Student Success & Retention Resources

A mentor, advisor, or even a friend? Making connections in college makes all the difference. What single factor makes for an excellent college education? As it turns out, it's pretty simple: human relationships. Decades of research demonstrate the transformative potential and the lasting legacies of a relationship-rich college experience. Critics suggest that to build connections with peers, faculty, staff, and other mentors is expensive and only an option at elite institutions where instructors have the luxury of time with students. But in this revelatory book brimming with the voices of students, faculty, and staff from across the country, Peter Felten and Leo M. Lambert argue that relationship-rich environments can and should exist for all students at all types of institutions. In Relationship-Rich Education, Felten and Lambert demonstrate that for relationships to be central in undergraduate education, colleges and universities do not require immense resources, privileged students, or specially qualified faculty and staff. All students learn best in an environment characterized by high expectation and high support, and all faculty and staff can learn to teach and work in ways that enable relationship-based education. Emphasizing the centrality of the classroom experience to fostering quality relationships, Felten and Lambert focus on students' influence in shaping the learning environment for their peers, as well as the key difference a single, well-timed conversation can make in a student's life. They also stress that relationship-rich education is particularly important for first-generation college students, who bring significant capacities to college but often face long-standing inequities and barriers to attaining their educational aspirations. Drawing on nearly 400 interviews with students, faculty, and staff at 29 higher education institutions across the country, Relationship-Rich Educationprovides readers with practical advice on how they can develop and sustain powerful relationship-based learning in their own contexts. Ultimately, the book is an invitation--and a challenge--for faculty, administrators, and student life staff to move relationships from the periphery to the center of undergraduate education.

See also Connections Are Everything: A College Student's Guide to Relationship-Rich Education, which empowers students to seek out relationships by demystifying the varied ways they can cultivate significant connections: https://muse.jhu.edu/book/111986

Decades of research demonstrate how important the relationships with peers and professors are for students academically, personally, and professionally. Yet many students lack the strategies to develop educationally purposeful relationships in college. Connections Are Everything shows students the simple steps they can take to make their own college experience meaningful and transformational. In short, practical chapters, this guide helps readers learn how to build relationships through various strategies, including using "relationship accelerators" like internships and mentorships, undergraduate research, and campus employment. Undergraduate demographics have changed dramatically as students of color and first-generation students become the new majority at colleges and universities across the United States. Connections are particularly significant for these students; the positive—and negative—impacts of peer, faculty, and staff relationships are magnified. Higher education cannot meet students' needs or achieve equity, justice, and inclusion without relationship-rich education. This book empowers students to seek out relationships by demystifying the varied ways they can cultivate significant connections.

A New York Times Bestseller What makes for a happy life, a fulfilling life? A good life? In their "captivating" (The Wall Street Journal) book, the directors of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, the longest scientific study of happiness ever conducted, show that the answer to these questions may be closer than you realize. What makes a life fulfilling and meaningful? The simple but surprising answer is: relationships. The stronger our relationships, the more likely we are to live happy, satisfying, and healthier lives. In fact, the Harvard Study of Adult Development reveals that the strength of our connections with others can predict the health of both our bodies and our brains as we go through life. The invaluable insights in this book emerge from the revealing personal stories of hundreds of participants in the Harvard Study as they were followed year after year for their entire adult lives, and this wisdom was bolstered by research findings from many other studies. Relationships in all their forms--friendships, romantic partnerships, families, coworkers, tennis partners, book club members, Bible study groups--all contribute to a happier, healthier life. And as The Good Life shows us, it's never too late to strengthen the relationships you already have, and never too late to build new ones. The Good Life provides examples of how to do this. Dr. Waldinger's TED Talk about the Harvard Study, "What Makes a Good Life," has been viewed more than 42 million times and is one of the ten most-watched TED talks ever. The Good Life has been praised by bestselling authors Jay Shetty "an empowering quest towards our greatest need: meaningful human connection"), Angela Duckworth ("In a crowded field of life advice...Schulz and Waldinger stand apart"), and happiness expert Laurie Santos ("Waldinger and Schulz are world experts on the counterintuitive things that make life meaningful"). With "insightful [and] interesting" (Daniel Gilbert, New York Times bestselling author of Stumbling on Happiness) life stories, The Good Life shows us how we can make our lives happier and more meaningful through our connections to others.

