Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 1

Administrative Hearing Officer Training Assessment

Brian Berchtold, Samantha Rengstorf, Leonard Zongo

Northern Illinois University

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Executive Summary

This semester our group was tasked with assessing the Administrative Hearing Officer

training offered through the Student Conduct Office at Northern Illinois University (NIU). To

begin, we conducted a review of the literature relevant to the Administrative Hearing Officer

Training. Our group reviewed literature on the differences between the criminal justice system

and the student conduct process, the history and foundation of student conduct, student

accountability and college success, the NIU Student Conduct Office, Administrative Hearing

Officers at NIU, and employee training. Based on our findings from the literature review and

interviews with the Associate Director of NIU’s Student Conduct Office, we identified a set of

criteria to adequately assess the Administrative Hearing Officer Training.

To collect relevant data about Administrative Hearing Officer Training, we used a variety

of data collection methods. We interviewed four current Administrative Hearing Officers, two

new hearing officers and two veteran hearing officers. A survey was sent to all of the hearing

officers, and half of them completed it. Observations were made about hearing officer training,

as well as documents associated with the training and the hearing process. For the most part, the

current Administrative Hearing Officer training is beneficial and effective. In regards to future

suggestions, we recommended that the training be split with one being for new hearing officers

and one being for returning officers. The current rubric used to assess students could also be used

to assess hearing officer self-efficacy. How-to guides could be created to help hearing officers

navigate the Maxient system. Finally, we recommend that some kind of hands on component be

added to the training. This could be through shadowing a hearing or doing a mock hearing during

training.

Table of Contents
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I. Introduction…………………………………………………………………….4
II. Literature Review……………………………………………………………....4
A. Differences between the Criminal Justice System
and the Student Conduct Process…………………..………....……….4
B. History and Foundation of Student Conduct………………………….4
C. Criminal Justice System and the Student
conduct process………………………………………………………….6
D. Impact of Student Accountability and College Success………………7
E. NIU Student Conduct Office…………………………………………...8
F. Hearing Officers………………………………………………………...9
G. Employee Training……………………………………………………..9
F. Conclusion……………………………………………………………....11
III. Methods and Results……………………………………………………………12
A. Training Observation………………………………………………….12
B. Interviews……………………………………………………………….13
C. Survey………….………………………………………………………..15
D. Document Analysis…….……………………………………………….18
IV. Recommendations………………………………………………………………19
A. Training Specific……………………………………………………….19
B. Supplemental Documents……………………………………………...21

Introduction
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Comparable to systems within the greater society, higher education institutions across the

country have systems in place that serve the purpose of holding individuals accountable for their

actions. Colleges and universities put forth the code of conduct in which they expect students to

abide by. While comparing these codes they may vary slightly, they aim to serve a similar

purpose which is to educate students on what is and is not allowed while attending the

institution. Within the colleges and universities which have codes of conduct, there are those in

place whom serve the purpose of holding students accountable and ensuring the university is not

only safe but upholding the university mission and purpose. The code of conduct is in place to

help students align their actions with not only the university mission but also what the university

and its affiliates feel what is in the best interest for the students. It is pertinent that students

within higher education institutions follow the student code of conduct set forth by their

institution to ensure their continued success and well-being.

Literature Review

Differences between the criminal justice system and the student conduct process

In practice, the student conduct process is different from the criminal court system. The

conduct process generally takes place in a much more informal setting than that of the criminal

court system. Before delving deep into the distinctive characteristics of both systems, the

following will shed light on the history and philosophical foundation of student conduct.

History and Foundation of Student Conduct

The main role of student conduct is to address students of concern and students who have

engaged in inappropriate behavior within or outside of the premises of the university. Through

the conduct process, student conduct administrators strive to educate students as part of the

bigger mission of the university to help them become better learners and better citizens.
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Historically speaking, student conduct is a relatively young field in higher education. According

to Waryold and Lancaster (2008) student conduct was instituted 20 years ago after the student

Judicial Affairs (ASJA) was founded in an attempt to officially recognize the field as an

organized higher education profession (p.6). Due to it being relatively new, there is a lack of

published books and research documents related to its operations which makes it harder for the

public to grasp the holistic role of student conduct.

