Engaging Community Colleges A First Look

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TAIR 2007 Using CCSSE Results for Improvement
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CCSSE Overview
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CCSSE A Tool for Improvement

• Student Engagement
• the amount of time and energy students invest in
  meaningful educational practices, is the
  underlying foundation for CCSSEs work.
• CCSSEs survey instrument, the Community College
  Student Report (CCSR), is designed to capture
  student engagement as a measure of institutional
  quality.

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CCSSE A Tool for Community Colleges

• The CCSSE survey
• is administered directly to community college
  students during class sessions
• asks questions about institutional practices
  and student behaviors that are highly correlated
  with student learning and retention and
• uses a sampling methodology that is consistent
  across all participating colleges.

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• CCSSE data analyses include a three-year cohort
  of participating colleges.
• The 2006 CCSSE Cohort includes more than 249,000
  community college students from 447 community and
  technical colleges in 46 states.
• The 2007 Cohort will include 526 colleges across
  48 states.

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Emphasis on Student Engagement

• 20 Years of Research on Undergraduate Student
  Learning, Persistence and Success
• 1 Year of Really Cool Research in the Community
  College Field

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The CCSSE Validation Research

• A three pronged project that links responses to
  the CCSSE survey with three external
  student-level data-sets
• the Florida community colleges
• the CCSSE Hispanic Student Success Consortium
• 24 of the 27 initial colleges participating in
  the Achieving the Dream initiative

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CCSSE in Texas

• 53 (76 of) Texas community and technical
  colleges have participated in CCSSE (2002- 2007)
• 45 of those colleges have participated more than
  once

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CommunityCollege Students
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Test Your Community College IQ!

• What percentage of first time U.S. freshmen in
  colleges and universities enroll in community
  colleges?
• 24
• 33
• 45
• 61
• Answer 45

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Test Your Community College IQ!

• What percentage of community college students are
  25 or older?
• 1/4
• Almost 1/2
• 3/4
• Answer 46

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Community College Students Contend with Competing
Priorities
Most Students Are Enrolled Part-Time
Most Students Work
Source IPEDS, Fall 2004.
Source 2006 CCSSE Cohort data.
22 of students at 4-year colleges attend
part-time
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Students who participate in college-sponsored
activities
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Giving Voice to Students
26-year-old single mother of a 6-year-old son and
a 4-year-old daughter
Carolina Villamar (left) and classmate Luisa
Castano.
Im a divorced, single mother. I can and need to
do this. If I fall down, my kids are going to
fall down. If Im standing, they will be there,
right beside me.
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Building aCulture of Evidence
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Understand What Is Happening

• 19 of part-time students versus 30 of full-time
  students say they often or very often talk about
  career plans with an instructor or advisor.
• 38 of part-time students versus 25 of full-time
  students say they never have those conversations.

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Understand What Is Happening

• Part-time students are less likely to
• Work with other students on projects during class
• Make class presentations
• Participate in a community-based project as part
  of a course

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Share and Act On What Youve Learned

• Take nothing on its looks take everything on
  evidence. Theres no better rule.
• Charles Dickens (18121870) Great
  Expectations

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Using CCSSE Results
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CCSSE Benchmarks for Effective Educational
Practice

• CCSSE reports survey results in two ways
  national benchmarks areas that educational
  research has shown to be important in quality
  educational practice and students responses to
  individual survey items.
• The five CCSSE benchmarks are
• Active and Collaborative Learning
• Student Effort
• Academic Challenge
• Student-Faculty Interaction
• Support for Learners

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Using CCSSE To Assess, Inform, and Act

• Identify key areas.
• Identify relevant survey items and student groups
  in need.

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Using CCSSE To Assess, Inform, and Act

• Start with the benchmarks.
• Look at individual survey items.
• Disaggregate the data.

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Using CCSSE To Assess, Inform, and Act

• Involve the college community.
• Design strategies and set targets.
• Share the data and plans to address them.

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Using CCSSE To Assess, Inform, and Act

• Track progress by measuring outcomes.
• Scale up efforts that are working. Modify or
  discontinue those that are not.
• Repeat.

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Florida measures progress

• Floridas community college leaders wanted to
  know whether a new Student Life Skills (SLS)
  class was promoting student success. Measuring
  student progress from 1999 through 2004, data
  showed that significantly more students 18 of
  all students - who took the SLS course achieved
  their goals. Among college-ready students,
  almost an additional 20 either graduated or
  transferred. Among those taking remedial
  courses, from 20-25 more students achieved their
  academic goals.

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Support for Learners an in-depth look

• The items that contribute to this benchmark
  include
• Whether the college provides the support students
  need to succeed
• How much the college helps students cope with
  nonacademic responsibilities
• Students use of academic advising/planning and
  career counseling services

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Support for Learners

• What are your most important services?
• How satisfied are students with them?