Feedback is one of the most powerful influences on student achievement, yet it is difficult to implement productively within the constraints of a mass higher education system. Designing Effective Feedback Processes in Higher Education: A Learning-Focused Approach addresses the challenges of developing effective feedback processes in higher education, combining theory and practice to equip and empower educators. It places less emphasis on what teachers do in terms of providing commentary, and more emphasis on how students generate, make sense of, and use feedback for ongoing improvement. Including discussions on promoting student engagement with feedback, technology-enabled feedback, and effective peer feedback, this book: Contributes to the theory and practice of feedback in higher education by showcasing new paradigm feedback thinking focused on dialogue and student uptake Synthesises the evidence for effective feedback practice Provides contextualised examples of successful innovative feedback designs analysed in relation to relevant literature Highlights the importance of staff and student feedback literacy in developing productive feedback partnerships Supports higher education teachers in further developing their feedback practice. Designing Effective Feedback Processes in Higher Education: A Learning-Focused Approach contributes to the theory and practice of higher education pedagogy by re-evaluating how feedback processes are designed and managed. It is a must-read for educators, researchers, and academic developers in higher education who will benefit from a guide to feedback research and practice that addresses well recognised challenges in relation to assessment and feedback.

Covering both higher education and school education, this book contributes to the field of assessment by providing a systematic account of student self-assessment based on a consistent conceptualisation. Yan advocates viewing self-assessment as an active and reflective process and using it as a learning strategy rather than an assessment method. He builds on a newly-developed self-assessment model adopting a process perspective and synthesises a series of interrelated empirical investigations into the whole "chain" of student self-assessment research. The research encompassed in the volume spans from self-assessment practices and measurement, through predictors of self-assessment, its interweaved relationship with self-regulated learning and feedback literacy, impact on student learning outcomes, to designing sustainable self-assessment interventions. The empirical evidence is from a wide range of current scholarship to ensure that the principles and implications conveyed are applicable internationally. Policymakers, students and scholars in educational assessment, educational psychology, and teaching and instruction will find the theoretical explorations and empirical investigations contained within useful, to show how student self-assessment could be better conceptualised, researched, and practised.

When it was originally released, Thriving in Transitions: A Research-Based Approach to College Student Successrepresented a paradigm shift in the student success literature, moving the student success conversation beyond college completion to focus on student characteristics that promote high levels of academic, interpersonal, and intrapersonal performance in the college environment. The authors contend that a focus on remediating student characteristics or merely encouraging specific behaviors is inadequate to promote success in college and beyond. Drawing on research on college student thriving completed since 2012, the newly revised collection presents six research studies describing the characteristics that predict thriving in different groups of college students, including first-year students, transfer students, high-risk students, students of color, sophomores, and seniors, and offers recommendations for helping students thrive in college and life. New to this edition is a chapter focused on the role of faculty in supporting college student thriving.

Reimagining the Culture of Leadership for Student Success A revision to the practical and popular guide, this book asks the crucial question within today's environment, "What's a student-ready college?" Higher education leaders are responsible for preparing their institutions to serve the students they admit in the best way possible. By asking ourselves how we can transform our institutions into student-ready colleges to create a new culture of leadership that is responsive to current challenges and focuses on understanding and utilizing student assets and social capital to achieve shared goals for student success. Becoming a Student-Ready College shows you how. Conversations in higher education tend to focus on defining college readiness for students. Too often, we forget to ask the question from the other side, and we miss important opportunities to develop institutions in ways that can help students thrive. Higher education leaders and educators can better serve today's college students through responsive and redesigned practices and policies. This updated edition features revisions and new material that speak to the social realities of today's incoming students and cover the latest strategies and techniques for connecting with learners to foster equity and success. Leverage existing resources to the benefit of students and deliver the right support at the right time to achieve equity in student outcomes and build on students' assets Design eco-systemic partnerships and support programs that nurture the relationship between the student and the institution Strengthen institutional capacity-building for achieving defined student-ready goals Build shared governance to promote agency and to foster change and collaboration   Becoming a Student-Ready College explores leaders' shared responsibilities in advancing student success and provides practical recommendations for educators at all levels.

The study presents data from 30 colleges and universities in the USA about their recent retention experiences, with data spanning 2018 through Fall 2021. Survey participants discuss how their pandemic experience impacted key retention-oriented student services such as financial aid, academic advising, tutoring, childcare, career services and assessment and how these services will be re-shaped, or not, going forward. Survey participants give key retention rate data for graduate students, adult students, undergraduate students, low income students, STEM students and other demographics and categories. The report also looks at spending on retention oriented consulting services, both current and expected, and looks particularly closely at college efforts, and satisfaction with such efforts, to retain students in lower income and other socially disadvantaged groups. In open ended questions, survey participants describe what they have done well, or not, in recent years and what their expectations are for the near future.