The philosophical foundation of student conduct “comes down to raison d’être, or the

reasoning or basis of which our practice is grounded or the intention we attach to our work”

(Waryold and Lancaster, 2008, p. 7). In other terms, “raison d’être” is “the thing that is most

important to someone or something: the reason for which a person or organization exists”

(Merriam-Webster dictionary, 2017). Student conduct generally draws its roots from counseling

theories and student development theories. Consequently, the ultimate purpose of student

conduct is to promote students’ growth and development while protecting the interests of the

university community at large (Waryold and Lancaster, 2008, p. 9).

Here at Northern Illinois University, the daily operations of student conduct are guided by

the six principles of the Northern PACT, which outlines the expectations that the university staff

or hearing officers have for the members of the university community members. Listed below

are the six principles of the Northern PACT:

· Purposeful: Where academic goals are shared, and faculty and students work together to

strengthen teaching and learning across campus.

· Just: Where all people are valued and supported while they learn from the diversity of our

community.

· Caring: Where the well-being of all is supported, and service to others is encouraged.
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· Open: Where freedom of expression is welcomed, and others are respected.

· Disciplined: Where group members accept their responsibility, and expectations guide

behavior for the common good.

· Celebrative: Where traditions are honored, and both past and new rituals are embraced.

Criminal Justice System versus Student Conduct Process

Though there are differences between the criminal justice system and the student conduct

process in terms of practices and use of terminologies, the two processes are not considered

mutually exclusive. For example, a student may be arrested for criminal charges and also have

charges brought against them for violating the student code of conduct. A palpable case would

be when a student gets arrested for physical abuse while a student conduct administrator

sanctions the same student with suspension or expulsion from the university premises.

Furthermore, an act not criminally prosecuted may still violate university policies, therefore

subject to a conduct hearing. For example, a student caught with less than 10 grams of cannabis

may just receive a citation but will still go through a conduct hearing because the act is a

university policy violation.

During a the conduct process, student conduct administrators agree to adhere to the belief

that minimal procedural constraints should be placed upon the conduct process. According to

the procedures of student conduct, administrators must provide accused students a guarantee of

due process through a fair and impartial conduct process. Accused students must receive a

written notice of the alleged charges, must have sufficient time to examine the evidence, must

have the opportunity to provide their perspective on the events described in the incident report

and must have the opportunity for a route of appeal. While criminal courts make a determination

of guilt or innocence on the basis of the presence or absence of physical evidence or witness
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testimony, student conduct reaches a determination of responsibility based on whether the

accused was more likely than not to commit the alleged act. Therefore, circumstantial

information can be sufficient in some cases for student conduct to determine that an act was

more likely than not to have occurred.

The criminal justice system and the student conduct process use different terms in their

practices and below is the list of the common terminologies that distinguish both processes.

Impact of Student Accountability on College Success

Karp and Sacks (2014) mention that active accountability is important for developing

independent moral judgement. This occurs through less reliance on blind obedience and

compliance and a change toward sense of personal responsibility. This act of taking personal

responsibility and developing independent moral judgement can lead students to become better

critical thinkers. Furthermore, developing successful critical thinking skills can lead to greater

academic success (Williams & Worth, 2001). This lense allows us to infer how student conduct

can have an impact on students college success. When students are expected to follow the

student code of conduct and fail to do so, the office of student conduct holds said students

accountable for their actions in hopes of having students learn from their mistakes and become

more responsible and successful individuals.

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NIU Office of Student Conduct

The Northern Illinois University Office of Student Conduct holds an important and

impactful role on campus. The office operates in unison with the Student Code of Conduct as

they monitor violations of the code in order to ensure the safety and well-being of both the

students and the greater community. With three full time professionals, an office manager, four

graduate assistants, and two interns; they work to ensure the code of conduct is being upheld and

to hold students accountable for their actions. The Office of Student Conduct can receive reports

with alleged conduct violations from a variety of sources such as; university housing, faculty,

NIU police, DeKalb Police, and so on. When the office receives an incident report and decides if

there is a violation of the code of conduct they move forward with a preliminary conference.

