Georgia Perimeter College Campus Plan Update 2015

High-impact strategy

Early College and Dual Enrollment Initiatives

Related Goal

Goal 6: Shorten time to degree completion through programs that allow students to earn college credit while still in high school.

Summary of Activities

GPC had more than 1,142 dual enrollment high school students, which represents a 10% increase over the previous year, who completed 11,981 credits worth of college-level courses, which can be applied to degrees at matriculation into an institution of higher education. The most popular courses are English and math, but a wide range of courses that satisfy core requirements for most degree programs are offered.

In addition to dual enrollment, the DeKalb Early College Academy (DECA) is operated jointly with the DeKalb County School District (DCSD). The focus of the program is on those students of high ability as demonstrated by past performance on standardized tests and classroom effort. Students from any middle school in DCSD may apply in the 8th grade to join DECA. In addition to the college preparatory curriculum, students can receive up to 60 hours of college credit leading to an Associate of Arts degree. Students spend the 9th and 10th grades at the Academy location and the 11th and 12th grades taking classes at GPC. The program is designed to accommodate 400 students in grades 9 through 12. Of those students, 164 are on a GPC campus, and they completed 4,057 credit hours of college level course work in FY 15.

Baseline Status

In FY 2009 the college had approximately 884 students in the Dual Enrollment program and DeKalb Early College Academy.

Interim Measures of Progress

The college continues to expand the Dual Enrollment program and seeks opportunities to serve additional high schools. The total number of high school students taking courses at the college in FY 15 was 1,306, which represents 20% of all dual enrolled students within the university system of Georgia.

The students in DECA graduate on time at a rate that is greater than 90%, which is far above the state average of 71% and the DCSD rate of 62%. Additionally, students acquire significant college credit with 30 students receiving their associate’s degree last year at the end of their high school career. However, due to resource considerations, it is not possible to significantly increase the number of students in this program, and for the next few years, it is likely to continue at its current size.

Measures of Success

Students in Dual Enrollment and DECA pass their classes with a C or better at a rate greater than 97%, earning more than 16,038 hours of college credit. The total monetary value of this credit depends upon the college to which each student matriculates, but estimating a tuition rate of $100 per credit hour, which is approximately the lowest rate for state colleges in Georgia, this represents $1,603,800 saved by the families of these students in tuition costs. GPC believes the Dual Enrollment program can grow by 10% per year with the passage of the Move on When Ready law, which provides payment of tuition, mandatory fees, and required books for the student. This new law will make college attendance more accessible to qualified high school students by reducing their cost.

DECA has won numerous awards for excellence. It has been a Platinum and Gold Award Winner for Student Achievement. More than 90% of all students graduating through this program enter college after completing high school, and most of them will complete a bachelor’s degree within four years of entering college. Additionally, 30 students completed their AA degree along with receiving their high school diploma.

Lessons Learned

Academically prepared students who are provided an opportunity to experience college while still in high school benefit from the experience in a number of ways. Most importantly, they are able to complete general education requirements before matriculation, allowing them to take courses within their major earlier. This opportunity creates scheduling options, which allow students to take advantage of specialized programs, such as, internships, study abroad, and second majors, to enhance the educational experience while remaining on the pathway to graduate on time.

DeKalb Early College Academy has shown that given support and direction motivated high school students can be successful in a college environment regardless of the challenges of their circumstances. Success in DECA translates into continued success in college with nearly all of the students completing bachelor’s degrees on time and many going onto graduate and professional schools.

