VOLUME 1: UNIQUE EDUCATIONAL PRACTICES
CO LL ECTION
VOLUME ONE:
UNIQUE EDUCATIONAL PRACTICES
CONTENTS Editor’s Note ……………………………………………………….
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Boosting First-Year Retention with Limited Resources ……………………………………………………….
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Leveraging Residence Hall Assignments to Increase Engagement in a First-Year Seminar ………………………………………………………. 5 The Catalyst Semester: High-Impact Educational Practices in the City ………………………………………………………. Academic-Career Integration: A Symbiotic Infusion ……………………………………………………….
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Published by: National Resource Center for The First-Year Experience and Students in Transition University of South Carolina 1728 College Street, Columbia, SC 29208 www.sc.edu/fye The First-Year Experience® is a service mark of the University of South Carolina. A license may be granted upon written request to use the term “The First-Year Experience.” This license is not transferable without written approval of the University of South Carolina.
PUBLICATIONS STAFF Theresa Haug-Belvin
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Guest E-Source Editor
Rico Reed
Managing Editor
Effecting Change: A Redesigned FYS Call-to-Action Service Learning Project ……………………………………………………….
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References ……………………………………………………….
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Lisa Grundy Copyeditor
Stephanie McFerrin Graphic Designer
Jennifer Keup
Executive Director
eSource for College Transitions Collection, Vol. 1: Unique Educational Practices
EDITOR’S NOTE Theresa Haug-Belvin, Assistant Professor/Faculty Director of UVU Mentor Program, Utah Valley University During the past two years, the task of creating opportunities for our students to engage in their campus communities has been a challenging one. As we continue to deal with the ramifications of a global pandemic, those of us in higher education strive to design unique educational practices to ensure our students have access to high quality opportunities that will serve them while they are students and into their transition as global citizens. The five articles presented in this curated edition of E-Source for College Transitions exhibit some of the previously published excellent work by our colleagues that highlight innovative approaches to increase student engagement. Some of the common themes you will see throughout these articles is a focus on a shift in culture, thoughtful assessment measures, an incorporation of HIPS, and ensuring students understand their role in a civilized society. In this issue, you will find an update to Washburn University’s attempt to increase first-year retention with limited resources by creating a first-year seminar along with a unique restructuring of university libraries and stronger relationships with institutional research. Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology shares how they successfully leveraged their residence hall assignments to increase engagement in their first-year seminar. You will learn more about North Park University’s dynamic creation of a cohort-based program centering on meaningful integration of the city through general education courses. The staff at Rollins College in Florida prioritized integrating career preparation and academic advising while first-year seminar administrators at Reinhardt University piloted a revised curriculum to incorporate a service-learning project that was Covid-compliant and aligned with the institution’s QEP assessment plan. We have all been inspired by the resilience of our students and colleagues over the past two years as we have observed numerous examples of imagination and creativity. As we move forward as higher education professionals seeking new ways to engage our students, it is our hope that we can look to the ideas shared in this issue and use them as a catalyst to challenge us to continue to find ways to collaborate with others inside and outside of our institutions. We hope these ideas inspire you as well as remind you of the impact our work has on students and their success.
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BOOSTING FIRSTYEAR RETENTION WITH LIMITED RESOURCES Alan Bearman, Dean, University Libraries and the Center for Student Success and Retention, Washburn University Elaine Lewis, Assistant Director, Undergraduate Programs, Virginia Polytechnic and State University Sean Bird, Associate Dean, University Libraries and the Center for Student Success and Retention, Washburn University At higher education institutions, improving first-year student retention is a common goal. After a mandate from the Kansas Board of Regents, Washburn University took a unique approach to improving first-to-second-year retention beginning in 2011. In the six years following, the university improved retention from 62.2% to 72.4% without changing the profile of incoming students. Three strategic initiatives, each of which center on data-driven decision making, led to this change.
Building a Culture of Student Success First, research related to best practices led to the creation of a first-year seminar (FYS). Securing this course as a graduation requirement initially proved challenging. However, project leaders connected the FYS with Washburn’s newly adopted learning outcome of information literacy and technology, which is rooted in the Association of College & Research Libraries’ Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education (ACRL, 2016). Doing so reinforced legitimacy and faculty buy-in for the course. A need to support the FYS brought about structural changes to university libraries at Washburn, including the creation of the Center for Student Success and Retention (CSSR). This academic unit, housed as part of the university libraries, took on the responsibilities of exploratory and specialized academic advising, the tutoring and writing centers, first-year seminars, and a variety of other retention-focused initiatives. Without an influx of funding to create new positions at the center, leadership opted for a flexible organizational structure. Informed, research-driven decisions led to adoption of the boundaryless organization model, in which removing artificial obstacles (e.g., hierarchy) and promoting quick, proactive changes creates successful organization (Ashkenas, 2002). The CSSR was able to create new positions by reallocating employee responsibilities and positions vacated by retirements
within the department. A unit-level data analytics position was one example. Finally, with the understanding that an FYS would not be enough to improve university retention on its own, the CSSR sought to build a relationship between the analytics position and institutional research. The CSSR saw this as an opportunity to (a) make informed decisions, (b) bring consistency to assessment activities, (c) ask direct questions through institutional research, and (d) identify trends for intervention opportunities. Targeted interventions, made to a narrowed, specific group identified by institutional research, cost significantly less to launch than more conventional interventions to a larger population, as they require fewer personnel. One example: setting up a no-cost re-recruitment effort in which faculty contacted students not yet enrolled for the upcoming term. Tracking response, referral, and enrollment rates showed the success of the initiative. Such initiatives succeed because the continual flow of data to the CSSR allows for early identification of intervention points in the academic life of both individual students and entire cohorts.
