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Student Success is more than Software
The document discusses various aspects of student success in education, emphasizing the importance of data-driven strategies and collaborative efforts among stakeholders including students, faculty, and administrators. It highlights the role of technology, like the IPASS system, in supporting educational goals and enhancing student engagement while pointing out that software alone cannot ensure graduation. The document also calls for a holistic approach to student success that integrates clean data, effective communication, and innovative practices across institutional silos.
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Similar to Student Success is more than Software
Student Success is more than Software
- 1. Ellen D. Wagner,Ph.D. VP Research, Hobsons Howard Bell SVP/ GM, Student Success, HObso Student Success: More Than Software Student Success : More Than Software Ellen D. Wagner, Ph.D VP Research, Hobsons Howard Bell, SVP and GM, Student Success, Hobsons
- 2. Currently work inK-12 Settings? Currently work in post- secondary ed settings? Come from a foundation or an NGO? 1 Are part of a commercial ed tech software and services org? Are part of a commercial ed tech hardware/platform org? Are part of an ed tech start up? 2 3 4 5 6 How Many ofYOU are Engaged inStudent Success?
- 3. The Many (Other)Stakeholders of Postsecondary Student Success • Students and their Families • Advisors, and Student Services Professionals • Faculty and Academic Affair Professionals • Institutional Researchers, Registrars, Bursars • Department(s) of Education • Department(s) of Labor • Employers • Legislatures
- 4. Putting Data toWork in Service of Student Success: The College CompletionAgenda Source: New York Times; NCES 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2-yr colleges Graduation rates at 150% of time Cohort year
- 5. Organization for EconomicCooperation and Development (OECD) Graduation Rankings, 2012
- 6. Organization for EconomicCooperation and Development (OECD) Rankings, 2015 • The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), measures reading ability, math and science literacy among 15-year-olds in developed and developing countries every three years. • The most recent PISA results, from 2015, placed the U.S. an unimpressive 38th out of 71 countries in math and 24th in science. • Among the 35 members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which sponsors the PISA initiative, the U.S. ranked 30th in math and 19th in science. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/02/15/u-s-students-internationally-math-science/
- 7.
- 8. Evolving Goals ofthe US College Completion Agenda, 2008-2017 Priorities related to improving college completions via analytics in education have have evolved from: (1) completion (2) retention (3) gainful employment (“high value certificates”) (4) personalization (5) rigor and quality
- 9. Integrated Planning andAdvisingfor Student Success (iPASS): Putting Data to Work • iPASS is an integrative approach to student success that promotes shared ownership for educational progress among students, faculty, and staff. • It encompasses services that help students formulate and advance toward educational goals, including advising, counseling, progress tracking, and academic early alerts. • iPASS technologies contribute by documenting and tracking students’ educational plans, improving data analysis, offering self-service resources that reduce advisor workloads, and triggering interventions based on student behavior or faculty input. https://www.educause.edu/ipass-grant-challenge
- 10. NEWSFLASH: Software, onits own, doesn’t help a student graduate – Career exploration tools need a student interested in exploring. – What good is a mobile app that students don’t use? – An alert flag is not an intervention, it is only a prompt. – An online appointment is useless if the participants don’t show up. – A drag-and-drop academic plan isn’t much good if a student doesn’t follow it. – A data visualization gathers virtual dust if someone isn’t looking at it, preferably with an eye towards transforming the status quo.
- 11. In Praise ofToday’Educational Intrapreneurs The most important innovators in today’s student success are the people: the community engaged in solving problems and responding to opportunities, in novel ways, using human ingenuity. That is the very definition of innovation. Our software and services contribute to their innovation in the service of student success. • The faculty, advisors, and student services professionals working to help students achieve their academic goals; • The advisors, tutors, peer mentors, counselors, who help students progress • The registrars, enrollment managers, recruiters, registrars, IR professionals, bursars, deans and administrators dedicated to creating environments • The students at the center of our energies.
- 12. Analytics Student Success andAdvising Early alert Holistic advisingDegree planning
- 13. Starfish by Hobsonshelps all students engage with an informed, connected campus community dedicated to keeping them on track to reach their education and life goals.
