Analyzing Current and Future Workforce Issues: A New Publication of Student Perspectives

In this podcast episode, Melissa Venable, NCDA's Director of Professional Development, co-hosts with Dr. Michael Stebleton a conversation about a new NCDA publication titled, Analyzing Current and Future Workforce Issues, Students' Perspectives on Career Development. Written by students enrolled in Dr. Stebleton's University of Minnesota course in Spring 2025, the publication explores various career development topics through the lens of graduate and undergraduate students. 

The episode features students Nathan Price, Shannon McCrady, and Kirsten Koerth, who share their experiences and insights on the writing process. The discussion also highlights the importance of integrating theory and practice, the challenges and benefits of the editing process, and the potential value of similar educational projects in the future. Key contributions and topics such as AI in career development, the role of HR in supporting LGBTQ employees, and declining male college enrollment are also examined.

Michael J. Stebleton, PhD, is a Professor of Higher Education at University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. He teaches both undergraduates and graduate students in the Department of Organizational, Leadership, Policy, and Development. Contact Dr. Stebleton at: steb0004@umn.edu.

Nathan Price is a PhD student in the Higher Education track of the OLPD program at the University of Minnesota. I/O Psychology practitioner and founder of The Academic I/O, a platform dedicated to advancing academic leadership and workforce development through evidence-based organizational strategies.

Shannon McCrady is a graduate student at the University of Minnesota. She is pursuing a Master of Education in Human Resource Development. She also works at the University of Minnesota and lives in Minneapolis with her family.

Kirsten Koerth is a graduate student in the University of Minnesota Agriculture Education master’s program. She obtained her undergraduate degree from St. Olaf College in Biology and Environmental Studies, and she grew up in Helena, Montana. Her academic interests include sustainable agriculture research and education. 

Transcript

Career Practitioner Conversations Podcast

National Career Development Association

Analyzing Current and Future Workforce Issues: A New Publication of Student Perspectives

January 13, 2026 

Welcome to the podcast. I'm Melissa Venable in CDAs, director of Professional Development, and this episode shares the experiences behind a new NCDA publication titled, analyzing Current and Future Workforce Issues, students' Perspectives on Career Development. This publication was written by students enrolled in a course at the University of Minnesota in the spring of 2025, and their instructor and editor is Dr.

Michael Stebleton, and he is here to help me co-host  the conversation with the students today. So Mike, thanks so much for being here. Thank you, Melissa. It's a pleasure to be here. . Get us started.  Just tell us  about  the course and, and the project. Sure. Yeah.  This is a course called Foundations of Individual and Organizational Career Development, and it's a graduate level course in our College of Education and Human Development  program.

And I, um, am in the higher education program. So I, I teach and do research on higher ed issues, and one of my interests has been, , career development, and I've had a longstanding. Relationship and affiliation with NCDA. And so, , this course draws students from a number of different disciplines., So there's usually some students from higher ed, but also, human resource development, adult education.

 Students from our business school on campus. And so it really is a combination of, , students from different areas and have different  career pathways themselves.  This past spring of 2025, we had 14 ambitious students and, , there was a combination of PhD Master's students and then we had three, , undergraduate students.

So the monograph is really a collection of these 14 different chapters. Based on students' interests and throughout the course. Uh, we really looked at career development theory, but more importantly, we talked about putting theory  into practice. And I know our students  would probably agree. We had plenty of opportunities and discussion points  to do that.

So we really looked at trends in education and trends in the workplace, but also looked at how we define career. And in class we always define career as a collection. Of paid and unpaid roles across one's lifetime. So it's really this constellation of, of life roles. And so  together we  talked about these issues and collectively came up with 14 different chapters that became part of the, the monograph.

And Mike, you contacted me about this in the fall of  2024, which was like a year ago. Like a year ago now. It's about a year ago. Yeah.  And this was gonna be, , an assignment, the writing, uh, that, that eventually became this, , monograph. Can you you wanna tell us more about that assignment, as a class project?

Yeah, definitely.  Um, I think most faculty members and most instructors have some type of final project, right? And usually the students  dutifully complete it and they, they get their grade, they might get comments, they might not, but it ends up being sort of a static piece, , that's a requirement or.

A check, you know, to get that final grade for the course. And  about a year ago I started re-envisioning, you know, different ways for students to have more of a developmental learning process and to get feedback on their writing. And then also to think about their writing as a final product that they then would share with others.

And so. When I came to you, Melissa, this was still a work that was sort of in progress as you might recall, and you very generously agreed to kind of help me shape it.  And so, you know, we agreed that it would be an opportunity for students to have a developmental writing experience, so we wanted students to have.