High-impact strategy

Intrusive Advising Initiatives

Related Goal

Goal 4: Provide intentional advising to keep students on track to graduate

Summary of Activities

The college developed a proactive advising program known as the Performance Alert for Student Success or PASS, which provided early and ongoing updates to students who may be in danger of failing or of performing poorly in a class. Based on designated core concepts that have been identified by members of the course curriculum committee, a central computer system issues an alert at three different points throughout the term apprising students of their status in mastering key concepts for the class. The first occurs within a few weeks of the start of the semester, which allows the instructor to identify early those students who need intervention before the first assessment occurs and gives students time to access college resources to gain mastery of the key concepts before the first major exam or assignment. The remaining alerts occur at strategic times in the semester to inform those students that they are missing key concepts or skills prior to exams or assignments that count significantly towards their grade. Instructors direct students to the appropriate resources that will best meet their needs for academic success. Additionally, advisors meet with students who are identified as struggling, assess the barriers to success, and create a plan of action to give these students the best chance of success. 

Baseline Status

The college will measure the effectiveness of this program by looking at the success rates of the students who have received alerts. Since academic year 2015 is the first year of this program it will be used as the baseline for this program and the intervention activities related to it.

Interim Measures of Progress

During spring semester of 2015 the college issued an alert to 13,399 different students whose performance on an assessment indicated that they did not fully grasp a key concept in one or more of their classes and were in in danger of earning a D or F. 

Measures of Success

The college lacks a historical foundation from which to draw significant empirical conclusions since this initiative was only in effect during fall 2014 and spring 2015; however, the statistical trend seems to indicate that the overall impact of this initiative was positive. For example, of the 20,301 alerts sent out during spring 2015, 11,820 resulted in a student earning a C or higher in the specified course.

Lessons Learned

The PASS alerts provided students with useful information concerning their understanding of important concepts and strengthened communication between the instructor and his/her students. Issuing the alerts before major assessments spurred many students to seek help before the instructor’s exam, which improved their grades on the exams. Moreover, providing multiple warnings several times over the course of the semester kept students focused on their grasp of certain skills or concepts as well as their overall performance in the class. Not only were students warned by the third week of behaviors that might put them at risk, but also students who began strong in the class but exhibited unsatisfactory progress by week six or seven were identified and offered remediation.

Important to making the PASS program work effectively is the identification of the core concepts that students must master to succeed. These core concepts or benchmarks were identified by the faculty and assessment instruments were created to measure the students’ grasp of them. The faculty are now reviewing the data from the PASS alerts to ensure essential concepts are being identified and that the assessment instruments are reliable measures of the students’ understanding of them. This review will improve the PASS program and lead to an increase in the number of students performing at a passing level in their courses.

High-impact strategy

Guided Pathways to Success

Related Goal

Goal 2: Increase the number of degrees that are earned “on time” (associate’s degree in 2 years, bachelor’s degree in 4 years).

Summary of Activities

GPC created Program Maps for all programs of study; these maps provide students with the recommended course selection for each term to complete their AA in four semesters. Program Maps are available on the college website and through the advising offices. Advisors encourage part-time students to take as close to 15 hours as possible each semester, taking into consideration their personal and work commitments.

Part-time program maps are currently being developed, which will provide a clear path to graduation for students taking 9 hours per semester. The college has adopted a strategy of encouraging part-time students, who make up 63% of the population, to take at least 9 hours per semester. This will put a part-time student on track to graduate within 6 semesters, which is significantly fewer than the current average of 8 terms required of students to complete an associate’s degree.

The Program Maps have been added to DegreeWorks, the college’s online advising platform. While the Program Maps assist students in planning their semester schedule early in their college career, DegreeWorks monitors a student’s progress toward degree completion by tracking the courses completed, those in progress, and the ones still needed for the declared program of study or major.

Additionally, the college held a graduation fair that identified students who have more than 55 hours of credit. A graduation audit was performed for all of these students, and they were invited to meet with an advisor to complete an application for graduation if they had already met the requirements or to identify the remaining classes needed to be eligible to graduate. This process will be repeated each semester as a way of reaching out to students who have successfully completed a significant amount of course work but may not realize that they are close to graduating or even that they have fulfilled all degree requirements.