During a preliminary conference the Student Conduct Administrator decides both if there was a

violation of the student conduct code and, if there was, what the sanctions for said violation

should be. At the conclusion of a preliminary conference if the student is found responsible for

violating the student code of conduct they can either agree or disagree with the finding. If the

student is found responsible and they accept responsibility, sanctions will then be applied for

them to complete. If a student is found responsible and they do not accept responsibility the case

then moves forward to a formal hearing.

Hearing Officers

Hearing Officers within the NIU Office of Student Conduct serve the purpose of

adjudicating cases which have already gone through a preliminary conference but reached a

finding of responsible where the accused student did not agree with. During the hearing the case

is presented in front of the hearing officer, the university presenter, and the accused student(s)

along with any witnesses. After the case is presented it is up to the hearing officer to decide if
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they agree with the finding of responsible and then decides if they agree with the applied

sanctions or would set forth lesser or increased sanctions based off the finding of responsible.

As sanctions can vary from monetary fines to probation to suspension, it is pertinent that the

hearing officers are properly trained to hear cases and make decisions that can prove to be quite

impactful on a student's life.

Employee Training

There are several characteristics of effective employee training programs. It is highly

recommended that the organization first conducts a needs assessment. Without a needs

assessment organizations risk overdoing training, not conducting enough training, or conducting

training on topics that do not need employees to be trained on. To successfully conduct a needs

analysis, one should identify specific problem areas that could benefit from further training, elicit

support from upper management, measure the effectiveness of a training program, and determine

the costs and benefits of conducting the training.A needs assessment can help identify both the

strengths and weaknesses of a given system. For the Student Conduct Office, an emphasis will

be placed on how effectively the office meets their goals from the training and how they can

identify any gaps in skills between the Administrative Hearing Officer and those that are

required to be effective in the role. This is done by obtaining and examining the learning

outcomes of the training and through evaluations of the performance of the Administrative

Hearing Officers. Doing this would assist in assessing if there is a need to make changes to the

training program (Brown, 2002).

Once a needs assessment has been conducted to identify any gaps or deficiencies in the

training program, transfer of training and training utility should be assessed. Transfer of training

describes the process of applying material trained about on the job. One primary outcome of any
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training program is to provide knowledge or introduce a skill that the employee can use to do

their job better. Without this transfer of training, there would be little use to conduct the training

program (Burke & Hutchins, 2007). Saks and Belcourt (2006) mentioned that even though

transfer of training is the overall goal of any training program, it has been documented by several

organizations that only about a third of what included in a typical employee training program is

actually applied on the job a year after the training was conducted. The researchers noted that

62% of what is learned during training is applied on the job immediately, 44% of what is learned

during training is still applied on the job after six months, and 34% of what is learned during

training is still applied on the job after a year. Transfer of training is more likely to be successful

with adding pre-training and post-training activities. Pre-training activities can include

supervisor support and employee input. Supervisor support is effective when the supervisor sits

down with the employee and states the importance of the training, establishes goals for the

training, and encourages the employee’s participation. Employee input allows the employee to

state what their goals are for the training and possible skills that they feel like they are deficient

in or skills that could use some input. Establishing goals and integrating employee input helps

to motives the employee to take the training seriously. Post-training activities can be equally, if

not more, important. These activities can include refresher training, buddy systems, and

transferring training to other employees. Overall, the main focus of post-training activities

should be to welcome newly trained ideas and to have the new ideas be integrated by supervisor

support (Saks & Belcourt, 2006). This information applied to the Administrative Hearing

Officer Training can help identify ways to make the training more effective as well as allow the

office to identify what can be done in terms of on going training to ensure that hearing officers

are both supported and successful.

