A behind-the-scenes look at the new vice president of student engagement
BY: GENEVA LEE
News Editor
Many students do not realize that there is an immense amount of work behind the scenes at Meramec. There is a huge team of faculty, people who work to make things straightforward and supportive, so that when life happens, the hardest part of school is the material on the tests. And who makes sure there are clubs, groups, and activities that allow students to get career experience or pursue a fun hobby or side passion?
Dr. April Johnson is the new Vice President of Student Engagement and is doing the most to make school easy and fun.
Dr. Johnson just joined STLCC Meramec this semester, moving here from her previous job at Bowie State University in Maryland. She has her doctorate in education and nearly 20 years of experience in higher education at four year, community, and HBCU schools, according to STLCC.
Even with these achievements, Dr. Johnson never intended to be a vice president.
“But all of my mentors and supervisors were…saying I’d make a great one, (and) when my last mentor retired, I ended up being the interim VP for Student Affairs,” said Dr. Johnson. When she saw a posting here at Meramec, Dr. Johnson recalled modestly, “I said, you know, maybe I could do this.”
Dr. Johnson started this job in the thick of the age of the delta variant and medical misinformation. As social distancing is still necessary to protect people’s health, engagement remains difficult and unfamiliar.
Dr. Johnson said that the “number one [challenge is] getting all the students back on campus and getting them engaged right now. We’re finding a lot of students are navigating the whole coming off of virtual for a whole year, [and are] getting their feet wet on a college campus.”
Dr. Johnson explained that she must carefully do “the work of getting everyone back into clubs and [organizations]…[and] navigating the guidelines and procedures around what to do if you are exposed to someone who tests positive… any day, someone could get exposed, and we gotta shut down.”
But the core of her mission is the same, virus or no virus.
Her priorities are “to create this comprehensive, cohesive culture campus-wide, build a robust peer mentoring program and a first year experience program—which could also include a first year experience course—[and] revamp our new student orientation to make sure it aligns with national standards,” to name a few.
Essentially, Dr. Johnson said she is “making sure that our students are engaged and that we are providing quality curricular programs and activities for our students to help them feel engaged and connected to the college.”
To achieve these goals, Dr. Johnson emphatically highlighted the need for streamlining and creating standard protocols within the entire STLCC community.
“My charge when I got here was to create a comprehensive student life district wide,” Johnson said. “Right now, I’m focused on how people are doing things, creating procedures to make it all the same… [and] my job as a supervisor is to clear the way so my staff can do their job, which in turn, greatly supports our students.”
She has helped support her staff in a number of ways, perhaps the most important of which is listening.
“Just simply…taking the time to have conversations with the campus life staff and the student affairs staff here on the Meramec campus, to listen to their needs, to get to know them, to get to talk about ideas that they’ve had for years and wanted to implement and being to actually build cohesive team and empower them,” is key, Dr. Johnson says.
She explained how she had the people in charge of the school budget come in to talk to her office, to help facilitate transparency, and she was flooded with thank yous.
“No one had ever shown them how the budget worked, how we got our money,” she said. “And some of them had been working here for over 15 years.”
With this knowledge and transparency, staff are better equipped to use their budgets efficiently and effectively.
Dr. Johnson also aims to “clean up” the operations of student groups and clubs: the current dearth of standardization creates complexity and confusion.
“This past semester, all of the student clubs and [organizations] went through a district-wide training,” she said. “And everyone is on the same page about how they can submit budget requests to get money, [and we’re] cleaning up travel policies and fundraising policies.”
Dr. Johnson is working to have all of the forms regarding policies and procedures on one easy-to-access website. “My goal is to have all of this stuff in place,” she said, “[to] build the foundation, by the end of the semester.”
Upon this foundation, Dr. Johnson hopes to build an even richer campus life. For example, she excitedly shared that “starting in January, every campus life office is going to set up programs to celebrate the diversity on campus, celebrating all students, all faculty, on campus.” This vision, this excitement and passion, all stems from one place, as Dr. Johnson explained.
“My spirituality is very important,” she said. “It is who I am, it guides everything that I do, my thinking, my actions.”
As she helps the school build a foundation, Dr. Johnson is setting up her new life here. When asked about what she has liked about Saint Louis, Dr. Johnson remarked, “I’ve enjoyed the BBQ,” but in terms of sightseeing, as she’s only been here 90 days, “I haven’t gone anywhere!”
If any students have suggestions for faculty engagement with the city, make sure to contact the VP of student engagement.
