Academic Counseling for English Students (ACES)

Academic Counseling for English Students (ACES) serves a key goal of Wake Tech’s strategic plan—improving student success in gateway English courses. The college’s English department created this innovative mentorship program to pair at-risk students with English instructors focused on identifying discipline-specific challenges and addressing them with individualized solutions. The relationship developed between student and faculty member establishes trust, builds accountability, and empowers students who often feel marginalized. The department reports that during the initial one-year pilot, 100 percent of the students who worked continuously with project faculty were successful. One successful student stated, “Thank you so much for all your motivation and your inspiration. For some reason, you believe in me, and I swear it is beyond the appointed four times a charm. . . . I am humbly grateful.” As a result of the pilot’s early success, ACES has expanded and will continue to expand. This program offers quality, creativity, and timeliness, and provides a model that can be duplicated in other disciplines.

Innovator

• Laura Ingram, Assistant Professor, English, and Faculty Lead, ACES
• Kelli Keltz, Associate Department Head, English
• Lisa Martin, Associate Department Head, English
• Emily Morris, Assistant Professor, English
• Eileen Sweeney, Professor, English
• John Wells, Associate Professor, English