Professor Daphney Wadley is an Assistant Professor and Program Director of the B.A. in Child Development (Accelerated Undergraduate Degree). Wadley has been teaching at PLNU since 2016, and has worked in the field of family and child development for 15 years. She has directed family and children programming in community nonprofit organizations like City Tree Christian School in downtown San Diego.
Listen to her Lomacast: A Point Loma Nazarene University Podcast below:
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Learn more about Professor Wadley
Episode Transcript
Hello and welcome to Lomacast. A Point Loma Nazarene University podcast. My name is Jim Daichendt. I am the provost and chief academic officer here at Point Loma. And in what follows is an interview with Professor Daphney Wadley. She is our program director in the Child Development Program, where we have an accelerated undergraduate program that offers a bachelor's of arts. She's an assistant professor, and in this interview, we talk about what is child development, her own journey and higher education, a little bit about what an accelerated undergraduate degree is and how how that differs from the traditional undergraduate degree here at the university. And of course, we dig into a bit of her courses and what she teaches. So sit back, relax, and enjoy, and thanks for listening. Professor Daphney Wadley, welcome to Lomacast.
Thank you, Dr. Daichendt. It is wonderful to be here.
We don't have to be that formal.
No, okay.
Thank you.
I'll go by Daphne.
Okay, Daphne, thank you so much for agreeing to do this podcast. You have been at the university for a while now. I think it's been eight years?
I'm in my eighth year right now.
That's unbelievable.
I know.
It goes really fast.
It does go quite fast.
And so you are a director.
I am.
And you've been in that role for all of your eight years.
All of my eight years.
Can you fill listeners in in terms of what your role is here?
Absolutely. So I am the director of Child Development, our Bachelor of Arts and Child Development for our accelerated undergraduate program.
So accelerated undergraduate program, how is that different from the traditional undergraduate programs we have here at the university?
Yes. So there are a few differences. Probably the major difference is our students aren't residential. They don't come to the Point Loma Nazarene University residential campus. They are attending classes either hybrid, which means they go to class one night a week in their community. So our child development program is at four different community colleges, well, three community colleges and one class that we hold is at our Mission Valley Regional Center. And then we also have a separate program that's completely online and asynchronous.
That is a lot of different offerings.
Yes.
And it sounds rather confusing, but it's actually really convenient, isn't it? For students?
It really is. It's a great way for our students to get an education.
Yeah, I just read an article about Los Angeles community colleges, and it was a very low percentage of students that finish their community college AA associate's degree actually go on to complete a bachelor's degree. So this program that where we meet students at the community college is a really big deal because they get a Point Loma Nazarene University bachelor's degree.
Absolutely. After they've completed their coursework at the community college.
It's pretty incredible.
It is incredible. In fact, just this week, I had one of our grads send me a picture of her diploma. She has just finished in May, walked across the stage in the Greek amphitheater, was really excited when she got her diploma, sent it and took a picture and let me know, hey, I am a graduate.
Okay. That's awesome.
It was really cool.
Yeah, that's pretty phenomenal because it's meeting a need. It's more affordable that way as well. So that's one thing. So those degree completion students are finishing an associates. The other side that you mentioned is completely online.
Yes, it is.
Okay, so we have, so if a student jus , for whatever reason, you said accelerated undergrad, which is a really important term there. So I could actually ask you to, why is it called accelerated? So that's the first part of my question. Then the second part is the sort of the online version of the students are all over the place in terms of how they're finishing. Not everyone can get to a campus like Point Loma or a community college.
Right.
Where they're taking it face to face. And so, yeah, walk us through why it's accelerated. Why is it, what's with that term?
Sure. So our students do most of their classes in eight-week formats. So we're our typical semester is about 16 weeks. Our classes are taken in eight weeks. This accelerates the process for them. Most of our students are working adults, they have families, they have responsibilities that would prohibit them from to a campus to take classes, to be here for 16 weeks for one class. So this allows us to provide fewer classes in a shorter format so that they can get all of the classes they need in about a 15- month time frame, about four semesters. So it would typically, to get that number of units, would take a couple of years.
Okay. I appreciate that. Thank you. And this is not meant to be an advertisement for the program, but it kind of is. But it's helpful for folks to understand who are listening because we do offer a lot of different types of degrees and we meet the needs to students in a variety of circumstances. And this is one of those developments over the last decade that's been really important for the university and a whole new audience that are alums of Point Loma that have experienced education in a much different format and have changed communities and lives and families and schools institutions. It's pretty, the stories are incredible. That come out of the program. So, okay, one more contextual question that are helpful. You're a professor of child development, a child development degree. What is child development??
Oh, it's only the best discipline in the world.
That's a great answer.
