Out From Under The Shadow

Danny Paschall has been elevated to Dean of Students. Here's what you don't know about him, including how he chooses his "self" over his "should's."

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In one of his first decisions last spring as the newly-appointed VP for Student Development and University Planning, Dr. Chris Grace promoted Danny Paschall to the newly created position of Dean of Students. Danny has been at Biola for 15 years, starting as the RD of Stewart and then becoming Associate Dean of Residence Life, then Associate Dean of Student Development.

In his new role, Danny works alongside Dean of Student Development John Back, and oversees the areas of Residence Life, Housing, Student Transitions, International Student Services, Commuter Life and the Learning Center.  He also supervises two Associate Deans (Beth Born, Matthew Hooper) and brings leadership and oversight to the Student Care team.

We sat down with Danny to find out more about him and his views about students.

What led you into Student Development?

What led me into it was going through a process of learning the things that I didn’t want to do… that was kind of a long maze. I think Student Development was something I kind of landed on; I wasn’t intentional about it. I think I first became aware of it when I was an undergrad at Azusa Pacific, working in Graduate Admissions, and across the hallway was the College Student Affairs (CSA) master’s program.

I graduated, I got my teaching stuff all done, and I realized “I don’t want to teach… I don’t want to be in the classroom…” So one afternoon, I went over to the CSA office and got an application for the program… and I realized, that’s when I felt most alive when I was an undergrad, that's when learning really began to happen for me, was in those little moments when I was in the leadership positions I took on as an undergrad.  That’s what gave me a sense of direction… and so when I got into it, I realized “this is cool…  I really like this. I connect with this idea of how to develop college students.”

And I was at a place in my life where I was young enough, still single, and the idea of being a Resident Director, living among college students, sounded really attractive. So I didn’t have long-term goals in mind then; I was thinking, “I want to be an RD, I want to hang out with college students.” And then I think that kept fitting with me, even when I didn’t necessary want to be an RD anymore, I still wanted to work with this age level.

It’s definitely a place where it merges with a lot of my gifts and it’s where I feel most alive… hanging out and being around college students.

Talk about your own undergrad experience; what was memorable?

My undergrad years were a mixed bag. I made really good friends, and I just kind of took advantage of everything the school had to offer. If there was a leadership opportunity, I wanted to at least apply for it, whether it was SOS, RA, in the Music program… I really enjoyed that.

But it was also a hard time for me, because in the middle of my undergrad years is when my brother died. And I think, looking back, there were a few key people that connected with me in small ways that made a huge difference for me. I remember about a month after Brent died, I got this phone call from Jon Wallace, who was Dean of Students at Azusa at the time, and he said, “Hey, I’m going to Santa Barbara for the day to meet a donor. Would you come with me?” I went with him, and that was really significant to me… somebody paying attention to me during that time. And Jon and I connected again during my time at APU, but just that one day, if that was all we’d done, that was really significant for me. I realized, wow, it doesn’t take much to pay attention, to particularize a student… and it was through those developmental conversations where, for me, change began to happen.

Another really significant person for me was the Associate Dean of Students, Sue Bunker… she was another person who really paid attention to me, particularized me.  I think all those things combined were really rich experiences for me, and made me think, “You know, I think I want to engage in this world of college students in this way.”

And now, all these years later, you’re a Dean of Students. What types of interactions do you have with students at this level, as a Dean?

What I’ve tried to do is get really clear on what are my gifts, what do I do well, where do I enjoy myself the most… So where I’m most comfortable, where I feel like I give away my best self, is in one-on-one conversations with students. So I carve out a lot of time just to be with students one-on-one. Typically it’s over a meal, but not always. I just carve out time, and I’ll email students and say, “I want to stay connected to students, I want to stay connected to campus life, can we have a meal together?” And students respond really well to that.

And if students are having a difficult time—in fact yesterday, I found out someone’s mother had passed away—I’ll email or text them and ask, “hey, can we have lunch?” Now a connection’s made, I’m getting to know that student, and I get to know their friends, and who’s significant to them. For me, that’s the way I connect with students, in these one-on-one interactions.

And being present… what are events where it’s important for me to be present? I feel like my job as Dean of Students is just that, to be a presence on campus for students. I’m not going to know every single student by name, but I want every single student to at least know who I am, and find me approachable, so that if something comes up, they know who I am and how to contact me… I’m their Dean; I’m their advocate. Like I tell freshmen, I’m here to make sure they have all the tools they need to be their best self.  I want to take that seriously.

If you’d look at my goals for the year, the theme that comes through is ‘presence.’ I want to develop a presence here on campus. What am I doing to be a presence among students? That’s going to come out in what I do with Admissions: when a student gets accepted here, I want to be able to say, “hey, I’m glad you’re here, this is what Biola’s about, this is who I am.” They’ll see it during Orientation, even in Parent Relations, developing a presence there. I’ve been writing for Inside Story (Biola’s employee newsletter), telling staff what’s going on with students.  That word ‘presence’ is a big word for me right now… how am I showing up here, particularly among undergraduate students?

And not just among the student leaders, or just with the students who find themselves in trouble, but with the huge majority of students who are neither... How do I have a presence with them?  [Associate Dean] Matthew Hooper and I are doing these focus groups with students every month, students that specifically are not in leadership, and we get together and we’re just engaging with them and asking them questions. So my goals there are not just to connect with them, but also to hear them, “how’s your experience been here at Biola?” Those are just small but important ways that I try to be a better presence for students. That’s a major focus for me this year.

During your whole time here, not just as Dean, but your entire… you’ve been here how long now?

15 years now.

In your 15 years, what has been your toughest challenge thus far?