Boosting Information Literacy The FYS has a vital role in exposing students to and teaching the University Student Learning Outcome of information literacy at Washburn. To highlight the gains of students in this area, the CSSR and university librarians developed an extensive assessment and evaluation process for the FYS. As an example, objectiveembedded evaluation showed students’ understanding of the academic integrity element of information literacy did not meet university standards. Librarians made curricular revisions in 20152016 that emphasized the importance of academic integrity by developing a new activity, Chipotle Ethics, in which students learn about ethics and integrity through life application. Evaluation of an associated reflection activity showed that students increased
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eSource for College Transitions Collection, Vol. 1: Unique Educational Practices their understanding of academic integrity. A drop in the number of instances of plagiarism among first-year students was also linked to this curriculum change. Using data analytics led to other valuable, retention-focused initiatives in the CSSR. For example, institutional research showed improved retention of commuter students, more specifically those living in the ZIP code 66604 directly adjacent to campus, would greatly affect the overall retention rate (Handley, 2016). The data also showed that most of the students in 66604 only enrolled in morning classes. Targeted outreach revealed that these students did not perceive the campus as welcoming and thus took morning classes to free their afternoons and evenings for local employment. Realizing this, members of the CSSR team researched commuter student success, developing a detailed strategy to improve their academic success and retention. The university libraries and the CSSR collaborated on two specific interventions for commuter students. First, the libraries created a workshop series at noon on weekdays to address life as a commuter student. The workshops provided students lunch and taught success strategies while also showcasing the main university library as a “home base” for commuters. Second, academic advisors at the CSSR worked with commuter students to build course schedules for their academic success. Advisors realized that commuters frequently misjudged the amount of time needed to get to class in the morning, specifically for 8 a.m. courses. To combat this, they worked with students to develop learning-centered schedules, starting their days a bit later and spreading courses into the early afternoon. These targeted, low-cost approaches saw retention of ZIP code 66604 rise from 48% to 68% in just two years.
Conclusion An institutional focus on information literacy directly led to Washburn’s drastically improved retention rates. This idea permeated all decision making at the institution, from research into improved organizational structure and reliance on institutional research, to assisting with strategic retention initiatives, to an information literacy-driven FYS curriculum. The shift in focus helped Washburn use available funding to make the largest impact.
Update Today, Washburn University continues to strengthen and expand efforts for student success. In 2018, when this article was published, it focused primarily on retention as a measure of success. Now, four years later, graduation rates are available for students who participated in the first mandatory cohort of the First-Year Seminar (FYS). Washburn has improved six-year graduation rates through these efforts from 33% to 51% over five cohorts of students. Information literacy, the role of the librarian, and the importance the library as a home base for students continue to be key components of the FYS. Through the COVID-19 pandemic, this idea of physical space was especially critical for commuter students. The Center for Student Success and Retention and University Libraries faculty and staff took great care to provide a comfortable place for students while maintaining a safe space within the unknowns of the pandemic. The University Libraries also served a key role to connect students to emergency funding and resource support for those who are home and food insecure. The team took their role in student success to a new level, like many higher education professionals, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Even with great improvements of retention and graduation, Washburn continues to struggle with limited resources. Since this article’s first publication, Washburn has invested resources and reallocated personal to grant acquisition, administration, and support within the University Libraries. Initially, it was difficult to articulate the value of reallocating a personnel line to this effort; however, long term, the university has reaped the rewards. Most recently Washburn was awarded a federal Title III, Part A – Strengthening Institutions grant focused on student coaching efforts. This grant brought additional staff to the Center for Student Success and Retention to develop new initiatives with the same goals of student success, retention, and completion. Washburn continues to stay committed to the mission of enriching the lives of students with all backgrounds and live stories.
Related Articles in E-Source Boyette, B. G. (2011). Retention at work: Instituting a student success program. 8(2), 13-14. Clemson, C., & Whaley, P. (2016). Promoting academic confidence and success in the first college year. 13(3), 4-6. O’Connor, K. M. (2009). Succeeding in student success: Tracing Lasell College’s retention increase. 6(6), 1-3.
This article was originally published in December 2018.