The opportunity to write as if they were a scholar submitting to a professional publication. So that would means  a revision process, a revise and, and resubmit process with the goal of making student work even stronger. Um, we also wanted students to have the opportunity and I wanted them to integrate the theory with the practice.

So when we  articulated the course. Guideline and the project guidelines, part of the task was to integrate theory and practice. And so I think all the students  integrated I think it was at least two or three theories of your favorites that would connect to the topic  of interest.

And I think the final piece is that we wanted, um. Some type of contribution  that we would share back with the association that other readers  could access for free and then perhaps use in their own practice  they could use it with their students.  I might even use it as a supplemental reading for this next course that I teach.

Um, and so we wanted something that would  be tangible, but also have some practical use. So those were my main objectives for. For the project itself. Melissa, do you remember other areas that we talked about, you know, as we prepared for this project? I'm trying to remember if there are other pieces that I may have missed.

Absolutely. I think that writing piece was, was huge. And that what, what is the actual experience of submitting, , your work mm-hmm. To  a publication. And that is a goal itself is, is really huge. And that's what happened. I mean, what we have now is a. Professional publication and everyone is a published author.

, That that's a part   of your course that's  submitted a chapter to be included. Yeah. I also remember us discussing, at least tangentially at the beginning, that this is really a snapshot of what's important. To students right now , in this time, in this era, it's almost a, it'll have some sort of historical significance at some point, and that these are the issues that they're thinking about and, , want  to learn more about and research and write and  to continue to study and perhaps even to work in these areas of career development.

Mm-hmm. I'm glad you mentioned that point. And we really wanted this to be student directed. We were gonna provide some frameworks and some guidelines, but we really wanted students to choose their own topics. And to have some autonomy around what they decided  to research and to write about, and then eventually to share with with readers.

And so there are two main sections of the monograph.  And  as luck had it, about seven students  picked topics that we felt,  could lie under exploring current issues in career development. So that was topic one. And then topic two was applying career development models to support, specific populations.

And so there are a range of different  topics and , areas of interest that students explored, but they were all driven  by the students themselves. Maybe we should hear from the students now. I think so since we're not here for this's talking so much. Yeah, exactly. So I'll start off here and, and Melissa, feel free to jump in as we  move ahead.

 But I wanna ask the students, and we'll just maybe we'll start with Nathan and then we will, um, go around. But I would like  for you to introduce yourself. And  maybe talk about your year in the graduate program if you're still in a program, and then also maybe a little bit about  your professional interests and how this course fit into some of , your own goals.

Um, so Nate, do you wanna start first? Yeah, I can kick us off. Um, hello everyone. My name is Nathan Price. I'm a third year PhD student and the organizational leadership and policy development Higher ed track. So for my background, I am an industrial traditional psychology practitioner who solely practice in academic settings.

Europe calls us workplace psychologists. For those that don't know, I always say we're HR on steroids.  For we are the scientists behind the employee lifecycle and workplace experience. So when I even enrolled in this course, , it was to really deepen my understanding of how f today's practices and theories can be applied to student development, leadership, coaching, and also institutional practice too.

So for those that know me, know that I spent, I wanna say five years in student affairs, and I promise you those are my babies and that truly drives me. Um. Then I shifted to working with academic leaders  VPs, all the way down to department leaders. Um, so for me, really drawing from like the frameworks that focus on the centered experiences of students of color.

Truly drives me a little bit more. So as I advance through the PhD journey, I'm actively trying to build a platform that integrates ai as you can read from the paper. Um, simulation work and narrative based approaches for students to prepare for the future of work. Um, and in this class, it was a great experience to be able to be a part of this and start to venture off.

 I think this is my first official. A paper that I, um, submitted by myself, I usually co-author. , So I don't get the stressors of the edits or having to do these many iterations. So it was a great experience to have, to say the least. Yeah. That's great. And I know we, we talked at length about  some of the challenges of  tying some of your, your interests, which we'll learn more about here as it kind of relates back  to higher ed and then also career development.

Um. So Shannon, um, would you like to go next, please? Sure. , I am Shannon McCrady and I  I'm about halfway through my Master's in education, in human Resource Development program.   I work for the U of M. I'm in the medical school. I support neurologists in the Department of Neurology, and I  manage our promotion and tenure process for the department.

And I took this class.  Cause I wanna work in human resources and I felt like career development is a really important part of that.  One of my goals is to do like talent and development. So this class was extremely relevant to what I wanna do and I learned a lot about how we can support people.

And then, you know, that led into my topic for the monograph, which I'm still very passionate about. So it was a great opportunity. So you've got one, one more year left, Shannon, in the program? Um, I think I have like three semesters. Okay. It depends on if I'm gonna do a minor. I haven't decided. Okay. Great.