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In addition to transfer of training, training utility can also help facilitate training

effectiveness. Training utility refers to the perception from the trainee that what they are

learning during the training or activities conducted during the training session are going to

benefit their effectiveness as an employee. Van Eerde, Simon Tang, and Talbot (2008) found that

training utility mediates the relationship between training needs assessment and organizational

effectiveness. This suggests that activities and material taught to the employee needs to be

perceived as personally relevant to the employee. If not, even if the training is meeting the

organization’s goals, it will likely not be effective. For the Administrative Hearing Officer

training, it is important to ensure that all materials and activities are personally relevant to an

Administrative Hearing Officer.

Methods and Results

Training Observation

The Student Conduct Office at Northern Illinois University provides training each year

for their Administrative Hearing Officers. Offering the training on two separate occasions in the

fall allows for the office to ensure each of their twenty-four hearing officers are adequately

trained to fulfill their role. We were able to do some observational data collection through the

approximately one-and-a-half-hour training administered by the Associate Director of the

Student Conduct Office, Dr. Brian Glick. Dr. Glick gave each hearing officer a copy of the

Northern Illinois University code of conduct to reference and utilized a PowerPoint throughout

training. Throughout our time observing we were able to collect information on the content

presented to the Administrative Hearing Officers and gain a deeper understanding of the role

they play in the conduct process, which will allow the strengths and weaknesses of the training

process to be more easily identified.

Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 12

Dr. Glick began the training by doing a brief overview of the conduct process which

could be beneficial for those who are unfamiliar with the conduct process or are new to the

Hearing Officer role. Dr. Glick moved on to explain things that have changed from last year to

this year which would be beneficial for returning Hearing Officers who were in the role

previously. An overview of those involved in hearings and what their responsibilities are during

hearings was then provided to give trainees some context and allow them to understand the role

of an Administrative Hearing Officer. Dr. Glick did a walk-through of their conduct tracking

software, Maxient, which was important for Hearing Officers to understand as it is required in

their role.

Dr. Glick encouraged questions as he moved through the content in order to ensure that

the training officers were clear on the information and got clarity when need be. A few of the

trainees asked if it was possible for them to observe a hearing before volunteering to act as a

hearing officer which leads me to believe that a mock hearing during the training might be

beneficial. After observing this training and reflecting on the information provided we felt that it

may be beneficial in the future to do separate trainings one for returning Hearing Officers and

one for those who are new. This way those who are new to the role get a more in-depth training

and those who are returning get a refresher along with any updates that are pertinent for them in

the role.

Interviews

Out of the twenty-four Administrative Hearing Officers in the Student Conduct Office

there are far more returning Hearing Officers than new ones, which means while some have seen

a number of cases others have seen few. As each of these Hearing Officers will have a different

insight on the role based off their experience thus far getting an individual view through
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interview was a form of data collection that would give us a series of varied responses. To find

correlations among interviews, we decided to conduct four interviews. Two of these interviews

were for returnee Administrative Hearing Officers and two new Administrative Hearing Officers.

Our interview contains eight questions that ask about the pros and cons of Administrative

Hearing Officer training.

The first Administrative Hearing Officer interviewed was new to their role this semester.

This individual felt overall the training was extremely beneficial as they had not known much

about the conduct process nor the Student Conduct Office before beginning the semester. They

felt that the training set them up for success in their role as a Hearing Officer and thought that the

PowerPoint, Code of Conduct handout, and walk-through of Maxient was what was most helpful

throughout the training. Although this individual has not acted as Hearing Officer thus far this

semester, they have observed in multiple hearings in order to get a deeper understanding. This

individual felt something that would have been useful was a ‘mock hearing’ or being required to

observe in a hearing before acting as a Hearing Officer, which was a common thread found from

participants throughout our data collection.