I call it my ‘shadow,’ the ‘shadow’ of leadership. It’s me confronting those voices inside me saying “Danny, this is how you should do it… this is the right way for you to do this job,” regardless of whether it’s something I possess or not. And that can be paralyzing sometimes, if I let that voice get too loud. So for me it’s the challenge of continually confronting those ‘shadows’ and instead saying, “Lord, here I am… this is how You created me. You led me into this position… what does it look like for me to live out this job with my gifts and what I possess?” And not to worry about doing it the ‘right’ way but doing it His way… I think I can get caught up in those ‘ought-to’ and ‘should’ kinds of shadows.

Do you think students here sense those shadows in themselves, those "ought-to’s"?

Yes, definitely. Especially in a Christian community like Biola, it’s really easy to live in the ‘shoulds’ and the ‘oughts’… and that what I enjoy in connecting with students, breaking through those barriers, “What’s the truth? What’s going on in your heart?” ‘Cause once we can locate the truth, and when students feel safe to say, “here’s what going on in my heart,” okay, now let’s talk about a constructive way to build from there.

Because some of the things we carry around in our hearts are destructive… there are things that are truths about us that we shouldn’t be living out, but to get beyond them we have to be able to say, “here's what’s going on in my heart.” There’s something really freeing about being able to locate that, and having someone help you locate that. It’s a good place to begin.

If a student is starting to feel overwhelmed by the demands of school, work or family, do you have any suggestions that might help them cope with these issues and get back on track?

There are some practical things. One, you need to be getting sleep. The basics: “Are you sleeping? Are you eating well? Are you taking care of your body?”

Beyond that, there’s “Who are you connecting to?” This book that I still think about, College of the Overwhelmed, talks about how students can come to college and be so overwhelmed on so many different levels. And I agree with the author, that students are coming to college not relationally and emotionally connected or grounded with people… and it’s amazing, if you feel like you’re floating and not grounded into certain people and relationships, how overwhelming it can become when things are stressful.

So if I could focus on one thing for Biola students, it would be friendship. What does it mean for you to be in really honest, safe friendships? How do you cultivate safe friendships, to people that you’re really connected and grounded to, people you can work through conflict with… what does that look like? What does it look like to be a good friend?

And how are you connecting to your own heart? Are you taking time each day to stop and ask yourself, “What’s going on in my heart? What’s the dominant feeling I’m feeling right now? What am I carrying around right now?” It’s so easy with the busyness of college to go through and never stop, never once, just to connect to yourself. But our hearts were designed to have an experience and then a little margin to reflect on it: “What just happened to me? How do I feel about that?” Or taking time, before you enter into a potentially significant event, and prepare yourself. This idea of rest and reflection is not something we value, and it costs us.

You’re now in a position to set goals and make changes in how Student Development operates. How do you take that idea of rest and reflection into the lives of students?

I think one important way is to ask myself, “Am I modeling that for myself? Am I a person who is active and productive, but also values rest and reflection? And am I modeling that for my professional team, and are we modeling that balance for students? “ Parker Palmer would say that a healthy person is able to live in the balance of the active and the reflective. So to me, we have to wrap our minds and hearts around that for ourselves first, and that will hopefully be evident to the students we’re around.

A lot of it also comes through what we’re doing in Spiritual Development.  I’m so excited about Todd [Pickett, Associate Dean of Spiritual Development] and who he is, and these sabbathings and silent retreats, these reflection projects that Todd’s always writing up right after a Chapel… saying, “Hey, tonight, when you go to bed, here’s some reflection questions based on the Chapel you heard today…. Spend ten minutes thinking about these.” Just a brief thing, but it’s so significant, just getting into the practice of doing that. It’s an important way to impart to students the importance of reflection and silence, rest… connecting with your heart.

Do you have other goals for Student Development… where’s your attention going to be focused in the next few months?

One way that I want to lead is through our 7 Core Values of Student Development. I want to be sure all our Directors share these values: are we looking to have “developmental conversations”? Are we valuing the “spiritual development” that’s taking place in our students while they’re here? Are we reading our students right in terms of what’s important to them and what questions they’re asking? Are we relevant to their world right now? How are we communicating to students; is it relevant to their world? Do we have a “physical presence”: are we eating with them, are we engaged in the same events they’re at? Are we fostering “collaborative leadership”? So we‘ve been focusing on these; this will be my guide for leadership this year.

What are things that Student Development does really well? What areas need to grow?

I look back at these 7 Core Values, and there’s some of both. In so many ways, we are engaging students in developmental conversations. We value that as a team. And at the same time, we can do that better than we have in the past.

I love that, in spiritual development, we’re not just creating programs to address issues, but we’re first stepping back and asking, “how do student develop spiritually?” Then we can talk about what kinds of things we can place along that path, which will help them grow. So we’re not just talking about topical issues, but we’re down in the roots. We’re doing some really interesting research with [Dr.] Todd Hall [from Rosemead] and his Spiritual Inventory…. So some of those things we do really well.

I also feel like we engage faculty really well. It doesn’t feel divided to me at all. There’s some really good collaboration going on between faculty and Student Development. I think we’re well respected across the board. Faculty come to us, asking “help us understand our students better,” which is what they should be coming to us for, and so we can provide helpful tools and information to our faculty. I feel like over the years we’ve branded ourselves accurately, and the image faculty have of us is accurate.  There’s some really good crossover going on.

Another strength I see is that among the Directors in our division, there’s some really good diverse thinking going on. You just can’t put all those people into the same mold; there’s a lot of different backgrounds and points of view and values, and it comes together to make a really rich department, and that’s a real benefit for students.

 

Interviewed by John Tuttle, Director of Student Communications.