Our program covers child and adolescent development. So we are looking at development from birth all the way through adolescence. So we're really looking at all of the domains of development, physical, cognitive, social, emotional, how do we grow? How are we affected by our environment? What are our individual needs as well as our group and family and community needs? And how do we provide the best possible opportunities for children to thrive in life? We all start there. We all start as babies and children and going through that adolescent phase. And so really looking at all of the things that affect development and how we can prepare families, prepare teachers, prepare individuals who are working with them to give them the best possible opportunities.
So I have so many questions to follow up with that and obviously that's why it's an entire degree.
Right.
So we're not going to solve it here. But when students get a degree in child development, where do they typically work at?
Well, that's a great question because I don't know that there is a one typical answer. One of the things I do in our information events, in fact, I was just at Southwestern College today and was able to ask this question. And it's something that we ask here at Point Loma Nazarene is who are you called to be? And that's one of the first things that we look at and that we ask around the degree of child development because our students can do so many different things. So we have our students who are just passionate about education, about early childhood education, about working in the school system. And so we have many students that go on to be teachers or doing something in the educational field, including school counseling. We also have many that are really passionate about working in the community and developing and supporting programs that support children and families, so many go into social work and nonprofit work. We also have a lot who are interested more in the sciences side of things going into supporting families and children through occupational therapy and speech therapy and even child life in the hospitals where they're supporting children with medical fragilities who may not understand what's happening in their lives as they're going through major medical trials.
That is super helpful because the stereotypical, maybe response one has in their head is that someone always goes into teaching.
Right.
Which would be common, but that is why it's its own field. And there's all sorts of nonprofit and community work. And like you said, so many other fields that it may dovetailed in into from everything from clinical psychology, social work. There's many things that one could build upon in their education, how this would act as a foundation going on.
It really is.
That's fantastic .
Okay.
So let's dig into a little bit of your past then too.
Okay, great.
In a good way.
Sure.
It's not a reveal show.
So you are a first generation college student. Is that right?
Yes.
Can you tell us a little bit about that process. In going through that in your experiences? Because that's a really big thing here at the university with first generation students coming here and creating a context in which they feel welcome, but also where they feel comfortable overall.
Yeah. So I grew up in small town Louisiana, southern Louisiana, and moved out here with my mom when I was 15 years old and went to Point Loma High School. And that was a tremendous culture shock to me. I didn't come from a family or even a community where education was really talked about all that much. It wasn't something that I grew up thinking, I'm going to college and I'm college bound. And it really wasn't until I was in high school that I started thinking about college and what I wanted to do and realizing that, okay, you know, I'm in Southern California, this is talked about the expectation in school was that I would go to college. And so when it came time to apply, having moved so far already, I knew I didn't want something big. And I was here in this Point Loma community and happened to know some families who were affiliated and associated with the university. And I thought, that's where I'll go. It's really small. I won't have to suffer another culture shock. So I did. I came to Point Loma Nazarene. it was Point Loma Nazarene College, PLNC at the time and just loved it. It was a place where I felt welcome. It was it was community, it was family. So as a first gen student, without any clue or support or how to navigate getting into college or financial aid or any of those things. I felt like I had a community of people come around me to support me in doing that. So it was a good experience.
That is fantastic. And there probably weren't the same types of support that we have today.
The financial aid office was a little scary then.
Was it really?
Yeah.
It was in a dark building.
It's strange, isn't it?
I do remember financial aid here now. Like, I'm not so scared to walk in that building.
We have better lighting overall.
Better lighting.
Maybe that's what it is. No, that may be a common story in general. Like you think about undergraduate days because when I went to school, we did, well, obviously we didn't have the internet the same way. We weren't able to look up resources the same way. Most likely you looked it in some guidebook.
Right.
Followed a map across campus and it felt like Lord of the Rings that you're going across campus a mile.
Right. Oh, yes. There were no shuttles either here, too. We had to walk.
You, the knock on a door. Find the right placard with your name where you have to go hoping you're in the right place and talk to an adult that you probably aren't as comfortable talking to.
No, it was a little scary.
Yeah. It was intimidating for sure.
But those are the things, right? Those are the realistic hurdles as a first gen student you have to engage with because it's not as though you call a parent or aunt or uncle that says, hey, you know, you did this not so long ago. Is this what I'm supposed to do? You're on your own.
You really are.
Yeah.
And I have a lot of compassion for our students that are first gen students because it can be daunting. And every school is different. So especially for those that are coming from community college and having a very specific experience in the community college and now they're coming to Point Loma. How can we make sure that they feel like they belong here? And that's one of the things that I find super important about what we get to do is helping them to feel like they belong, even if they're new to the campus, the university, the community.
Do you have quite a few first gen students?
I would say almost the majority of our students are first gen. We have a lot of first gen students.
That's got to be pretty incredible for you.
