Innovations Library

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Heidi Neu Stephens February 2021
Volume: 24 Issue: 2
Count all 692
Community college systems have invested in the development and implementation of free open educational resources (OER) as a means of relieving inequitable student financial burdens and removing barriers to completion and access. Community college students across the U.S. cite paying for college as the top reason for not succeeding (Porter & Umbach, 2019). And the cost of textbooks—especially as a proportion of income for disproportionately impacted student groups—is enormous.
Jessica Crotty January 2021
Volume: 24 Issue: 1
Count all 347
Improving an already successful course requires creativity, collaboration, and nontraditional classroom techniques. That’s how two Moraine Valley Community College (MVCC) faculty members approached Introduction to Computer Science, a class that struggles with student cheating, above average withdrawal rates, and low retention rates across the nation due to academic rigor.
Benjamin K. Roberts and Sarka Faltinova December 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 12
Count all 423
The Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training (I-BEST) model was developed by the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC) in 2004 to help adult basic skills students to complete certificates in career and technical education programs (Community College Research Center, 2015). According to SBCTC (2014), I-BEST is
Lynn Tincher-Ladner November 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 11
Count all 902
A decade ago, community colleges in the U.S. made a unified shift from a student access mission to both a student access and student success mission. This shift was in response to President Obama’s education agenda and challenge for community colleges to educate an additional 5 million students with degrees, certificates, or other credentials by 2020.
Cynthia Wilson October 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 10
Count all 181
In discussion groups and surveys conducted through the League for Innovation’s Faculty Voices Project, faculty told project facilitators that they would welcome meaningful professional development focused on teaching and learning. They readily acknowledged that their education and expertise is discipline based, and that they had little or no training or preparation for teaching prior to joining the faculty ranks.
Patrick R. Turner September 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 9
Count all 223
As technology has become a ubiquitous part of modern life, it has had a significant impact on course delivery in higher education. For almost every career, the understanding and application of technology represents an essential component of the educational experience, from learning how to navigate information to everything that is science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM) (Rouhiainen, 2016). More recently, the COVID-19 pandemic required institutions to pivot to 100 percent remote learning in a very short timeframe, creating even more issues around accessibility.
Haleh Azimi and Elsbeth Mantler August 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 8
Count all 269
Many community colleges rely heavily on part-time faculty. As a matter of fact, nearly 67 percent of community college faculty members are categorized as part-time employees (Hurlburt & McGarrah, 2016). It is, therefore, particularly important to offer adjunct faculty high-quality professional development (PD) to keep them abreast of college policies and pedagogical practices, and to help facilitate their engagement with colleagues and students.
Jonathan Miller July 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 7
Count all 465
The COVID-19 pandemic has left higher education institutions with many unknowns heading into the fall. With rising unemployment rates and mixed results across the country for summer courses, the uncertainty of enrollment at community colleges will have significant impacts given the steady decline in the number of students coming through their doors.
Rick Amster June 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 6
Count all 425
In an environment where many community colleges are facing declines in enrollment, decreases in funding, and demands to produce more graduates, it is essential that these institutions equip their students with the tools they need to successfully navigate the higher education ecosystem. One way to do this is for colleges to critically evaluate their processes of onboarding new students via first-year experience (FYE) courses.
Dasi Danzig May 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 5
Count all 308
The Maricopa County Community College District (MCCCD) has begun an ambitious redesign of developmental education to support a higher percentage of underprepared students in successfully completing developmentally appropriate coursework and navigating the college experience. The new developmental education model consists of holistic assessment and planning with a suite of support services.
Daniel J. Phelan April 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 4
Count all 294
Jackson College (JC) serves three, largely rural counties in southcentral Michigan, educating approximately 6,000 students per year. Like most open enrollment community colleges, about 70 percent of the students arrive at our door challenged by one or more developmental education (DE) holds in reading, writing, and/or math. This issue of Learning Abstracts describes our collective effort to serve these students better by moving our developmental education course offerings to a corequisite model.
Marla Freitag March 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 3
Count all 307
When preparing college students for the current working world, faculty also need to prepare them for the workplace of the future. Rapid advancements in technology mean that students will encounter software, systems, and responsibilities at work that may differ substantially from what is studied in today’s classrooms.
Jessica Crotty February 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 2
Count all 200
Trying to find the new STEM Center at Moraine Valley Community College in Palos Hills, Illinois, won’t be easy. The virtual center has no bricks and mortar, yet has become a valuable resource for many in the community, including Moraine Valley faculty and students as well as local K-12 teachers and students.
Lydia Falbo, Toula Kelikian, and Carolyn Markel January 2020
Volume: 23 Issue: 1
Count all 549
Hispanics comprise approximately 17 percent of the total U.S. population (Stepler & Brown, 2016), but make up only 5 percent of registered nurses (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2017). The Sullivan Commission (2004) studied the number of ethnic minority students in health care education programs and concluded, “To increase diversity in the health professions, the culture of health professions schools must change” (p. 3). The Commission went on to propose that
Jeff Vande Zande December 2019
Volume: 22 Issue: 12
Count all 910
About 12 years ago, I discovered that a handful of students in my fiction writing courses each semester wanted to be screenwriters. I’d always been interested in film myself, so, recognizing an opportunity for students, Delta College, and my own growth, I attended Gotham Writers Workshop to learn scriptwriting. When I offered Introduction to Screenwriting for the first time in the winter of 2008, the course filled in six days. Clearly, I had discovered a topic in which students had an interest.

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