Thank you for your introduction. Mm-hmm. Um, Kristen, would you like to go next? Hi, I am Kirsten Kerr and I just graduated from the Agriculture Education Master's program at the U And  I  became interested in this class because  a huge part of, of teaching and student teaching is advising  students on their career path and their career journey.

So it was very relevant  for me 'cause I was student teaching at the same time. So it was great to be able to, uh, apply what I learned in class to my teaching experience. Excellent. And you're, you're a recent graduate as of this past spring. Is that right? Yep. Kirsten. Great. Yeah. So, so Kirsten, since we're with you, maybe we will have you respond to, to the next question  initially  tell us a little bit more about your selected  topic for your chapter, and then  how did you go about selecting it  and maybe what you learned from , the process.

Absolutely. My topic is on male college enrollment decline and the tool belt generation and how to apply the career development theories to that issue. So I became interested in this, in this topic because I was, I'm seeing it play out basically in my student teaching experience and seeing.

 A lot of, male high school students not really be interested in college and  this huge interest in, in trades or, , as it's come to be known, the tool belt generation , of kids going into trades instead of going to college. And  so I kind of became interested in that because I was seeing it every day.

And   it was great because I was really passionate about the project, so I was able to really dive in and  , it really became a , very interesting project for me. What was like kind of one takeaway that  you wanted readers to, to possibly  learn from your, your writing or a contribution that you hope that readers take away?

Yeah. I think that I would love for people just to have more awareness about this issue and. Understand the kind of unique issues that are present for male, uh, high school students who are looking to go to college or who are not looking to go to college, and some of the pressures that are on them. And  the.

Unique situation, I guess, that they're in now. And then how we can address that, especially  teachers or, uh, other staff in high school can address that  to  help students realize that they can go to college, that it is possible for them, that there is value in a college education, and  that it's important for students to have that as an option.

Of course, that's not how, it's not the right choice for everyone, but that mm-hmm. Students should feel as though that can be an option for them. And Kirsten, I'm glad you referenced that tool, belt generation  term. I think we talked about that last spring. How many are now considering sort of more tangible career options?

And this particular author, I think it was a, a Wall Street Journal article, talked about this is sort of the, the tool belt generation, and it certainly applies to your, your topic of inquiry. So thank you. Um, Shannon, let's, let's go over to you.  Could you talk a little bit about the topic that you selected for your chapter  how you went about it.

I remember having numerous conversations with you about  literature and how to narrow it down and how to find the most recent citations.  Talk us through that process a little bit and, and what you gain from the experience. Sure. Um, so I wrote about how career counselors and HR professionals can support the LGBT community in the workforce because  they in particular face a lot of workplace discrimination.

And I think  I know that this community often tries to be invisible, so they aren't going to HR and letting them know what's going on. They're just. Taking it and hiding from it and trying to pretend it's not happening. Um, so I think it's important, like Kirsten said, to raise awareness that if you are an HR person and you don't have a lot of L-G-B-T-Q people in your life, you might not know that you have employees that are suffering and that's not what we want.

   I'm a parent of a couple of queer kids and they both have friends that live with us right now. So I'm surrounded by it and I'm very aware of it and, um, I learned a lot from this. Writing this paper.  Like it's one thing to be aware that  L-G-B-T-Q people suffer from discrimination. It's another thing to research it and find all of the statistics and realize just how bad it really is.

Uh, so that was quite educational.  , one of the things that I learned is that this started in 1953 when Eisenhower.  Issued an executive order basically banning LGBT people from being  employed by the federal government. And that was not repealed until 2017, which was Obama's very last executive order.

So for 64 years, we were literally blatantly discriminating against this community of human beings just like everyone else.  So that was. Uh, kind of shocking, I guess. And I also learned all of the ways that I'm ignorant about this history. So that was great to learn. And then  I hope that when people read my article or my chapter, that they  find some empathy.

For this community and start to realize how maybe little things that they've done, I think we've probably all said things we shouldn't say when it comes to discrimination against any group of people. Um, but I hope that reading it will help them see that sometimes casual words and phrases can cause harm.

 Especially at work where we should just, you know, respect our coworkers and be kind to everyone. Yeah. Thank you Shannon.  Such an important and timely topic, and I was really glad you dug into it. I think early on in the semester, I kind of had a hunch that that was gonna be your, your chapter focus, um, through our conversation.

So I'm really glad you  dug into the assignment  and made the contribution that you did. Thank you. Um, Nathan, let's, let's go to you talk a little bit about  your chapter, how you went about selecting it, and what you learned and what you want readers to, to get from it. So I've heard this statement from a, a leader when we're talking about ai.

 I know there's been multiple conversations of how leaders are trying to use AI to leverage a better workforce, how people are trying to get rid of jobs as well and use AI to inform that to, and the quote that someone told me that it just like sticks with me is someone stated, um, you can either be a.