This is the only book to offer an evidence-based model for retaining students and ensuring success across the nursing education spectrum. It is designed to assist faculty in creating, implementing, and evaluating student retention and academic success strategies. This model, Nursing Undergraduate Retention and Success (NURS), can be used effectively with all kinds of nursing programs, both traditional and nontraditional, including diploma, ADN, RN-BS, and accelerated BS. The book features the Nursing Student Retention Toolkit, an easy-to-use digital toolkit for assessment and planning that is thoroughly cross-referenced and integrated into the text. Together, these complementary resources offer a wide selection of educational activities and support strategies for diverse learners and settings. The text provides guidelines for maximizing educational strengths, identifying and assessing at-risk students, facilitating student retention, and revitalizing teaching methods. It examines the multidimensional factors that must be considered, including cultural values and beliefs, and describes proven strategies for promoting retention and academic success such as faculty advisement, promoting professional events and membership, peer partnerships, and enrichment programs. Nursing Student Retention, with its breadth of information and one-of-a-kind digital toolkit, will be of great value to nurse educators, administrators, and graduate students. This new edition features: An easy-to-use format that includes the Nursing Student Retention Toolkit, a digital adjunct containing assessment tools, and templates for designing, implementing, and evaluating retention strategies Chapters updated to provide a wealth of new information and evidence-based strategies Real-life scenarios featuring diverse learners and settings Vignettes to synthesize and demonstrate application of learning

Although access to higher education is virtually universally available, college student retention stills remains a vexing and puzzling problem for educators and legislators. In College Student Retention: Formula for Student Success, second edition, Alan Seidman deals with this problematic issue by examining a number of areas critical to the retention of students, including the history, the theories and concepts, models, and a standardized definition of the term. Seidman and his contributors also lay out the financial implications and trends of retention in one of their updated chapters. Completely new to this edition are three chapters that examine several recent issues: the current theories of retention, retention of online students, and retention in community colleges. Tying all of these components together, Seidman then presents his formula and highly successful model for student success that colleges can implement to effect change in retaining students and helping them to complete their academic and personal goals.

While access to higher education has increased globally, student retention has become a major challenge. This book analyses various aspects of the learning pathways of black students from a range of disciplinary backgrounds at a relatively elite, English-medium, historically white South African university. The students are part of a generation of young black people who have grown up in the new South Africa and are gaining access to higher education in unprecedented numbers. Based on two longitudinal case studies, Negotiating Learning and Identity in Higher Education makes a contribution to the debates about how to facilitate access and graduation of working-class students. The longitudinal perspective enabled the students participating in the research to reflect on their transition to university and the stumbling blocks they encountered in their senior years. The contributors show that the school-to-university transition is not linear or universal. Students had to negotiate multiple transitions at various times and both resist and absorb institutional, disciplinary and home discourses. The book describes and analyses the students' ambivalence as they straddle often conflicting discourses within their disciplines; within the institution; between home and the institution, and as they occupy multiple subject positions that are related to the boundaries of place and time. Each chapter also describes the ways in which the institution supports and/or hinders students' progress, explores the implications of its findings for models of support and addresses the issue of what constitutes meaningful access to institutional and disciplinary discourses.

From scholars working in a variety of institutional and geographic contexts and with a wide range of student populations, Retention, Persistence, and Writing Programs offers perspectives on how writing programs can support or hinder students' transitions to college. The contributors present individual and program case studies, student surveys, a wealth of institutional retention data, and critical policy analysis. Rates of student retention in higher education are a widely acknowledged problem: although approximately 66 percent of high school graduates begin college, of those who attend public four-year institutions, only about 80 percent return the following year, with 58 percent graduating within six years. At public two-year institutions, only 60 percent of students return, and fewer than a third graduate within three years. Less commonly known is the crucial effect of writing courses on these statistics. First-year writing is a course that virtually all students have to take; thus, writing programs are well-positioned to contribute to larger institutional conversations regarding retention and persistence and should offer themselves as much-needed sites for advocacy, research, and curricular innovation. Retention, Persistence, and Writing Programs is a timely resource for writing program administrators as well as for new writing teachers, advisors, administrators, and state boards of education. Contributors: Matthew Bridgewater, ?Cristine Busser, Beth Buyserie, Polina Chemishanova, ?Michael Day, ?Bruce Feinstein, ?Patricia Freitag Ericsson, ?Nathan Garrett, ?Joanne Baird Giordano, ?Tawanda Gipson, ?Sarah E. Harris, Mark Hartlaub, ?Holly Hassel, ?Jennifer Heinert, ?Ashley J. Holmes, ?Rita Malenczyk, ?Christopher P. Parker, ?Cassandra Phillips, ?Anna Plemons, ?Pegeen Reichert Powell, ?Marc Scott, Robin Snead, ?Sarah Elizabeth Snyder, ?Sara Webb-Sunderhaus, ?Susan Wolff Murphy