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LEVERAGING RESIDENCE HALL ENROLLMENT TO INCREASE ENGAGEMENT IN A FIRST-YEAR SEMINAR Sarah A. Forbes, Director of Student Academic Success Kyle A. Rhodes, Business Process Analyst, Student Affairs Mary J. Szabo, Instructional Designer Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology At Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, all incoming first-year students are enrolled in a required, one-credit-hour seminar during their first term. The course is taught by staff who have been at Rose-Hulman for at least a year and have either completed or are enrolled in a graduate program, including three graduate assistants. Instructor training is conducted through a hybrid approach, with both a face-to-face workshop and supplemental materials online. In alignment with the mission to provide individual attention and support, Rose-Hulman leverages a small-group model, enrolling 12-15 students in each of 40 course sections. In theory, these small class sections should provide more opportunity for each student to be engaged, with a more relaxed setting and less ability to hide out in the crowd. However, there has not been any evidence to support this in the past. Week after week, instructors stood in front of their classes desperately hoping that students would talk or show some form of engagement. As noted by Johnson (2013), evidence of student engagement includes paying attention, taking notes, listening, asking questions, responding to questions, following requests, and reacting. Few of these behaviors were observed in the seminar. In an attempt to prompt student engagement, instructors tried rewarding students with treats, as well as explaining why engagement was important to the learning process. These tactics were not successful. Cold calling was the most effective technique, as it forced students to talk; however, students’ responses did not promote an ongoing dialogue. Through various forms of evaluation, instructors asked for information on “how to handle unresponsive students” and “suggestions for getting students more engaged in the class when they are reluctant to talk.” Instructors were not
...the arrangement can help [faculty] get to know the students better. For example, they can visit that floor during move-in day to welcome the students and parents or participate in residence hall events throughout the year. April 2022 | page 5
eSource for College Transitions Collection, Vol. 1: Unique Educational Practices the only ones to notice this issue, as reflected by comments on the student course evaluation: • “I think participation needs to improve.” • “For the small groups to actually work, the students must contribute more and be more active in the activities.” Aside from the awkward silence, students were missing out on the benefits of engagement, which research suggests may contribute to learning and have a positive impact on course grades and even persistence (Kuh, Cruce, Shoup, & Kinzie, 2008). Further, this lack of engagement profoundly impacted course staffing. Several instructors declined to continue teaching the first-year seminar, internalizing the lack of student engagement as a reflection of their teaching ability. With fewer instructors, class sizes started increasing, thus moving away from our mission.
A New Enrollment Strategy While common, this lack of engagement was not evident in all firstyear seminars. Observations of one section revealed students who easily conversed with each other and with the instructor. What accounted for the difference? One theory: out-of-class connections among the students. Enrollment in this section was limited to students in a living–learning community. Because the students were living together on the same residence hall floor, they were familiar and comfortable with each other prior to beginning the first-year seminar. In Fall 2015, we conducted a pilot test to determine whether housing assignments could be leveraged to increase engagement in the first-year seminar. First-year students at Rose-Hulman are pre-registered for their fall quarter courses based on their declared major. Student Affairs provided housing assignments and the number of course sections needed; the Registrar’s Office created a rule in the scheduling software to place students into a section of the first-year seminar with others living on the same residence hall floor. Academic advisors were made aware of the enrollment strategy and committed to maintaining the residence-based assignments when they met with their advisees during orientation. Prior to the start of the course, students completed a week-long orientation process with the other residents on their floors. Throughout orientation, students participated in many common activities to familiarize themselves with each other and to promote the development of a cohesive floor identity.
The Result: Increased Engagement
• “The group talks pretty well without me having to really pull teeth.” • “I like that the students are all from the same floor. They speak more freely in class, and there is a sense of camaraderie.” • “Participation in discussions during class time is fruitful.” A focus group was also conducted with students. They reported that having a relationship with their classmates outside class led to more participation in class. With such noticeable success, this course enrollment model has been used for the past four years. Three years ago, a specific question was added to the student course evaluation to determine the helpfulness of being in class with students from their residence hall floor. The percentage of students reporting “extremely helpful” or “very helpful” has remained approximately 75%.
The Future: Promoting the Enrollment Strategy At the time the new enrollment strategy was piloted, all residence hall floors at Rose-Hulman housed a single gender. As a result, the first-year seminar sections were also single gender. In Fall 2018, Rose-Hulman conducted a pilot with gender-inclusive residence hall floors resulting in two first-year seminar sections that were gender inclusive. Feedback from the instructors indicated that the level of engagement in these sections was similar to, or even higher, than the single-gender sections they have taught in the past. As the institute expands to offer more inclusive living environments, the first-year seminar will become less segregated. We plan to continue the first-year seminar enrollment strategy moving forward, while emphasizing the potential benefits to students and faculty. For students, the emphasis will be on leveraging each other as resources, given their close, physical proximity in the residence hall. For instructors, the arrangement can help them get to know the students better. For example, they can visit that floor during move-in day to welcome the students and parents or participate in residence hall events throughout the year. While our enrollment strategy does not guarantee engagement, building on an already established connection has demonstrated effectiveness. If course assignments based on residence hall floor is not a feasible criteria, institutions might consider other ways to establish connections among students, such as groupings by major. New student orientation may also provide opportunities for helping students get to know one another before classes begin.