Baseline Status

A comparison of the percentage of students taking 6 or 7 hours to the percentage taking 9 or 10 will be tracked. Additionally, A comparison of the percentage of students taking 12 or 13 hours to the percentage taking 15 or 16 will be tracked. As a baseline, the college is using data from 2014 where 22.1% of the students took 6 or 7 hours; 17.9% took 9 or 10 hours; 26.3% took 12 or 13 hours; and 6.12% took 15 or 16 hours.

Interim Measures of Progress

The number of students who access DegreeWorks will be tracked, which will provide a measure of how effective communication has been.

The college invited 1,700 students to meet with an advisor to discuss graduation during the graduation fair, and advisors met with 365 students.

Measures of Success

The college has seen an increase of 5% in the number of students taking 9 or 10 credit hours of course work, and a decrease of 3% in the number of students taking 15 or more hours. The total number of full-time students, defined as 12 hours or more, also decreased over last year.

Additionally, as a result of the graduation fair, the college saw an increase of 242 students applying for graduation during the spring 2015 semester compared to spring 2014. This represents a 42% increase in the number of students applying for graduation during the comparable time periods.

Lessons Learned

Changing the culture of the students to embrace taking additionally classes is ambitious, but the college has made a good start at changing this message. The college has added the position of Coordinator of Social Media Strategies and College Completion, to enhance its completion messaging to students through multiple means including the use of social media, mobile device applications, and college website as well as other channels.

Degreeworks is proving to be very popular with students as a tool for tracking their progress. However, there is a continued need to inform students about Degreeworks to ensure all incoming students are made aware of it and to make this tool an integrated part of the college advising process. The college is looking to increase the number of access points on campus for student use of Degreeworks.

The graduation fair showed that there is a significant number of students who need help in recognizing that they have finished or are close to finishing degrees. While many of the programs at the college are focused upon getting incoming students started correctly and keeping them on track for graduation, there is also a demonstrated need to help them recognize that they have completed or are very close to fulfilling degree requirements. Additionally, the graduation fair revealed that many students are informed about the requirements for attending the senior institution to which they wish to transfer but have not educated themselves about the requirements for and value of the associate’s degree. The college sees an opportunity to significantly increase graduation numbers by working with students more intrusively as they near the completion of their degrees

High-impact strategy

Supplemental Instruction

Related Goal

Goal 8: Restructure instructional delivery to support educational excellence and student success.

Summary of Activities

Supplemental instruction was provided in select general chemistry and college algebra courses. A student who had passed the course previously attends the regular lectures and then offers additional instruction to students in another arranged setting. During the supplemental instruction session, the lead student provides additional review and time for the enrolled students to grasp the concepts presented. The lead student is generally viewed as a peer by the enrolled students and hence is more likely to be asked questions.

Other activities supported by GPC are those designed to support student success in science, engineering, and mathematics and to promote interest in these fields among students of ability who belong to underrepresented populations. These programs encourage students’ interests in the STEM areas and support their success in the required courses. Activities include summer research opportunities at universities and laboratories, participation in science competitions, and opportunities for tutoring, additional instruction, and mentoring. 

The four specialized STEM programs that are available to students at the college are:

• One (1) University System of Georgia -funded program which provides resources for faculty to conduct research and to students to engage in co-educational activities:
  
  • Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement (MESA)
• Three (3) National Science Foundation-funded programs which provide students with scholarships, exposure to professionals in their fields of study and opportunities to conduct research at some of the top research institutions in Georgia and around the country:
  
  • Educate and Nurture Leadership in STEM (ENLISTEM)
  • Peach State Louis Stoke Alliance for Minority Participation (PSLSAMP)
  • STEM Talent Expansion Program (STEP)

Baseline Status

Students taking advantage of the opportunity for supplemental instruction will have their performance compared to their peers in the same course who did not attend and with students in sections of the same course who did not have the option of supplemental instruction.

Interim Measures of Progress

There were approximately 115 students in 18 classes who took advantage of the supplemental instruction during the last academic year. The college has learned from this experience and looks to expand its offerings in the upcoming year with the hiring in January of a full-time coordinator for this initiative, who will move the program from the pilot stage to an operational phase.