This is a book for all faculty who are concerned with promoting the persistence of all students whom they teach. Most recognize that faculty play a major role in student retention and success because they typically have more direct contact with students than others on campus. However, little attention has been paid to role of the faculty in this specific mission or to the corresponding characteristics of teaching, teacher-student interactions, and connection to student affairs activities that lead to students' long-term engagement, to their academic success, and ultimately to graduation. At a time when the numbers of underrepresented students - working adults, minority, first-generation, low-income, and international students - is increasing, this book, a companion to her earlier Teaching Underprepared Students, addresses that lack of specific guidance by providing faculty with additional evidence-based instructional practices geared toward reaching all the students in their classrooms, including those from groups that traditionally have been the least successful, while maintaining high standards and expectations. Recognizing that there are no easy answers, Kathleen Gabriel offers faculty ideas that can be incorporated in, or modified to align with, faculty's existing teaching methods. She covers topics such as creating a positive and inclusive course climate, fostering a community of learners, increasing engagement and students' interactions, activating connections with culturally relevant material, reinforcing self-efficacy with growth mindset and mental toughness techniques, improving lectures by building in meaningful educational activities, designing reading and writing assignments for stimulating deep learning and critical thinking, and making grade and assessment choices that can promote learning.

Student retention has become a key issue for all further and higher education institutions and is a major concern among those involved in online learning courses where retention rates are often even poorer than those for traditional campus-based courses. There is increasing recognition that student retention is the responsibility of the actual institutions running the courses, and that it is within their power to encourage sustained participation without compromising academic standards.In this book, Ormond Simpson provides a clear, accessible analysis of what works and at what cost. He outlines strategies for increasing retention, providing useful case studies and examples to illustrate how these strategies can change institutional policy and practice. Areas covered include:• Who drops out and why• Integration• Reclamation•'Retentioneering'an institution• Recruitment and retention• Course design.

With the passage of the Post-9/11 GI Bill in 2008, more than 1.4 million service members and their families became eligible for higher education benefits, and veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan enrolled in colleges and universities in record numbers. The first wave of research about these new student veterans focused primarily on describing their characteristics and the transition from military service to civilian life and the college campus. This new edited collection presents findings from the second wave of research about student veterans, with a focus on data-driven evidence of academic success factors, including persistence, retention, degree completion, and employment after college. An invaluable resource for educators poised to enter the next phase of supporting military-connected college students.

This is a guide for teachers entering or continuing in the specific realm of adult education of students who are at-risk due to their criminal backgrounds, substance abuse issues or undiagnosed learning disabilities. The book provides readers with an overview of the teaching challenges for this population of students, presents research on their unique challenges as learners, and provides teachers with evidence-based practices to enhance the success of this adult learner population.

At-Risk Students: Transforming Student Behavior details the warning signs of disturbing behaviors, which are often overlooked by educators and/or misdiagnosed by mental health professionals. Educators will be provided with the tools to: expeditiously identify at-risk characteristics; incorporate policies that support and monitor their achievement; implement research-based strategies designed to create a positive school culture that promotes teaching and learning. At-risk Students was written for district and school administrators, department heads, teachers, individuals employed in a traditional public or charter school system, staff in an alternative school working with at-risk students, as well as anyone looking to incorporate a comprehensive behavior system into their strategic school improvement plans as a response to intervention. At-risk Students is a must-read supplement for graduate students seeking a degree in educational administration. Additional FREE features are available to download for this book at www.rowman.com.

This book is premised on the need for institutional transformation in higher education (HE), changing institutional structures, processes and governance, and developing an inclusive culture and altering processes of knowledge creation (research) and knowledge transfer (learning and teaching). Key features include: developing the concept of institutional transformation and student engagement to widen participation in HE and improve student retention and success; providing an analysis of how well institutions in England are doing in terms of taking a whole institution approach to widening participation, student diversity and success; exploring the meaning of institutional transformation in relation to outreach, admissions, induction and transition, learning and teaching, personal tutoring and support, research and progression beyond HE; identifying approaches to managing institutional transformation; involving students in the process of transformation; and, illustrating and developing these themes through a serious of mini international case studies. This book helps readers engage with a number of core HE issues that have dominated UK and International policy over recent years.