During Fall 2015, approximately 85% of first-year students were enrolled in a section with others from their residence hall floor. If Fall 2018, residence-based seminar assignments increased to 96%. As part of a larger course evaluation, instructors were surveyed during midterm of the pilot year to identify what aspects of the course were going well. The question was intentionally broad in order to ascertain whether there was a big enough impact for instructors to notice. A number of instructors commented about the increased engagement:
This article was originally published in November 2019.
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THE CATALYST SEMESTER: HIGHIMPACT EDUCATIONAL PRACTICES IN THE CITY Richard Kohng, Director of Civic Engagement, North Park University Jodi Koslow Martin, Vice President of Enrollment Management and Student Affairs, Triton College
North Park University is a Christian institution in Chicago that embraces interculturalism and civic engagement as its institutional values, which have been key to the university’s history. More than 40 years ago, university leaders exemplified these values by choosing to remain in the city when a suburban property became available. At that point, the institution began to embrace the city’s residents as potential students and committed to educating an urban population. This emphasis on civic engagement, along with the cultural diversity of the surrounding neighborhoods, led to a significant rise in the number of students of color enrolled at North Park. For example, more than half of the first-year class in 2017-2018 identified as students of color. In Fall 2015, university administrators supported piloting a cohortbased, experiential learning program called the Catalyst Semester. One of the program’s core objectives was to deepen students’ understanding of civic engagement with high-impact educational practices (HIPs) that leveraged the city of Chicago. North Park students indicate the city’s location as a primary factor in their college selection process; to administrators, embracing Chicago would meet the expectations of students while also embracing innovation. Within this article, we offer an example of a creative approach to crafting an educational environment aligned with North Park’s urban identity.
Overlapping HIPs for Impact Kuh’s (2008) research on HIPs served as the methodological backbone for program development. Knowing these practices had the potential to deepen students’ experience in significant ways, program administrators saw value in overlapping them for further effect. According to Kuh (2008), HIPs consist of “first-year seminars and experiences, common intellectual experiences, learning communities, writing-intensive courses, collaborative assignments and projects, undergraduate research, diversity/global learning, service-learning and community-based learning, internships, and capstone courses and projects” (pp. 9-11). Aiming for a large impact and having already embraced many of these HIPs, faculty
and administrators integrated these teaching techniques into an experiential learning opportunity: the Catalyst Semester. Ambitiously launched in Spring 2016, the Catalyst Semester comprised a learning community of first-year commuter and residential students taking two or more Chicago-focused classes together that meet general education requirements. Each student in the cohort interned at a city-based community organization and attended weekly curated experiences. The program was small at its inception (12 students), with each student explaining their interest in this new way of learning in their application. The most innovative part of the program design centered on meaningful integration of the city through general education courses. After significant research on how best to design the experience, faculty teaching in the Catalyst Semester were asked to shape their learning outcomes using the Civic Knowledge and Civic Values rubrics commissioned by the Massachusetts Department of Higher Education (Massachusetts Department of Higher Education, 2015, 2016). These rubrics helped faculty develop learning outcomes that prioritized civic knowledge and civic values (e.g., open-mindedness, civic negotiation, empathy, social justice; Massachusetts Department of Higher Education, 2016). In one instance, a mathematics faculty member tailored an introductory course called Just Stats to introduce statistical analysis through examining issues related to social justice, such as the intersection of racial demographics and housing segregation. Homework sets used real-world scenarios that drew upon current issues in Chicago. All students in the program also took a writing-intensive firstyear seminar required of all students. Taught by a program administrator, the course served as a platform to develop firstyear students’ writing skills while showcasing the university’s citycentered focus through course content that drew from current issues such as activism and protests relating to racial divides. In addition to the general education courses offered to students in the program, each cohort was placed in a major-specific course
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eSource for College Transitions Collection, Vol. 1: Unique Educational Practices unique to them. For example, students in the business cohort were asked to enroll in an introductory marketing course together. Faculty had students visit various businesses to see how they built their brand identity in an urban context for local clientele. Such common intellectual experiences (Kuh, 2008) helped cohorts build deeper connections with one another and the city as they studied local civic discourse and practiced civic negotiation skills with their first-year peers (Massachusetts Department of Higher Education, 2016).
Learning Outside the Classroom In addition to classroom work, student learning expanded into the city as members of the cohorts interned with local communitybased organizations to better understand Chicago’s challenges. For example, one student interned with Sit, Stay, Read, a city-based nonprofit that placed public schoolchildren with dogs to practice their reading and improve their literacy skills. This student was able to see a creative approach to educating children in public schools. The experience was powerful enough that the student changed her major to elementary education and is now pursuing a career as a teacher in an urban setting. The program’s third component consisted of weekly curated experiences in various city neighborhoods. For example, students visited a community center where they met a gang intervention specialist on Chicago’s South Side. Talking with students, the community leader dismantled stereotypes about his community and challenged students to humanize what they saw in the news. Such conversations raised questions about equity and access, allowing students across the socioeconomic spectrum to engage with one another. Those from predominantly white suburban or rural contexts began to see how urban violence can be directly traced to systemic injustices. In this way, community-based learning (Kuh, 2008) served as a critical pedagogical tool for students not familiar with this narrative while also affirming students who deal with such realities daily.
