Next-Gen Leadership Starts Here: NASPA USC Preview - Adventures in Advising

The NASPA Undergraduate Student Conference isn’t just another conference—it’s a launchpad. Charlie Sloop from Michigan State University and Derrick Ball from Texas A&M University join us to break down what students can expect, how the conference creates space for leadership and belonging, and why this experience sticks long after the closing session. From professional development to meaningful connection, this conversation is your all-access pass to what’s coming and why it matters. 

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Transcript

Ryan Scheckel  
Well, hello there, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Adventures in Advising podcast. My name is Ryan Scheckel, co-host along with me is Matt Markin, as always, Matt, how are you today? 

Matt Markin  
Good. I mean it's, it's January. I guess we can still be saying a Happy New Year, right?

Ryan Scheckel  
Sure. Yeah. You know, I saw something online where, I'm sure someone probably posts something like this every year, but it was 2025, with the five overwritten into a six, and it's like, we're going to be doing this for a while. We can do that verbally as well, or check in and be like, it's it's not another year yet. Is it another year? So yeah, super excited for today's episode and our guests, especially, sort of broadening that comfort zone and in that organizational perspective, talking with some folks about NASPA and their events, and so I don't know if we want to bring our guests on now, at this point, how's that sound? Sounds great. So with us here today are Charlie Sloop and Derrick Ball, and we're going to get a chance to get to know them a little bit more. They're going to share with us as well some information about the NASPA undergraduate student conference. But Charlie, if we can start with you, could you tell us a little bit about your journey in higher education? Sort of, what's your origin story?

Charlie Sloop  
Absolutely, and thank you again for having us today on the Adventures and Advising podcast. I actually started diving into student affairs as I was an orientation leader my freshman summer year at Virginia Tech. This was kind of one of those moments where the mentor taps on your shoulder and it's like, Hey, I think you would actually be really good at working in student affairs and colleges. Because my goal, ever since I had a 4H background, was to help people in some shape or fashion, and so it led me into this exploration of Student Affairs, going through Res Life, doing research, and one of my favorite positions was serving as a hazing prevention specialist in student engagement and campus life, so allowed me to work with student organizations facilitate hazing prevention training, and it's led me to where I am now. So I'm currently a graduate student at Michigan State University in the Student Affairs Administration program, and I am a graduate assistant and registered student organization, so instead of just my little group of student organizations, now I get to help out with 1200 student organizations. So it's a huge jump. But yeah, that's a little bit about my story. 

Ryan Scheckel  
Thanks. And Derrick, can you tell us where you're at, what you're doing, and how you got there?

Derrick Ball  
Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. I'll start with Howdy, because I'm currently at Texas, a and University in College Station. My background started all the way in California, at the University of Redlands, where I was an RA. I was in student government. I was an orientation leader. I just, I kind of did everything I possibly could, and I just fell in love had some really great mentors, and ended up being able to do a mentorship in our student affairs office under our Dean of Students. And that's really what kicked off like, Yeah, this is definitely what I want to do for a career. And so falling in love with in California, I said, What don't I know? Packed up my bags and I moved all the way country to all the way across the country, to Texas. We're now one of the largest public institutions in the country, and I served as the hall director for Hart Hall, and I'm just having a blast. We're in ra training this week, and so everything's chaotic and it's fun, and I couldn't imagine being anywhere else right now.

Matt Markin  
I don't know if I could ever do the whole housing ra thing. So more power to you for that. Now, before we jump into the main focus of this episode, I always like to give thanks to how connections happen. And so Charlie, I want to throw it to you about how you got connected with us and events and advising and how this came about?

