Conference of the College

October 20, 2006

Opening Remarks by President Eduardo J. Martí

Thank you, Dr. Gillespie.

Today, I would very much like to enter into a dialogue with you about the Role our College plays in the individual student’s success. Many of you have heard me speak, in different settings, about the plan to institutionalize the good work that you do to enhance our students’ chances for success.

As with any institutional change, first we need to understand the vision, define the desired outcomes, recognize the needs of the project and attend to the detail of implementation. We have much work to do.

Today we have the opportunity to spend ½ a day away from our daily routines and to continue the exploration of all the nuances and ramifications of this plan. I thank Dr. Gillespie and the rest of the Faculty Executive Committee for having the foresight to call for this Conference of the College.

I have made a concerted effort to promulgate the elements of the plan. At the September 7 Convocation and at all the departmental receptions, I have tried to define the vision of the plan.

• You have heard me speak about the Academies and how every first time, full-time student will enter our curriculum through these educational portals.
• You have heard me speak about cornerstone, milestone and capstone experiences.
• You have heard me speak about e-portfolios
  

Today, I want to discuss the implementation of these plans.

From the beginning of the student’s experience, we must pay attention to their success.

The existing literature on student retention is replete with evidence that the freshman experience is a determinant for success. It has been amply demonstrated that students come to College with a need for extensive orientation to college life. It has been shown that freshman experience courses such as our ST 100 work!

It strikes me as odd that selective admission colleges spend a great deal of time and resources in orienting the entering class while community colleges, at most, provide a voluntary ½ day orientation to incoming first time students. I am puzzled as to why we assume that our students are so well versed with the mores of our academy that we believe an orientation is not necessary. I am puzzled as to why we do not provide a great deal of counseling and advising to our students, when selective admissions colleges, that have better prepared students, do so.

Let us start with orientation. It is my hope that we can launch a marketing program that will result in the majority of first time students declaring their intention to come to Queensborough Community College by June or as early as possible. This, by itself, will be difficult. It is counterintuitive to the open admissions policy. Let’s hope that we can do this through incentives. Let us exhort the benefits of full time enrollment and promulgate the possibility of full or partial scholarships. Again, the literature shows that full time students have a better chance of completing their studies than part-time students

Let us make the orientation relevant. Let us listen to the current students’ voices and ask them to guide us as to what should be included in an orientation.

We know that our students benefit most from ST100 after the semester starts. Maybe we can compress some elements of the ST 100 course, combine it with academic advising and with some bonding activities- similar to our Student Welcome Back, and provide it to all incoming students during the last week of August before classes begin. Let us bring faculty to meet with students during that time and let us find the way to compensate the faculty members who participate according to the terms of our collectively bargained agreement.

The Academies

The purpose of the Academies is to engage students from the outset in their academic pursuits. Students will be encouraged to enter programs as full-time students in academies. Academies will include blocked programming and learning communities, both of which help to institutionalize individual instruction because they forge stronger connections between faculty and students and among students themselves, between students and their programs, and between students and their goals. Two academies are being piloted this fall, in Education and in Technology. In fall 2007, two more academies will be added, probably in Business and in the Fine Arts or Natural Sciences. Within three years, almost all new students will enter and experience the College via this route and be encouraged to move together toward timely graduation.

The two Academies that ran this semester appear to be a success. I am looking forward to the breakout session on the Academies for Learning. We have much work to do in this area, and we must learn from the experiences of these pioneers.

Among the questions that we need to answer are how we are going to determine the composition of future academies. The goal is to have all first time students; full-time students enter our college curriculum through the portal of an Academy within 3 years. So, we need to decide what the next phases of implementation are.

Another question …. How are we going to decide which courses to link? How do the linked courses relate to milestone experiences? Can we have Academies with more than one academic department, such as the Liberal Arts Science or the AA? Where are the students going to congregate? Are the Academies only for full time students or are they all inclusive?

In addition to the orientation and the Academies and to lend greater structure to the educational endeavor, we propose to develop cornerstone, milestone, and capstone experiences for curricula across campus. Cornerstone experiences will provide a strong foundation at the beginning of the student’s academic career. Blocked programming or a learning community, or both, will provide students with a fundamental experience in reading and writing in their curriculum that engages them from the outset as partners with faculty in learning and prepares them for the more difficult work of their program. The 30-credit milestone experience will encourage students to create projects that reflect the development of their skills of analysis and synthesis in preparation for passing the CUNY Proficiency Examination. Finally, capstone experiences, which might involve both courses and extracurricular experiences, will be culminating experiences for students that prepare them for the workforce or a transfer program in a baccalaureate institution. Development of cornerstone, milestone, and capstone experiences will occur in task forces among faculty across campus.

But there are many questions that must be answered to ensure success of this program.

For cornerstone experiences: Are they a course such as ST 100 or is it a Learning Community that includes Basic Skills courses? Are the Academies to be defined as the cornerstone experience? How are we going to have students engage in this activity? Is it voluntary or is it mandatory?