Maybe with a hammer or a mastermind with a powerful tool. Um, and the things that I'm starting to realize with working with individuals as they explore AI is that they are utilizing it sometimes incorrectly by not putting a lot of the input that's needed for, um, really sound judgment as well.  And also for the statement of AI is gonna be  get rid of a lot of jobs too.

And that is not. It's just impossible to get rid of, um, the components that we would have with career development. So for me, I was able to explore a little bit further in how we can utilize AI as a tool, um, to enhance  access to students. Because even with looking at how many. Students, each guidance counselor has is ridiculous to even assume that somebody can have one-to-one conversations with a caseload of 375 students and above.

 So for me, it's always thinking about that systems theory lens of what can we do to advance the systems that are already here, that are broken?  Or that needs a little bit of tweaking to make sure that all students have access to career development. Because I think every student deserves a career, um, development specialist to assist them as they try to map out their, I would say, or navigate their, um, career journeys, to say the least.

And it does start off in high schools. Um, you know, every year when students graduate, they're asked, so what do you wanna do with your life? And that is a scary moment if you don't know, but. I still don't think that we put enough time and effort into training individuals of what are their core competencies already?

What are the skills that they may have that they can leverage and bring into any workspace?  Workspaces, education. I think building that self-awareness is needed. Um, one staff that always. State is 95% of people believe that they're self-aware while the actual number is 12 to 15%.    In order for us to really leverage, um, our tools, I think that AI is a good tool to utilize to make sure that we are giving students what they need and also training them in the ways on how to use it, um, properly so it doesn't create harm.

 Yeah. And I really appreciate  the title that you came up with. 'cause I think it captures the message that you just shared with us. It was AI Colon, a possible career development tool and not our replacement. So I think that kind of captures  some of the challenges and struggles that we're trying to reconcile with AI and how does AI fit in  with our lives.

Um, and Nate, your, your piece fit under that first section, exploring current issues in career development, uh, which I thought was a great contribution there in the first part of the monograph.  I wanna share three other titles that. Appeared from that first section. Um, these were from other co-authors, your, your peers.

 The first one was employee retention and generational issues. Second one is called, um, the Future is Hybrid, and the third one was DEI and organizational diversity issues and trends, applications to career development. So, uh, somewhat connected, Shannon to your, your topic, but  looking more at  maybe broader at, at some of the DEI and belonging  issues, I wanna move next  kind of into the process piece and ask students and also Melissa to talk a little bit about.

 The process of writing and actually contributing to the monograph. And I know for many of you, this might've been your first scholarly opportunity, right? You probably wrote papers for classes, but maybe this was your, you know, your first byline   on your cv, where you had to get professional feedback  and revise it.

And so. Um, this process started early on. Um, in retrospect, we probably could have started earlier. I think Shannon, we talked about that one time, is this could have been a full, like semester length project, but I think we started it in, in March  as a class and then got done with it by the end of April.

Early, early May. But so it took a little while, but, um, that's the process of, of academic scholarship. Um, so Shannon, maybe we'll start with you. Can you kind of describe what that process of, of writing. Uh, was like, so, you know, you've talked already about selecting the I idea for the chapter, but what were maybe some of the challenges?

What was enjoyable? Maybe just your overall experience as a, as a emerging scholar and author.  I think probably the biggest challenge was sorting through so much material. 'cause there's academic research, there's. I dunno, would you call it industry research? Like the human rights campaign has done a lot of research on this.

Of course.  So there were like, I still have a stack of papers on my desk from that project that's huge. And I threw away what I didn't use.  So it was a lot to weed through and I finally had to just decide that I was. Primarily looking at articles since the marriage equality passed in 2015. So I kind of had to like pick a place to go from and that helped narrow it down a little bit.

 And then the writing process, I mean, I've, I. Written so many papers, I couldn't possibly count them, but I've never obviously been published before. And so I think the writing process went the same as it ever would until we got to the editing. And as someone who prides herself on being good at proofreading and editing, it was an experience to be edited.

 Not in a negative way necessarily. It was just like. Interesting to see someone else pick apart my paper the way I've done to my kids so many times. Um, so that was really, it was a really good experience.  I would've liked to have been one of the people that got a second round of edits. 'cause I felt like the first round was such basic stuff.

It was the stuff that made me cringe that I didn't catch it. And I would've liked to have seen if   more improvements could have been made to my writing if we could have gotten into like the more nitty gritty stuff.  Then after the fact, every typo that I still see in it just drives me absolutely bonkers because, and that's just how it is.