Charlie Sloop  
Yeah, absolutely. And first off, I want to, like, shout out Anthony, to bring these worlds kids together, because that was kind of one of those ways where you can just see things overlap, and it's like, Oh, wow. Like, okay, so like we were in the know with people, but Anthony serves on the NASPA Undergraduate Student Conference with us. Was one of the first people I actually got to meet through NASPA as a part of my way into the professional organization. And so we were talking about, kind of just some ways to strategize. How do we keep talking about the conference? How do we continue to let people know about our mission and vision? And it was through these relationships. Is where I was like, hey, so let me go ahead and email a couple of people Anthony was creating the list, so that way we can keep reaching out. And then I was like, hey. So my colleague actually recommended me to reach out to him and then me forgetting to attach my colleague in that email, but was able to follow back up and be like, Oh no, it's Anthony. Here's Anthony's email. Like this is, this is not a random person. We have a little bit of connection there, and then being able to have a little chat on Zoom, which was really nice to kind of just get to know each other and see how small the Student Affairs world actually is.

Matt Markin  
Yeah. And can you both expand a little bit more about kind of how you all got, you both got involved in NASPA?

Charlie Sloop  
I can go first. I I started getting involved in NASPA because my senior year as an undergrad, I joined the NASPA Undergraduate Fellowship Program, also known as NUFP. NUFP is a way where you are given the opportunity to, as we were, kind of talking, just explore Student Affairs. Like, what can we get? What could I give my hands on, in terms of the field, networking, mentors, connections, and it was that preparation phase of like, okay, I know I want to do graduate school. I know this is a part of my trajectory. How can I continue to be prepared in that and so and earlier in 2025 I was about to say this year, but I was like, Oh, we're in a new year. I got to attend the NASPA annual conference as an attendee to the undergraduate student conference where I got to meet Dr. Asha Jones, that overseas enough program, and got to meet a lot of people affiliated with enough program, which allowed me to network with people and then continue to do the opportunities like enough internship and work at a different college campus for a summer and then attend a Leadership Institute. So it's one of those things where I applied for NUFP, and then was like, whatever's happening. Sign me up. Let's run with it. And it's really great because these people continue to check up on you and really solidify what mentorship actually means. 

Derrick Ball  
I think I had a very different route to Charlie. So as an undergrad, I was in our student affairs office all the time, and I became I had a lot of really good mentors, and I became close with Jillian strong, who served as the person running the undergraduate student conference last year. And so she reached out. Was like, hey, Derek, I'm working on the undergrad student conference with NASPA. Love for you to join. I was like, What's a NASPA? I had never heard of NASPA. NASPA before, not really sure what they were. And so I was like, Sure, I would love to do new things. Love some professional development. And then found out, you know, what is NASPA? And as I kind of went on, that was last year, so I got to serve on the Undergraduate Student Conference Committee. And then this year, it was one of those of like, Hey, we're getting the band back together. Like somebody who was on the conference team last year is running it this year, Brooke, we love them. They're amazing. And so just coming full circle, keeping it going, just trying to be better every year. And it's really just an amazing experience to talk to people who were where I was not sure what they would necessarily want to do, are considering a field considering a field in student affairs.

Ryan Scheckel  
Yeah. And sort of To that end, I want to talk a little bit about NASPA's interest in engaging the undergraduate student. You've both shared a little bit of your perspectives as sort of participants in that, but from an organizational point of view, what is, what is NASPA's intent with these sorts of structures, the conference and the fellows programs and that sort of stuff, what's, what's the hope and the goal there?

Charlie Sloop  
Yeah, from my perspective, is genuinely to cultivate the next generation of equity minded, conscious and courageous student affairs professionals, right? Or educators or leaders, right? You think about the ways where our goal, especially with the conference, is to provide that one day high impact experience where they get to participate in tracks of their level of interest in the field. And I think with NASPA's intent, it's being able to provide that holistic introduction, but also being able to say, hey, there's also people in similar boats to you, right? Like we talked about them how important mentorship is. But it's also good to see like people in that similar headspace in terms of, how am I going to turn this into career, or this wasn't my major, so I don't know what this actually looks like, because maybe I pursued engineering, or maybe I was in communication, so like this wasn't intentionally my track at first. For some people, it's like, oh, yeah, this was intentionally my plan as well. So we try to provide flexibilities those ways. And for NASPA, it's always been thinking about like, how can we continue to reshape, remix and reimagine our Student Affairs leaders? And it starts with those people that were tasked by mentor that feel out that interest and then have a safe community to just be in that exploration phase.

