NASPA/ACPA Joint Meeting

I just arrived home from the 2007 joint conference of NASPA/ACPA a couple of days ago. (It's not important what those acronyms mean, just know that it's a meeting of student affairs professionals from around the world.) With over 10,000 people in attendance, this was the largest gathering of student affairs professionals to date.

Much of my time was spent commuting on a bus between these two beautiful hotels, The World Marriott and the Gaylord Palms.I haven't had a chance to really process the whole ordeal, but I thought blogging about it might help spur some reflection. Here are some random notes about the conference.

(1) The people who planned the conference deserve a lot of credit. The logistics could have been A LOT worse. Trying to coordinate shuffling around 10,000+ people sounds as appealing as a dinner date with Glenn Beck.

(2) Al Gore is long-winded. He was the opening speaker, and all I can say was he must have been well-rested. Something else that dawned on me when he was speaking was how did he become funny? For a man who was notoriously dry, lifeless, and boring during his presidential campaign, he is very funny all of a sudden. Surely it isn't brought on by talking about global warming, because it's not funny. It's inconvenient.

(3) There are few better feelings in this world than being reconnected with old friends and colleagues.

(4) When ballpark food prices suddenly seems reasonably priced, chances are you're paying too much for food.

(5) Marriott beds are uncomfortable. I felt like I was sliding off a cliff.

(6) I further get the feeling that student affairs, in some regard, suffers from a bit of scholarly disinterest, especially amongst young professionals.

(That's Jen, Julie, Erica, Me, and Dave at Universal Studios)

(7) For the four days I was there, I felt like a hamster trapped in an atrium. We were more or less trapped in between these two hotels, which I liken to one of those giant atriums that you can put hamsters in (see below). That was what it was like in the hotels. A few cool things to do, but after the settling realization that you are trapped inside, and it costs $30 for a taxi to escape, it becomes a bit suffocating.

(If you look closely, you can actually see Dave presenting on Education City in Qatar in the upper right hand ball. It's also where hamsters like to relieve themselves after a long day of burrowing under cedar chips.)

(8) This was probably the first of many conferences Erica and I will attend together. She's a good travel buddy.

(9) Many of the educational session presentations are uninformative, boring, and haphazard. Some are very good, however.

(10) I'm glad to be home, even if it has been overcast for the last two days. Viva Oxvegas.