Cultivating Habits of Discernment:
The Lilly Vocation Discernment Initiative

Cornerstone Three:
Faculty and Staff Development

The Lilly Vocation Discernment Initiative is intended to assist all who share the life of Holy Cross to experience a greater integration of faith, learning, and daily life. Without faculty and staff who are comfortable with and articulate about their own sense of vocation, we will not be able to mentor students adequately. The addition of so many new faculty makes it particularly important that we pay special attention to this task in the next several years. In addition to our participation in programs like Collegium, the Lilly Fellows Program, and the Rhodes Consultation, we will work to improve faculty and staff development in four ways:

(1) Vocation Seminar: Each academic year and each summer over four years, 10-12 faculty and staff members will participate in a Vocation Seminar directed by Lilly Vocation Fellow Elizabeth Johns. Borrowing insights from Ignatian spirituality and from her own distinguished career as a teacher, she will help participants deepen their understanding of vocation, relate that understanding to their own work, and consider how they might participate in the LVDI. After an initial seminar in the summer of 2002, two or three persons who have experienced the seminar will work with each succeeding group. Those participating in either academic year or summer seminars will receive a modest grant, in lieu of stipend, to support personal efforts to deepen and enrich their academic vocation. That grant could be used for resource materials, off-campus retreats, participation in conferences or seminars, or other purposes approved by the seminar director. As participants complete the seminar they will be encouraged to apply to one of the development funds for assistance with ongoing projects to support their work.

(2) Student Affairs Staff Training: The LVDI and Dean of Students will develop new programs for training Student Affairs professionals on questions of Jesuit identity, reflective practice and vocational discernment. They will also train student leaders, such as Resident Assistants and leaders of student organizations, to develop their reflective capacity and encourage community-wide attention to vocational discernment. Included will be orientation programs for new members of the staff. Particular attention will be given to training staff and student leaders for the first-year student orientation and to promoting written reflective practice in subsequent years. As at other peer institutions, our Office of Student Affairs experiences significant turnover each year among the younger staff who work most closely with students. It is especially important that we educate these staff members, given the degree of influence that students' living environment can have on their lives.

(3) New Faculty Orientation: The LVDI will support expansion of the new faculty orientation program conducted by the Office of the Dean of the College. One segment of this program, in cooperation with the Holy Cross Jesuit Community, deepens faculty understanding of Jesuit traditions and commitments. Grant support will allow for the expansion of new faculty orientation programs, deeper engagement with academic vocation, and increasing opportunities for senior/junior faculty mentoring, faculty retreats, and spiritual direction. The LVDI seeks support for these programs during the first three years of the grant period, by which time the number of new faculty will be reduced and the full program of orientation will be incorporated into the operating budget.

(4) Mentoring and Enhanced Advising: The LVDI will provide support for the Dean's Advisory Group to develop additional programs to improve the quality of academic advising and mentoring, including development of an annual advising/mentoring workshop. The LVDI will make available small grants in the second, third, and fourth years of the initiative for training workshops for faculty to develop skills as mentors. The workshops will give special attention to faculty committed to working with the first-year orientation and subsequent convocations. These grants will be administered for the Dean's Advisory Group.

(5) "Last Lecture" Series: The College will invite two faculty members each semester to deliver a public lecture on any topic provided that it is what they would say to friends and students if it were their last chance to say anything at all. The lecture will be followed by a dinner with two dozen students and colleagues. The series responds to a desire expressed by students to learn more about their favorite professors and to gain a deeper sense of what is important to them. We expect that it will offer a unique opportunity for faculty to focus on what has been most worthwhile in their careers, expressing their understanding of the academic vocation.