Similarly, for the Milestone and Capstone experiences: Are we talking about a course that we designate as the milestone experience or do we create another type of experience? Who is going to manage the experience? Are we to incorporate the experience as a requirement and, if so, how does it affect the curriculum? Does the student pay tuition for the experience or is it part of a student service?

Another aspect of this plan is the academic support services. Ultimately, we plan that each Queensborough student will develop an individual e-portfolio. Its purpose is to assist students in understanding and navigating their way through the College and its programs, as well as facilitating their progression to a senior college or directly into a career. A fundamental component will be My Academic Plan or MAP. The MAP helps students to understand, shape, and articulate educational and career goals and to set aggressive but realistic expectations for attaining them. Linked to the e-portfolios, the MAP will be customized to each student’s experiences—both as an archive and developmental tool. Pilots took place in some Business and Music Electronic Technology courses in 2005-2006, and the number of sections utilizing them will be expanded about five-fold in 2006-2007.

Tutoring has been decentralized. It is expected that each Academy will have tutors assigned to them. This, in addition to the Writing Center and the writing intensive courses, should provide students with the necessary skills to navigate the curriculum successfully. But, there are many questions yet to be answered:

• Where should the tutoring take place?
• Is there going to be dedicated space for each Academy? Is the space a place to “hang out” or a quiet space for study, reflection and tutoring?
• How are we going to monitor the tutoring? Is there going to be a coordinator for each Academy? Or, are we going to have a centralized supervisory structure?
• How much more is this tutoring model going to cost? How are we going to pay for it?

We are at the beginning stages of implementing this plan.

I believe that the only way we can be successful is if we participate as a collective in developing the implementation plans. Administration must coordinate the effort, but the voices of the College must be heard as we develop the action plans.

To that end, I am calling for the establishment of an Advisory Council on the Academies. I believe that the founding members of this Council should be individuals from the pilot academies. We should add members who can help answer these and many other questions. Service on this Advisory Council should be considered as important as service on the Middle States Committees. In both cases, the participants will help shape the future of our College. We will entrust upon them the privilege and the responsibility that comes with leadership. I know that those who have a vested interest in how this College will operate 10, 15, 20 years from now, are the individuals who should be most interested in participating. So, as Dean Steele taps you for this service, please consider it to be the highest possible college service that you can engage in.

Needless to say, that any recommendation emanating from the deliberations of this Council that are within the purview of the Academic Senate will be presented to the appropriate committee of the Senate.

Institutionalized, individualized attention is expensive.

Of course, I cannot end my presentation without talking about funding. It would be irresponsible of me to agree to implement such an ambitious plan without having a clear understanding of the financial sustainability of said plan.

Community colleges have been historically under-funded. Without appearing to be too radical, I posit the possibility that the reason for the under-funding of our sector may be the local nature of the institutions and our own desire to gain respectability through large enrollments. So, our resources go to provide the least expensive education to the largest number of students. The Digest of Education Statistics 2001 figures demonstrate that public selective colleges spend $27,973 per student, while community colleges spend an average of $9,183. So, what we are saying as a society, is that 50% of the students attending college are receiving an inexpensive education. Then, we complain about the retention of students at the community colleges. There is a direct correlation between funding and success

So, how are we to fund this ambitious plan? For now, we are going to use the money we receive from the Compact, from Perkins, from the Robin Hood Foundation through MDRC, and from the CUE initiative to create an environment that provides educational services equivalent to those found at selective institutions.

The Compact came at the right time. As you may know, the Compact is a funding mechanism that incorporates a private/public partnership. We benefited from it this year. Although this year was funded at 75%, it is our hope that next year, we will receive approximately $1.5 million dollars to fund present and future initiatives. This money is crucial for us to be able to put into place all the elements of this Integrated Educational Plan.

The Compact simply says the following:

1. State and City: Cover the expenses from last year plus the inflationary increases and 20% of the $1.5 million.
2. University: Find the other 80% through
   1. Tuition increases ($90 per year for community colleges)
   2. Fundraising
   3. Productivity

But as our initiatives are being augmented through grants such as the MDRC, by the Robin Hood Foundation and Perkins, as well as University initiatives such as the Coordinated Undergraduate Initiative, we need to look to the future. We need to see how we can sustain our initiatives through the reallocation of existing resources and new revenues gained through better retention of students. I am confident that we can do so; but, we need to ensure that whatever changes we make to our delivery of instruction, can be sustained for many years to come.

As you can see, we have a lot of work to do…. But, it is exciting work. If we do this well, we will be helping hundreds of students. I firmly believe that we can save many of those who are lost; I firmly believe that all of our students deserve the same individualized attention that is provided for those who are more fortunate. Help me extend our services so that our students benefit from the advantages normally found in private institutions.

Thank you for your attention. I will be happy to answer any questions.

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