What a wonderful way to spend the first week of your new job – with over 3,000 of your best friends in the wonderful city of Baltimore! The 31st Annual Conference of the National Academic Advising Association was clearly a first in so many ways – my first in the role as Executive Director, the celebration of the superb and memorable leadership of our first Emeritus Executive Director Roberta “Bobbie” Flaherty, the introduction of our first Charter Class of Emerging Leaders and Mentors, the first time our NACADA chorus opened our Conference, and our first Conference overseen by a Pirate!
However, the Conference was also steeped in tradition: nearly all of our Past Presidents on stage to acknowledge the tremendous work of Bobbie Flaherty over the past 17 years; as always a phenomenal conference planning team led this year by Stacy Woycheck; thought-provoking, powerful, and informative keynote speakers like Patrick Terrenzini and Sharon Fries-Britt; an outstanding set of preconference workshops, concurrent sessions and panel discussions; and an Executive Office team led by Nancy Barnes and Rhonda Baker dedicated to making this year’s conference immensely successful for each participant in attendance! As our President Jennifer Bloom says in her column, we are building on our past successes and traditions as we set high expectations for the future of our Association.
As you settle back into your routine and the rush of registration on many of your campuses, please take time to begin now to plan for the variety of NACADA events you can take part in for the rest of the year. I encourage you to utilize our successful Webinar series as a means to provide campus-wide professional development for your institution - the next Webinar is on the very exciting topic On the Horizon: The Future of Academic Advising and Technology on December 12, 2007. In addition, in February 2008 in beautiful San Diego, California, we will hold our annual Academic Advising Administrators’ Institute and ourAssessment of Academic Advising Institute, as well as our National Seminar this year entitled Advising by Design: Planning the Future of Academic Advising on Your Campus. We are excited to announce that this year’s Administrators’ Institute has a new track focused specifically at experienced administrators who have campus-wide responsibilities for advising. Last, our ten excellent Region Conferences will begin in March. These Region Conferences are a wonderful opportunity to network with professionals in your Region. I encourage you to not only attend your Region Conference, but to also to submit a proposal to present there.
I also encourage you to continue to explore the variety of publications and CDs we have available for you as grow in the profession and work to provide quality material to your colleagues on your campuses. The quality of our monographs, the NACADA Journal,Academic Advising Today and Clearinghouse of Academic Advising Resources articles are truly without compare in higher education. I also urge you to take advantage of these publication opportunities for your own research and growth!
I am honored and excited to take on the new responsibility as Executive Director for our Association. As we continue to grow, reaching 10,000 members in the next year, I am committed to work hard to be sure that we continue to have the open, inclusive, and welcoming culture that NACADA is recognized for. Our strength must continue to be that our new members and professionals to the Association are welcomed and mentored by our seasoned members and professionals. I also am committed to increasing the diversity of our membership and leadership and feel strongly that our Emerging Leader Program is a wonderful step forward to meeting that goal. And, last, I am committed to working with our leadership and our superb Executive Office staff to ensure that we are offering the best and most comprehensive services and events possible in as many delivery mediums as we can.
The title of Bobbie’s last column as Executive Director was”We’ve Come a Long Way, Baby! It’s Been a Wonderful Journey!”I agree we have and it has been! But We Have a Long Way to Go and Our Journey Will Be New and Exciting!I look forward to walking side-by-side with each of you on this journey!
Charlie Nutt, Executive Director National Academic Advising Association (785) 532-5717 [email protected]
Cite this article using APA style as: Nutt, C. (2007, December). From the executive director: Thoughts from the executive office . Academic Advising Today, 30(4). Retrieved from [insert url here]