The next interview was also with a new Administrative Hearing Officer. The participant

felt that Administrative Hearing Officer training was beneficial, though he had had a lot of

contact with the Student Conduct Office prior to becoming an Administrative Hearing Officer

since they worked in housing. Also mentioned in the survey, this participant felt that some real

time exposure to the hearing process would be beneficial. They stated “Having people observe

operating as a hearing officer. To witness the process in real time.” The participant did not feel

that there were any gaps in the training and did not offer any other suggestions.
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The next interview was with a returning Administrative Hearing Officer. This individual

felt that the training was useful. Even with attempting to use prying questions, this participant

did not have any suggestions for changing training in the future. The participant also felt that the

training as is helped them to be well prepared for the role of Administrative Hearing Officer.

The final interview was also with a returning Administrative Hearing Officer. They also

felt that training was beneficial. This individual had a lot of previous experience with the hearing

process from their position in housing prior to taking the Administrative Hearing Officer

Training. This participant did with that they had more training in Maxient. Since Maxient

training was added recently, it is possible that this identified gap had already been remedied.

They also would have liked to have had further training on completing the hearing forms. The

participant also would have liked for there to be a simulation or more hands on training prior to

doing their first hearing.

Survey

On October 26th we launched a survey in Qualtrics to aid us in assessing the effectiveness of

Administrative Hearing Officer training. We had 12 hearing officers participate in the survey.

Nine were Administrative Staff (75%), 2 were graduate students (16.7%), and 1 was a

Faculty/Instructor (8.3%). The majority of participants had taken the training within the last 3

months (75%). There was a range of how many hearings the participants had been part of, with 1

participant being part of 0 hearings (8.3%), 5 participants being part of 1-3 hearings (41.70%), 1

participant being part of 4-6 hearings (8.3%), and 5 participants being part of 13 or more

hearings (41.70%).

The survey contained six questions regarding attitudes about the training on a 6 point

scale (“Strongly disagree” to “Strongly agree”). These items were followed by three open ended
Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 15

questions asking “What did you enjoy about the training?”, “Do you feel that there were any

gaps in the training?”, and “Additional comments/suggestions?”. These were followed by

demographic and Administrative Hearing Officer experience questions. Finally, at the request of

the Student Conduct Office, we added a request for refresher training and a space to provide

contract information for the Student Conduct Office to be able to reach out to them. We had one

participant provide a topic for refresher training, however they did not provide their contact

information.

For the first attitude about training question, “I felt that the trainer related to me”, the

participants indicated that the trainer did relate to them (M = 4.92) with the majority of

participants selecting “Agree”. This question was requested by the Student Conduct Office and it

provides good feedback to the trainer. The next question, ”I felt that the training was a good use

of my time”, participants generally felt that it was a good use of their time (M = 4.42) with the

majority of participants selecting “Agree” and “Somewhat agree”. Following that we asked “I

felt that the training was useful”, which participants did feel that the training was useful (M =

4.50) with the majority of participants selecting “Agree”. The next question “I feel that after the

training I can fulfill my role as a hearing officer” was incorrectly left with a 5 point scale. This

scale also went from “Strongly disagree” to “Strongly agree”, but did not use the force choice

method by having a neutral category. Participants did feel that the training helped them to be

able to fulfill their role as a hearing officer (M = 3.83) with the majority of participants selecting

“Agree”. Following that question, we asked ”I felt that the training adequately prepared me to

complete the Case Resolution Form after a hearing in Maxient”. Results for this question

produced mixed responses (M = 3.92) with 8 participants indicating that it had and 4 participants

indicating that it had not. The hearing officer training was revised recently to include Maxient
Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 16

training, and these 4 participants may have taken a previous training. Next we asked “I would

recommend the position of Administrative Hearing Officer to my colleagues”. All by one

participant indicated that they would recommend the training to a colleague (M = 5.50) with only

one participant indicating “Somewhat disagree”.

