One Size Does Not Fit All: Traditional and Innovative Models of Student Affairs Practice (review)

One enduring characteristic of the student affairs profession is its elusive organizational configuration. There are no clear boundaries in terms of the functional areas encompassed in a typical division of student affairs. Indeed, the organizational structure typically differs by the size, type, and source of control (public versus private) of the institution. Although these variations represent the norm for most practitioners, Manning, Kinzie, and Schuh identify common threads in student affairs administration. In One Size Does Not Fit All they weave those threads "to delineate models of student affairs practice" (p. viii).

The book evolved from the authors' work on the Documenting Effective Educational Practices (DEEP) project conducted by the National Survey of Student Engagement Institution for Effective Educational Practice at the Indiana University Center for Postsecondary Research. The DEEP project examined the ways in which 20 high-performing colleges and universities achieve student success. One Size Does Not Fit All summarizes what the authors learned from that project. That knowledge is encapsulated in vignettes provided in each chapter that illustrate the five traditional and six innovative models of student affairs administration described in the book.

The volume is organized in four parts. Part 1 offers a historical context. Chapter 1 describes the evolution of the profession including the three ways in which student affairs work historically has been conceptualized (student services, student development, and student learning) and the factors that influence how student affairs work is organized. The second chapter, not as clearly conceptualized as others, discusses research-based models of student affairs: student engagement, the connections between student engagement and student affairs, and the DEEP project that provides the data for the volume. It concludes by identifying six traditional models of student affairs practice.

These six models form the nexus of Part 2. Chapter 3 discusses the extracurricular model of organization in which student affairs and academic affairs operate independently with distinct "missions, functions, and pedagogies" (p. 39). Administratively centered models, including the functional silo and student service approaches to professional work, are presented in the fourth chapter. Learning-centered representations of student affairs administration form the focus of Chapter 5: seamless, competitive (academic versus student affairs), and co-curricular learning models. These six traditional approaches to practice set the stage for the five innovative forms of organization.

Part 3 presents the crux of what Manning, Kinzie, and Schuh offer readers. The sixth chapter discusses learning-centered innovative models of student affairs work: the ethic of care, student-driven, and student agency models. In each case, the authors present developmental theories most closely aligned with the organizational model. For example, Astin's (1984) involvement theory, Kuh et al.'s (2005) engagement theory, and Schlossberg's (1989) notions of mattering are all intricately woven into the fabric of the student-driven model of practice.

In Chapter 7, innovative models based on academics and collaboration are presented, including the academic/student affairs collaborative and academic-centered approaches to practice. For these models, linkages between founding documents of the profession—the two volumes of Student Personnel Point of View (American Council on Education, 1937, 1949)—and organizing frameworks are drawn. It is the connections the authors draw between theories and documents (with which practitioners are likely to be familiar) and organizing principles (with which they likely are not) that render this part of the volume so enticing.

The final chapter (Part 4) addresses how institutions might transition from traditional to innovative ways of organizing. It describes elements within each of the three contexts that influence transformation: the national, professional, and institutional levels of operation. Finally, the authors identify challenges to adopting innovation and discuss the ways in which graduate preparation programs might enable professionals to understand and embrace these innovative models of practice.

In general, One Size Does Not Fit All offers some intriguing ideas about student affairs organizing principles. It is...