I find typos in books that I read all the time. So I know  that's just reality, but I hate it so much.  That's probably the most painful part for me. I want it to be perfect. Yeah, I, I talked with, uh, many of you, I think after the first round and there was a lot of like red marks. Right. And sometimes we're not used to Oh yeah.

To, to red marks. I, I know as a writer I've been  in the faculty role and, and doing authorship types of responsibilities for decades now, and I still, you know, have to kind of like. Put on an extra layer of skin. You know, when I open up the email, and I know Melissa, we've talked about this too, is  it is still sometimes difficult  to get that feedback, even though it's meant in the spirit of improving your work.

   Nathan, you want to talk a little bit next about  kinda the, the process for you, and I don't know if there were certain challenges that in retrospect, you can identify, maybe there were some highlights. Like what, what was the overall experience like for you? I. Let me start off positive first. Um, it was actually a great experience to see that my scholars and like read their papers 'cause there's very many iterations of it too.

Um, you built a great support system with having us to relay  iterations and also like go through each other's papers as well, have discussions from it.  Pulled together a lot of the. Insight that was needed to like form our papers. So I did appreciate that.  The one thing that I can say is I was actually preparing for my preliminary examination at the same time.

So it is just that time period just reminds me of stress.  Overall, but it was a great time, um, to really connect with scholars and everyone that was in that class was just. Phenomenal. Um, even hearing about the passions behind the projects too. Um, I think that that was an experience, a lifetime experience that I will just treasure as well.

 So there was a lot of enjoyable moments. The only thing that I would say is the stressful part was trying to. Do the preliminary examination while also look at the edits. And as Shannon was saying, that red ink, it always hurts, but it's not a hurt that's like, oh my gosh  I can't do this. This is more of a, oh, I really, this is a really rough drive.

 Um, so I think that that definitely helped me a lot. Um, even. Moving forward into like getting some revisions for the prelim as well. Um, it was like, okay, I've been through this once. I can do this again. Okay. Make sure edit this, um, go this. So I think that it's a great experience that, um, I would say every scholarship experience overall.

Great. I remember taking a pedagogy course and um, the instructor suggested purple instead of red. I don't know, maybe that's sort of less anxiety producing. So  great. Thank you Nathan. And, and Kirsten, how about you? What were some of the, kind of the, the processes  highlights, lowlights, anything that you kind of reflect on having, uh, completed this project?

Yeah. To echo Nathan, I feel like the peer review and getting to not only read other people's papers, but also have them read mine was  a huge highlight. I really enjoyed  hearing the different perspectives on my work from other people, getting to see what  corrections different people had, uh, I think is always good.

And,  I also, again, really like to see what other people were interested in, and it helps me just  connect more of  what we were learning in class to some of the, uh, issues that are going on in the current, workforce trends. And, uh, yeah. So that was a huge positive. I would say for my topic specifically, it was a little bit difficult to find a, a lot of scholarly research just because  it's a,  a relatively new issue. So there was plenty of, uh  news sources and  preliminary research, but not  as many journal articles. Uh  which was fine because I felt like I was able to find enough to, to bolster my argument. But that was probably a challenge for me.  The editing, I, I actually found it very comforting because I felt like there was.

Someone kind of watching my back or something and having, having someone catch my errors felt very comforting. Like, um, I didn't feel insecure about submitting my work to be published. 'cause I knew that if there was anything,  small, it would be caught. So, uh, or at least, uh, that there would be more eyes on it.

So  I found it to be a comforting thing though.  Again, like Shannon mentioned, it was you look back and you're like, how did I miss that?

Yeah.  Thank you Kirsten. And, and for listeners who are just joining us  my name is Mike Stepton. I'm a faculty member at the University of Minnesota. We're talking about a new student monograph, published by NCDA. It's titled, analyzing Current and Future Workforce Issues, student Perspectives on Career Development.

And there are 14 chapters in the monograph, all written by, um, students who completed this course in the spring of 2025. I wanna share three additional. Uh, titles that came from the second section of the monograph. This is the section title, applying Career Develop Models to support specific populations.

Uh, one is called Employee Mental Health and the Examination of Organizational Culture and Leadership Approaches. A second contribution is the role of schools in shaping future careers. And the final  contribution in this section is. Called Applying Chaos Theory to non-college educated African Americans.

So you can see the the representation. Of, , those chapters from other students   in the class. Um, so Melissa, I wanna pull you into the discussion here. We haven't forgotten about you.  We spent a lot of time editing these wonderful  chapters. We saw 'em right from the beginning and we saw 'em right, uh, to the end and.

Till we got that final, , draft  of the, uh, completed, uh, product. So I want to, uh, talk a little bit with you. We weren't quite sure what to expect. I remember having some early conversations last spring, like, Hmm, I wonder what these are gonna look like.  I kept telling you the students are working hard, but I'm not quite sure what the results will be.

