3. Agenda – Virtual Session #2
Introductions (10 min)
Education Expressway (50 min)
What support services are available for
mature students?
How do they know about them?
Persistence Parkway (15 min)
Do your policies support students’ efforts?
Your Best Ideas from Today (10 min)
Confirm next COP topics (5 min)
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4. Services for Mature Students
How are their needs different?
Sandwich generation
Disability issues
Health insurance
Veterans affairs
PLA
Remedial courses
Study skills
Technology assistance
Financial Aid
5. Innovation in Student Services
Financial aid specifically for mature students
Match students with others who can help
Child care/elder care assistance for students
and staff
Transportation solutions
Public transportation pass
Parking/Escort to car
Safety workshops
Inter-campus shuttle
Mature Student Officer
Social Networking Sites
6. Getting the Word Out
Orientation
Emails
Faculty and Staff
Messages through online courseware
Bulletin boards- Actual and electronic
Texting
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7. Keys to Persistence
Planning process tailored to
students’ needs
Self- Motivation
Knowledge of available resources
Supportive network
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8. One Study- Eight Themes
Major life transitions
Multi-faceted educational goals
Awareness of personal assets
Relationships with professors
Peer relationships
Life-role conflicts
Supportive institutional infrastructure
Experiential learning opportunities
8 Source: Mature Students in the Persistence Puzzle, Canadian Council on Learning, 2008
9. The Problem
• Low rates of student persistence in
community colleges
• Community college responses to
persistence frameworks, such as
implementing student support
services, have had minimal impact
in increasing retention and
persistence.
Source: Institutional Policies and Student Use of Support Services: Beware Unintended
Consequences, Community College Research Center, Teachers College/Columbia University
9 Council for Opportunity in Education’s 27th Annual Conference, September 18, 2008
10. Influence of Support Services
• Participating in support services was
related to progress toward a degree
– Of students using two or more
services, 80% made progress toward
a degree
– Of students using fewer than two
services, 60% made progress
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11. Differential Access to Services
• Support services were generally open
to everyone but not all students
accessed them equally
• This inequality was institutionally
structured: Policies and practices
actually discouraged student use of
services
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12. Example: Student Success Courses
• Northern Community College only required full-time
students to take Student Success
– “I asked if I had to take this class, the Forum,
and they said no I don’t have to because I’m
a part-time student. I say what if I go back
and be a full time. [They said] you’re not
now, so you don’t have to.”
– “Sometimes they have like tutors in the
building, peers. But I’ve never been to one
myself personally because usually they
charge.”
• Part-time students are more likely to need the
information provided in these classes
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13. Program Advising
• College counselors
– Available to everyone during mass registration.
Information provided ranged from adequate to
incorrect. Using them is like “throwing darts at a
board.”
• Program counselors or faculty advisors
– Available to those who have declared a major or
completed a certain number of credits. Information
provided was useful but eligibility was confusing.
• “Casual counselors”
– Available to those who take the initiative. Information
provided was most helpful but available to the
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fewest students
14. Unintended Consequences
College policies addressing student support
services inadvertently leave out some students.
Access easiest for those with the most pre-existing
capital
Students entering college with the greatest level of
family resource used more services (2.25 v. 2.0)
Need networks to access services
Part-time, older, low-income students less likely
to create networks or have a chance to
participate
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15. Study Conclusions
“Open access” doesn’t mean all will participate
General advising is less effective than
personalized advising
Savvy students find their own information; the
students who need the information don’t have
the savvy to get it
Word-of-mouth doesn’t reach all students
Students who are part of a network get the best
information; but students who need the
information aren’t part of networks
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17. Next Session
Job Seeker Junction
What’s new in job search coaching?
How much counseling is reasonable?
Social networking, e-folios, video
interviews
LinkedIn – “CAEL Career Pathways
and Counselor Initiative”
Post and check
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Notas do Editor
Vets- Service Members Opportunity Colleges
U of Michigan staff resources available to studentsUniversity College- Cork