Roxbury Community College                         Sterling Giles  /  Coordinator  /  Achieving the Dream 1234 Columbus Avenue, Roxbury, MA  02120 Office 3-201C  /  Languages  /  sgiles@rcc.mass.edu 617-427-0060, x5125  /  www.rcc.mass.edu

      

February 2010

An Update on RCC’s Progress under Achieving the Dream

            We are now well into the second year of implementation work under the initiative.  There have been great steps forward, a few steps back, and surprises along the way.  Before looking at the specific initiatives below, let’s be reminded of three essential facts that became evident in our study year: first, the fact that more students need to get extensive advising early in their educational experience; second, the need for improvement with the appropriateness of teaching/learning methods for our diverse student population; and third, the challenges students face in developmental (pre-100-level) courses, especially mathematics.

Advising

            The engagement of full-time faculty in advisement before each semester has been institutionalized, and the level of involvement has increased; academic deans and advising staff have collaborated to make this work.  A cadre of part-time faculty has been trained to do similar work and is now well experienced in providing this service. The shift for the advising staff from primary providers to resource specialists is thus moving forward in very small steps; there is still much to do to fully achieve this goal.
            The increased reliance on faculty advisors has made it less difficult for advising staff to devote themselves systematically to the intensive advising of students on academic probation.  As the policy on probation and dismissal has been updated and is now being fully implemented, the number of these students has increased considerably.  We are hoping to receive a grant which will help us devote sufficient time and support to these students.
            The fact that more students than ever are taking The College Experience in their first semester means that students are more self-reliant in their advising and more likely to hold substantive discussions of the major and next steps; they can finally move beyond the immediate need for next semester’s classes.  Enlisting the help of the College Experience faculty at pre-registration time has increased pre-registration numbers and ensured advising from staff who know the students well, yet systematic training about major requirements and transfer realities is something we still need to provide for many of these faculty.  Overall, the integration of faculty and staff in the advising process has made several steps forward.
           
First Semester Enrollment

            This is the first academic year in which the College Experience course is a firm requirement in a student’s first semester.  It has been challenging to staff so many sections, but a sense of community has emerged among these faculty, who have engaged with the Dean for Student Success in discussions about curricular revision, course delivery, and text selection.  We have substantially increased the percentage of first semester students taking a college experience course, from 33% in fall 2007 to 41% in fall 2009.  Our target for fall 2010 is 45%.  Fall 2009 first semester students who took a college experience class had fall-to-spring retention rates 23 percentage points higher than those for students not taking a college experience (56% to 33%). An ongoing need for some professional development has emerged here, but it is a case of refining a successful model, not a problem to be solved.  Both faculty and students feel good about this step.
            A second policy change is under discussion: that of requiring students to take their developmental courses in their first semesters, rather than postponing them.  This would also formalize something long advised as good practice: begin with English, then Mathematics, and finally add Science.  No decision has been made, but it is actively under discussion.

Professional Development

            In May 2009 we began to address the ways in which a rich multi-cultural environment challenges faculty and staff as they strive to reach people with so many different kinds of prior experience.  Based on a survey of the campus community, an interactive session was designed in which principles of emotional intelligence were applied to the design of appropriate and effective responses to real-life situations in the classroom and elsewhere on campus; faculty and staff worked together on these cases.  The vast majority of participants said the session was useful, that more work is needed, and that a next logical phase would be to focus more sharply on particular areas of curriculum and service delivery as contexts for development of multi-cultural interventions.  These are under consideration as the team for Learning Academy 2010 will soon meet and prioritize.
            Helping students to overcome math anxiety remains a goal, but we have not yet found a way to help faculty with that.  The incoming Coordinator of Developmental Education will address it in the course of the next six months.
            The Professional Development Committee received funding from a greater variety of sources this year and redefined its priorities, seeking broad engagement in cooperative activities that address the needs of developmental students, among other purposes.  One result has been a long overdue, and much appreciated, professional development opportunity for tutors:  three stepped sessions over the course of four months; almost all tutors have chosen to attend.
            In May we will be hosting the American Association of Community Colleges’ regional workshop on integrating civic responsibility into the curriculum and fostering service learning.
           