Um, so what was the editing process like for you? What were you hoping?  To maybe accomplish in terms of your support  of these young writers  and just overall your kind of, . Your role in the process? Oh, yeah. It's interesting to hear the sort of reflections from the three students that are with us today.

And I, I felt all that as a writer myself, working with editors over the years. And, uh, I worked on this project with you, Mike  also with Melanie Reinman. I want to give a, a, a huge, uh, shout out to Melanie, who is  one of my NCDA colleagues. She and I each edit other NCDA publications and we. Went at this project as this was gonna be an and is an NCDA publication.

So we wanted it  to have the same standards    that everything else that comes out of the association does. And so sometimes that did. On that first draft, especially, uh, look a little bloody when we had gone through it  at one point we both read all of , the drafts and, and then we split it up where we were each, uh, kind of taking half.

   You know, our role really was sort of part project management and, you know, kind of getting this through the logistical pieces of, from working with you all as students and with drafts to working with a layout designer.  Printer, you know, all of that to get it to the final  product.  Certainly copy editing is part of that, but there's, you know, there's also more to it.

You want everyone's voice to be heard.  You want it  to be perceived and received by the reader as as professional work  as serious work. So that did    come through, I think in the editing process, uh, I will say we did have that, that. Revise and resubmit process, but we would've done more of that.

There would've been more iterations of that. Had we had more time outside of that, that one semester. We knew Melanie and I, that we really couldn't reach the students through your course, through that sort of  context. After the semester ended, it was gonna be much more difficult to, you know, get everybody together and, you know, find people and get it, deadlines and things like that.

So we would've done more of, of that back and forth.  Had we had more time. Yeah, I think the element of of time is a  good point to explore and maybe re-envision if we were to do  this again, right? Because, um, as, as you know, Melissa and, and Melanie Ryerson knows this as well because she's been at this for a long time, and, um, I think we both come to her  for sometimes guidance and her own wisdom.

Um, this takes a long time and sometimes authors.  Do revise and resubmit four or five times before it's finally, uh. Accepted and then published  in, in a, in an outlet. And so, you're right. I mean, I think, you know, Shannon, your comment kind of alluded this, is that we probably could have done even more  editing.

 Not to like envision more red ink, but  the process, we wanted to simulate the process of what it was like. To submit something to a professional journal and then get, some feedback.  But you're right, we probably could have  done a little bit more and probably could have started a little bit earlier in the, in the, um, semester.

 Melissa, I talked a little bit about the developmental process. I think that was a spirit that I, I think we were very intentional about that, right? We wanted to be, yes. We wanted to have high standards. We wanted students to go through this rigorous process, but, um, no one was gonna be rejected. Right.

Um, and so we wanted, we wanted people to have this opportunity where they were learning from each other, and we did a, some peer review process in class. I read the work, and so students were getting feedback from different sources throughout the journey. Can can you say a little bit more about  maybe the developmental process that.

Maybe you took with this project, but maybe what, what NCA does, kind of generally with, with writers who might wanna permit to a professional publication. Yeah. Oh, absolutely.  That kind of, to Kirsten's point here,  we're on your side, right? We are, we're on, we're part of the team. We want your work and your voice to be out there and.

In the best possible way, um, so that it will be received by,  the most possible people. So  we, when did this particular project, Melanie and I, um, and you know, we met to discuss it on our side, kinda how are we gonna do this? How's it gonna work? We wanted again, for it to be professional editing, right?

 That you were gonna receive. But then we also did more I think, in the comments and things on the documents. So it wasn't just, this is wrong or take this out, but this is why this is wrong. Or this is why we want you to take this out, or this is why we think you need more.  

So knowing that you were students, knowing that this is just a, for many of you, your initial sort of foray into this kind of writing and editing process, we wanted to give you a little bit more background  to again, develop those skills. You're gonna do this hopefully a lot more.  And I know with the, uh, the membership magazine that, that I edit for NCDA and the web magazine that Melanie edits for NCDA.

Our, we wanna publish, we, we want you to get published. I, we really wanna work with authors and on submissions to, to get them where they need to be. So it's not, we're not trying to weed out. Great. Um, and, and this certainly was, uh, one of those situations as well. Yeah. Yeah. I think  we wanted students to have the opportunity right.

 To publish and yeah, some of you might go on  and do additional publish work. I, you know, for others in the class, maybe this was, they're gonna be their loan opportunity.  And what a great opportunity to have the support of, you know, 14 other students and faculty and editors at a professional organization  to try and accomplish that, that goal.

Um, and I, I've, I've heard from a number of you through. Probably LinkedIn posts that, you know, this was a dream of yours, you know, to see your, your name in print or maybe you, you know, read other people's work at one point growing up and you thought, huh, I wonder what it was like to see my name there. And, uh, all 14 of you now have  have had that experience and, and accomplishment.

