Category: Uncategorized

Identifying At-Risk Students: What Data Are You Looking At?

Renewed national and public pressure on college completion rates is fueling a continuing surge of interest in “early warning” intervention programs for college students deemed at risk of withdrawal or failing. The earlier an academically at-risk student is identified, the better the prognosis for their success in college. Early alert systems, implemented within the first 4-8 weeks of a term, can be instrumental in beginning an intervention that can help facilitate students’ success and increase retention. However, faced with frequent studies offering multitudinous data on factors influencing student attrition, it can be challenging to sort through the information available to determine what indicators deserve most attention, both to proactively identify students who may be at risk at a point prior to enrollment, and to drive early alert systems in the first weeks of a semester. This week, we interviewed Jennifer Jones, a clinical assistant professor and recently director of academic retention at the University of Alabama. Jones has developed a comprehensive and strategic approach to identifying at-risk students. Predictive Historical Data The past decade has yielded abundant studies citing factors that can contribute to the likelihood of student attrition. Cohorts often deemed at risk in the published research include the academically under-prepared, students who have taken a […]

Making the Most of Alumni Volunteers

by Jim M. Langley

It’s critical that development officers at colleges and universities identify the best opportunities for harnessing alumni volunteerism. A December 2009 study by the Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund and VolunteerMatch offers some compelling data to demonstrate the importance of volunteerism to fundraising: The average amount given by volunteers is more than 10 times that given by non-volunteers The rate of volunteering increases with education (36% of Americans with high school diplomas, 56% with four-year degrees, 61% with post-graduate degrees) 63% of Americans cite a renewed sense of the value and importance of service to their community 66% believe “true philanthropy” involves giving both time and money Early this year, we connected with Jim Langley, founder and president of Langley Innovations, and past vice president of advancement at Georgetown University, and asked for his advice on how advancement shops at colleges and universities can harness the power of alumni volunteerism. Shifting Your Approach Langley warns, “Too many organizations are being too patently obvious about getting people to volunteer as fundraisers or on a one-off pretext. An institution will invite nominal volunteerism (for example, sitting on a board), and then in a few months ask the volunteer to give. The problem with that is that it doesn’t recognize […]

Report: What Higher Ed Leaders Are Saying About Program Prioritization

The recent economic crisis has driven a surge of interest in program prioritization, as state legislators and governing boards insist that colleges set priorities for future investment and as institutional leaders find that they can no longer afford to “be all things to all people.” Facing severe financial shortfalls and external demands for accountability, many colleges and universities are having to make difficult decisions about what programs and initiatives are most worthy of investment. A PROCESS FOR UNDERTAKING PRIORITIZATION In his book Prioritizing Academic Programs and Services: Reallocating Resources to Achieve Strategic Balance (Jossey-Bass, 2nd ed; 2010), Dickeson outlines a process for pursuing prioritization efforts with direction, transparency, and rigor. Over the past 10 months, four workshops addressing program prioritization have drawn 550 higher education officials from approximately 300 institutions in the US, Canada, and Puerto Rico. At each workshop, participants were queried about the drivers behind program prioritization and the challenges faced at their campuses. Though participants varied in their level of experience with program prioritization (some were exploring the desirability of conducting a prioritization process; others were mid-process and had questions about next steps; and still others had completed the process once and were returning to it), an amalgamation […]

Piloting the iPad

A growing number of colleges and universities have launched pilot projects to test how the iPad might be used to produce a positive impact on student learning and engagement. In this article, we visit Pepperdine University to find out what lessons could be gleaned from Pepperdine’s own iPad pilot project. We interviewed Dana Hoover, assistant CIO for communications and planning for IT, and Hong Kha, project manager for pedagogy development and special projects. Here’s what we learned. Initial Findings Pepperdine University’s iPad Research Initiative is a three-term study (consisting of classroom observations, surveys, and focus groups), and Pepperdine has just completed the first third of the study, looking at how students are actually using the iPad in class when given the opportunity. Future terms will assess effectiveness on teaching and learning. The preliminary findings from the first term suggests that students have found value in using the iPad because of its: Ease of use (students noted its touch-screen and the fact that unlike a laptop, the iPad has no “boot up” time) Mobility (students noted how easily the iPad could be passed around a group of students, making for smoother collaboration and group study) The vast variety of apps available (students […]

Encouraging Students’ Financial Literacy

Beginning in 2012, the federal government will use three-year student loan default rates (which are rising quickly) to help decide which higher ed institutions qualify for federal student aid programs. While this will have the largest impact on for-profit colleges (whose students, according to a US Department of Education report, are more likely to default within three years of graduation), it will be important for all types of institutions to take steps to help their students develop financial literacy and make sound financial choices. And this is not only important because of federal requirements; numerous studies have indicated that financial difficulties are the most frequent reason why students “stop out” and do not complete a degree. At the University of North Texas, one of the institutions on the leading edge of financial literacy programming, Paul Goebel has established a Money Management Center with very few staff, relying on partnerships, staged implementation, and peer counseling. Four years later, the center is showing a remarkable success rate. We interviewed Paul Goebel and the center’s assistant director, Danielle Champagne, for advice on managing (and measuring the effectiveness of) a financial literacy program. Offer Personalized Advising First, Goebel emphasizes the importance of focusing not on simply transmitting […]

