College males: Keeping them engaged on your campus

There has been much discussion in the popular media over the last few years to the effect that there is a “crisis” with regard to men in higher education. There have been several angles in these reports, including arguments suggesting that men are declining in student ranks, or that women are outpacing their male counterparts. In any case, these reports have asked questions about where the men are if not in college; and what will be the consequences of this problem in terms of the workforce, families, or the potential nature and future of higher education. One could easily be both intrigued and concerned by the fact that (not unlike a number of other issues facing higher education) the conversation is being led by individuals and organizations generally outside higher education itself (e.g. governments and media)

What Should We Be Doing to Reduce or End Campus Violence?

Over the last several years, there have been a number of high-profile incidents of violence on college and university campuses. These have precipitated discussions and new initiatives on campuses and within our professional organizations intended to prevent and respond to violence

His story/her story: A dialogue about including men and masculinities in the women’s studies curriculum

The article discusses the issue of inclusion of men and masculinities in the Women\u27s Studies curriculum. Women\u27s Studies programs were started to compensate for the male domination in the academics. Women\u27s Studies presented a platform where scholarship for women was produced and taken seriously, female students and faculty could find their say or voice, and theoretical investigations required for the advancement of the aims of the women\u27s movement could take place. If the academy as a whole does not sufficiently integrate Women\u27s Studies into the curriculum, integrating Men\u27s Studies into Women\u27s Studies might end up further marginalizing Women\u27s Studies by decreasing the number of classroom hours students spend engaging women\u27s lives and feminist scholarship. Such an integration would presents an another form of male privilege, with men manipulating their way into the only branch of scholarship that has consistently focused on women. On a ground level, feminist scholars are apprehensive that a move from a Women\u27s Studies program to a Gender Studies program will reduce the political aspect of women\u27s programs

Beyond Bad Dogs: Toward a Pedagogy of Engagement of Male Students

As Student Affairs has developed as a profession, scholars and practitioners have identified deficiencies in classical identity development theory pertaining to women; gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, or trans-gendered people; people of color, people with disabilities; and other historically underrepresented identities. Further, the school of thought is that student development theory is primarily based on research subjects who are middle/upper-class Caucasian men and thus is applicable to this population primarily. Thus, newer scholarship has emerged to explain identity development in particular minority groups and women. This project argues that classical theory not only fails to capture salient developmental processes of marginalized groups, but in fact fails to capture elements of male identity development. While the theories are gendered male per se (due to the subjects studied), they are resonant with hegemonic (socially constructed and imposed) masculinity rather than an authentic human masculine identity. There are consequences to this for men and women.The Student Affairs field has established knowledge, values, and best practices, which is inculcated into new practitioners through the professional socialization process. The purpose of this constructivist inquiry was to examine this process, its underlying values and norms, and its effect on professionals' conceptions of male students. Seventeen Residence Hall Directors with graduate degrees in Student Development or related disciplines were interviewed about their socialization into the field, thoughts about male students, and reactions to a case example depicting an incident on a college campus. Findings suggest a lack of theoretical or conceptual understanding of male gender identities, and consequently a difficulty in viewing male students developmentally. Moreover, without such understanding, new professionals' conception of marginalized identities can unwittingly reify rather than interrupt stratification and privilege

The Relevance of Extracurricular Activities for Citizenship: Why Cutting Budget for Student Associational Activity is a Bad Policy

Universities are tasked with providing rigorous education and training for successful entry into disciplinary and professional fields. Their instrumental roles are situated within broader commitments to political communities through cultural stewardship. As such, the process of socializing students with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions of democratic citizenship is a complementary and acute obligation of institutions of higher education. Student Associations arguably serve as strategic enablers of this key responsibility through their unique identities as laboratories of shared governance. When students participate in co-creating their educational and community experiences, the dividends for learning and development escalate. The deliberative processes and activities of student associations resemble those ideal in the broader civil society and should be supported. We suggest that the respective aspirations and impact of universities and student associations are mutually bound though an experiential curriculum of democratic citizenship. Hence, we propose that it is in universities’ interest to provide and protect funding for student associations and their activitie

Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA and Amplified Fragment Length Polymorphism Analyses of Pasteurella multocida Isolates from Fatal Fowl Cholera Infections

Fowl cholera, a disease caused by Pasteurella multocida, continues to be a major problem for the poultry industry. The sources of pathogenic organisms responsible for most sporadic epidemics remain unconfirmed, although attenuated vaccines that retain a low level of virulence have occasionally been implicated in outbreaks of the disease. One of the vaccines most commonly used to prevent fowl cholera is the M-9 strain. In the present study, 61 clinical isolates from turkeys that died of fowl cholera from 1997 to 1999 on 36 Utah farms were analyzed and compared to the M-9 vaccine strain. Genetic analyses of the isolates were done by random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) analysis and amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) fingerprinting. The results of these genetic analyses were correlated with the vaccination status of the flock, isolate serotype, and geographic location. Although both genetic techniques effectively identified similar subtle genomic differences, RAPD analysis provided only 77% of the detail provided by AFLP analysis. While a relationship between genetic profile and serotype was evident, no significant relationship indicating geographic influence was found (P = 0.351). Interestingly, organisms isolated from vaccinated flocks were significantly closer genetically to the M-9 vaccine strain than isolates from unvaccinated birds were (P = 0.020). Statistical analyses revealed that this relationship could not have been determined by serotyping alone (P = 0.320), demonstrating the value of AFLP and RAPD analyses in the characterization of disease-causing strains