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Student Learning & Development

In my Student Development Theory course, I had the opportunity to interview a junior at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. Throughout the semester, we discussed how his life fit into the various categories we were discussing in class. The 3 main categories were Chickering’s Theory, the Cross’s Black Identity model, and how Belenky, Clinchy, Goldberger, and Tarule categorized women in five perspectives on how they viewed the world in Evans’ Student Development in College (2010).

 

Chickering’s Theory of identity development consists of seven vectors: Developing Competence, Managing Emotions, Moving through Autonomy toward Interdependence, Developing Mature Interpersonal Relationships, Establishing Identity, Developing Purpose, and Developing Integrity. I especially enjoy Chickering’s Theory because it covers a wide spectrum of an individual. It recognizes every milestone in a growing adult life.

 

Cross’s Black Identity model consist of 5 stages: Pre-encounter, encounter, immersion-emersion, internalization, and internalization-commitment.

 

The five epistemological perspectives (Belenky, Clinchy, Godlberger, and Tarule) are silence, received knowledge, subjective knowledge, procedural knowledge, and constructed knowledge. Backgrounds and upbringing can play a major part in a woman’s perspective on the world. I thoroughly enjoyed this semester long project and it aligns perfectly with the Student Learning and Development Competency because it illustrates an actual individual and how he matriculated through the various stages of life.