TheOnlineBeacon.com
Thursday, February 27, 2020
Volume 90 • Issue 4
Men’s Basketball Wins in Final Seconds
MCLA players (from left to right) Hayden Bird ‘21, Bright Afful ‘21, Quentin Gittens ‘23 and Noah Yearsley ‘21 defending against Fitchburg State last Tuesday (For More See Page 8) Photo by Jake Vitali Board of Trustees
MCLA Factbook Data Shows Drop in ALANA Retention BY BRIAN RHODES SENIOR NEWS EDITOR According to the 2019-2020 MCLA Factbook, 53.8% of first-year ALANA students (African American, Latino, Asian and Native American), returned for the Fall 19 semester. This is a 15.2 percentage point decrease in retention from the previous year. Overall student retention increased slightly from 70% in 2018 to 72.4% in 2019, but the 15.2 percentage point decrease in ALANA retention resulted in a 18.5% difference in retention between ALANA students and the rest of the class. MCLA’s Board of Trustees Student Affairs Committee discussed this, along with other retention data, at its Feb. 20 meeting. MCLA president James Birge mentioned that African American students specifically had a much lower first-year retention percentage than in previous years, claiming that 50% of male African American students who entered in Fall 18 did not return. “What’s so disconcerting about
that is that we’ve actually had African American students outperform their [first-year peers] in retention for a number of years,” Birge said. “So this year was particularly concerning.” Catherine Holbrook, vice president of student affairs and Gina Puc, dean of enrollment management and community relations, discussed “Kickoff to College”, an initiative to rework the college’s first-year experience programs to improve retention in response to the and the Student Satisfactory Inventory (SSI) results. Holbrook said that Kickoff to College will attempt to involve new students in the campus with the help of redesigned orientation, a canvas page specific to helping new students, increased focus on freshman academies such as Lead Academy and emphasis on firstyear cohort classes where students have multiple classes with the same group of students. “In the first eight weeks that they
Retention, Page 3
Grant to Assist MCLA Partnership on Adams Project BY NATALIA GIACOMOZZI STAFF WRITER
Adams will receive $20,000 grant to expand its partnership with MCLA, Williams College and the Massachusetts Audubon Society, a non-profit nature conservation organisation, on a new recreational outdoors center. The grant is a part of Governor Charlie Baker’s decision to give $260,000 in grants to 10 western Massachusetts towns. The grants are designed to help western Massachusetts spur economic growth through promoting nature-based tourism and to assist in conserving the forests. In addition to Adams’s grant, North Adams will receive $20,000 to create a trail map accessible to tourists and residents of Berkshire County. The trail map will include hiking trails that are both publicly and privately owned. The money Adams will receive is directed towards developing the Greylock Glen Project. The Greylock Glen Project is the title for a still-in-de-
velopment- recreational outdoors center meant to teach the public about the local environment and the affects of climate change. Representatives from Adams Town Hall did not respond for comment. Elena Traister, chair of the environmental studies department, did not know how Adams will distribute the $20,000 within the specifics of the Greylock Glen project. “I have no idea about how the money will be directed [but] this is good news for helping to move this project forward,” she said in an email. Traister said she did not know why MCLA partnered with Adams on the Greylock Glen Project. However, she noted that MCLA’s role in the initiative is to advertise the Greylock Glen Project as an opportunity for students interested in exploring environmental studies on and off campus. “We really don’t have much of a
Greylock, Page 3