Just in time for the holidays, I am reissuing David Arendale's Guide to iPad Apps. <Click on this link to download the free PDF document.> This is my hand-picked favorite iPad apps. The 31-page directory lists approximately 330 of them. With more than one million to select from, it was difficult to identity the ones that I find the most useful for my personal and professional life. Enjoy.
Transforming Remediation: Understanding the Research, Policy, and Practice (Webinar)
Transforming Remediation: Understanding the Research, Policy, and Practice was a webinar conducted October 4, 2013 highlights research into the problems of remediation, along with promising practices from community colleges across the country. Speakers include Complete College America’s Bruce Vandal, the California Acceleration Project’s Katie Hern, North Carolina’s Cynthia Lyston, and researcher Michelle Hodara. The webinar was co-sponsored by the American Youth Policy Forum and the American Institutes for Research. Through the California Acceleration Project, the state is seeking alternatives to traditinoal approaches of developmental-level courses for meeting the needs of the students and the state.
Strategies to Support Success of Former Veterans in College, Report 2011
The National Science Foundation provited grants to increase sucess of returning veterans with enrolling in and completing baccalaureate and graduate engineering programs. They conducted a detailed evaluation of the grants to identity best practices. The report was completed by Penn State University. <Click on this link for the entire report.>
Based on the researchers review of the professional literature, the following criteria emerged as being highly supportive of the veterans. It was not expected that any institution would have all the following, but a critical mass was necessary for creating a supportive environment and warranting a field review of their programs. The entire report provides the detailed field reports on the institutions and illustrated how they met these criteria.
- The presence of a veteran’s office and/or on campus veterans counselors and services. Services provided by such an office might include:
- assistance with university and Veteran Affairs paperwork
- programs to assist students called up to active duty
- orientation programs or programs for veterans helping them adjust to college life
- participation in the American Council on Education/National Association of Student Personnel Administrators program for disabled vets
- an active veterans support group
- service available to assist veteran students with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI)
- active lobbying efforts to improve institutional services and/or state and federal veteran support
- other programs available to veterans and families
- Explicit institutional focus on student veterans in the form of task forces or committees to address their needs and issues
- College credit for military training and experience
- College credit for standardized tests (CLEP and DANTES)
- Faculty awareness of veterans in the classroom
- Access to tutoring services and refresher courses
- Easily navigable and executable procedures for students called to active duty who must exit/re-enter the institution
- Accessible disability and counseling services
- Flexible academic options, such as:
- Online course offerings
- Weekend, evening, or early morning classes
- Participation in the Yellow Ribbon Program
- (institutional grant aid to close the gap between tuition costs and GI Bill benefits)
- Veteran-knowledgeable staff in other institutional offices
- Institutional provision of transition assistance or orientation specific to veterans
- Presence of a veterans’ student group
- Application fee waivers for veterans
- An on-campus military presence (e.g., ROTC)
- Status as a Servicemembers Opportunity College
Counseling Makes a Difference for Low-Income Students Attending College
From Inside HigherEd by Scott Jaschik. "A theme of several studies in the last year has been that there are plenty of academically talented low-income students who for some combination of reasons are not applying to competitive colleges to which they would probably be admitted. A new study along those lines -- this time documenting the impact of intense college counseling -- was released Monday by the National Bureau of Economic Research. The study (abstract available here) found that a nonprofit group that focuses on college counseling in Minneapolis-St. Paul had a significant impact in increasing the rate at which low-income students enrolled in four-year colleges, including competitive institutions.