So I, I think that's something to. To acknowledge for sure.  So I have to tell everyone, I just have to be very honest. I've, I've been bragging about the students  and this product to a number of my colleagues, my faculty colleagues, and telling them what we did. And they're pretty impressed with you all, just to let you know.

And, uh, some of the responses I get from these faculty members are like  how did you get them to do that?  Wow. I mean, all 14 of 'em are published and I'm like, yep.  And then they say, well, I wonder if I could do something like that. And I say, you know, well, good luck.  Don't do it through NCDA.

'cause that's, that's us. But, um, my question is to the students is, you know, what advice would you give to maybe other instructors or educators could be in higher ed or outside of higher ed who might be interested in creating  let's call it capstone experience    that maybe could get published?

Elsewhere.  Or, or maybe it's just a learning opportunity in class where students work on a, a completed piece with multiple revisions.    What advice would you give to faculty members? Hope, hopefully it's not  don't do it.  But if that's the way you  feel to share. But, um  honest opinions or, or thoughts.

And maybe we'll start with  Kirsten again, this time. I think that, uh, staying very organized and having it laid out from the start   is really good. I, I actually think that you had the class organized in a very  in a great way because there were check-ins very frequently, so. It wasn't, uh, something that was introduced and then put off for a long time, and then we had time to forget what we are, you know, our topic was on or  not follow up.

So I, I think having it be very intentional from the beginning of the course and, uh, have periodic check-ins, revisions, and  just connections to what you're talking about in class can help. Make the product feel  less stressful at the end of the course as well as just getting it done in a professional way.

Yeah, and I think one barrier to maybe not starting earlier is that we were still learning theory right through probably the first three-fourths of the semester. And so it would've been hard for someone to write about. Applying chaos theory if they weren't introduced to the, to the theory at, at that time?

Yeah. I think the timeline that we had for our class actually worked well.  I think it was plenty of time to write it and  it did allow for more of those check-ins, I guess. Okay. Nathan, how about you? Other insights or recommendations you might give to other educators that want to create this type of capstone experience?

Really focus on the writing process. Hmm. So two things come to mind when doing this, um, especially within thinking about being a PhD  student, uh, is having additional support from those that are around. So  really encouraging each student to have someone that will be able to. Possibly review this or possibly like, give insight to we, it was embedded into the class, but I think that would be a great opportunity to connect with, uh, mentors, advisors, or a e  individuals within that realm.

And then also the second thing I'm thinking as well, although this is a great experience, I think also giving a opportunity to have individuals co-author.  That may look totally different, um, within the ways that we did it, but I think  that also gives students the opportunity to really understand like, what does it mean to co-author?

How do you combine the literature? How do you combine your two voices into one, two?  So that's just, those are the two things that I'm thinking of that will be a little twist to it. But I think that this is a great opportunity and that  it should be implemented in a lot of programs. So thank you, Dr.

Piper. Spearheading this 'cause it was a good one. Do you think it'd be easier or more, more difficult to work with a co-author? I, I find sometimes it's more difficult de depending on the co-author, no names, but I'm just, uh, wondering what, do you think it's easier to, to do it solo or with, with someone else?

I think it would be difficult, but it is a journey too. So  if they wanna do,  let's say try to make it a little bit harder on themselves. But no, I think that it could actually give in a little bit more insight of  assisting in how to collaborate within that. Perspective giving as well. So I think that it'll be a little bit more advanced, but I do think that there will be some great benefits if you had the co-authoring option as well.

And that could also be with  mentors . So it's more of a having them to co-author and assist to like really dive into the experience too. So that's where my mind goes for all. Okay, great. How about you, Shannon?  Advice that you might give to other instructors or educators that are trying to integrate a Capstone experience, either for a publication or, or not?

 My thoughts is, I was listening to Nathan and Kirsten, is that you are so organized, like probably one of the most organized college professors I've had. Everything you put on the agenda is what we actually did. You know, like you, you are just an organized person, and I, I feel like not every  college instructor could pull it off.

So good job, Dr. Mike.  And we've talked about a lot of things already, like  maybe introducing part of it early, but I was thinking the same thing, that we had to learn the theories first, so I don't know how much earlier we really could have started it. Right. Um, but  I think the experience is super worthwhile and.

If a teacher can pull it off, I think students would benefit. And to Nathan's point about the co-authorship, I think that was a really great idea because if you have a future in academia, you are going to be co-authoring  lots and lots of publications, hopefully. Um, so I think there's definitely merit there too.