Participants indicated that they enjoyed many aspects of the training. These include “The

ability to share knowledge and support colleagues”, “Discussing real-life scenarios of what

happened during an officer hearing and how the situation was handled”, and “I enjoyed walking

through the whole process and the letters/form involved”. A few gaps were listed and include “It

would be most useful to go through a mock hearing so that everyone feels prepared rather than

just talking about it.”, ”A print out of a completed Maxient letter and reasoning would be useful

for reference.”, and “More in-depth training on Maxient”. Five participants (41.70%) felt that

they would benefit from additional training while 7 (58.3%) did not. Only two participants

(16.7%) felt that they would benefit from refresher training. One stated they wanted training on

“How to complete the Case Resolution Form on Maxient.”. The other participant who indicated

that they wanted refresher training did not list a topic. Neither of these two participants provided

contact information to be passed on to the Office of Student Conduct. Besides for the error in

scaling for one item, we think that we received some substantial results to use for our overall

assessment.

Document Analysis

The two documents that were provided to the assessment team were the Administrative

Hearing Officer Training PowerPoint presentation and the student rubric. Starting with the

Administrative Hearing Officer Training PowerPoint, there are forty-two slides in total. These

slides cover the themes of the hearing process, policies relating to hearings, Administrative
Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 17

Hearing Officer expectations, tools to help the Administrative Hearing Officer make decisions,

the Maxient (online database used by the Student Conduct Office) system, and self-care. The

majority of the slides focused on tools to help the Administrative Hearing Officer make

decisions. There is only one slide on the Maxient system. This could be relevant as it was an

addition to the training program this year. Also, as mentioned in another memo, providing

supplemental training on the Maxient system was a recommendation that came out of the

Qualtrics survey results.

I also examined a student rubric. This rubric needs to be filled out by the student after the

hearing process. The rubric contains four dimensions (Understanding Impact of Behavior,

Connecting to Personal Values, Decision Making, and Effect on Community) using a five point

scale (“Beginning” to “Advanced”). The rubric also lists student learning outcomes for the

hearing process. The purpose of this rubric is to be a tool for students to reflect on the process in

hopes of making them more accountable for their actions in the future. Problems that were

identified by the Student Conduct Office were that students may not be honest, students may not

want to complete the rubric, and it can only be used if the student is found to be responsible for

what they were accused of. The scale could also use a revision. Currently the second and fourth

scaling option just says “Transition” and lacks descriptions in the rubric. One option to collect

continuous assessment data is to develop a rubric for the Administrative Hearing Officer to fill

out after the hearing. This would help the Student Conduct Office to continuously gauge the

preparedness of the Administrative Hearing Officers.

Recommendations

At the conclusion of our assessment of Administrative Hearing Officer training through

surveying, interviewing, and observing several areas of improvement were identified. The
Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 18

following table outlines the strengths and weaknesses of the hearing officer training identified

through each of data collection methods.

Surveying Interviews Observational Data Analysis

Strengths Discussion Training was Content within Content within

Walk-through of useful Powerpoint Powerpoint
Maxient Walk-through of Supplemental
Maxient Materials
Walk-through of
Maxient
Questions

Weaknesses Absence of Felt observation Absence of Adjustment

mock hearing was needed mock hearing needed for
More Further training continued
supplemental on CRF needed assessment
materials wanted Repetitive
Repetitive

The following areas of improvement will serve as context behind recommendations for the

Student Conduct Office to implement in future trainings.

Training Specific

The incorporation of a mock hearing into training or a requirement to observe a

hearing. The data collected would lead us to also recommend that the Office of Student Conduct

incorporate some type of observational training piece into the Administrative Hearing Officer

training. Through our data collected, many respondents felt that being about to observe a

hearing rather than talking about it in hypotheticals would allow them to feel more readily

prepared to act as a hearing officer. It is because of this feedback that we would recommend that

the office take steps to ensure that participants get to witness a run-through of a hearing to better

understand how they a operate. The office can do this one of two ways by either incorporating a
Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 19

mock hearing into the training or require that new hearing officers act as an observer in a hearing

before signing up to hear a case. By incorporating a mock hearing into training the office

administrators have a little more control over what type of case is heard and ensure all steps are

being taken in the matter they would like them to be which may help in the long run in ensuring

their expectations are clear. If the office would rather focus on the content throughout training

and just require hearing officers observe a case on their own time before signing up to hear a

case that is another option. This option would still allow of hearing officers to witness a run-

through of the case and keep training time limited but the office administrators would have less

control over the type of case heard and the ways in which the hearing is handled as that would be

up to whichever hearing officer hears the case. Either of these options will serve as our

recommendation to incorporate something more than hypotheticals into training and allow

participants to gain a better understanding of how they work.