Changes in Enrollment While a full assessment of the program is still in progress, preliminary program enrollment demographics reveal some interesting trends (Table 1).
Table 1 Race/Ethnicity Participants by Semester (N = 123) Cohort by Semester
Comparing the number of white students enrolled with students of color is significant as related to the institutional narrative. As more students come to North Park from the city, they increasingly represent the demographics of the city. Based on 2017 U.S. Census Bureau estimates, people of color make up 68% of the city’s population (U.S. Census Bureau, 2017). The enrollment demographics of both the institution as well as the Catalyst Semester program increasingly mirror the city’s population. Through focus groups, program administrators have seen a trend among students from Chicago being drawn to the Catalyst Semester because they desire to learn more about their city—not just their familiar neighborhoods. Bringing diverse students together in an intentionally designed learning community demonstrates North Park’s commitment to civic engagement, as well as a willingness to embrace innovation in the undergraduate curriculum.
The Impact: A Schedule Shift Overlaying HIPs to advance learning objectives through an urban context led to conversations on campus about creating a more comprehensive vision for civic discourse beyond the first year. Indeed, the impact of the Catalyst Semester was one of the factors leading to a shift in the campuswide academic schedule. Faculty ultimately voted to overhaul the university’s weekly schedule to open up Wednesday afternoons for longer educational experiences, thereby creating a weekly civic engagement block on campus. During the 2017-2018 academic year, faculty in more than 100 courses took advantage of the civic engagement block by emulating the Catalyst Semester’s weekly integrative sessions. Setting aside an afternoon on a weekly basis allowed classes to travel as a group and engage in innovative, shared-learning experiences. Students used the block of time to interact with public relations professionals who work with city government, visit a brain bank at a medical school, and tour local businesses with aldermen.
Looking Ahead Curriculum reform at the undergraduate level that embraces innovation, experiential learning, and HIPs is rare in higher education, and taking such a bold approach to integrating the urban identity into North Park’s curriculum has not been easy. The vision of the Catalyst Semester had to be clear and supported by leadership in both academic and student affairs. Student affairs staff were essential in communicating the value of the program and the change in the weekly schedule to students. Going forward, further assessment will be done to measure impact on students. For now, Chicago is not just a location for North Park, but a key part of the institutional identity that has come to life in students’ educational experience beginning in their first year.
n
White students (%)
Students of color (%)
Spring 2016
12
83%
17%
Fall 2016
14
7%
93%
Related Articles in E-Source
Spring 2017
44
36%
64%
Kilgo, C. (2012). Colleague spotlight: How effective are high-impact practices? 9(2), 18-20.
Fall 2017
53
42%
58%
Moody, B. L. (2007). Forming connections: Combining orientation and community service. 4(6), 7-9.
This article was originally published in December 2018.
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ACADEMIC–CAREER INTEGRATION: A SYMBIOTIC INFUSION Tricia Zelaya-Leon, Director of Career Development, Rollins College
Career center professionals feel pressure from external constituents to help students get jobs immediately upon graduation, yet students often fail to engage with these resources early or often enough to support career placement. Recent data have shown students typically visit career centers irregularly and only during their final months on campus (Hudson & KleinCollins, 2018). At Rollins College, upperclass students were satisfied with the career center’s services, but by the time they visited, it was almost too late for real progress to be made. In 2015, only 17 first-year students from a cohort of 493 voluntarily made appointments with career advisors. Understanding that engagement with a career center can have a positive impact on student satisfaction, retention, and graduation (Cuseo, 2005), we made the integration between career preparation and academic advising the focus of the college’s Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP). Through R-Compass, the QEP, staff sought to transform campus culture by infusing career- and life-planning education and resources into as many parts as possible of the student experience. Similarly, the staff at the Rollins career center were motivated to develop new and innovative ways to engage students earlier and more often.
Phase I: First-Year Infusion
...staff sought to transform campus culture by infusing career- and lifeplanning education and resources into as many parts as possible of the student experience.
Career center staff leveraged partnerships with academic deans and faculty allies to develop the Career Liaison Program to increase their interactions with first-year students. Each liaison is assigned between three and five course sections, and they work with faculty to identify students’ needs. The liaisons subsequently visit the class to discuss those specific areas with the students. They also reach out to the students individually throughout the semester to offer virtual and one-on-one major and career-related guidance. In 2019, four years after the launch of R-Compass, 80% of Rollins’ first-year students are engaging with the career center. R-Compass has become a staple of the first-year experience; faculty are motivated to participate, and students speak highly of the services they receive.
