Eastern students' ‘voice' with the administration

By JOHN McCALLUM

Editor

Make no mistake; Al Thompson has a big job.

Eastern Washington University's new dean of students is not only pretty much in charge of the Office of Student Life, but one of his goals over the next year is to find out what can be done to improve student retention, especially between the freshmen and sophomore years.

But also make no mistake; Thompson, who is also the associate vice president of student affairs, not only has the enthusiasm and energy for the job, but also an idea of how to do it – and that doesn't involve sitting behind a desk.

A native of Richmond, Va., Thompson has sort of been making his way steadily westward since graduating from high school. Instead of staying local, he headed to the Midwest, attending Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa, 20 miles east of Cedar Rapids, before moving on to the University of Iowa where he completed his bachelor's and master's degrees. He received his doctorate in education from St. Mary's University of Minnesota.

Thompson's first position was at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, a liberal arts college of around 2,600 students located in northeast Iowa. At Luther, he served as hall director, missions' counselor and the coordinator for multi-cultural services.

“I was a jack-of-all-trades at Luther,” Thompson said.

Thompson spent three years at Luther before moving to the University of Wisconsin-Platteville where he headed up that university's diversity efforts for nine years. From there, Thompson headed about 100 miles to the northeast to the University of Wisconsin-LaCrosse, where he served as the assistant to the chancellor for affirmative action and diversity.

After 12 years at UW-LaCrosse, Thompson said he had a yearning to get back into student affairs. When Eastern's dean of students' position came open, Thompson contacted several former UW-LaCrosse colleagues, who had also made the move to Cheney, among them provost and vice president for student affairs John Mason, and Rex Fuller, dean of the College of Business and Public Administration.

“They really thought highly and praised Eastern Washington,” Thompson said. “And I liked what I saw when I came off my interview.”

Thompson was named dean of students in June, and took up his duties on Aug. 1. He replaced Bob Hille, who has served as interim dean since late May 2007.

It's a big job. The Office of Student Life is made up of eight other departments besides the dean of students: Student Activities, Disability Support Services, Counseling and Psychological Services, Students Rights and Responsibilities, Health, Wellness and Prevention Services, Associated Students, Residential Life and Campus Recreation.

Thompson said his main role is to serve as an advocate for students. Essentially, his job is to make sure the experience of higher education at Eastern is a good one by developing and maintaining a healthy, supportive student community. That involves everything from handling issues in residence halls to medical and personal emergencies to working with the Associated Students to getting “their voices heard.”

One of Thompson's goals is to try to determine ways to increase Eastern's student retention, especially between the freshmen and sophomore years. Other departments within the university are focusing their efforts on improving this as well, and Thompson wants to find out what it is about the experience at Eastern that keeps students from returning.

“I don't have the data to know if it has to do with the classroom setting, the campus setting or the community setting,” he said.

But Thompson doesn't plan to sit behind his desk and wait for the data to come in. He plans on getting some data firsthand – from the students themselves.

Thompson has already met with representatives from university groups, as well as just simply gone on walks around campus and talked to students he meets. He hopes to institute monthly meeting with student groups to sit down, maybe have lunch, and talk about life at Eastern, sort of “fireside chats” with the dean, something Thompson said he has seen work at other universities. His may even involve games of pick up basketball, one of his passions.

Thompson said he used to play lunchtime pick up basketball games at UW-LaCrosse with students, staff and faculty, and found everyone benefited from the camaraderie and accessibility.

Thompson is married with two children, daughter Megan who is with Americorp in Seattle, son Aaron a sophomore at University of Iowa, and wife Telitha, who is an academic advisor at UW-LaCrosse, and still back east “trying to sell the house.”

John McCallum can be reached at [email protected]