Clarify the Path
All programs are mapped (with the students' end-goal in mind) to transfer and career and include these features:
- Detailed information on target career and transfer outcomes
- Information on course sequences, critical courses, and recommended contextualized/ complementary general education and elective courses
- Embedded awards and progress milestones
- Mathematics and other core coursework are aligned to each program of study
Get on a Path
These supports will help ensure students get the best start (early momentum):
- Multiple measures to assess students' needs
- First-year experiences to help students explore careers, fields, and majors
- Accelerated/Adaptive curriculum to ensure college-level credit as early as possible
- Full program educational plans
- Contextualized, integrated academic support in gateway and critical courses
- K-12 partnerships focused on career/college program exploration
Stay on a Path
To keep students on path, we want to utilize these supports:
- Ongoing, proactive academic counseling
- Technological tools for students to easily track their progress
- Targeted, contextualized extracurricular programming
- Building community through cohort-based offerings and services
- Systems/procedures to identify students at risk and provide needed supports
Learn on the Path
To enrich and strengthen student learning:
- Program-specific learning outcomes
- Project-based, collaborative learning
- Applied learning experiences
- Inescapable student engagement
- Faculty-led improvement of teaching practices
- Systems/procedures for the college and students to track learning outcomes
- Intentional development of critical thinking skills
If we want different results, we need to design our institutions differently. Building a structure with the students and their end goals in mind results in everything we do being focused on helping students reach their self-defined goals, regardless of the level at which they arrived.