Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella): Welcome to lessons learned from the field conversations to help build stronger and more thriving communities for our inaugural lesson. We are learning from Sue Rankin, president of Rankin Climate. Sue, thank you so much for taking time to share your story with us. I am thrilled to talk with you about the work that has informed Rankin Climate, your commitment to collaborating with institutions to cultivate thriving communities, and lessons you have learned along your journey. I have the privilege of knowing Dr. Sue Rankin, but for those of you who don’t, can you tell us a little bit about yourself Sue.
Sue Rankin, PhD.: Sure. Hi, everyone! I’m very happy to be here and chat with you about what we’ve done at Rankin Climate in the last 2 and a half decades that I’ve been doing this work. So for those that don’t know I am a researcher by trade, and I’m not a consultant by trade and I started my career and ended my career at Penn State all 36 years of my career at Penn State. In that time I served as a physiologist, a tenured professor in physiology. I also coached women’s softball, because back then you had to have a tenured job in a college in order to coach. So I taught and coached for 17 years. Then I moved into the Administration, served as the Vice Provost office for about 12 years, and then, frankly, wanted to go back to faculty and be with the students again so I moved back to the faculty and finished my career in the college Ed..
This work started from a research project done back in the early nineties where I had a very whopping grant of 500 bucks to do a 30 campus study on the environment in higher education, how it influenced or impacted faculty, staff and student success. And that’s where the work really started. When I finished the project I had a school call and say, hey, this is a really interesting project I’d love to be a part of that. And I’m like, oh, yeah, we’re done. Can you do it for us, anyway? I’m like, I guess so. So now I’m a consultant. So I am the accidental consultant. That’s what I think. So since then we’ve done over 250 college universities around the country looking at their environments. And again, the mission in fact how it influences and empowers faculty, staff, and students.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella): Yeah, what led to that first project, even coming about?
Sue Rankin, PhD.: Great question. So at Penn State I was very active in the LGBTQA+ community and worked with the first commission on LGBTQ equity that was offered at Penn State for faculty, staff, and students from across the institution and they asked us to do an internal climate assessment about what is like for those folks, or us on campus. So I worked with Pat Terenzini and [inaudible]. Pretty big people in higher Ed, both who would also serve on my committee later on, and we did that assessment, and that kind of got my mind working around, um, let’s look at these different ways people exam or understand it and how it influences whether or not they are successful staying in the institution or leaving the institution whatever. So that’s where it kind of started. My dissertation was also on that same topic and I was very interested in looking at the theoretical frameworks of Daryl Smith, and again mid to late nineties, and then Sylvia Hurtado and Milam and others looking at this moving forward.
Daryl, looked at the work on from diversity kind of viewpoints, and what campus diversity was like around the country and in her model she’d have campus climate as one of those sections that was important.
Sylvia Hurtado looked at mostly racial climate. Latinex, Latino, Latina, and African American. And so I was like, Okay, well, that’s kind of looking at one slice in 2 different ways, what if we put both those together and try to examine that using the voices, the people that actually experiencing so developed a mixed method model that led to the national study, that led to the transformational tapestry model that we use for the book that we do still.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella):Yeah. So from 20 plus years of a passion project turning into accidental consulting, what major lessons have you learned about campus climate from the research?
Sue Rankin, PhD.:That we collect tons of data in higher education. And I got really tired of going to meetings where we collect this lovely data, we create a nice task force, they make a nice plan, and it would not go anywhere. So you know box from a critical postmodern feminist. I am very action focused, action oriented. And thought that our process should very much be about action, and because of the information we got back from people in the national study and other ones since then is, why keep telling my story when nothing ever happens anyway? I’m really tired of telling my story over and over again. I agree with them. So how do we create this model that would actually be more action focused? So what I’ve learned is we can actually do that, we can create data-driven decision making around the issues of climate that we focus on.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella):Yeah, that’s beautiful. Are there any specific experiences that have stood out the most as you’ve kind of really compared, you know, I’ve heard you say that your campus is special, but it’s not unique, right? So when you think about that, what are kind of the specific things that have stood out to you as we think about the larger, higher Ed landscape and campus climate?
Sue Rankin, PhD.: Since we are built on our work, whether it be survey questions and or interview our protocols for focus groups. We’re built on looking at the current social context that’s happening, which has obviously changed in my 25 years of doing this work. As well as the literature, which, as you know, on a daily basis changes. And we have to be cognizant of both those 2 things to work in higher education. Right? So if we are cognizant of those, then our work should reflect that. And I think that’s probably one of the biggest things I’ve seen is, people say, “Well, what have you learned from doing this work?” It’s by each campus. And by a particular time period that we’re doing that. So I look at, prior to 2020, pre-covid, very different, than during covid and postcovid. And the questions that we created for post Covid surveys to investigate how that influences people and how that is still impacting them, is crucial. From, and I don’t care what side of the aisle you sit on, but there was a definite turn in political climate, social climate, during the Trump administration. And that seriously impacted the work that we do because much of the work is around DEI issues and those DEI issues obviously were impacted incredibly by legislation that was either passed or cut based on previous work. So when you say, what I learned over the years, it’s that every campus is special but I don’t know how to say this, you’re unique but not special. That your unique campus, where you are, where you sit in the context you’re currently in, be it social context, political context, whatever, but you’re also not very special, because from the literature we know all of these things that we know currently happen on college campuses that influence their impact [inaudible] if they’re embedded into our surveys, and we’re doing our due diligence, then what we find at Campus A, similar to Campus B not exactly the same, but similar. So, for example, in North Dakota, in the system of North Dakota, there were 12 different indigenous tribes that we offered as part of their graphics. I wouldn’t do that in Mississippi, you know, it would be a different kind of demographic. And so we have to make sure that we’re being very clear that these are conceptually driven surveys. That it’s about the specialness, right? The uniqueness if you look at the campus. And then obviously, we’re going to find trends that happen.