The study was conducted by Christopher Avery of Harvard University -- co-author (with Caroline Hoxby of Stanford University) of a study released in December that found that most highly talented, low-income students never apply to a single competitive college. That work has set off widespread discussions about what sort of interventions might make a difference. Avery's new study looks at College Possible, a program that provides in-depth college counseling as well as tutoring on the ACT or SAT. Avery was able to study the impact of the program by comparing results on College Possible participants with those who applied to (and were not admitted to) the program despite having slightly better academic preparation. The study found no statistically significant gains in ACT scores for those who participated in the program. Avery writes, however, that this may understate the impact of the program, because he suspects that some of those who didn't get into College Possible found test-prep services elsewhere. But the study found a significant impact on College Possible participants in applying to and enrolling in four-year colleges, and especially to competitive colleges. More than 45 percent of the students in the College Possible program enrolled at a four-year college, while the figure in the control group was 34 percent. And the most popular college among those in the program was Augsburg College, a competitive liberal arts college that did not enroll a single student from the control group (though some would appear to have been academically qualified had they applied). The findings could be significant in that the earlier Avery-Hoxby study noted that low-income students who enroll in more competitive colleges are more likely to land at institutions with better graduation rates, more financial aid, and more resources to promote their academic success.San Jose State Efforts for First-Generation College Students
The Chronicle of Higher Education reports on efforts at San Jose State University to better serve first-generation college students. <Read the entire report on the Chronicle of HE web site.> One of the items that I noticed was the concern about programming and support services for first-genration students AFTER the first year. So often many colleges provide programs to transition students into college and additional programming during the first year. They the institution turns to the next cohort of students and focuses on them. The second, third, and fourth year students are assumed "safe" and little attention is paid with them. The Noel-Levitz enrollment management organization documents how one of the biggest drop out groups in colleges are the invisible "middle" students. These are the struments that survived the first year and then go off the radar of intrusive and comprehensive student retention services. These students silently exit the institution for the same reasons that had such a difficult time during the first year, but no one pays any attention to them anymore. If they are surveyed why they left, they provide the politically correct answer it was financial. The school officials shrug their shoulders and say it was the poor economy that did it to the students. Actually, the departure of the students is far more complex and often preventable.
From the Chronicle of HE report: "....Among the programs Ms. Morazes has set up is a series of workshops for first-generation students. The sessions focus on such topics as goal-setting, stress-management strategies, and talking to family members about college. She also visits local high schools to publicize resources at San Jose State and to provide students with role models, something she hopes to do more of.
Also looking to expand the program is Art King, the university's associate vice president for student affairs. "Right now we only look at first-generation students when they come in, but they are first-generation students throughout their time at college," he says. "My hope is to have programs for second-year students, third-year students, and for fourth-year students, so each group gets appropriate resources and help."
Because the program is new and growing, there is not much long-range data on its effectiveness. Ms. Morazes is tracking the progress of participating students, including retention rates after the first year and progress toward declaring a major and earning a degree. She conducts evaluations before and after events to assess changes in students' knowledge of campus resources, their sense of belonging and connectedness, and whether they feel they are on track to earn a degree...."
Highlights from College Completion Annual Conference: Game Changers
The College Completion Annual Conference was this week. <Read the entire report on the Chonicle of Higher Education webpage.> Much of Monday's discussion centered on what Complete College America calls the "game changers"—strategies that it says can double the number of remedial students passing college-level courses, triple the graduation rates for students transferring with associate degrees to four-year colleges, and quadruple completion of career certificate programs. Those include tying state appropriations to student performance; making introductory college-level courses, rather than remedial courses, the default placement for almost all students; and offering co-requisite remediation, which is offered alongside college-level courses, to those who need it.
Speakers also argued that too many students are placed directly in remedial courses on the basis of a single placement test, dooming many to a semester or more of courses they pay for but don't get credit for. Mathematics educators described accelerated math pathways, like Statway and Quantway, that they say are more relevant to most students than the traditional sequences that trip up many learners The approach, which was developed with the University of Texas at Austin's Charles A. Dana Center, is being used this fall across all of Texas' 50 community-college districts.
The group also heard from students. Kierra Brocks said that when she enrolled at Ivy Tech Community College, in Indiana, she missed the cutoff in math by two points and ended up in a remedial class that didn't challenge her. "It wasn't only money wasted but time wasted," she said. "It doesn't give you motivation to continue."
Top Rated New Activities TRIO Leaders Want for Their Programs
In spring 2012 MAEOPP surveyed its members regarding what education practices they wanted for their programs. The information is categorized by highest priority and also by category. This information might be helpful for MAEOPP members as they consider education practices to submit from their own programs.
Practices requested by more than half of the survey responders:
- Financial literacy curriculum and activities
- Strategies for raising retention rates of students within the program
- Leadership development
- Study skills building workshops or courses
- Methods of assessing students for academic advisement
- Improved attitudes towards learning
- Improved student confidence
- Effective methods for tracking students after program completion
- Career exploration activities and classes
- Holistic assessments of students (example uses could be for program admission, academic advisement, or other program purposes)
- Job shadowing activities
- Career interest assessments and activities
[Click on this link to download the two-page survey results.]