The purpose of this book is to assist post-traditional students to achieve success in the Occupational, Workforce, and Leadership Studies (OWLS) Department and develop their individualized pathway to earn the interdisciplinary Bachelor of Applied Arts and Sciences (BAAS) degree at Texas State University. Applied baccalaureate degrees incorporate higher-order thinking skills and advanced technical knowledge and skills with applied coursework. BAAS students may also earn college-level credits through prior learning assessment (PLA), evaluating and credentialing knowledge and skills gained outside the classroom. The organization and content of this book provides adult degree program faculty and leaders an example of how one required textbook develops and supports the outcomes and activities in all the core courses of an interdisciplinary degree program designed for post-traditional adult learners. The majority of the students earning the BAAS degree are post-traditional students. They are often defined with some or all of these characteristics: over age 25 years old when starting or returning to college, may not have a traditional high school diploma, enroll part-time, work full-time, are financially independent, have dependents other than a spouse and may be a single parent. These students juggle multiple roles and responsibilities in the family, workplace, and community. Post-traditional students bring rich work/life experiences, may be experiencing personal and/or professional transitions, have clear career goals, and often finance their education. They seek flexible programs including online education, PLA, and accelerated course formats. Thus, post-traditional students want active, collaborative, and interactive learning relevant to career and other roles and goals.

Winner of the 2020 Scholarly Contributions to Teaching and Learning Award from the American Sociological Association Many students struggle with the transition from high school to university life. This is especially true of first-generation college students, who are often unfamiliar with the norms and expectations of academia. College professors usually want to help, but many feel overwhelmed by the prospect of making extra time in their already hectic schedules to meet with these struggling students. 33 Simple Strategies for Faculty is a guidebook filled with practical solutions to this problem. It gives college faculty concrete exercises and tools they can use both inside and outside of the classroom to effectively bolster the academic success and wellbeing of their students. To devise these strategies, educational sociologist Lisa M. Nunn talked with a variety of first-year college students, learning what they find baffling and frustrating about their classes, as well as what they love about their professors' teaching.   Combining student perspectives with the latest research on bridging the academic achievement gap, she shows how professors can make a difference by spending as little as fifteen minutes a week helping their students acculturate to college life. Whether you are a new faculty member or a tenured professor, you are sure to find 33 Simple Strategies for Faculty to be an invaluable resource.  

Increasing Student Engagement and Retention Using Classroom Technologies: Classroom Response Systems and Mediated Discourse Technologies examines new research on how classroom response systems are being used in higher education to increase learner engagement in an epoch of increasing globalization and diversity. These enabling technologies are reshaping and reframing the practice of teaching and learning in higher education. Through case studies, surveys, and literature reviews, this volume will examine how classroom response systems are being used to improve collaboration and interactivity between students, to create engaging social learning communities in the classroom, and how these technologies are being used to create more meaningful and authentic learning experiences. This volume will also discuss a framework for adopting and deploying these technologies.

Increasing Student Engagement and Retention Using Multimedia Technologies: Video Annotation, Multimedia Applications, Videoconferencing and Transmedia Storytelling examines new research on how videoconferencing, video annotation, video mapping, and related technologies are being used in higher education to increase learner engagement in an epoch of increasing globalization and diversity. These enabling technologies are reshaping and reframing the practice of teaching and learning in higher education. Through case studies, surveys, and literature reviews, this volume will examine how video, mapping, and related technologies are being used to improve writing/publishing skills, academic literacies in students, and create engaging communities of practice through digital storytelling, narratives, and inter-culturalism. This volume will also discuss a framework for deploying and assessing these technologies.

Increasing Student Engagement and Retention in e-Learning Environments: Web 2.0 and Blended Learning Technologies examines new research on how online and blended learning technologies are being used in higher education to increase learner engagement in an era of increasing technological convergence and dependence. These enabling technologies are reshaping and reframing the practice of teaching and learning in higher education. Through case studies, surveys, and literature reviews, this volume will examine online and blended technologies are being used to improve academic literacies in students, to create engaging communities of practice, and how these technologies are being used to improve learner motivation and self-empowered learners. This volume will also discuss a framework for adopting and deploying these technologies.

"Increasing Student Engagement and Retention using Social Technologies: Facebook, e-portfolios and other Social Networking Services" uses case studies, surveys, and literature reviews to examine how these social media technologies are being used to improve writing and publishing skills in students, create engaging communities of practice, and how these tools are being used for e-Mentoring and constructing online reputations. Chapters include applying positive psychology and cognitive styles in user design, designing outcome based curricula using student personality types, engaging second language students through electronic writing tasks, applying psychological variables on the academic use of social media, using social media to motivate students to take charge of their own learning processes, and creatively using technology to enhance teacher education. This volume will also discuss a framework for deploying and assessing these technologies in higher education institutions.