Phase II: Curricular Infusion The Career Liaison Program’s success encouraged career center staff to expand their outreach. In partnership with Academic Affairs, they built a strategy around curricular infusion: How could students engage with the career
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eSource for College Transitions Collection, Vol. 1: Unique Educational Practices center beyond their first year? They looked to the College of Liberal Arts, where all enrolled students are required to take a Health and Wellness course that focuses on the Nine Dimensions of Wellness, including occupational wellness. A common assignment for the Health & Wellness course was introduced that required students to reflect on the process of creating and reviewing a draft résumé with a career advisor. The assignment brings approximately 300 students (across 10 to 11 sections) to the career center each semester. Every student is now obligated to visit the center at least once during their academic career, because of this assignment.
Culture Shift and the Future
Phase III: Full Engagement
For campuses contemplating how to effectively integrate career preparation in the first college year, a multipronged approach has been vital for Rollins College. Uniting academic and student affairs partners from the beginning created innovative and integrative opportunities for curricular and cocurricular infusion. Support from high-level campus constituents provided the necessary direction, and identifying those with the social capital to successfully implement the initiatives was also key. Finally, thoughtful assessment measures, both programmatic and summative, were essential in gauging the programs’ advancements. Preparing students for lives after graduation should be everyone’s job, not just the staff of career centers. By deputizing campus constituents as partners in career preparation, higher education institutions will ensure that early and frequent engagement becomes the standard.
Career center staff saw modest success from increasing their visibility with first-year students and adding a required visit to the center to the curriculum, but they wanted to sustain that engagement. They found a solution in an article about the University of Nevada-Reno’s career studio model (Calhoon, 2018). A career studio is an open, collaborative space where undergraduate peer leaders offer career guidance to students on a drop-in basis. Inspired by the idea, Rollins staff piloted a career studio in the 20182019 academic year. Within the first four months, an average of 200 students were visiting the studio each month. Students began inviting their friends. Faculty, staff, and individual departments throughout campus began requiring their students visit the studio for all of their career preparation needs. Over the course of its first year, almost 1,200 unique students participated, and many students were repeat visitors. Checkout survey responses indicated a 99% satisfaction rate.
Other R-Compass Measures of Success In addition to the success of the career center’s initiatives, R-Compass made its own impact. Nearly 80% of faculty advisors have voluntarily attended regular training sessions that focus on infusing career preparation into their academic advisement. A new program, Advising Mentors, invites faculty to weekend-long training devoted to academic advising; they then serve as peer mentors to their fellow faculty. With nearly 200 faculty members at Rollins, 24 have been trained, and almost every major is represented. Nearly 70% of all academic departments’ websites promote career-related content that demonstrates to current and prospective students (and their parents) the value of a Rollins education. Some sites highlight Rollins alumni and others include video testimonials from successful alums. Additionally, every second-semester student is partnered with an R-Compass Peer Mentor—an upperclass student who focuses on academic and career success. In their assessment of these 22 mentors, first-year students on the whole indicated they felt fully supported and prepared for a successful second year.
R-Compass has generated momentum for a shift in culture at Rollins College, and this momentum is also manifesting itself physically. A facility at the center of campus is being renovated and will bring together multiple academic and student affairs programs, including the career center. The career center has been located on the periphery of campus for nearly a decade, so relocating to the heart of campus will further keep career planning front and center for students.
Uniting academic and student affairs partners from the beginning created innovative and integrative opportunities for curricular and cocurricular infusion.
This article was originally published in March 2020.
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EFFECTING CHANGE: A REDESIGNED FYS CALL-TO-ACTION SERVICE LEARNING PROJECT Lydia Laucella , Assistant Director, Center for Innovative Teaching and Engaged Learning, Assistant Professor of Education and Instructional Design Center for Innovative Teaching and Engaged Learning Walter May , Dean of Students Reinhardt University
Abstract During the Covid-19 pandemic, some college students have felt isolated, seeking connections with peers, with faculty, and with community partners. During this time, political and social issues in the United States have brought awareness to the need for a platform for youth to voice their opinions and to effect change. During the Fall 2020 semester, the Reinhardt University FYS administrators were tasked with revising the FYS curriculum to fit the needs of its first-year student population. To fit a new course design, a preexisting service learning project would need to be redesigned to be student-driven, site-flexible, social-change forward, compliant with Covid-19 restrictions, and aligned to the institution’s QEP assessment plan. This article outlines the creation of the 6- week long project titled, Effecting Change: A Call-to-Action Service Learning Project, which resulted in Reinhardt’s first-year students making an impact on the Reinhardt University campus and its surrounding communities.
Introduction Service learning and community-based learning opportunities are recognized as a high-impact educational practice by the Association of American Colleges and Universities. These learning opportunities “model the idea that giving something back to the community is an important college outcome, and that working with community partners is good preparation for citizenship, work, and life” (AAC&U, 2020). Service to the institution and to the larger community is an integral part of Reinhardt University’s (RU) culture and aligns with the university’s mission, which is to educate the whole person by developing the intellectual, social, personal, vocational, spiritual, and physical dimensions
of its students. It is also an integral part of Reinhardt University’s First-Year Seminar (FYS) course, a 25-person capacity course that is mandatory for all incoming, first-year students.