Matt Markin  
So I guess, what can you tell us about the upcoming NASPA undergraduate student conference? I can

Derrick Ball  
I can tell you it's gonna be a lot of fun. So we're planning on March 8, we're gonna be in Kansas City, Missouri. So it's gonna be a pre conference. So the day conference. So the day before the major NASPA conference starts, we're going to kick it off, and we're looking to bring in a number of undergraduate students for networking opportunities, professional development opportunities, little bit of learning what the field is like. Last year we had a really great opportunity where we got vice president to come in and address, the Vice President of Student Affairs to come in and address all of the undergraduate students. And we also had an opportunity for students to talk to executive leaders in student affairs. We're looking for a very similar opportunity this year where students are going to talk to people in student affairs that aren't just their mentor, because, like Charlie said, many of these people get into Student Affairs because they had a really good mentor that tapped them on the shoulder. And so how do we get that learning from I had a good mentor. They did a great job to this is a great field that I want to be a part of, and I want to contribute to, and that's really, I think where we're going to be seeing is we're going to be cultivating these opportunities to go beyond just that one mentor, beyond your one institution, and really begin to understand student affairs as a whole.

Ryan Scheckel  
Awesome. So you mentioned it kind of a pre con situation. What's the opportunity? Are there any opportunities for people to participate if they're not going to be attending the larger conference and that kind of stuff? How does that work? What's the range of ways that people can engage with this?

Charlie Sloop  
Yeah, absolutely. And thinking about the registration process too, like you can opt in for either you can either register as a rate under the standalone pre conference, or you can register with the full conference registration. And so the ways that it allows you to have people to connect with if you want to go through the whole experience. So I think a big part of it is that, like, we will introduce people to education sessions, similar to the NASPA annual conference itself, and it's a ways for them to be like, Okay, this is how I am learning in the conference space. This is how I can adapt some of those skills. This is how I can facilitate conversations about my experience so they're able to carry that with them through the annual conference. But if it's like, I just want to be there for today, just to focus on maybe they're in that just like, curious phase, or just wanting to get that leadership practice within that pre con that is also totally an option. Our registration rates, we've actually extended our Early Bird rate until February 4, so people can either register as a member of NASPA under $110 or and that is for the full conference registration, or if they want to do just a standalone pre conference, it is a registration of $200 non members would just pay a little bit more, but you can actually become a member when you reach out to us, so we'll help you facilitate that process too. Of like, what does it mean to be a member as an undergraduate student, or even potentially becoming a Nuf, which is the NASPA undergraduate fellowship program.

Matt Markin  
And so it's titled as the Undergraduate Student Conference. Is it just students you're looking for? Who do you want to attend this?

Derrick Ball  
So we're looking for predominantly undergraduate students. Really, the idea is, the experience is, hey, I'm thinking about a career in student affairs. I'm at that level of my career. Let's see what comes next. But it is not exclusive to undergraduate students, and I think that anybody who's considering a career in student affairs will find a lot of value in attending this conference.

Matt Markin  
Awesome and hopefully too that anyone's listening like an advisor or someone might have a student in mind that maybe they can share this with as well.

Ryan Scheckel  
Absolutely, I was thinking about all the students on our campus, you know, I did a little bit of digging in preparation for our our talk today. And I know Charlie, you have a background in public relations and and theater arts, creative background, and Derek, you have a background in psychology. But you know, from the student affairs perspective, looking back at your undergraduate areas of study and your intent, stuff like that, what alignment Do you see with your own values that brought you into your undergraduate areas of study, but now as you're moving into that career phase, and where do you see the things matching that you wanted to do? And. Contribute to who you are as a person, but also how you contribute to the world larger.

Derrick Ball  
I can answer this one easy. It's the people. It's always about the people. I love working with people. I love building up people, working in Rise life. I also love helping people when things go wrong, lot of crisis management, lot of hey, my life isn't going exactly how I thought it would. How do I pivot? And I think psychology, that's really why I got into it. How do we understand people? How do we help people? And that just extends through Student Affairs. And I think we help people in a lot of different lights. I actually got to work an internship as an academic advisor or community college over last semester, and I really saw the academic advising perspective of we're talking people, were telling them, Hey, how do I help you figure out the pathway to your career? And I think that that is what student affairs does, is just, how do we help people?