"Increasing Student Engagement and Retention using Online Learning Activities: Wikis, Blogs and WebQuests" uses case studies, surveys, and literature reviews to critically examine how these technologies are being used to improve writing and publishing skills, student subject awareness, and literacy create engaging communities of practice, and as experiential learning tools. Chapters include ones on the design for a robust use of wikis, using blogs to enhance student engagement by creating a community of practice around a course, integrating blogs across a range of college level courses, publishing activist biographies on Wikipedia, using blogs to increase off-campus student engagement, using video and wiki technology to engage learners in large international cohorts, using wikis as an experiential learning tool, consuming and constructing knowledge through WebQuests, and rethinking WebQuests in second language teacher education. This volume will also discuss frameworks for deploying and assessing the effectiveness of these technologies.

Praise for Transformative Conversations "In the 'superstorm' of writings about the crisis in higher education this little gem of a book stands out like a mindfulness bell. It calls us back to the only thing that truly matters--the energy and wisdom buried in the minds and hearts of dedicated educators." --Diana Chapman Walsh, president emerita, Wellesley College; trustee emerita, Amherst College; member of the MIT Corporation "This book is revolutionary! It is about transforming the very essence of higher education through the power of authentic conversation, knowing that as the people within the institution evolve, the institution will transform." --Patricia and Craig Neal, The Art of Convening: Authentic Engagement in Meetings, Gatherings, and Conversations; founders, Heartland Inc. "This is a radical story about how to create a more intimate and relational culture inside the halls of higher education.... for those who long for higher education to return from the abyss of siloed isolation to its original charter as a cooperative learning institution committed to developing the whole person in service of the common good." --Peter Block, Flawless Consulting and Abundant Community Transformative Conversations offers guidance to help readers create and sustain Formation Mentoring Communities, where faculty, staff, and administrators can speak openly and honestly to the heart of their work as educators and human beings.

College has the power to transform students into intentional, critical, and engaged people. The recent trend of trying to measure higher education's return on investment misses a fundamental point, argue Charity Johansson and Peter Felten. The central purpose of a college or university is to transform the lives of students--not to merely change them or help them mature. This transformation is an ongoing process of intentionally aligning one's behavior with one's core sense of personal identity. It is the university's central role to lead students in this transformation, a process that shapes students into intentional, critical, and engaged individuals. Recognizing the remarkable influence of the college experience on peoples' lives, the authors offer a guide to how colleges and universities can effectively lead students through this life-changing process. Drawn from extensive interviews with students and graduates, faculty and staff, Transforming Students gathers diverse stories to show how students experience the transformation process, which rarely follows a neat or linear path. The interviews illustrate central themes from the literature on transformative learning and the undergraduate student experience. A sequel of sorts to George Keller's classic Transforming a College--which chronicled Elon University's metamorphosis from struggling college to a top regional university--Transforming Studentsaddresses the school's core educational mission: to shape students into engaged adults who embrace learning as a lifelong endeavor. Given this effect, the college experience is much more than preparation for a career. It is preparation for life.

A guide to developing productive student-faculty partnerships in higher education Student-faculty partnerships is an innovation that is gaining traction on campuses across the country. There are few established models in this new endeavor, however. Engaging Students as Partners in Learning and Teaching: A Guide for Faculty offers administrators, faculty, and students both the theoretical grounding and practical guidelines needed to develop student-faculty partnerships that affirm and improve teaching and learning in higher education. Provides theory and evidence to support new efforts in student-faculty partnerships Describes various models for creating and supporting such partnerships Helps faculty overcome some of the perceived barriers to student-faculty partnerships Suggests a range of possible levels of partnership that might be appropriate in different circumstances Includes helpful responses to a range of questions as well as advice from faculty, students, and administrators who have hands-on experience with partnership programs Balancing theory, step-by-step guidelines, expert advice, and practitioner experience, this book is a comprehensive why- and how-to handbook for developing a successful student-faculty partnership program.