Making Your Faculty-in-Residence Program Successful

A small but growing number of public institutions are adding living-learning residence programs that include the integration of faculty into the residential facility. Recent news has highlighted faculty-in-residence programs at the University of Colorado and the University of South Carolina. What’s clear from the success of programs at USC and other institutions is that having faculty reside with or alongside students in a living-learning community can produce gains in student engagement, persistence, and academic performance, but the effort entails unique challenges. It’s critical to select the right space and the right faculty, and clarify roles in the housing/faculty partnership. We turned to Gene Luna, associate vice president for student affairs at the University of South Carolina and one of the pioneers of the living-learning community, and David Jones, assistant vice president for student affairs and executive director of housing and residential communities at the University of Alabama, for their insights on what academic leaders and housing directors need to consider from the outset to ensure success in a faculty-in-residence program. MORE ARTICLES ON CAMPUS HOUSING Do Your Living-Learning Communities Offer a Comprehensive Immersion Experience?Adding Gender-Neutral HousingThe Physical Campus: A Critical Asset, A Key OpportunityAddressing Housing Overflows Proactively Designing (or Renovating) the Space Luna […]

Helping Students Cope with Stress

The weeks preceding the holiday see quite a bit of media attention to practices student affairs professionals have adopted to help students manage the stress and study-load of exams week (for example, this piece in the Boston Globe). A number of colleges are trying “emergency stress relief” techniques such as bringing a masseuse or late-night yoga to the residence halls or offering a midnight breakfast during finals. These practices have become particularly popular over the last couple of years, given concerns over the rising mental health needs of students. The reality, however, is that for stress management programming to be effective, it needs to start with the first day of the term. We turned to Sherry Benton, director of the University of Florida’s counseling and wellness center and co-author of College Student Mental Health: Effective Services and Strategies Across Campus (NASPA, 2006), to learn how institutions can put in place more effective programs to help students cope with exam week stresses and build better coping skills throughout the term. Benton offers these four tips for making your program effective: Don’t wait until end of semester to begin reaching out to students about stress management To the extent possible, offer both […]

Adding Gender-Neutral Housing

While most media coverage and public attention to gender-neutral housing has been positive (for example, see this article in the Washington Post), it is critical to manage communications with the local media, conservative student groups, parents, and other campus constituencies with some care. A few proactive steps early in the process can help prevent or mitigate consternation among campus groups or the wrong type of media attention. Solicit Broad Input To learn more about how colleges and universities can prepare for opening gender-neutral housing, we interviewed Peter Konwerski, dean of students at the George Washington University. GWU has just walked through the process of setting up a pilot program for gender-neutral housing. From his recent experience with the process, Konwerski offers these practical takeaways for peers at other institutions: When the option is initially proposed, poll representatives of all your campus constituencies — check in not only with donors, alumni, faculty, staff, the student government, and the residence hall association, but with student groups on your campus that have religious or political affiliations; “engage students fully in the process,” Konwerski recommends Allow for several days of “testimony,” where members of your campus community can visit a review committee and offer five […]

Survey Report (Part 1): Meeting the Challenges of Integrated Planning and Budgeting

Strategic planning at a college or university is difficult work. Institutions are large, complex, and highly decentralized environments. Too often, institutions of higher education approach strategic planning reluctantly and without meaningfully seeking input and commitment from key stakeholders, which unfortunately leads to plans that are disconnected from budgets and plans that don’t get implemented. In November 2010, Academic Impressions surveyed presidents, chief financial officers, and academic leaders at a variety of public and private institutions to learn how the majority of institutions are approaching strategic planning and budgeting, and to discover what key challenges they are facing; more than 50 institutional leaders responded. Key Finding: Difficulties in Aligning Budgets with Plans Here is what we learned when we asked institutional leaders what they find most challenging. When asked about the most significant challenges faced with respect to strategic planning, respondents told us: integrating the planning and budgeting process (72%) prioritizing what to invest in and limiting the plan to a reasonable number of priorities (46%) creating transparency around the process and decisions (42%) establishing appropriate success measures (42%) Here are the most significant challenges colleges and universities face with respect to resource allocation: ensuring budgets support plans (74%) creating transparency around […]

Survey Report (Part 2): What is Broadly Participative Planning?

In the first part of our report on Academic Impressions’ November 2010 survey of presidents, chief financial officers, and academic leaders, we noted that the foremost challenge cited by institutional leaders related to strategic planning and resource allocation is integrating the planning and budgeting processes. In this second part of our report, we want to draw attention to another of the findings. Key Finding: More than 50% of Strategic Planning Efforts Are Unlikely to Succeed What has especially caught our attention at Academic Impressions is that more than 50% of colleges that responded to the survey are not pursuing a “broadly participative” process. What this indicates is that more than half of the strategic planning efforts underway are being pursued in a manner that calls into question the likelihood of implementation. A participative process in which numerous and diverse stakeholders have input into the thinking at the start is a key to building trust in the plan’s direction and investment in its initiatives. In fact, the lower the level of trust within an institution, the more need for an inclusive and participatory process; only through collaborative planning and transparency can institutional leadership begin building the trust and buy-in needed. Broad […]