Problem In the Fall 2020 semester, 310 first-year students were enrolled across 15 FYS course sections, including two Honors sections. The Covid-19 pandemic required Reinhardt’s FYS administrators-the author (current FYS Coordinator) and coauthor, Dr. Walter May (Dean of Students and former FYS Coordinator)- to replicate engaging face-to-face interactions typical of the FYS course in modified online spaces. This was particularly challenging in a course that is reliant on fostering in-person, studentto-student, and student-to-faculty interactions, especially since many of RU’s students could face difficulty engaging in on-ground classes because of work commitments, athletic travel, or quarantine mandates based on pandemic mitigation efforts. A micro-hybrid FYS course model was piloted in Fall 2020 that was intentionally designed to accommodate the first-year students’ needs. The micro-hybrid course fused brief on-ground; in-person scheduled meetings (students were provided a synchronous meeting option) with additional weekly asynchronous learning components. All sections of FYS utilized the same course design, providing a common first-year experience. In the process of redesigning the course, the FYS faculty encountered a hurdle, how to redesign a pre-existing service learning component that would fit the micro-hybrid course design model while accounting for Covid-19 masking and social distancing requirements. Additionally, RU’s Quality Enhancement Plan required specific assessment and reporting guidelines for service learning experiences. Therefore, the redesigned
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eSource for College Transitions Collection, Vol. 1: Unique Educational Practices service learning project needed to be student-driven, site-flexible, and aligned to RU’s QEP assessment plan.
Designing Effecting Change When considering how to redesign the project, not only would the outcome of the project need to be measurable for reporting HIP engagement, but what is more, the FYS faculty felt a sense of urgency to create a project that could foster meaningful connections to the campus and to the community. This sense of urgency arose because of two reasons- the impact of Covid-19 on our first-year students and the social climate in the United States during the time of the project’s redesign. Covid-19 could negatively impact students’ college transition experiences and their development of a sense of belonging. Many college students have felt isolated because of the pandemic (Gopalan & Brady 2020). Quarantine, social distancing, and limited social interactions might have curtailed students’ interactions with faculty, students, and community partners. Yet, these interactions are vital to first-year students’ development of a sense of belonging. The project redesign was also influenced by the political and social climate of the United States during the time of the redesign. There was a rise in youth-activism, a heightened awareness of social justice issues, and the desire for a platform in which youth can voice their opinions and effect change. Effecting Change: A Call-to-Action Service Learning Project, was created as a fusion of Delaney’s (2015) call-to-action project with a previous social-change forward project the author had created. Effecting Change was a six-week project, containing four components: a proposal, a check-in, the call-to-action, and a presentation. The Effecting Change project was designed to be student-driven, siteflexible, and social-change forward. Students a.) picked a call-to-action subject of interest, b.) completed research on their subject of interest and developed a rationale for why they chose that subject, c.) chose their audience (requirements were at least twenty people), d.) proposed a timeline to complete their call-to-action, and e.) chose a method in which they would conduct it (e.g. petition, donation, solicitation of a behavioral change). Students chose their cause and conducted their call-to-action in any desired format as long as it adhered to the audience requirements. For instance, they could choose to create and distribute t-shirts on campus spreading awareness of youth suicide prevention, or, they could choose to elicit Red Cross donations for the 2020 wildfires in Oregon. It aligned to RU’s QEP assessment plan; the measurable outcome of the project was the students’ creation of a Pecha Kucha- style presentation (a story-telling presentation style). The QEP standards were included in the project description; student reflections on the QEP standards were necessary to earn full credit on their presentations. The presentation was aligned to a common rubric in Canvas that assessed for the following QEP Professional Development standards based on the service learning HIP: 1.
Initiative: How did completion of this service learning project help you generate and pursue opportunities to expand your knowledge, skills, abilities, attitudes, or values?
2.
Independence: How did you go about gathering more information on your subject, how did you approach information gathering
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differently as a result of this experience, and how did this approach inform future professional challenges? 3.
Curiosity: How would you continue this project?
4.
Transfer: How have you applied the knowledge you gained during your service learning experience to other areas of their life? In particular, how has this project fueled your imagination, independent thought, and lifelong learning?
5.
Self-Reflection/Self-Assessment: What did you learn about your strengths and weaknesses as it relates to professional development through completion of this service learning project?
FYS instructors evaluated the products of the service learning projects based on the common outcome rubric associated with the assignment. These outcome scores were retrieved using reporting mechanisms in Reinhardt’s LMS.
