Innovations
Predicting the future may be a fool’s errand, but as technology evolves and societal changes occur, it is necessary for higher education leaders to consider the next phase of curriculum offerings. For the purposes of this article, the next phase will be viewed through the lens of new courses that institutions may offer as soon as 2030, if not before. A common phrase touted by college leaders and administrators for several years now is, “We are preparing students for jobs that do not yet exist.” Thankfully, there are thinktanks, advisory boards, datasets, and other tools offering predictive...
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Transform_ED is a year-long Austin Community College District (ACC) research initiative and plan to anticipate and address future changes in higher education. The purpose of the research is to “analyze how external factors may impact future programmatic growth and student success at ACC to inform strategic positioning and decision-making" (Austin Community College District, n.d., Mission). The program brings together representatives from ACC’s Instruction Division, Student Affairs Division, and Teaching & Learning Excellence Division (TLED) to:
Anticipate changes in higher education and...
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Community colleges are complicated environments impacted by precarious funding models, population shifts, burgeoning enrollments of students with nonacademic barriers to success, and more. An institutional climate can easily become volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA). In 1985, Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus’s Leaders: Strategies for Taking Charge, “emphasized the need for leaders to be adaptable, comfortable with uncertainty and ambiguity, and capable of navigating complex environments” (VUCA-WORLD, n.d., para. 3). In 1987, the U.S. military coined the term VUCA (Wright, 2023),...
The Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (OMHAS) found a 353 percent increase in demand for behavioral health treatment between 2013 and 2019 (Hernandez & Lampl, 2021). Additionally, 2.4 million Ohioans live in communities that lack adequate behavioral health professionals (Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addition Services, 2023). In response to this crisis, a collaboration was formed between OMHAS and the Ohio Departments of Higher Education and Medicaid. The mission of the resulting Ohio Wellness Workforce Great Minds Fellowship is to increase the number of...
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Literature has pinpointed metrics such as credits earned and course success as important measures to best determine academic momentum for community college students (Attewell, Heil, & Reisel, 2012; Jenkins & Bailey, 2017). In fall 2020, Anne Arundel Community College’s (AACC) average course success rate was 72 percent. However, success rates at the section level often varied widely for the same course. Equity gaps existed among student groups with different demographic characteristics and based on course and section designs, such as modality and section length. To address the issue,...
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In November 2021, 16 unemployed or underemployed individuals began their journey toward bettering their lives and those of their families by becoming the first cohort to participate in Santa Fe College’s (SF) new Achieve, Conquer, Believe and Excel (ACB Excel) program. ACB Excel’s mission is to empower members of the SF community who want to break the cycle of poverty, but need the financial and emotional support to do so. The concept for this program stemmed from conversations that the college’s president, Dr. Paul Broadie II, had with community leaders regarding local economic needs and...
Valuing faculty and staff development as an essential component to enhancing student success, Community College of Baltimore County (CCBC) has developed a twofold approach to supporting pedagogical inquiry and learning. First, the college founded an academic journal, Teaching and Learning Excellence through Scholarship (TALES), as a mechanism to encourage faculty engagement in the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL). Second, CCBC established a journal club for faculty to foster a culture of curiosity and lifelong learning in pedagogy. Both of these initiatives are low-cost and high-...
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Congratulations to the 2023-2024 Innovation of the Year Award winners from 28 participating League member colleges! The League initiated the Innovation of the Year Award over 35 years ago to recognize local community college programs and initiatives that reflect the spirit of innovation and experimentation on which our organization was founded. The award provides an opportunity for colleges to showcase their innovative efforts; celebrate the dedicated educators, staff, and administrators who are responsible for this exceptional work; and promote a culture of innovation at their institutions....
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Dallas College, originally Dallas County Community College District (DCCCD), opened in 1965 and evolved into seven independent colleges positioned to meet the rapidly growing needs of the now second most populous county in the U.S. In 2020, DCCCD consolidated its individual colleges into a one-college system, with each campus location embracing the opportunities and challenges that manifest in a thriving metropolitan area.
At most higher education institutions, technology enables students to interact with a system in real time, 24/7, throughout the year. However, Hanover Research (2024)...
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Foothill-De Anza Community College District: A Creative Approach to Increasing Access to Internships
In 2019, Foothill College Workforce Development nurtured an idea: What if we could remove one of the biggest barriers students face when entering the workforce with a low-stakes opportunity to gain experience and an internship? Students want to work, but industry professionals want to hire those who already have experience. The flip side of this scenario is that companies won’t hire those without experience and students can’t gain experience if no one will hire them. Our goal became providing students with work experience and an opportunity to explore career opportunities that they wouldn't...
