Innovations
Postsecondary institutions have long recognized the importance of student success and retention, with many colleges and universities explicitly emphasizing these goals in their strategic plans (Darabi & Garland, 2018). Throughout the United States, campus learning centers, which the National College Learning Center Association defines as “interactive academic spaces which exist to reinforce and extend student learning in physical and/or virtual environments” (as cited in Darabi & Garland, 2018, p. 4), regularly contribute to success and retention efforts. Delta College, which serves...
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Virtual student exchange programs have been implemented by higher education institutions across the globe. The Stevens Initiative (2021) found that 214 colleges and universities offered 3,073 virtual exchange programs from fall 2020 to summer 2021 and that 62 of the responding institutions had more than five years of experience with virtual exchanges. These programs, which offer platforms for students to communicate, collaborate, cooperate, and achieve their learning objectives by building learner communities, have been coined by scholars as Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL...
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April
2023
Authors’ Note: This article is largely excerpted from the authors’ full study report, The Philosophy and Practice of General Education in Community Colleges in the United States, which was presented as a paper at the 2022 International Symposium on General Education and published in the associated Journal of General Education and Multi-Culture (2022), both sponsored by Shih Hsin University, Taiwan. Excerpts of the full study also appeared in the League for Innovation in the Community College’s Learning Abstracts, 24(12), “Understanding general education in the community college: A national...
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To revitalize the teaching of liberal arts and humanities and improve outcomes in gateway courses, motivated faculty and the Liberal Arts and Humanities Division Dean at Austin Community College formed the Liberal Arts Gateway (LAG)—an incubator for curricular innovation that increased student engagement and retention. Starting with seven faculty in spring 2020, the program now includes almost 50 faculty and offers over 75 sections of redesigned gateway courses in four disciplines. Early data reveal that LAG courses, specifically in the formative Composition I course, outpace traditional...
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Much like online learning, the concept of course sharing is not new; for decades, college students have taken classes at nearby schools that offer seats for visiting learners. In fact, online course sharing originated in community colleges in the late 1990s (Walker, 2021). Today, given the recent transformations within higher education, alongside great strides in technology, the modes through which course sharing can occur now span across individual institutions, consortia, and online platforms and networks. Thousands of colleges and universities across the U.S. use course sharing frameworks...
In December 2022, Harvard Business Review (HBR) published “The Partnership Imperative: Community Colleges, Employers, and America’s Chronic Skills Gap” (Fuller & Raman, 2022) based on surveys conducted from November 2020 to April 2021. Researchers from Harvard Business School’s Project on Managing the Future of Work gathered 347 responses from leaders in businesses and community colleges in the United States. The researchers identified three broad areas for partnership and stated, in summary:
The partnership between employers and community colleges is currently not fit for the purpose of...
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In January of this year, Inside Higher Ed (IHE) reported on a meeting between tech executives and presidents of small private colleges in the article, “Preaching to, and Challenging, the Liberal Arts Choir” (Lederman, 2023). The meeting took place in San Francisco in a special session at the annual meeting of the Council of Independent Colleges. IHE (Lederman, 2023) reported that, “In a conversation with presidents of small private colleges, tech company executives praise graduates’ leadership and critical thinking ability but say they need to develop skills for a first job, too” (subheadline...
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We’ve all gotten emails that attempt to gain sensitive personal information or hack into our employer’s systems. The pervasiveness of malicious hacking, including phishing campaigns, has made the need to combat such efforts a top priority for businesses across the globe. Santa Fe College (SF) is revolutionizing its security curriculum by training students in the Information Technology Education (ITE) department’s ethical hacking class to conduct phishing campaigns in collaboration with Information Technology Services (ITS). Students gain real-world experience protecting the college’s systems...
The rapid advancement of technology and the future of work have increased pressure on the knowledge and skillsets needed for success in the workplace. Social, political, and economic challenges highlighted by COVID-19 and changing global political landscapes have further solidified the need for graduates to be adaptable learners with the mindsets to solve complex problems. Initiated in 2017, Humber College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning’s Institutional Learning Outcomes project (Humber Learning Outcomes or HLOs) highlights the key mindsets and skills that empower students to...
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In anticipation of the coming tax season, Paradise Valley Community College (PVCC) in Phoenix, Arizona, is partnering with Jackson Hewitt and Fresh Start Women’s Foundation to expand the pool of highly qualified tax preparers. This strategic alliance between education, business, and nonprofit partners gives students the opportunity to acquire in-demand job skills and offers guaranteed interviews at Jackson Hewitt for PVCC students and Fresh Start women who successfully complete the Enrolled Agent (EA) program.
