Report from the Learning Communities/Student Engagement Strategy Team

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Report from the Learning Communities/Student
Engagement Strategy Team

• Dr. Terrance Suarez
• Jason Ingles
• Donna Stanley

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1. Current Condition Student Engagement

• Little data on the
• quality of student
• engagement at MECC
• This year, we will begin collecting information
  through CCSSE
• Results of CCSSE at 152 colleges in 30 states
  reveal that 80 of students did not participate
  in college-sponsored extra-curricular activities
• With this latest report, CCSSE sponsors
  recommended that colleges focus on the first year
  experience and development of learning
  communities

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1. Current Condition Student Engagement

• Positive Extra-curricular
• Efforts at MECC
• Student-to-student relationships are fostered
  through clubs, AmeriCorps, student social events
  and the Student Center
• 14 of sophomores responding to a survey
  indicated that involvement in clubs helped them
  continue at MECC

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1. Current Condition Student Engagement

• Weaknesses of Extracurricular Efforts
• Low percentage of students participate in
  extra-curricular activities
• Question - are reaching students most at-risk of
  dropping out?

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1. Current Condition Student Engagement

• Positive Curricular Efforts
• Student surveys reveal strong connections with
  faculty, counselors, and staff through roles in
  instruction, advising and leading student
  organizations.
• Data on orientation reveals that students who do
  participate are more successful

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1. Current Condition Student Engagement

• Positive Curricular Efforts
• Anecdotal evidence suggests that students in
  certain programs (such as nursing) have strong
  bonds of mutual support for academic success

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1. Current Condition Student Engagement

• Weaknesses in Curricular Efforts
• Courses are not organized to build student
  connections
• If study groups exist, they tend to be initiated
  by students
• There is little collaboration among faculty in
  connecting content across the curriculum

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Report from the Learning Communities/Student
Engagement Strategy Team

• REVIEW OF LITERATURE

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2. Review of Literature

• Our strategy team focused on reviewing
  literature related to learning communities, and
  to a lesser extent, other literature related to
  engaging students.

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2. Review of Literature

• Learning Communities Definition
• Purposeful restructuring of the curriculum by
  linking or clustering courses that enroll a
  common cohort of students. This represents an
  intentional structuring of students time,
  credit, and learning experiences to build
  community and foster more explicit connections
  among students, faculty and disciplines.
• Gabelnick, 1990.

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2. Review of Literature

• How common are learning communities in
  community colleges?
• The Second National Survey of First Year
  Practices (2002) reported that 25 of all
  community colleges offer learning communities.

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2. Review of Literature

• Research Findings
• Multiple studies show higher rates of
• student retention, improved student
• GPAs, and higher levels of student
• and faculty satisfaction as the result
• of participation in learning
• communities.

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2. Review of Literature

• Benefits of learning communities
• Building community through greater sense of
  belonging and validating course structures
• Fostering innovative, exciting teaching (through
  longer blocks of time to pursue complex
  intellectual tasks, to encourage collaborative
  work on integrated assignments, service learning,
  etc.)

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2. Review of Literature

• Benefits (continued)
• Better use of capture time to build engagement
• Can be a medium for structuring some student
  advising/career exploration
• Enhances curricular coherence and helps students
  understand the relevance of general education
  requirements
• Enriches teaching by reducing isolation

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2. Review of Literature

• Values expressed in learning communities
• Learning is/should be a social enterprise
• Patrick Hill, Provost of The Evergreen State
  College, described learning communities as places
  where diverse people engage in conversations of
  respect
• Emphasis on increasing student civic engagement
  with local and global problems
• Students gain community-building skills that can
  be transferred to building community outside the
  classroom

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2. Review of Literature

• Learning Communities are commonly used for
• First Year Initiatives significant transition
  point
• Developmental Education address issues of
  significant underperformance
• General Education to enhance relevance of
  courses/curricular coherence
• Within Major to focus on at-risk or
  under-represented student groups
• Honors Programs enrichment provided by
  interdisciplinary perspectives
• Living-Learning Communities integrated
  experience involving dormitories, study abroad,
  etc.

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2. Review of Literature

• Organization of Learning Communities
• The model used depends on the goals for students
  and the flexibility/ability to support change in
  institution
• Learning communities vary in levels of student
  collaboration, faculty collaboration, curricular
  coordination, shared setting

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2. Review of Literature

• Analogy
• To prepare an omelette requires three basic
  ingredients
• Eggs
• Cooking Surface
• Heat
• Regardless of the additional ingredients, you
  still have an omelette.

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2. Review of Literature

• Similarly, there are three basic ingredients
  for learning communities
• Common cohort of students taking the same classes
• Student collaboration is encouraged
• Faculty coordinate topics and assignments to
  varying extents
• You still create a learning community,
  regardless of whether you add other ingredients

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2. Review of Literature

• Some Options
• Autonomous classes that are unmodified
• - Can add integrative seminars to course
• sequence to provide integration
• Paired or clustered courses, with faculty
  collaborating in the design of the courses, no
  team teaching
• - May be linked by themes
• Integrated courses that faculty team teach.

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2. Review of Literature

• When developed at multi-dimensional levels,
  learning communities are transformational
  altering the organization, curricular,
  pedagogical, and assessment practices typically
  used in traditional courses.

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3. Policy/Practice Issues to be Addressed

• Concerns about transferability
• Student choice requires marketing to help
  students understand benefits of learning
  communities, even if it means changing plans for
  scheduling courses
• Managing inter-institutional compacts (such as in
  nursing) changes in scheduling adds to the
  complexity of managing these compacts
• Cost
• Space
• Sustainability administrative support,
  recognition are necessary

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4. Recommendations

• 1.MECC should develop a plan for piloting
  learning communities for groups of at-risk
  students. If the pilot is successful, and as
  resources allow, learning communities should be
  expanded to enhance student success across the
  curriculum.

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4. Recommendations

• 1a. The College should provide training on
  learning communities to faculty and other
  interested personnel to create a common
  understanding of the benefits of learning
  communities.

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4. Recommendations

• 1b. Create a Learning Communities Task Force to
  plan for the establishment of learning
  communities. The Task Force should include
  academic administrators, student services
  personnel, faculty serving developmental students
  and other faculty teaching general education
  courses with an interest in piloting learning
  communities.

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4. Recommendations

• 1c. Utilize orientation sessions as a building
  block for learning communities.

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4. Recommendations

• 1d. The College should secure promotional
  materials/sample course outlines from other
  community colleges to develop a resource file for
  the Learning Communities Task Force.

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4. Recommendations

• 1e. Recognize, reward and celebrate the
  successes of faculty and other staff who create
  and evaluate the outcomes of learning
  communities.

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4. Recommendations

• 2. Contact other community colleges in southwest
  and southside Virginia (SwVCC, DCC, PHCC) to
  assess which students are participating in
  athletic programs and if these programs are
  enhancing student engagement and academic
  success.
• (VCCS is planning to create an optional,
  state-wide club sports league for men and women.)
  

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Learning Communities/Student Engagement Team

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