Innovations
February
2018
Educating students is no longer the only role that community college faculty members are tasked with as part of their job description. They are increasingly forced to wear multiple hats and function more as advisors to their students and as support staff for administrators, helping them to craft strategies to improve graduation rates.
In a move to better understand how these growing responsibilities impact educators and students at community colleges, Public Agenda, in partnership with the League for Innovation in the Community College (the League), administered a survey in 2015 to community...
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Student retention and persistence have become areas of intense focus for college administrators in recent years. The growing concern with student retention is in part due to the recently declining number of high school graduates nationwide (Mertes & Jakoviak, 2016; Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education, 2012). A decreasing number of high school graduates often means fewer potential students eligible to enroll in an institution of higher education (Mertes & Jakoviak, 2016; Troester-Trate, 2017). Enrollment numbers for all types of higher education institutions have...
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Faculty and staff at Moraine Valley Community College in Palos Hills, Illinois, will join students, community members, and area high school students for a full day of open dialogue about diversity in February 2018. The Empowerment Through Diversity and Inclusion Conference will bring awareness about diversity to participants who will have an open platform to share their thoughts on the topic.
Diversity wasn’t always a core value at Moraine Valley like it is today. In 2005, the school brought in a diversity and inclusion consulting firm to conduct a self-study and focus groups that would gauge...
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Two League leaders—Rufus Glasper, current President and CEO, and Terry O'Banion, President Emeritus—discuss the League for Innovation in the Community College's 50 years of innovation.
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Assessment is an integral component to refining teaching, support services, and operations. It informs the choices we make and helps us make continuous improvements to our programs and processes. At Bergen Community College (Bergen), the Assessment Fellows Program provides a systematic approach for college faculty and professional staff to assume leadership in collegewide assessment as well as a unique opportunity to ensure quality of assessment plans for the institution.
After our accreditor noted that Bergen did not have a clear assessment process in place, the college began placing greater...
Every department at a community college has a responsibility to provide the type of customer experience that will contribute to student success. All too often, managers hear questions like, “How does my job really contribute to student success?” from employees who rarely, if ever, work directly with students. When these questions come from Information Technology (IT) personnel, what managers are sometimes hearing is a lack of understanding about how technology influences and impacts what instructors do in their classrooms, online, and after hours. In addition, many students are very...
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SUNY Erie Community College’s (ECC) Information Technology Program was recently honored as the Best Tech Team in Non-Profit/Education by InfoTech WNY as part of the organization’s annual Buffalo Emerging Technology Awards Showcase (BETAS) at Buffalo RiverWorks in May 2017.
“This award is exciting news for a program that’s been thriving for years,” said ECC President Jack Quinn. “Its faculty and staff have done a tremendous job in preparing our students for technology careers across Western New York, so this acknowledgement is deserved, and much appreciated.”
Competing in a category that...
Communicating to students in a way that leads to student satisfaction and success in online courses requires teaching presence. The main instrument of learning is communication and the success of students’ learning depends on the faculty member’s preparedness to engage them in the learning process (Serdyukov & Serdyukova, 2015). Online instructors must, therefore, work to find strategies to improve students’ satisfaction of teaching presence through approaches that address these concerns.
According to Florescu and Pop-Pacurar (2016), one of the most important factors influencing the...
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The League for Innovation prides itself on recognizing innovation and excellence in the community college. Colleges and institutions across the U.S. and abroad demonstrate their dedication to students and communities, and the following awards attest to the League’s support for the daily efforts of faculty, staff, administrators, and students.
League Awards
2018 Riegelman Awards for Excellence in Public Health & Health Navigation Education in Community Colleges: Open through October 31, 2017
2017 John & Suanne Roueche Excellence Awards: Open through December 15, 2017
2017 Terry O’...
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GAME (Growth through Action, Measurement and Engagement) is a workshop series developed by Kansas Small Business Development Center (KSBDC) at Johnson County Community College (JCCC), providing owners of growing businesses the opportunity to work on a strategic plan in a continual, focused, tactical way with the assistance of industry experts, business peers, and Small Business Development Center advisors. The GAME program is open to businesses that have been in operation for more than three years with annual sales in excess of $250,000; the average annual revenue of those enrolled is $700,...