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Student access and success are foundational to the community college mission. The learning paradigm proposed by Barr and Tagg (1995) initiated the student success movement, which paved the way for the completion agenda in the 2000s. However, only approximately 26 percent of community college students transfer to a four-year institution (Sansing-Helton et al., 2021). The situation is even bleaker when we evaluate the STEM fields. According to the Community College Research Center (2022), low-income community college students are less likely to transfer to a STEM field, and only 14 percent of...
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Jackson College has been committed to providing excellent education and support to its students for over 95 years. In today's fast-paced world, college students' requirements and needs are evolving. To address these needs, Jackson College has initiated a pilot program called Harriet's Hub, which serves as a one-stop student resource center.
The name hearkens back to the college’s heritage, remembering a former faculty member, Harriet Myer, who helped college students by establishing a student assistance fund. With two rooms of dedicated space in the college’s library, the hub provides...
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The global response to generative AI (GenAI) has been varied and dynamic. There is rapid adoption in some sectors, cautious exploration in others, and a growing push for regulation. Businesses and educational institutions worldwide are leveraging GenAI to innovate and enhance productivity, from automating routine tasks to generating new content and insights. However, this enthusiasm is tempered by concerns over privacy, security, intellectual property, and the ethical implications of AI-generated content. Governments and regulatory bodies are beginning to respond, with the goal of...
Critical thinking and clinical judgement of the nursing student is essential to the preparation of a competent novice nurse. Opportunities for students to practice making high-stakes decisions independently can be limited in the live clinical setting, for obvious safety reasons. Variations among local clinical placements may further limit the ability for entire cohorts to experience equitable patient cases. In addition, multiple nursing schools are competing for a limited number of clinical sites, straining programs’ abilities to meet clinical contact hour requirements. High-quality...
In 2022, Humber College launched the Bhutan Education and Skills Training (BEST) project, a five-year, $4.8 million (CND) initiative funded through the Government of Canada to support the reformation of the technical and vocational education and training (TVET) system in Bhutan’s technical training institutions. The project unites Humber College, Bhutan’s Ministry of Education and Skills Development, 10 national TVET institutions across Bhutan, the private sector, and local civil society organizations. The project is focused on building institutional capacity to support students who are often...
At Southern Alberta Institute of Technology (SAIT), we are leaders in applied education; we centre technology in our teaching and programming to equip our graduates with skills to be the problem-solvers of tomorrow. In fall 2023, SAIT welcomed Dr. Bill Rankin as Expert in Residence to facilitate the development of innovative teaching and learning approaches through the integration of new and emerging technologies. Through his Teaching Innovators Programme, Rankin will work with SAIT instructors to push the limits of technology integration in their own pedagogy.
“What is really powerful about...
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In a world fixated on conventional measures of success, the call to empower students as agents of change resounds with urgency. The journey begins by shifting our educational paradigm, placing intrinsic factors like competence, authenticity, and connection at the forefront. As we embark on this transformative endeavor, the following principles delve into practical steps to enhance student engagement and motivation, amplify student voices, and foster collaborative experiences. We envision a realm where education transcends mere preparation for an undefined future and instead becomes a catalyst...
Embracing neurodiversity in educational environments entails challenging traditional perspectives on cognitive differences. The term neurodiversity acknowledges the inherent variation in neurological functioning, emphasizing that diverse cognitive profiles contribute to the richness of the human experience. It encompasses conditions such as autism spectrum disorder, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), dyslexia, dyspraxia/developmental coordination disorder, Tourette syndrome, sensory processing disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, and social pragmatic communication disorder,...
Delta College exists as a microcosm of our larger society and is, therefore, impacted by historical inequities. Many sociocultural factors prevail at Delta College which predate the current student body, faculty, staff, and administration. Nonetheless, we cannot deny that we all contribute to the current health and vitality of our learning community. Grace Lee Boggs (Harewood & Keefer, 2009) wisely asserted that “you cannot change any society unless you take responsibility for it, unless you see yourself as belonging to it and responsible for changing it” (para. 60). We are committed to...
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With a focus on accessibility, diversity, and job-relevant education, community colleges are well-positioned to address the evolving needs of students and the workforce. Within the broader field of higher education, community colleges can serve as laboratories for experimentation in pedagogy and curriculum while providing affordable and high-quality education (Hadzi-Antich, 2023).
Recognizing the crucial role of quality and innovative teaching, Johnson County Community College (JCCC) used its strategic plan to leverage student learning to the forefront of institutional initiatives. Goal 1,...
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