Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 39

Talking Stick: In the book's
introduction you are clear about the
fact that the more than 200 students
you interviewed may not come
from the most representative crosssection of schools, but the decisions
and challenges they faced had a
commonality. What were some of
these major themes that you saw
emerge for students' decisionmaking process?
A few things stuck out for us after
reading the students' interviews.
The first was the importance of small
decisions such as deciding whether
to talk to a professor during office
hours, when to start working on an
assignment and whether to seek
help, or deciding whether to live in a
different dorm than your friends - and
how these decisions could have large
effects on students' college experience.
A good example is a student,
Nileen, who decided to go talk to a
guest lecturer on campus because
the work the lecturer was doing was
exactly what Nileen was interested
in. She didn't see herself as someone
who would talk to a speaker whom she
hadn't met, but she made the decision
on the spot to do so. That decision,
which led to a mentoring relationship
with the speaker, changed Nileen's
academic plans: who her major advisor
would be, with whom she would do
her senior project, and the topic of her
senior project. It changed her work in
college, but it also changed her work
after college: what graduate programs
she considered and so on. So, although
we stress the importance of big
decisions such as choosing a major,
deciding to study away, or finding an
internship, we don't often ask students
to be reflective about their small
decisions.
The second theme that emerged

was that how students approached
their decision making was critically
important to their college experience.
Students who saw decisions, big and
small, as opportunities to learn about
themselves and then reflect on the
process of making the decisions, as
well as on the outcomes, had much
richer college experiences than
students who saw decisions essentially
as obstacles to get over quickly. No
student was in only one or the other
of these camps all the time, but
those who came to understand the
value of their decision making, and
were thoughtful about the process,
left college in much better shape
for making decisions as adults than
those who tended to minimize the
importance of decision making.
As we say in the introduction, we
came to understand that the decisionmaking process is at the heart of a
liberal education, and that process can
occur in any kind of college and in all
arenas of college: academic, personal,
and social.
Talking Stick: The third chapter of
your book, "Connection," starts
with two quotations from students
about how so much of their first
and even second years of college
were shaped by the people with
whom they simply shared physical
proximity in the residence halls.
What were the major themes you
saw emerge about this connection?
First, that proximity is king - or
at least royalty - when it comes to
making friends. We know of no study
on the determinants of friendships
that fails to find proximity playing
an important role. So one theme that
emerges here is the importance of
shared physical space for preparing
the foundation for meaningful and

enduring friendships. But proximity
is not the only factor. If it were, we
would have found that residencebased friendships after the first year of
college were equally as common. But
they were not.
So what were the additional
reasons behind the enduring nature
of early friendships formed in dorms
and other living situations? The
second most important reason had
to do with students coming to college
strongly motivated to make friends.
Most of the students in our panel
study came to college knowing few
other students; they did not have a
ready-made friendship group to lean
on as they underwent the exciting, but
also anxiety-provoking, transition to
college. So most new students crave
social connections, and they want
them quickly.
At residential colleges like the
ones we studied, first-year students
find a ready supply of other students
interested in making friends right in
their dorms. A surprising number
of these early friendships endured
throughout college and beyond.
Others, as you might expect, became
less important after the first semester
or first year when students felt more
comfortable in their new home and
sought out more fulfilling friendships
based on shared interests or
experiences. These students regarded
early friendships as friendships of
convenience and moved on to make
new friends.
Regardless of how the friendships
developed, first-year students who
initially found friends among the
other students living close to them
tended to experience better transitions
to college than those students whose
relationships with roommates and
dormmates were more distant.

JANUARY
JANUARY ++ FEBRUARY
FEBRUARY 2017
2017

39
39



Talking Stick - January/February 2017

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Talking Stick - January/February 2017

Talking Stick - January/February 2017
Contents
Vision
Just In
Calendar
Your ACUHO-I
Transitions
Res Life
Facilities
Special Focus
Conversations
First Takes
Around Student Affairs
New Members
Snapshot
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Intro
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - BB1
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - BB2
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Talking Stick - January/February 2017
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Cover2
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 1
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 2
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 3
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Contents
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 5
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 6
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 7
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Vision
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 9
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Just In
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 11
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 12
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 13
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 14
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 15
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 16
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 17
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Calendar
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 19
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Your ACUHO-I
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 21
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Transitions
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 23
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Res Life
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 25
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 26
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 27
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Facilities
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 29
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 30
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 31
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Special Focus
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 33
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 34
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 35
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 36
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 37
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 38
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 39
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 40
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 41
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 42
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 43
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 44
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 45
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 46
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 47
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 48
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 49
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 50
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 51
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Conversations
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 53
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 54
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 55
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - First Takes
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Around Student Affairs
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - 58
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - New Members
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Snapshot
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Cover3
Talking Stick - January/February 2017 - Cover4
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20190506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20190304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20190102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20181112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20180910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20180708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20180506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20180304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20180102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20171112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20170910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20170708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20170506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20170304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20170102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20161112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20160910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20160708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20160506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20160304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20160102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20151112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20150910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20150708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20150506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20150304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20150102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20141112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20140910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20140708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20140506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20140304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20140102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20131112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20130910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20130708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20130506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20130304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20130102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20121112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20120910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20120708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20120506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20120304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_201201
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20111112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20110910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20110708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20110506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20110304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20110102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20101112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20100910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20100708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20100506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20100304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20100102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20091112
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20090910
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20090708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20090506
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20090304
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick_20090102
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick1108
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick0908
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick0708
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/acuho/talkingstick0508
https://www.nxtbookmedia.com