Learning Communities

            In the past two years we have experimented with various course combinations and schedules and seen that the logistics of our students’ lives and enrollment patterns make some communities thrive, while other great ideas never attract a critical mass.  We have learned enough by now to know that our learning community program will remain at 5 or 6 groups and not expand beyond that.  It can serve some students exceptionally, but will never be the answer for the majority.  Moving forward, learning communities will exist primarily for first semester students in developmental education.  Key components such as cohorts, dedicated tutoring, and faculty collaboration to address individual student challenges have been very successful.  We have made good progress, but still need to provide further support and training, to fully realize the potential of curricular coordination and integration of tutoring with classroom practice.  An unintended, but unsurprising, benefit of the learning community program has been rich cross fertilization of faculty expertise.

Developmental Education

            Though it has taken longer than expected, we are about to hire a Coordinator of Developmental Education, so some of the work in this area is only about to begin.  Student support has seen the following improvements, however, in the past year:  tutors reaching out to visit classes, fostering group tutoring as well as one-on-one, some facilitated study groups, the design (not yet implementation) of a mentoring program, and training for next year’s supplemental instruction program.  What is still needed, and about to arrive, is someone to help integrate these initiatives, and to forge stronger connections among tutors and teachers.  In addition to the new staff member, we are waiting to hear on a grant which will help us to implement these strategies.
            Mathematics is an area that has special needs and is getting particular attention.  It is the area we are focusing on as we strive for AtD leader college designation, granted to schools that exhibit responsive administrative mechanisms and can show improvement in an area that matters to student success.  The Math Clinic, long a cozy but remote and underutilized resource, has gotten new equipment and been moved to the same central floor as other academic support labs and tutoring, where integration of these services can begin.  It is being staffed more fully and more professionally than ever before; a culture of accessibility to on-demand mathematics support is slowly emerging as students decide it is ok to ask for help.  Full-time faculty volunteer their office hours to the room, and the College has hired an adjunct faculty member to staff the other hours.  There is work to be done to fully exploit the potential of the resource.  Getting students to take advantage of these supports is always a challenge, but we’ve made a solid first step by being reliable, accessible, and professional.
            In addition to support, testing and curriculum are areas of attention.  We are working to get more students to prepare for the placement tests, and are considering modular delivery of some prep and developmental courses between semesters and in the summer.  We will also look at the curriculum to ensure that it is relevant and well aligned with the needs of various majors.

Resources

            As mentioned several places above, we’ve applied for a variety of grants this year and are waiting to hear on them.  All are intended to support improvements in student service, curricular design, infrastructure to support these goals, and to provide professional development and support for student success measures.

Planning

            Achieving the Dream has had a substantial effect on the College’s next strategic plan, which will become operational in Summer 2010.  Student success is the core of the plan; broad engagement and creating a culture of evidence are key elements.  Many of the interventions and goals mentioned above are included in the plan: ensuring better coordination and effectiveness for support services, addressing affective and logistical barriers to student engagement with support, and providing communications infrastructure to make that all possible, to name but a few of the strategic goals.
            The College is straining its current institutional research capacity because more people than ever are asking questions and looking for the facts as they struggle to make the right decisions.  This is a good problem to have; people want to know.  A principal challenge going forward is improving the tools administrators and faculty have to query student outcome data, and providing the training necessary for them to make good use of those tools.
            One example of good progress with data is the Writing Center.  For years the Library collected and analyzed data to drive decision making, especially around resource allocation.  Two years ago the Writing Center collected data and shared it, but it was difficult for many to weed through and not much happened with it.  Today Writing Center statistics are presented on a regular basis, in a comprehensible way with contrastive emphasis, in reference to qualitative data as well, and with some help from the Coordinator in interpreting it all and pointing to possible future directions.  This is the result of several years’ evolution and has led to a deeper and broader understanding of the decisions which the Center faces on a daily basis.  First the Library, then the Writing Center …… something useful is spreading.

            As RCC becomes increasingly data driven and self reflective, we also become more nimble as we design programs to support students.  The plans we had a year ago have been partly realized, and partly changed in response to ongoing evaluation.  Though we have universal goals  -the success of each student-  our interventions are targeted to individual groups, in keeping with the principles of equity and excellence.  We invite every form of input; please be in touch if you have any questions or comments about this work.

Sterling Giles, Ed.M.
Coordinator
Achieving the Dream at RCC