PRIORITY

Increasingly, employers are requiring students to have internships or other experiential learning as part of their academic portfolios. Building strategic partnerships with local employers, community-based organizations, and alumni will give NSCC students the opportunity to participate in these experiences that provide meaningful, real-world skills and social networks to connect them with high demand jobs on the North Shore after college.

Developing deeper ties with the universities to which students transfer will also assure that NSCC students reach the educational and professional goals with which they came to college. NSCC and Northern Essex Community College are already engaged in work to facilitate transfer with Salem State University by creating a position for a shared counselor who facilitates the transfer process for students.

Environmental scan data confirms that NSCC must do more to support the needs of low-income students, including supporting non-academic food, housing, child care, and technology needs, if student retention and completion are to improve. Partnering deeply with community-based organizations who have the resources and expertise to support these non-academic needs is central to the plan, and in alignment with the NUE (New Undergraduate Experience) and Strategic Framework for Support Services for Student Success recommendations. These partnerships will assure NSCC students get the support for non-academic needs that can get in the way of school. The childcare and early education partnerships NSCC is pursuing with both the Demakes Family YMCA in Lynn and Pathways for Children are examples of such deep collaboration that will enable the college to attract students who have previously felt unable to take advantage of an NSCC education due to lack of support.

Taken together, data points to the need for NSCC to develop flexible and holistic educational strategies to expand student credit completion and retention, address equity gaps, direct additional funding towards teaching and learning, and to develop community partnerships to meet students’ social, financial, and academic needs. NSCC is poised particularly well to address these needs as modalities of instruction are shifting, and as students expect to attend classes in a variety of ways. Innovations such as Open Education Resources (OER), micro credentialing, Competency-Based Education, Hyflex courses, and Spanish language courses for Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSI) are already underway at NSCC. Examples of current initiatives underway include: hyflex course pilots allowing students to take classes in person or remotely simultaneously, and the opportunity to earn a Bachelor’s degree in business on NSCC’s campus through a partnership with Quincy college. In each of these current initiatives, NSCC seeks to meet students where they are, educating the whole student by recognizing their unique needs. These existing initiatives are a hallmark of what NSCC already does well. The opportunity to expand and respond to how students learn is deeply connected with the programs likely to see the greatest growth, namely STEM, manufacturing, health care, and social sciences. NSCC will need to address the widening tech gap in order to ensure equitable access to these innovations.

Lag and lead metrics were designed to complement each strategic priority in the plan. With NSCC’s college course and student experiential education offerings becoming better aligned with urgent regional needs, it is anticipated that student degree production in fields associated with high demand occupations will increase. Further, if NSCC students receive holistic support inside and outside of the classroom, in the form of flexible course offerings and needed social and financial services, then students’ rates of on-time course completion will likely increase. Because of this, metrics for the first strategic priority center student outcomes, including on-time program completion and degree production in fields associated with high demand careers. The full list of Priority #1 metrics follows below.

STRATEGIC PRIORITY #1 METRICS

• Degree Production in Fields Associated with High Demand Occupations (DHE) (lag)

• Number of new programs/courses developed or offered in high demand occupations, as wells as in new modalities, including new to campuses (lead)

• Number of students participating in new programs in new modalities (lead)

• On-Time Program Completion (i.e., intermediate milestone of credit accumulation success) (lag)

• Fall Undergraduate Enrollment Headcount (lead)

• Expenditures Devoted to Student Instruction and Support (lead)

• On-Time Credit Completion (HEIRS) (lag)

• Non Credit to Credit conversion rate (noncredit students moving into articulated credit programming (lag)

• Headcount (lead)

• Credit program completion (lag)

Promote social

2. Promote social justice at NSCC and in the community by delivering equitable student outcomes poverty rates in Lynn and Salem, two of the biggest feeder cities, than the state’s average, and a higher dropout rate in the feeder high schools than the state’s average. English language learners (ELL) will be a large portion of NSCC’s future students as the geographic areas with the largest growth are specifically those with the highest ELL population. These challenges also present opportunities for equity in recruitment and

North Shore Community College (NSCC) will eliminate equity gaps in student academic outcomes by 2027. We will be the college of choice, examining and transforming our culture and the student experience using social justice practices and co-creating an inclusive community focused on an authentic sense of belonging, especially for those who have been historically excluded from higher education.

1) Assure equitable student success through holistic support and culturally relevant teaching practice, including proven models like Early College.

2) Deliver equitable employee success through social justice practices in hiring, advancement, and retention.

3) Build infrastructure and co-create a culture of respect and inclusion.

4) Provide education, advocacy, and scholarship to build an institution that consistently values all its members.

With this strategic priority, NSCC redoubles its commitment to serve as a thriving HSI that centers social justice on campus. The need to act now is reflected in the environmental scanning information, which highlights the ways in which the college is uniquely placed in the midst of regional racial, linguistic, and age trends. The catchment area for NSCC has a higher percentage of the state’s Hispanic population, higher retention. For example, while the population of Massachusetts is trending older overall, diverse communities in NSCC’s service area are seeing an increase in high school-aged students, particularly Hispanic and Black populations. Initiatives are already underway to offer ELL students multiple entry points into the college. From noncredit English courses offered at worksites, such as Beverly Hospital, to a noncredit to credit pipeline, NSCC has already begun to ensure access and success for English learners is at the forefront of course offerings.

This strategic priority centers providing such students with Early College pathways and support. This approach is aligned with the Strategic Plan for Racial Equity which highlights the value to students of color of pathways that foster the timely completion of gateway college courses. The college will focus its Early College work in communities with low levels of college attainment, especially for communities of color and other underserved populations. The new Early College high school on NSCC’s Lynn campus is one example of this work, and the college is developing partnership projects with the Saugus and Salem public schools as well. The Frederick Douglass Collegiate Early College High School, housed on our Lynn campus, is the first in the state to be located on a college campus. Innovations such as an embedded early college academy show that the college is actively engaged with the K-12 districts in its service area. As NSCC expands Early College programming and access, emphasis will be placed on growing both the number of credits early college