Maybe that's a graduate only option and we wouldn't include undergrads in that or something, but I, I think that would have some real value as well. Thank you, Shannon  for your kind words. Um, I also wanna pull in Melissa to this response. I, I don't know if I can convince you to do this again. We have to have that follow up conversation, but    if prospective  faculty members or educators.

Approached you or someone else in, in the editing kind of  profession about wanting to, to do a project like this?  What might you advise from, from the editor perspective to, to faculty or educators?  Two things come to mind. Um, the first is, this needs a budget, right? So we, uh, in this past year, in 2025.

We had, uh, president Marty Apodaca at NCDA and he's just moved into the role of past president. But while he was president, one of the parts of his platform, one of the things he was working to support was graduate students in career development. And so this project came at the perfect time, um, the proposal to do this, and there was a budget for it.

So, you know, we've got layout designers again, we've got printers, editors, time, all of that, you know, has gotta be a, a kind of. Factored into whatever that that product is gonna be that you wanna come out of it. Uh, and the second idea  is to maybe you, you get, get this ball rolling in that initial semester, and then you have like a one credit course add-on that takes you into the next semester or even two.

 So that there, you've got that continued time to dedicate, to work on it. Give you more time, but also you get credit.  You know, the student date is not sort of working outside of the semester.

They've just closed to try to get this done, which is kind of how we kind of, we, we tried to wrap it up very quickly so that we didn't have to ask much of them after that course of it. Yeah. I, I like that idea. And I know different departments and programs have experimented with a, a writing for publication course.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. It could be a one credit or, or a pass fail class. But  I like that idea for students that really want to develop those skills,  in addition to maybe the, the course content where we lay out the expectations and form the ideas and get started with the process. Yeah, I think it could be really creative with it.

 Maybe you go to a different department that's training a journalist and editors. Um, yeah. And, and it's a, it's also a project for those students in their courses. It takes a lot of coordination. But, um, you know, that could be a way to pull everybody into it in a, in a really interesting way. Yeah. And you, you've already mentioned two of our colleagues, and I just want to acknowledge 'em, both, both Marty and and Melanie Reyerson were very supportive  behind the scenes largely, we're appreciative. And then Marty, our past president now, I think, as you alluded to fit in, is fit in nicely with his agenda around supporting graduate and professional student education. So kudos to, to both of them as as well. Um, we're nearing our end of, of our time together.

 Melissa, did you have anything else to add or students, this might be an opportunity for you to add any final comments if, if you wish, um, thoughts that maybe we didn't cover  in the first part of our, of our session.

I would just say, uh, if you're out there, you're listening and you are a student, uh, studying career development or you're working with students  encourage writing. Uh, this is still a very important thing. Uh, writing skills are gonna be important even with all of the AI tools. Uh, that are out there, , to help us along.

So, encourage students, uh, work with students, and if you are a student, reach out, uh, to publications and to your mentors , and your faculty members and let them know    that this is something that you want to do. You wanna find out more about. I think that's a re uh, excellent, uh, recommendation.

Melissa and I, I think the career convergence is an excellent avenue as well. Um, listeners and readers are probably familiar with NCAA's Career Convergence. Usually about 950 words, a thousand words. It's almost like a blog post. Uh, but it's, I call it a scholarly blog because usually writers include citations.

You get feedback. Revise and resubmit process.  And it's an excellent way to get your foot in the door as as a writer and to make a contribution, uh, where you can share  your insights or your experiences with others. Anything else from the students before we close Shannon? Yeah, I just wanted to say thank you for the opportunity 'cause I have been wondering how it was paid for.

Because I pay for publications for the doctors I support. And so that has been bo bugging me, so thank you NCDA for supporting students in that way. 'cause that was really cool. And I hope it's something that other classes get to do. 'cause I think it was really worthwhile.  Yeah. Thank you.  Nate or Kirsten, anything else in closing?

I would just  echo that and thank you to, to the, to everyone, uh, for supporting us and coming up with this idea and, uh, seeing it through. 'cause it's great to have so much feedback on, on our writing as well as have this  really cool publication. Yeah, that's great. And thank you for volunteering.  I think I mentioned to all of you that next year's annual conference for NCD will be in Minneapolis, Minnesota, not far from where many of us are sitting right now.

There may be an opportunity for us to have a panel presentation, to, to share your, your good work. Melissa, final thoughts. Thank you all so much for, for being part of this and, um, for being here today. You represent  many more people that were, your, your classmates and colleagues who added additional chapters to this.

Uh, also wanna let listeners know again, the title of this publication is Analyzing Current and Future Workforce Issues, students' Perspectives on Career Development. This is. On NC DA's website now, it is free to access. You can find the link in the show notes to this episode. And again, thank you all, Dr.

Steon  and students for your contribution to the career development field through this publication. Thank you.