Oh, I love it. I think, and their stories are amazing because we also have a lot of adults who took a break from maybe working towards their AA or doing a few college classes and are coming back after they've been in the field for a little while or have had their children and are working. So their stories are incredible and their resilience, their determination, their motivation, it's really special. It motivates me. It inspires me all the time.
I can see it as you're talking. I mean, how often do you share your own story with students?
Well, I actually got to, at Southwestern today, even share a little bit about being a first gen student and knowing what they're going through. And got a lot of those head nods and smiles and, you know, you get that sense of, yep, that's where I'm at. And, um, and also it's, you know, one of the things I love about Point Loma is that sense of community and connection. And even though we only get to be in person with students one day a week, if we're hybrid or sometimes not at all, if we're online, fully online, we still have this opportunity to just really connect and build connection. And that's one of the things I hear from our students over and over again is I felt like I was seen. I felt like I was heard. We were building relationships.And sometimes, you know, this is going in a different direction, but I've had experiences now where the first time I saw a student face to face and not behind a Zoom screen was here at graduation. And the joy on their faces and the excitement and the connection you still feel, even though you weren't face to face with them all week long is pretty incredible. That's because it was a real connection.
It really was.
Yeah, absolutely. It's like, it's not as though taking courses online is a passive thing, right?
No.
I mean, you do a lot to ensure that there's a give and take and there's quite a bit of active learning. Through the process.
Yeah.
And there's all sorts of pedagogy to do that.
Yes, there is.
Yeah. So, and so I know that in many ways, teaching online can be much more demanding for the professor and the student.
It really can.
It can. You have to be very intentional. You have to really think through how you want to build your class and how you want to build a community and an environment to engage with them. We just did a training with Dr. Rochelle Wong from the School of Education with our faculty last night. And she did this wonderful research project on radical hospitality in the online environment. And so our faculty got together and we got to hear her presentation and we got to share our own practices . And I love that idea from the School of Education of radical hospitality, because I think that encapsulates who we are at Point Loma. And bringing that into the online space, while it has its challenges, it's definitely doable and we definitely get to make real connections with our students.
Yeah, did you come up with a way to change something already from a presentation like that?
Yeah, you know what? We all shared takeaways at the end and we got to share a lot of things we were already doing.
Okay.
And that was exciting. But some of the takeaways were really exciting with video feedback in when you're grading. So not just simply leaving comments, but video feedback. Another was, you know, video welcoming announcements. And the more we can be seen and humanized was really important in that space. Also just different casual touch points throughout. You know, we talked about this idea. We feel like we have to be so professional on video. And sometimes we get stuck in that space and we lose our personality.And so I loved this idea of one take, right? When you're doing a discussion board, when you're interacting on video, don't keep rerecording. Just one take. If you mess up, who cares? You do when you talk face to face.
That's right.
So, it sort of brought down that, that level of intimidation with using video and making it more of a connecting point.
Yeah, those are great takeaways. And I can echo one of them. A student had received video feedback on an essay and wanted to share it with me and replayed it twice for me to hear the words that the professor had given to them. And in that moment, for me, I'm like, wow, this is really important. And it's not, it's so important. It's nice to be able to hear it several times so it sinks in. Sometimes we're our own worst critics and we don't hear the great job that we're doing in a class or just in general in life. It'd be nice if when someone gives you a compliment that you could just hold on to that a little bit longer rather than have your memory fade. But the video comments that that are available in our campus accounts and what we do, how we teach or how we deliver our courses, that's really powerful. So I'm glad you said that because I have experienced that from students.
Well, and what a difference it makes. We know if we send text messages or emails, we lose all of the tone and the expression and the connection. When you do video, we can really talk and use our tone. I remember having an experience when I very first started teaching. This was one of my very first classes. It was a hybrid class where we were in face to face, and then we were also online. And I would go to class and we'd have these really engaging discussions and we'd have a lot of fun and and I remember I walked in about the second or third class and this student who just is was a bold personality and always spoke her mind. She shouts out, Professor, you're really mean online. And I said, oh, tell me more about that. I want to know why you think I'm mean online. And she's like, well, you're just, you know, here, we're interacting with you. We're having a conversation with you online. It just seems so harsh. And I kept hearing that word harsh with my grading. And what I realized was there was no personality. It was just very objective. It was just like text and video and using more conversational and personalized language helps to break that down. So I no longer get idea evals, say that I'm harsh.
Well, that's good. I'm glad to hear that.
And that is funny, though, too, because it's we've seen it in comedy shows where two people are exchanging texts and there's no context with it and someone can assume the worst.
Oh, 100%.
And how you can misread something. So the same is true, right? With an assignment, you could be very objective and you're trying to give direct feedback that is done in a caring and loving way, but you're not using all the contextual language in order to communicate that, what we would do in face to face. Right? So it does make sense. And not only that, we're talking about a student professor relationship.