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At 19, Dalton Sasin’s wizardry with a welding wand is taking him places. In July, he began a 20-week specialized welding training program in Port Arthur with Cheniere Energy, who recruited him right out of high school. “It’s extra training that’s going to help me down the road, so I’m looking forward to it,” said Sasin, who learned to weld in classes at Ingleside High School. “I’m glad I went into the program. Now I’m getting a career out of it.”
Once he completes the Cheniere training, which he said pays $23.50 per hour plus a $60 per diem, Sasin plans to complete his associate’s degree in...
September
2017
Play isn’t the first word you think of when you consider earning a college degree. This is serious business, people! Settle down and get to work. Put your nose to the grindstone (whatever that is), shoulder your burdens, gut it out, accept the yoke (again—what does this mean to our students who may not even know what an oxen team is let alone know how to yoke them together). We seem to throw out a lot of images and phrases that may or may not have encouraged us as students oh-so long ago when we pontificate to students about the intrinsic value of hard work. And while learning to work hard...
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It is a glaring truth. No matter how broad the scientific research or how far academia have reached to date, science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields have been and remain a man’s world. Although there have been some changes in the last few decades, for the most part, women and minorities still face disparities (Office of Science and Technology Policy and Office of Personnel Management, 2016).
There are many negatives associated with women and minorities’ limited participation in STEM fields, such as repression of creativity, loss of true innovation (Del Giudice, 2014), lower...
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August
2017
Initiatives are a way of life in education. In institutions run by thinkers and creative types, we jump at the chance to experiment and try new things. We’re the ones who liked playing school so much we stayed in as long as they would let us and then came back to spend our professional lives on a campus. It’s in our blood, and the constant movement of new faces, eager minds, and fascinating disciplines keep us charged up. At San Jacinto College, we realize that these are exciting times to be in education. We’re also careful not to over-extend our people. The possibility of initiative overload...
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Since the launch of the American Graduation Initiative in 2009, the call to increase college graduation rates and to create a better educated workforce for the jobs of the future has become nearly universal. According to Former President Obama, speaking at the University of Texas on August 9, 2010, “in a single generation, [the U.S. has] fallen from first place to 12th place in college graduation rates for young adults" (as cited in de Nies, 2010, para. 3). He advocated for America to “once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world” by 2020 (as cited in Fry, 2017,...
August
2017
Does unintentional plagiarism exist? In a college setting, this question is rather significant. Some purists would claim that it does not exist. Plagiarism is plagiarism. Period. It’s wrong. Everyone knows it’s wrong. As with horseshoes and grenades, there is no almost. As such, so claims this totalitarian approach, all instances of plagiarism must be punished severely.
I wholeheartedly agree with the wrong part. Intentionally taking the intellectual work of another and passing it off as your own is a crime akin to forgery, counterfeiting, and theft. And it is egregious. I do not accept...
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Community College of Allegheny County’s Fire Volunteer Education, Service, and Training Scholarship (FireVEST) program is now in its eighth year. More than 330 Allegheny County volunteer firefighters have participated in this recruitment and retention program. These scholarship recipients serve in 136 of the county’s 187 volunteer fire departments. The only program of its kind in the state, FireVEST is a unique partnership between CCAC, the Allegheny County Executive, and the Allegheny County Fire Academy. Individuals enrolled in the program receive a full scholarship to any associate degree...
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August
2017
Performance funding certainly works in industry. Commission is a proven formula for motivating sales professionals to go out and establish new territories and secure and maintain customers. The bonus system works well in a manufacturing environment, too. Paying work crews additional money for a certain number of accident-free days or incentivizing early project completion can be a sound investment that motivates workers to increase productivity safely and share in the rewards of that efficiency.
The general concept of performance funding has been introduced into the higher education world by...
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August
2017
If any one leg-up boost could be bottled and sold to help new faculty become more comfortable in their roles in college teaching, the best seller would be mentoring. Receiving help—solicited or not—from a colleague who has already experienced what new faculty are encountering can be priceless. From the mundane to the critical, mentors can make the difference between faculty surviving and thriving. Between sticking it out only long enough to secure a better gig and digging in to become a staunch advocate for generations of students. Supporting faculty creates supported, successful students....
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