PVCC’s EA program Certificate of Completion (CCL) prepares students for the...
Ohio has the third largest manufacturing workforce in the United States, employing approximately 700,000 individuals (Wile, 2021). According to the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association (2022), about 17.5 percent of Ohio's gross domestic product was based on manufacturing in 2020. Intel (2022) recently announced that it will build two new microchip factories in Ohio. According to Intel (2022),
As the largest single private-sector investment in Ohio history, the initial phase of the project is expected to create 3,000 Intel jobs and 7,000 construction jobs over the course of the build, and to...
Working professionals like Mohammed Alani are seeking out new ways to expand their skillsets and fit training into their busy schedules. As a professor of cybersecurity at Seneca College and research fellow at Toronto Metropolitan University, Alani doesn’t have the luxury of taking scheduled in-person courses. He was drawn to the Microsoft certificate offerings through Surge Micro-credentials, stating that, “The timing and format were very suitable for a working person like myself.” These online courses offer self-paced lectures, interactive labs, practice exams, live instructor office hours...
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November
2022
To register for the 2022 virtual Learning Summit while online registration is down:
Download the League account creation spreadsheet (see above);
Fill out and check all required information for yourself; you may also use this form to register other participants from your institution (whether or not they already have a League account); and
Email the completed spreadsheet to Robin Piccirilli.
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The COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent shift to online learning demonstrated to us that students can not only adapt, but also thrive when provided with diversified and complimentary instructional modes (Ascione, 2021). Inspired by the resiliency of our students, the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) department welcomed students back to Austin Community College (ACC) campuses by piloting a new course modality—Hybrid Flexible, or HyFlex. The HyFlex modality combines online and face-to-face teaching and learning activities in a regularly scheduled class where students are given the choice to...
November
2022
A robust body of research indicates that quality online discussion can lead to better student interaction, greater faculty satisfaction, and improved course outcomes. Pedagogy that supports intrinsic student motivation—by supporting robust peer-to-peer interaction and helping students formulate open-ended questions—can be especially powerful. At community colleges across the country, instructors are tapping the potential of inquiry-based discussion, powered by artificial intelligence, with the aim of boosting engagement in online classes. What they’ve found is that this approach doesn't just...
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In 2016, a group of students sent a letter to Seattle Central College’s administrators to name a part of their identity they felt was being overlooked as they embarked on a journey that would be pivotal in determining their futures. The students, who were previously incarcerated, had chosen education as the path to restart their lives upon leaving a Washington state prison. While community and technical colleges are open access institutions, they are still institutions with barriers that are, at times, only visible to some of the most minoritized and marginalized in our communities. In...
America's workforce now has greater access to Rio Salado College classes, micro-credentials, and degree programs through a new partnership with Guild (n.d.), “a Career Opportunity Platform that enables forward-thinking employers to invest in their employees, unlocking life-changing opportunities for personal and professional growth through learning programs, career development, and one-on-one coaching” (Who We Are page).
Rio Salado College is among Guild’s newest academic partners, and one of the only community colleges to join Guild’s growing Learning Marketplace. The Marketplace provides a...
In 2008, during a televised event, then White House Chief of Staff Rham Emanuel said, “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before” (Emanuel, 2008, 0:04). Many articles have been written about the crises the U.S. postsecondary education ecosystem faces regarding relevance, funding, and innovation, all of which demand swift action (Alexander, 2020; Cristensen & Eyring, 2011; Crow & Dabars, 2015; Grawe, 2018; McGee, 2015, Phelan, 2014). However, for many colleges, change has not come...
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Competing with 32 teams across the U.S., Calhoun Community College’s student manufacturing team placed second at the 2022 Project MFG National Championship in Wichita, Kansas. Project MFG shines a light on the need and opportunities for skilled trades by focusing on the development of new talent to provide a path forward for individuals and our country. Project MFG competitions throughout the U.S. promote the trades across industries and help advance the next generation of highly skilled trade professionals.
According to Tad Montgomery, Calhoun Machine Tool Technology instructor, the two-day...
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Indian River State College (IRSC) has received a three-year, $2,735,771 award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to establish a National Electric Vehicle Consortium (NEVC) to help alleviate an immediate shortage of skilled technical workers across almost every sector of the fast-growing electric vehicle (EV) industry. The consortium will focus on manufacturing, installation, operations, maintenance, repair, vehicle conversion, safety and standards, and emerging technological advances within the EV sector. IRSC will lead efforts that link academic, agency, and industry experts across...