Absolutely.
Which there is an interesting power dynamic there too, as the one assigning the grade or the feedback. And it could be read into even more, right? And sometimes a negative way, even if it's not even construed in such a way.
I was so glad she said that and said it out loud so that we could, I could learn more because it was a powerful learning experience. And thank goodness she felt comfortable to do it.
Oh, absolutely.
I was so happy about that.
Yeah.
And that goes back to the first generation student, knowing that you're a professor is a first generation student as well. It's like, oh my gosh, you mean I could be you someday? Like that's a possibility for me to be in such a role as a professor. So that's awesome that you're able to model that.
And while I tell my students, some of them do have goals to go into higher education as they pursue their careers. And I always say, come after my job. You're coming after my job. I see you, but do it.
And that's what we should do encourage students to be able to do that. That's awesome. So, okay. So other, you know, thinking about after you've graduated, you didn't go into the field for like 15 years, right? And so talk us through like what you did outside of higher education.
Yeah, I had the most fun in my career before coming into higher ed, which I also love. I right out of my undergrad degree was hired on as an outreach director for a nonprofit organization building community services, specifically community services for children and families and getting to do research in a small community and finding out what were the needs and finding the funding and then the people to run different programs was really exciting. So at that time, we started an afterschool homework club. We had already, when I went into the organization, had a counseling center, but we ended up starting art programs , and we actually had one of the first, or the first, Internet Cafe, if you remember those.
I do remember those.
When we didn't have Wi-Fi everywhere, you had to have the big computers with internet access. So we had an internet cafe and we had helped with job searches and resume buildings. So lots of different things. It was really exciting to serve the whole family, the children and the whole family. From there, I went into working directly for a church, developing children and family ministry programs, which was another one of those exciting opportunities to grow a program from just a few children to, by the time I left that, there were over 100 children and families involved. And did the programming that you would expect. Vacation Bible school and play dates and parenting classes and all of the things that support families. And then from there, took another leap into the early childhood education area and went into a leadership role as a school director, a preschool director, and helped them start an infant program. So when I went, they had a program that was for ages two to five. And at the time we were seeing the need for families who needed infant and toddler care. So I had to open that and be there. And while I was there is when I went back to school and did a degree completion program style or hybrid style degree, and then came in a higher ed after that.
That's great.
And so you experience what it's like to be in a degree completion or an accelerated style of degree. And that was early on in that the manifestation of those degrees. And they continue to change, right? In terms of how the student body and the interest which it's very malleable, it is in the higher space. So you experience that and then now have led one for quite a bit. That's quite a journey.
It's been a great journey.
Yeah.
That's awesome. So, okay. So we'll provide a link to your profile on the Point Loma website and it'll talk about the degree that you are director of. But it also lists the various classes that you teach. And there's a range and we could go into human growth and development and things of that sort. But you do teach a course related to parent education. And there's probably some parents listening right now. And so I'm curious, like, what is involved in parent education?
Well, I'm excited to talk to you about this class in particular because I think this class represents something that we as a department here at Point Loma do very well, and that is we listen to our alumni. This class grew from an alumni survey where we surveyed our students who had gone out into the field and we said, what was missing for you? What are the needs that you have now that you're in the field that maybe we didn't prepare you as well for? And they all said, working with diverse parent structures, right? So parents, single parents, kinship families. So grandparents raising children, military families where one of the parents is on deployment, incarcerated parents, all of these different family structures. And so what we what we did, and I wish I could take some credit for it, I got to be a part of some of the development of it in the first classes of it , but it really was a team effort in our department is we developed a class that really helped our students recognize that, you know, not only do we have to meet the needs of the children that we work with, but we have to be able to understand the needs of the whole family. So the parent education course is really about understanding the needs of various types of family systems. And how do we have things in place to really connect with them well, to understand their needs and to be able to meet those needs once we're out in the field?
Fantastic. And I can see how that would be relevant, whether you're working in education, a nonprofit, a community service program. You think about the diversity of the American family, just the American family.
Absolutely.
In itself. And how one could navigate that. And especially someone just entering a field.
Definitely.
Right. Who doesn't have a lot of experience in that area. So that's fantastic. And I love that it developed from alumni and that we're listening to our folks that are graduating from our program. And this is something that will help the degree. So that feedback is so important. Daphne, this is awesome.
Thank you.
I'm enjoying this.
Yeah.
Thanks for making time for this, but also for the last eight years. And all the students that you have touched and influenced were very much appreciative for that, but also for the Point Loma community as well. So thank you for being an important part of it.
Well, thank you. It's been an honor. It's been a true joy to work here.
Awesome.
I will include a link so you can learn about the program as well as Professor Wadley and everything she teaches. And so thank you again. We'll see you all soon.