A clear, practical framework for getting higher education back on track The Undergraduate Experience is a guide for significantly improving student learning and institutional performance in the rapidly changing world of higher education. Written by recognized experts in undergraduate education, this book encourages college and university leaders to rethink current practices that fragment the student experience, and to focus on creating powerful, integrated undergraduate learning for all students. Drawing from their own deep experience and the latest research, the authors reveal key principles that enable institutional change and enhance student outcomes in any higher education setting. Coverage includes high-impact practices for engagement, the importance of strategic leadership, the necessity of setting and maintaining high expectations, and insight on fostering excellence through systematic planning. Through its core themes and action principles, this book can be a valuable resource for faculty, staff, administrators, and governing boards at all types of postsecondary institutions. The book provides a practical framework for achieving excellence in undergraduate education by focusing on: Learning Relationships Expectations Alignment Improvement Leadership The value of an undergraduate education is under greater scrutiny than ever before, and campus leaders must be able to convey the value of their institutions to students, boards, donors, and legislators. Is a college or university degree worth the increasing cost? Are today's students academically adrift? What's the difference between a degree and an education? Responding to these questions requires focused action by individuals and institutions. The Undergraduate Experience offers practical guidance for creating and sustaining excellence in the face of disruption and change in higher education.

Colleges and universities silo diversity and inclusion by creating specific courses to address them, or programs to welcome and support people with a range of identities, whereas in reality students, faculty and staff do not encounter diversity in the fractured ways that match the organizational structures of our institutions. We all simultaneously embody a variety of identities with different saliency in different circumstances and times. This book offers models for institutions to move intentionally toward intersections - of study abroad and multiculturalism, of race and gender and religion, and of other essential aspects of our educational programs and our students' identities - to open doors to new possibilities that better prepare our students for life in a diverse world, and that allow our institutions to become more efficient and effective as we strive to not simply do things better in our own separate spheres, but to do better things by working together across difference. Each chapter offers action-oriented analysis focusing on particular campus intersections, rather than attending to specific demographic groups. Chapter authors also build on their own local expertise of doing this work on campuses that often do not have deep pockets or rich histories of such efforts. The book is organized into three sections: * Peoplefocuses on diversity broadly defined, considering questions about how we recruit and engage the students, faculty, and staff in the campus community, and how we work with governing boards and others to promote inclusive excellence. * Environmentfocuses on inclusion, including residence life, the local community, the working and learning environment, and external factors and events such as national and international news or town gown relationships. * Learningfocuses on perspective taking and learning about difference in the core curriculum, the disciplines, and the co-curriculum, as well as professional development for faculty and staff. This ground reaking book helps readers, no matter what position they occupy on campus, to develop the knowledge and capacities necessary to create inclusive classrooms and is premised on the understanding that identity, oppression, power and marginalization cannot be addressed by looking solely at single identities.

Chalkboards and projectors are familiar tools for most college faculty, but when new technologies become available, instructors aren't always sure how to integrate them into their teaching in meaningful ways. For faculty interested in supporting student learning, determining what's possible and what's useful can be challenging in the changing landscape of technology. Arguing that teaching and learning goals should drive instructors' technology use, not the other way around, Intentional Tech explores seven research-based principles for matching technology to pedagogy. Through stories of instructors who creatively and effectively use educational technology, author Derek Bruff approaches technology not by asking "How to?" but by posing a more fundamental question: "Why?"

College Belonging reveals how colleges' and universities' efforts to foster a sense of belonging in their students are misguided. Colleges bombard new students with the message to "get out there!" and "find your place" by joining student organizations, sports teams, clubs and the like. Nunn shows that this reflects a flawed understanding of what belonging is and how it works. Drawing on the sociological theories of Emile Durkheim, College Belonging shows that belonging is something that members of a community offer to each other. It is something that must be given, like a gift. Individuals cannot simply walk up to a group or community and demand belonging. That's not how it works. The group must extend a sense of belonging to each and every member. It happens by making a person feel welcome, to feel that their presence matters to the group, that they would be missed if they were gone. This critical insight helps us understand why colleges' push for students simply to "get out there!" does not always work. 

Higher education institutions have experienced a sharp increase in demand for accountability. To meet the growing demand by legislators, accreditors, consumers, taxpayers, and parents for evidence of successful outcomes, this important book provides higher education leaders and practitioners with actionable strategies for developing a comprehensive data culture throughout the entire institution. Exploring key considerations necessary for the development of an effective data culture in colleges and universities, this volume brings together diverse voices and perspectives, including institutional researchers, senior academic leaders, and faculty. Each chapter focuses on a critical element of managing or influencing a data culture, approaches for breaking through common challenges, and concludes with practical, research-based implementation strategies. Collectively, these strategies form a comprehensive list of recommendations for developing a data culture and becoming a change agent within your higher education institution.

