John L. Hoffman, Ph.D., Dean of Students

Five Year Evaluation Portfolio – Executive Summary

I developed the following after completing five years as dean of students at Concordia University, Irvine. This summary highlights my work during that period.

Overview

During five years as Dean of Students, Concordia University and its department of student affairs experienced significant change and growth.   Between 1998 and 2003, the undergraduate enrollment of the university doubled, and though the department's budget and staffing have also increased, these did not kept pace with enrollment growth.   One could expect core assessments such as retention or satisfaction to suffer; instead, they thrived.   I attribute most of the credit for this success to the work of my staff with no small additional share going to student leadership and Concordia's students in general.

Staff Development

• When I arrived in 1998, only one member of my staff was a person of color; today, five of the nine members of my staff are persons of color.
• In 1998, only two members of my staff had earned master's degrees; today, five staff members have earned master's degrees and one has an earned doctorate; three others are in the process of completing advanced degrees.
• In 1998, all the members of my staff were also members of the Lutheran Church —Missouri Synod (LCMS); today, five of the nine members of my staff are members of the LCMS.   During the first year of employment, each new hire under my supervision read and reviewed with me the book, Lutheran Higher Education: An Introduction, by Ernest Simmons.

 Facilities and Infrastructure

• During the past five years, one residence hall was constructed and a second was completed resulting in the addition of 440 spaces for residential students.
• The Student Life Center (SLC) was renovated to create a lounge space for students (notably commuter students).   The resulting SLC moved my office to a significantly smaller space, but created space for front-line staff members to interact with students.   The directors of residence life and intercultural relations, as well as the executive board of student government, now have offices directly adjoining the SLC lounge.

Student Retention

• Overall student retention increased 4.7% between 1998 and 2003, from 78.7% to 83.4%.
• Retention for students of color increased more significantly from 73.8% to 79.9% (an increase of 6.1%); the retention rate for Latino students increased from 69.8% to 81.4%, up 11.6%.
• The retention rate gap between students of color and White students (11.7% in 1998) was cut to 1.2% in 2002; even after a change in staff, the gap remained at just 4.8% in 2003.

Judicial

• I worked with groups of students to revise the university's sanctioning policies and to reorganize the Student Handbook to make it more clear and user-friendly.
• Although enrollment more than doubled, the total number of violations decreased by 26%; the number of repeat offenders dropped by 15%.
• Student satisfaction with the university's judicial review process increased by 17.9%.

Satisfaction ( per ACT Student Opinion Survey )

Areas of Increased Student Satisfaction

Areas of Decreased Student Satisfaction

Areas of Increased Satisfaction for Students of Color

Areas of Decreased Satisfaction for Students of Color

Other Professional Accomplishments

• I worked with the Vice President for Administration to review all sexual harassment and sexual assault policies.   Resulting from this effort were policy revisions, prevention education programs, and a university response protocol for incidents of sexual assault.

• I worked with the university diversity committee to develop a university diversity model and developed programs targeting the needs of students of color.   The above data demonstrate the effectiveness of these efforts.   One additional component of this program was the addition of a semi-annual diversity retreat with the goals of (1) increasing diversity awareness for all students, (2) increasing the number of students of color involved in student leadership, and (3) increasing the number of allies among current student leaders.

• I worked with the counseling center to develop a crisis prevention and response protocol.   Though no formal data support the influence of this protocol, anecdotal comments made by students and staff support the protocol's positive impact.

Personal Accomplishments

• I completed my Ph.D. from a highly selective program at the University of Minnesota .

• Five publications – one in a refereed journal; four in professional organization magazines.

• Eight professional conference presentations.

• I was the 2001 recipient of the WACUHO Individual Diversity Award for efforts to diversify staff and increase retention and satisfaction rates for students of color.

* Student satisfaction with orientation steadily increased while under my supervision; during the final year, orientation was not under my area of supervision and satisfaction dropped significantly.