Charlie Sloop  
I definitely relate to a lot what Derrick said, especially like, hey, crisis management. Same for PR, same in student affairs. There's a lot of it, and we learn how to do it well fairly quickly. But also, like, I think for me, especially with the theater arts background, like, I always wanted to find ways to let my art my values, to help people be curious, right? And so I think foundationally, in my work, especially in student orgs, is kind of showing up in the space of, like, you're giving me this idea of, like, maybe a new organization or something that was going to shape your involvement during your undergraduate experience. And so how can we elevate that to the next level? Like, where is that connecting and their values as well? And so I've done my Clifton strings, one of my top cliftonstrengths is restorative. And so it's being able to kind of find a ways where the experiences that people are getting is restorative to who they are and an authentic way and how they show up in the world, and then being able to carry that into spaces and be more comfortable with their presence, and be able to have the confidence into what areas or career paths they may be aligned with. And so, I mean, I run into students where I'm like, Oh, you would be a great student affairs professional, but I let them come to me with that conversation sometimes. So just finding where Curiosity, people say, curiosity gets the cap, but satisfaction always brings it back. So there's always a great way to like, see where that satisfaction leads.

Matt Markin  
I am curious about you have both of you have multiple roles and responsibilities, and you're putting on this conference coming up. So an extra responsibility there. What do you both do for your wellness?

Derrick Ball  
So I've got probably fairly interesting one. I'm a circus performer, juggling partner, acrobatics. I just got the opportunity to try a flying trapeze class over the break, and so that is really my wellness. It's teamwork, it's physical. It's a great time.

Charlie Sloop  
That is so cool. We learn new facts every day. That is so amazing. I think similar, for me, it's in the it's being in the performance space, where, like, I have been going to the gym more recently. So like, I always think, like the fitness and being able to reserve a dance studio, and so I also perform in drag outside Student Affairs. And so thinking about ways where, like, I can continue things that help me feed back my body is through performance. It's through working out, and it's through being able to be physically healthy in these spaces.

Ryan Scheckel  
Anything in particular that you are just really looking forward to at the undergraduate student conference?

Charlie Sloop  
I'm really looking forward to the ability to just connect with people that were in my shoes, not it's honestly, like less than a year ago, but also like we're giving so many opportunities to choose your tracks and to customize your experience as well. So I'm really excited to see how that plays out with the Undergraduate Student Conference. And again, it allows you to kind of like you're putting in what you want to receive out of it, right? So we want to have people to be comfortable in that space, and so that's what excites me, is the most is their ability to take it by the reins, customize this conference to their needs, and then us being able to provide that resource in some way.

Derrick Ball  
I think for me, it's, it's gonna be one of those things that refuels just a little bit, is getting to know all these students that are coming into the field. I know last year there was a student who talked about wanting to be a president and wanting to do all these wonderful things and flip higher education on its head. And it's just, I love seeing the passion. Of the undergraduate students and how they want to go and as they really begin their careers. And I mean, as a graduate student in a master's program, I'm still very much at the beginning of my career. But even as we just see more and more people, it's so passionate. And I love when people can come together over a shared cause and just talk about it and come up with new ideas and reignite their passions.

Matt Markin  
And to wrap it up, if someone has more questions they want more information, where can they go?

Charlie Sloop  
Yeah, so people can find us on our social media pages. Our main one is Instagram, so you can follow us at NASPA USC. You'll hear us say USC a lot as we start getting closer to the conference, but we're also on Facebook and LinkedIn, just as NASPA undergraduate student conference. And then if you have any questions that you want to directly send to us, we also have an email that's NASPA undergrad conference@gmail.com

Matt Markin  
All right, sounds good? Well. Charlie, Derrick, thank you so much for being on the podcast and sharing more about the NASPA undergraduate student conference.

Derrick Ball  
Thank you for having us. 

Charlie Sloop  
Thank you so much.