This valuable resource helps institutional leaders understand and implement a data strategy at their college or university that maximizes benefits to all creators and users of data. Exploring key considerations necessary for coordination of fragmented resources and the development of an effective, cohesive data strategy, this book brings together professionals from different higher education experiences and perspectives, including academic, administration, institutional research, information technology, and student affairs. Focusing on critical elements of data strategy and governance, each chapter in Data Strategy in Colleges and Universities helps higher education leaders address a frustrating problem with much-needed solutions for fostering a collaborative, data-driven strategy. 　

Research suggests that as many as a quarter of all undergraduate students may find themselves on academic probation during their collegiate years. If students on probation choose to return to their institutions the semester following notification, they find themselves in a unique transitional period between poor academic performance and either dismissal or recovery. Effectively supporting students through this transition may help to decrease equity gaps in higher education. As recent literature implies, the same demographic factors that affect students' retention and persistence rates (e.g., gender, race and ethnicity, age) also affect the rate at which students find themselves on academic probation. This book serves as a resource for practitioners and institutional leaders. The volume presents a variety of interventions and institutional strategies for supporting the developmental and emotional needs of students on probation in the first year and beyond. The chapters in this book are the result of years of dedication and passion for supporting students on probation by the individual chapter authors. While the chapters reflect a culmination of combined decades of personal experiences and education, collectively they amount to the beginning of a conversation long past due. Scholarship on the impact of academic recovery models on student success and persistence is limited. Historically, attention and resources have been directed toward establishing and strengthening the first-year experience, sophomore programs, and student-success efforts to prevent students from ending up on academic probation. However, a focus on preventative measures without a consideration of academic recovery program design considering the successes of these programs is futile. This volume should be of interest to academics and practitioners focused on creating or refining institutional policies and interventions for students on academic probation. The aim is to provide readers with the language, tools, and theoretical points of view to advocate for and to design, reform, and/or execute high-quality, integrated academic recovery programs on campus. Historically, students on probation have been an understudied and underserved population, and this volume serves as a call to action.

Inclusive instruction is teaching that recognizes and affirms a student's social identity as an important influence on teaching and learning processes, and that works to create an environment in which students are able to learn from the course, their peers, and the teacher while still being their authentic selves. It works to disrupt traditional notions of whosucceeds in the classroom and the systemic inequities inherent in traditional educational practices.--Full-time Academic Professional, Doctorate-granting University, Education This book uniquely offers the distilled wisdom of scores of instructors across ranks, disciplines and institution types, whose contributions are organized into a thematic framework that progressively introduces the reader to the key dispositions, principles and practices for creating the inclusive classroom environments (in person and online) that will help their students succeed. The authors asked the hundreds of instructors whom they surveyed as part of a national study to define what inclusive teaching meant to them and what inclusive teaching approaches they implemented in their courses. The instructors' voices ring loudly as the authors draw on their responses, building on their experiences and expertise to frame the conversation about what inclusive teachers do. The authors in addition describe their own insights and practices, integrating and discussing current literature relevant to inclusive teaching to ensure a research-supported approach. Inclusive teaching is no longer an option but a vital teaching competency as our classrooms fill with racially diverse, first generation, and low income and working class students who need a sense of belonging and recognition to thrive and contribute to the construction of knowledge. The book unfolds as an informal journey that allows the reader to see into other teachers' practices. With questions for reflection embedded throughout the book, the authors provide the reader with an inviting and thoughtful guide to develop their own inclusive teaching practices. By utilizing the concepts and principles in this book readers will be able to take steps to transform their courses into spaces that are equitable and welcoming, and adopt practical strategies to address the various inclusion issues that can arise. The book will also appeal to educational developers and staff who support instructors in their inclusive teaching efforts. It should find a place in reflective workshops, book clubs and learning communities exploring this important topic.

Sense of belonging refers to the extent a student feels included, accepted, valued, and supported on their campus. The developmental process of belonging is interwoven with the social identity development of diverse college students. Moreover, belonging is influenced by the campus environment, relationships, and involvement opportunities as well as a need to master the student role and achieve academic success. Although the construct of sense of belonging is complex and multilayered, a consistent theme across the chapters in this book is that the relationship between sense of belonging and intersectionality of identity cannot be ignored, and must be integrated into any approach to fostering belonging. Over the last 10 years, colleges and universities have started grappling with the notion that their approaches to maintaining and increasing student retention, persistence, and graduation rates were no longer working. As focus shifted to uncovering barriers to student success while concurrently recognizing student success as more than solely academic factors, the term "student sense of belonging" gained traction in both academic and co-curricular settings. The editors noticed the lack of a consistent definition, or an overarching theoretical approach, as well as a struggle to connect disparate research. A compendium of research, applications, and approaches to sense of belonging did not exist, so they brought this book into being to serve as a single point of reference in an emerging and promising field of study.