Last year, 113 students participated in one or more of the STEM programs, which represents 10.3% of all students at GPC eligible to participate, approximately the same percentage of eligible students who participated the previous year. These students had an average GPA of 3.3 and were predominantly from populations underrepresented in the STEM fields.

Measures of Success

Students receiving supplemental instruction this past year performed better than students who did not receive it, but too few students have been part of the program to be able to make definitive statements concerning how much improvement in performance has resulted from the use of supplemental instruction. GPC increased its support for supplemental instruction by adding a full time coordinator, who is recruiting supplemental instruction leaders, and monitoring the effectiveness of the overall program. The addition of the coordinator will allow GPC to increase the number of sections of supplemental instruction that are available to students by 50% and add additional subjects that are served by supplemental instruction.

GPC has seen a significant increase in the numbers of students receiving an associate’s degree in STEM fields. Students studying in a STEM field are more likely than others to transfer to a four year institution without completing an AA degree. However, through GPC’s support programs, Academic Year 2014 had a 41% increase in the number of associate’s degrees (171) awarded over Academic Year 2011. Of the students who earned STEM degrees, 75 were from underrepresented minority populations, which is a 47% increase over the previous year and 71 were women, which is a 7.5% increase over the previous year.

Lessons Learned

Supplemental instruction requires effective leadership in order to be successful and organized. The addition of a full-time coordinator to lead this program at the college has had an immediate effect of increasing the interest in the program and expanding the number of classes in which this is being offered. It will be important to continue to expand the administrative support for this program as the number of students and classes that are a part of supplemental instruction increase.

A limiting factor to the expansion of supplemental instruction at GPC is the constant need to train new leaders as successful students graduate and transfer. It is the nature of two-year college that qualified leaders graduate and transfer after serving only one year.

There has been significant success in helping students complete their AA degree in the STEM fields. The numbers of graduates have steadily increased, and these graduates continue to represent a greater diversity than the national average in these areas. GPC continues to focus efforts upon students in these fields through its programs and is the leader in the state for the number of minority and women STEM students educated.

High-impact strategy

Transforming Remediation

Related Goal

Goal 7: Increase the likelihood of degree completion by transforming the way that remediation is accomplished.

Summary of Activities

The college redesigned Learning Support classes to reduce the number of levels of courses from two to one. Additionally, GPC will pilot the placement of some Learning Support students in collegiate math and English classes with co-requisite support labs. Such programs implemented at other colleges have shown a dramatic increase in the rates of success for students while having the added benefit of earning collegiate credit.

Baseline Status

The base line data is the percentage of students moving from Learning Support math courses into collegiate level in 2012, which was the last year before major reform occurred. In this year 20% of the students moved from learning support math to college level.

Interim Measures of Progress

The number of students moving from Learning Support mathematics into collegiate- level math in one semester has increased from 20%, in fall of 2012 to 55.2%, in fall of 2014. For English, there has not been a measurable increase, but the number of students in Learning Support English has been substantially reduced as a result of recent changes in statewide standards for admission, thus making it difficult to compare populations.

Measures of Success

Ultimately, GPC will see more students who started in Learning Support completing degrees in fewer semesters. This data is inconclusive as of yet, since most of the students are part-time and would not be expected to have graduated until spring of 2016. GPC increased the fall-to-fall retention rate from 43.7% for 2012 to 2013 to 47.6% for 2013-2014.

Lessons Learned

Moving to the Emporium style model for developmental mathematics has shown a significant increase in student performance. The model provides students with more time on task in using mathematics and developing these skills.

GPC piloted the planned co-requisite model for English in the spring in preparation for full implementation in the fall of 2015. While the number of classes that were offered was small, these pilots gave the faculty an opportunity to test the new delivery method and to prepare for the larger roll- out of the courses. The pass rate in the pilot courses was about 50%, and the faculty hope to improve on this during the next year when the model is fully implemented.