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Support for Learners

• Most Important Services very or somewhat
  important
• 89 Academic Advising and Planning
• 83 Computer Lab
• 78 Career Counseling
• 77 Financial Aid Advising
• 74 Skills Lab
• 71 Transfer Credit Assistance
• 2006 CCSSE Cohort

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• Satisfaction with Most Important Services very
  or somewhat satisfied
• 71 Academic Advising and Planning
• 71 Computer Lab
• 50 Financial Aid Advising
• 51 Skills Lab
• 45 Career Counseling
• 37 Transfer Credit Assistance
• 2006 CCSSE Cohort

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A Texas College Acts on Fact

• After its first CCSSE administration, Cedar
  Valley College (TX) set a goal of making tutoring
  available to more students. The first objective
  was to provide tutoring to every CVC student who
  needed it, a change from the earlier practice of
  providing tutoring only to students who met
  particular guidelines. CVC created a tutoring
  center located in the middle of its campus to
  provide tutoring in all disciplines, for all
  students. The president committed funds to the
  center, and the college hired a director,
  employed additional tutors, and trained tutors
  extensively. The new tutoring center established
  relationships with faculty members, who broadly
  advertised its services. When CVC completed its
  second CCSSE administration, the college scored
  significantly higher than other colleges in the
  frequency of use of tutoring services. CVC also
  learned that students ranked tutoring as one of
  the three services with which they were most
  satisfied.

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2006 CCSSE Special Focus Findings
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2006 Special Focus Academic Advising and Planning

• CCSSE respondents value academic advising more
  than on any other student service.
• There is a gap between the number of students who
  value advising and those who use it.
• 89 of students say academic advising is somewhat
  or very important 55 report using that service
  sometimes or often.

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CCSSE Focus Question Academic Advising and
Planning

• While attending this college, what has been your
  best source of academic advising?
• Academic advisor (not faculty)
• Academic advisor (faculty)
• Friends, family or other students
• Online
• I have not received any academic advising

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Key Finding Academic Advising and Planning

• While attending this college, what has been your
  best source of academic advising?
• Academic advisor (faculty) 43
• Friends, family or other students
  26
• I have not received any academic advising
  13
• Academic advisor (not faculty) 10
• Online 7

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To think about

• What are you doing related to advising and
  planning that is showing positive results?
• What are areas that you need to strengthen?
• With which groups of students are you most
  successful?
• With which students are you least successful?

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• How do you know?
• How will you learn about students actual
  experiences and perceptions?
• Who needs to be involved in designing strategies
  for improvement?
• How will you involve them?

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Integrated Counseling and Advising Network

• Central Piedmont Community College (NC) initiated
  a student success planning initiative entitled
  ICAN. After initial advising, students consult
  with faculty advisors who are experts in their
  field, familiar with specific courses in their
  department, and knowledgeable about educational
  and career opportunities in their areas.
• Peer advisors, who are usually students, assist
  other students in navigating the catalog,
  preparing schedules, locating classrooms, etc.
  Finally, ICAN has developed a comprehensive
  online interactive advisement system intended to
  supplement the student/advisor relationship.

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Resources for Involving the College Community

• Student Services Predictions and Hopes
• http//www.ccsse.org/members/Student20Services20
  PredictHopes.pdf

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More Resources for Involving the College Community

• Engaging Faculty to Strengthen Student Success
• http//www.ccsse.org/members/Faculty20Involved.pd
  f
• Faculty Predictions and Hopes
• http//www.ccsse.org/members/PredictHopes.pdf
• Student Focus Groups Toolkit
• http//www.ccsse.org/members/focusgroups.cfm

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North Hennepin Community College (MN)

• To engage faculty members in reviewing CCSSE
  results, North Hennepin Community College (MN)
  gathered faculty members and asked them to
  predict students responses to the survey items
  Instead of doing this exercise on paper, the
  college used personal response system clickers
  and got immediate feedback after posing each
  question. The actual student data then were
  displayed for discussion. After getting this
  feedback, the faculty members were randomly
  divided into groups and assigned one CCSSE
  benchmark. Each group identified two priorities
  for change related to their benchmark. These
  priorities now are part of the colleges
  assessment plan initiatives.

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J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College (VA)

• J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College (VA)
  participated in CCSSE in 2004 and an action plan
  for communicating and interpreting the survey
  results was developed that included a Guess Our
  CCSSE Results web survey. This survey provided a
  forum for faculty and staff to predict the
  colleges performance on the CCSSE via a web
  survey. The college also scheduled Introduction
  to Student Success Data Forums to provide the
  college community with opportunities to learn
  about the results of the CCSSE, the VCCS
  (Virginia Community College System) core
  competencies assessment, and other information
  gathered about student success at the college.
• The presentations were followed with
  conversations about how the information could be
  used to focus both institutional and individual
  activities on the goal of enhancing the learning
  environment to improve student success.

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Discussion

• How was CCSSE introduced at your institution?
• How have your survey results been communicated
  internally?
• How have you used your CCSSE results been used to
  inform and promote student success?