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Spring 2024

Spring 2024 Advising Chats

Supporting Asian Pacific Islander Desi American (APIDA) Students

  • Date: Thursday, February 15
  • Time: 10:00 – 11:30 AM
  • Location: Hybrid (Multipurpose Room, Newman Library and Zoom). In-person attendance is strongly encouraged.
  • Speaker: Dr. Nina Ha, Director of APIDA+ Center and appointed member of the Virginia Asian Advisor Board (VAAB)
  • Description: As an Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institution (AANAPISI), Virginia Tech has an obligation to better understand and serve its Asian Pacific Islander Desi American (APIDA) student population. Therefore, this interactive presentation offers information about the VT APIDA population and will address the themes of microaggressions and micro interventions. Dr. Derald Wing Sue's research provides illuminating insight about how to better interact with people of diverse backgrounds, particularly the heterogeneous APIDA communities. Using Dr. Sue's scholarship, this session will offer opportunities to explore and practice difficult dialogues and engage in micro interventions when scenarios of microaggressions occur. The focus will be on the APIDA communities; however, these strategies may be beneficial in other scenarios as well.

Community Resiliency Model (CRM) for Advising

  • Date: Wednesday, March 13
  • Time: 10:00 – 11:30 AM
  • Location: Hybrid (Multipurpose Room, Newman Library and Zoom). In-person attendance is strongly encouraged.
  • Speaker: Erica Berry Coates, LCSW. Assistant Director for Campus Partnership Initiatives, Cook Counseling Center
  • Description: The Community Resiliency Model (CRM)® engages community members to regulate their nervous system (fight/flight/freeze/fawn responses) to not only help themselves but to help others within their wider social network.  CRM Workshops introduces the six wellness skills of CRM designed to help individuals learn to track our own nervous system responses to bring the body, mind and spirit back into greater balance, and to encourage people to pass the skills along to family, friends and their wider community.

Supporting First Generation College Students

  • Date: Tuesday, April 9
  • Time: 1:00 – 2:30 PM
  • Location: Zoom only (no longer hybrid)
  • Speaker: Page Fetter, M.S. Assistant Dean for First-Generation Student Success, Program Director for GenerationOne Living learning community
  • Description: During this session, we will explore first-generation student needs, assets, and barriers while in college. Setting a foundation in the Community Cultural Wealth model (Yosso, 2005), we will be able to highlight the unique strengths, assets, and values that first-generation students bring to their educational journey. This chat will highlight the definition(s) of first-generation students, national and Virginia Tech data, theoretical perspective, and recommendations for advising first-generation students.