My biggest disappointment is that I find the same things happening 20 years ago that I’m finding now. And it’s disheartening. And yet I’m a glass full, glass half full kinda person. And, if you look over the scope of 25 years, an immense amount of change has happened, around all kinds of issues. And if we just look at that one time, that one spot, you’re gonna say “I don’t see anything different than it was before.” We see difference that the numbers are increased.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella): Hmm.
Sue Rankin, PhD.: They’ve gone up! People are more cognizant, and the language used is very different. [inaudible] the 20 years ago. It’s how we now are much more inclusive in the language we use. So I think there’s been change. and I’ve seen change in individual campuses that I think is crucial to their own development. But overall, disheartening that, again, a lot of you have stayed the same, and I feel like, Well, what are we doing? I’m not making a difference. And then I think about it by campus, I’m making a big difference. I tried to answer your question, not sure if I did.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella):Yeah, no, you did. I mean from that perspective, then, you know, as campus leaders are trying to figure out particularly also the changing social context, which is always going to be, you know, fluid and continuing to ebb and flow. What advice would you give to campus leaders for cultivating a more thriving campus climate?
Sue Rankin, PhD.: Listen. Listen to the voices of the people in your community. This is what we try to provide through quantitative and qualitative data. Hear what they’re saying. It’s not anecdotal. It’s not one person saying this. These are themes, or these are significant differences between different groups of folks and how they’re experiencing your institution, which you have been privileged to be the leader of. Right? Your job is to serve your constituents, all of them. And so how do we create spaces where that dialogue can happen and that actual actions take place. so that people that have spent their time once again telling their stories, feel as if there’s been some action based upon that. So my biggest advice to the senior leaders is listen to the people on your campus. Listen to who they are, and what their needs are, and how we can help them move forward.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella):I love that, that’s beautiful. My last question, and then would love anything last parting thoughts you have.
Sue Rankin, PhD.: Can I add one more thing to the last one?
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella): Absolutely!
Sue Rankin, PhD.: You can’t do it on your own.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella): Hm.
Sue Rankin, PhD.: You are not the change maker of the institution. Surround yourself with good people. So you know they have the same vision and mission that you have for the institution. and then your voice should be heard through them and then lead to [inaudible] on campus. So I meant to say that and I forgot. So I looked at my notes.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella): That’s what’s nice about this being a written interview.
Sue Rankin, PhD.: Yeah. And as you’re talking I’m looking down like ah I should’ve said that.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella): And I’m sneaking in an additional question that I didn’t give you ahead of time. So if you don’t have an answer don’t worry because this is going to be a written interview, so what do you think the future of campus climate is?
Sue Rankin, PhD.: Given our current social context, we still…I feel that higher education is the place if we’re going to have change, it’s going to happen in higher ed. Which is why I think higher ed is being factioned. Is that other people know the same thing. It’s the nexus for where change will happen. And there will be push back. There always has been, in regards to whatever comes down the pipe from legislators, or, you know, campus leaders, that people will still move forward and try to figure this out. Doing this during Covid, proved that to me. Right? That our surveys that were live in February 2020, and then March everything closed down. Those surveys still stayed up, and we still received data that was crucial to those campuses. At that point we had questions during the survey, even if they were live in regards to how Covid was impacting them. And that helps senior leaders make changes right then in regards to data they collected. So I am confident that surveys, not surveys, data. Be it quality or quantitative data, is essential to moving campuses forward on the [inaudible] of climate and environment. And if we don’t do those and we keep thinking, why, no, because this person told me that that person told me it’s anecdotal, then you have nothing to stand on. So somebody comes to you and says, Why are you doing this? Well, we do this because we know from this data, that these are the students that are really feeling as if they don’t belong here. Or they are not achieving as well, in regards to [inaudible].Not a Gpa score, but for how they feel, their learning. And that’s our priority goal in higher education. We’re here for students. Our goal is to no matter who we are at the institution is to support students in their success. Now, if staff and faculty aren’t feeling as if they are valued and appreciated for what they do, how can they do their job well? And then, if they can’t, then students suffer. Right, so if we keep our, my suggestion, keep our focus on students and students success and what we are doing in every meeting we have. How is this decision impacting students’ success? Do you have your mission statement out in front of you while you’re talking about decisions that we make on an everyday basis? Is that decision following the mission or not following the mission? If it’s not then why are we doing it?
So I think again, probably off of it, from what you’re asking me to answer. But you know, I think we, campus climate surveys’ future is because social context continually changes. And because of literature continual changes, we have to keep doing these surveys to make sure that we know our finger on the pulse of our students, faculty, and staff.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella): Beautiful. Thank you so much for sharing your lessons from the field with us today. Is there anything else that we didn’t cover that you want to share with our audience?
Sue Rankin, PhD.:I wouldn’t change a thing I’ve done in the last 25 years. You know, it’s been challenging at times. And change is difficult. And people don’t like change. So how do we make that paddle? That this is something that will help our students be most successful, and I don’t think anybody on campus will ever say, well, I don’t want to do that, then? Right? So that’s it. Thank you. Appreciate your time.
Victoria Cabal (she/her/ella): Thank you. Yay.