Assessment of Effecting Change After completing the project in the Fall 2020 semester, the FYS faculty learned important lessons that would influence future iterations of the project. The faculty discovered that the Office of Student Affairs was overwhelmed from fielding students’ logistical questions and were unprepared for the project’s enormity. At the time of the project, RU did not have a funding structure in place to support students’ projects; funding is now in the approval process. The FYS faculty discovered that it was vital to collaborate with RU’s Coordinator of Spiritual Life and Service to provide community outreach resources for students interested in working with community partners. Finally, students needed models to help them understand the final desired outcome of the project. It was hypothesized that based on QEP assessment results the redesigned project would indicate deeper student reflection on their service-learning experience than the prior year (Fall 2019);however, it is important to acknowledge that the data from the Fall 2019 and Fall 2020 semesters are not comparable for numerous reasons. First, the student artifact assessed in 2019 was a service learning reflection paper, but in Fall 2020, it was a Pecha Kucha presentation. Second, the measured service learning experiences were not comparable. In Fall 2019, FYS students engaged in a service learning project in partnership with Junior Achievement of Georgia. In Fall 2020, students engaged in the Effecting Change service learning projects. Third, reporting numbers were different between the Fall 2019 and Fall 2020 semesters. In Fall 2019, there were n= 419 first-year students enrolled in FYS, n= ~250 (or ~59%) of those students were assessed via the outcome rubric. In Fall 2020, there were n=310 students enrolled in FYS, n= ~150 (or ~48%) of those students were assessed via the outcome rubric (N.M. Conklin, personal communication, March 9, 2021). Exploratory statistical analysis revealed no statistically significant differences between Fall 2019 and Fall 2020. However, based on the mean outcome scores, the Fall 2020 assessment scores outperformed Fall 2019 on two QEP standards: Independence and Curiosity. Transfer and Self-Assessment results were similar between the Fall 2019 and Fall 2020 semesters. And, in Fall 2019, Initiative outperformed Fall 2020 (see Figure 1) (N.M. Conklin, personal communication, March 9, 2021).
2.5
Mean Outcome Score
2.0
1.5
Course Term 2020
1.0
2019 0.5
0.0
QEP 2-1 Initiative
QEP 2-2 Independence
QEP 2-3 Curiosity
QEP 2-4 Transfer
QEP 2-5 Self-Assessment
Learning Outcome Name Figure 1 QEP Summary Assessment Report Results, Fall 2019 and Fall 2020. Although the data is unable to indicate whether students reflected more deeply on their service learning experiences, anecdotally, the FYS faculty observed that some students used the project to socially interact. Even though the project was originally designed to be an individual project, some students collaborated within their course or with students from other FYS courses. For instance, some students collaborated to establish a RU Fall Festival that involved combining numerous student groups running donation drives or advertising their causes. Another group reinstated the campus recycling program. Throughout the duration of the project, many FYS students had to collaborate with faculty and staff on campus, and with other organizations outside of campus, in order to achieve a successful project. For example, one student collaborated with a local theatre company and raised money to support it because it had been negatively impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Conclusion As a result of the redesigned service learning project, RU’s FYS students collaborated, acted, and effected change, and in some cases, longterm change. In conclusion, the Effecting Change service learning project was student-driven, site-flexible, and social-change forward. It was Covid-19 social distancing and masking compliant, and it aligned to RU’s QEP assessment plan. More importantly, the Effecting Change service learning project provided a platform in which students were given the opportunity to engage with each other, with faculty, and with community partners to effect change on the Reinhardt campus and its surrounding communities.
The FYS faculty also observed that many students enjoyed the project. In one class, the majority of students indicated in their end-of-term course evaluations that their favorite assignment was the service learning project (n=10 out of 16 respondents). In another, n=4 out of 8 respondents indicated that it was their favorite assignment. Further, one student stated in her project: “This project has absolutely invigorated me for more service in the future…I’ve realized that if you just pick something you care about and you want done, you should want to improve your community.” Some students also demonstrated an authentic passion for their topic and dedication to the project after the end of the course. At least two groups were still actively engaged in their causes after the end of the fall 2020 semester: one of which was a group that reinstated the LGBTQ+ Alliance on campus. They are still actively running the club and presented their project at Reinhardt’s Spring 2021 Convocation of Artists and Scholars. The other, was a group of students who have continued their cause of reinvigorating the campus recycling program.
This article was originally published in December 2021.
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eSource for College Transitions Collection, Vol. 1: Unique Educational Practices
VOLUME ONE:
UNIQUE EDUCATIONAL PRACTICES
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AAC&U. (2020). High- Impact Educational Practices: A Brief Overview. Association of American Colleges and Universities. https://www.aacu.org/node/4084 Delaney, S. (2015). How can I create an online service learning project? [Video]. Magna Publications 20-Minute Mentor Series. https://www.magnalearning.com/learn/video/how-can-i-create-an-online-service-learning-project Gopalan, M., & Brady, S. (2020). Fostering College Students’ Sense of Belonging Amidst COVID-19: Recommendations for higher education institutions. Penn State Social Science Research Institute. https://covid-19.ssri.psu.edu/articles/ fostering-college-students-sense-belonging-amidst-covid-19
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