Separation of new and returning Administrative Hearing Officers in trainings.

Through our data collection process upon analyzing the feedback from respondents we found

that it would potentially be beneficial to adjust the way in which training is conducted. As the

office already provides training on two separate occasions in the fall, based off the feedback we

received it would be recommended that instead of allowing participants to go to whichever

training, they would attend either a training dedicated to new hearing officers or a training

dedicated to returning hearing officers. This approach ensures that new Administrative Hearing

Officers are getting the in-depth training required for them to fulfil their role and get all their

questions answered. This also ensures that the returning Administrative Hearing Officers just get
Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 20

a refresher training which alerts them to any changes from the previous year and does not feel

repetitive.

Supplemental Documents

The distribution of a Maxient cheat sheet for Administrative Hearing Officers to utilize

in the future. This year, Maxient is a required tool that hearing officers must utilize when

hearing cases in order to log their findings. While for some Maxient may be more

straightforward, the completion of the case resolution form (CRF) can be somewhat confusing

especially for new hearing officers. When reviewing the feedback many respondents mentioned

that the walk-through of Maxient was helpful as well as suggested a cheat sheet to utilize in the

future. We used this feedback and created a Maxient cheat sheet which we recommend the

office distributes to hearing officers in the future. This cheat sheet is a step-by-step explanation

on how to complete the CRF and forward it on to the necessary parties which is an essential job

function of the hearing officer position. We believe that alongside the walk-through of Maxient

in trainings, supplying hearing officers with this cheat sheet would allow all parties to have the

necessary tools to understand and navigate Maxient.

Distribution of a rubric for Hearing Officers to ensure continued assessment and

success. As the client specifically requested and stressed the importance of continued assessment

for hearing officers and hearing officer training, we would recommend that the rubric in which

we analyzed be adjusted slightly in order to be applicable to hearing officers. This rubric would

be given to each hearing officer when they sign up to hear a case and at the conclusion of them

hearing the case they would complete it and give it back to the office administrators. This rubric

would gauge the hearing officers comfortability with the process, clarity on procedure, and

identify and gaps in training that need to be addressed. This way the office is getting consistent
Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 21

feedback from their Administrative Hearing Officers and can check in with individuals if need be

or do a mid-year training or refresher if there is anything that needs to be addressed.

Conclusion

There are many people and systems in place within Northern Illinois University that work

to educate students as well as prepare them for life beyond college. Between the Office of

Student Conduct, Student Conduct Administrators, Hearing Officers and all individuals in

between, the university is committed to ensuring that students are following the code of conduct

and are held accountable for their actions. Northern Illinois University is dedicated to providing

a safe learning environment for the student populations enrolled and by enforcing the code of

conduct on campus NIU is working to maintain their promise of a safe learning environment for

all. This purpose of this project is to assess the strengths and weaknesses of the Administrative

Hearing Officer training run by the Office of Student Conduct. At the completion of this

assessment the Office of Student will understand what steps if any need to be taken to ensure

their hearing officers are adequately trained and able to continue to maintain a safe campus.

References

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program. Public Personnel Management, 31(4), 569-578.

Burke, L. A., & Hutchins, H. M. (2007). Training transfer: An integrative literature review.

Human Resource Development Deview, 6(3), 263-296.

Karp, D. R., & Sacks, C. (2014). Student conduct, restorative justice, and student development:
Running head: TRAINING ASSESSMENT 22

Findings from the STARR project: A student accountability and restorative research

project. Contemporary Justice Review, 17(2), 154-172.

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