Lastly, a major aspect of the President role is representing ASCA at other organizational and association meetings. I believe my ASCA knowledge and network in the field will allow me to do this with ease. If elected, I would strive to acquire Board and member feedback when representing the Association and to communicate and advocate for ASCA as the voice of the student conduct profession. Too often, I think other organizations are doing the work of ASCA and/or not including ASCA at the metaphorical table for important student conduct-related conversations, and I would work to bridge and fill that gap as president.

Please describe how you will work to advance ASCA’s core values. It is the president’s responsibility to advance the mission and values of the Association. Equity and inclusion must continue to be a pillar of our work as we create an educational conduct experience for all students. Through our equity and inclusion efforts, I believe we can also continue the supportive community created within ASCA. I have always said student conduct professionals are a special breed. We navigate the worst of the worst situations – often without thanks – and are expected to show up every day ready to do it all over again. The work is not easy and the past two years have been challenging. It is a top priority for me to recognize a major part of our work is to create a professional home for our members and to provide an outlet that many do not have within their organizations. If elected, I will continue working to cement ASCA’s position as the voice of student conduct while ensuring the Association is flexible and adaptable to the ever-changing landscape of higher education. Often, conduct work is black and white – you violated a policy, or you did not. And although our work can be inflexible at times, I want our Association to continue to challenge the way we do the work, so conduct continues to be a valuable part of the student experience. In my years as a Board member, I have strived to assist the ASCA in fulfilling our core value of advocacy, whether that be with other organizations, institutional leadership, or position statements. It is my goal to assists our members in telling their stories within their institutions to make it easier to advocate for funding, new positions, and more. We will work to do this by increasing education outside of Gehring and the annual conference, continuing to seek information regarding salaries, staffing, and funding from our members, and to begin creating positional statements on productive processes and operations.

One of the biggest accomplishments of the Board of Directors in my time has been the removal of “shoulder-tapping” when identifying volunteers and leadership. As a result, we have had a more diverse Board of Directors and volunteer leadership. I do not believe in gatekeeping leadership opportunities by putting years of service or specific experiences as qualifications. I believe strongly that each one of our members has something to bring to the Association, and it is the role of the president and other leaders to create opportunities for others to cultivate their own leadership.

The role of the president requires experience, an inclusive mindset, decision making, and strategic thinking. What attributes do you have that will enable you to accomplish the association’s goals? My experience both within ASCA and professionally make me uniquely suited to serve as the ASCA President. I have experience with equity and inclusion, decision-making, and setting strategy specifically within ASCA. Outside of ASCA, equity and inclusion are a major part of my life as I have a consulting business focused on this work. In my experience as a Foundation Board member for the Belton Educational Foundation, I also gained experience with strategic thinking, decision-making, financial development, and event planning. Additionally, my seven years of volunteer experience within Sigma Kappa Sorority has provided me opportunities to explore ways to be more equitable and inclusive, work with a remote volunteer team, best practices for recruiting members and volunteers, and how to support members with different types of lived and institutional experiences. I am confident in my understanding and ability to lead ASCA in accomplishing its goals. The Presidential Task Forces I have successfully led are a testament to my commitment and effort. With every position I am in, I strive to create an environment where everyone can give input and a space where everyone has the tools to accomplish their tasks and goals. In thinking about the future goals of the Association, the following are the areas I hope the Association tackles in the coming years: a new strategic plan, implementing the equity and inclusion recommendations developed by the Presidential Task Force, creation of new resources based on the Knowledge and Skills and implementing them into our educational offerings, expanding our support of non-traditional conduct professionals, increasing student organization, Title IX, and foundational student conduct education, discussions about how to increase graduate student and entry level positions in the field, and increasing assessment of our educational offerings. I am hopeful and excited by the opportunity to serve as the ASCA President. I am confident in my ability to lead the Association and create an environment where anyone can have a positive experience. I have had the privilege to experience and assist with so much change within the Association and to work along many other dedicated ASCA members. As you might notice throughout my materials, I have operated as a “doer” on the Board, and I am hopeful to be able to take a step back, inspire the “doer” in our members, and support others in imagining and creating the future of ASCA.

The ASCA Board of Directors recently released professional guidance via the Student Conduct Knowledge and Skills. How would you, in your position on the ASCA Board of Directors contribute to the infusion of the priorities outlined in this project throughout the Association? As the leader and a contributor to the Knowledge and Skills Presidential Taskforce, this is one of the most significant priorities for me. The current Board members, other volunteer leaders, and the Central Office staff are making significant strides in determining how to infuse the Knowledge and

Skills, and if elected president, I would continue to seek out and advocate for opportunities to think outside of the box about new and innovative ways to implement the Knowledge and Skills. The present opportunities I would love to assist with and have been in discussions about include infusing the Knowledge and Skills into all ASCA programming. Some examples include utilizing the Knowledge and Skills in the program proposal process, in the determination of tracks for Gehring process, to include them in the assessment of programs, and more. Additionally, there are many opportunities to create resources for staff to utilize in their institutional work. The Knowledge and Skills will be instrumental in the development of position descriptions, performance evaluations, and determining areas of growth for staff and offices. There is also an opportunity to cultivate partnership opportunities with other associations and organizations that specialize in some of the knowledge areas (e.g., administration, assessment, law and policy). If elected, I commit to ensuring the Knowledge and Skills conversation stays at the forefront of the work of the Board of Directors by identifying Board members, volunteer leaders, and members who are interested in furthering this work and creating space for folx to get involved.