- 14. Pioneered early alert andcase management First to integrate multi-source data into common view Added our 200th higher education institution Joined Hobsons in 2015 Funded by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Led development of predictive analytics-as-a- service, as a not- for-profit membership organization First open source common data definitions, interventions inventory Joined Hobsons in 2016 ADecade of Student Success Experience
- 15. Community Strategy Advice and insightsfrom a decade of work with higher education Analytics Institution-level insights to challenge assumptions and identify opportunities Action The Starfish Enterprise Success Platform turns data into action for everyone on campus An engaged and accessible group of innovators Starfish IntegratedApproach
- 16. Action is Imperative Evidence is Essential Connections areCritical Time is Valuable What We Know Good data can challenge and validate your assumptions, and catalyse innovation. Knowledge is only the beginning. You need to turn data into action to help all students. To support students effectively at scale, you need to work together, across functional groups. Your students need your best help now. You must act both quickly and strategically.
- 17.
- 18. • Capacity acrosssilos • Clean, secure data to inform decision-making across the institution • Comprehensive understanding of available interventions across the student lifecycle • Guidance on focusing questions Leadership
- 19. • The abilityto match interventions to the level of concern • Data at-a-glance and on-demand • Power to generate reports and prioritize activities Advisors and Student Services
- 20. • Input intostrategic decisions by functional leaders • Ability to leverage existing skill sets and expertise • A phased approach with low risk and high impact • A deep understanding of the impact of choices Information Technology
- 21. • Simple toolsto register concerns, make referrals, and acknowledge progress • Integration of academics /LMS with student success • Connections to students, advisors, counselors, coaches, and others • Notifications when concerns are resolved (“closing the loop”) Faculty
- 22. • A networkof clearly-defined, helpful, personal resources • Academic plans that connect individual best-fit schedules to goals • Self-scheduling for meetings and appointments online and in one place • Policies that encourage persistence and grit Students
- 23. • Clean, securedata to inform decision-making across the institution • Ability to delegate some kinds of daily reporting to focus on larger research Institutional Research
- 24.
- 25. Action is Imperative Evidence is Essential Connections areCritical Time is Valuable Our Four Principles Good data can challenge and validate your assumptions, and catalyse innovation. Knowledge is only the beginning. You need to turn data into action to help all students. To support students effectively at scale, you need to work together, across functional groups. Your students need your best help now. You must act both quickly and strategically. “This work has allowed us to eliminate the duplication of services by multiple departments and streamline our programming to offer first class interventions to our student population. Michelle Wiley, Student Support Specialist, Penn State World Campus Evidence is Essential
- 26. “In order toachieve the goals in our strategic plan, it’s absolutely essential that we approach student success in a holistic way, with good data to drive decisions. Mark Askren, CIO, University of Nebraska - Lincoln Evidence is Essential
- 27. “We can’t justthrow data at faculty and expect them to embrace it – and understand it – unless they realize that there’s a problem they’re trying to solve.” Larry Dugan, Director of Instructional Technologies, Monroe Community College (SUNY) Connections are Critical Source: Jankowski, Natasha A, “Unpacking Relationships: Instruction and Student Outcomes.” American Council on Education, 2017
- 28. Action is Imperative “Ibelieve that as an institution of higher education, we have a moral obligation to offer all that is possible to assist with a student’s success. Dr. Francis L. Battisti, Executive Vice President and Chief Academic Officer, SUNY Broome Community College
- 29. Thank you foryour Interest!
Editor's Notes
- #10 The link between software tools and student success has accelerated and been strengthened since 2012, when the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation first awarded funds to colleges interested in actively partnering with technology companies to collaborate on using technology tools specifically designed to improve student advising and rates of student retention. EDUCAUSE and Achieving the Dream have been leading these efforts to help institutions explore both the promise and the risks of iPASS
- #14 Identify students needing intervention or kudos Connect students to campus services and people who can help Assess which interventions are working Help students plan their coursework and schedules to fit their goals and their lives.
- #15 Key Objective: Establish credibility – Why should they even listen to us? Our history is strong. ----- So that’s why we’re in the same room together; necause you have some problems that need solving. Real problems, involving students, advisors, faculty, technology, funding, initiatives,…. And more. And that’s why I am really here. SHORT VERSION: Starfish was the first to bring student success solutions to now over 300 campuses in the US; we started back in 2008. PAR, another pioneer, was the first to bring student success analytics, they’ve been working with higher ed since 2011. So although this is an exciting new combination, neither one is a new solution. And those experiences have been working experiences. Our solutions are not just “what is the latest idea” but vetting, testing, validating, refining, constantly. Thought leadershup isn’t separate from tools for us – it is deeply embedded. That is how we got to be who we are, and that is why Hobsons had the brilliant idea of bringing us together. LONGER VERSION: I’m here talking about Starfish, of course. But the Starfish today has in interesting history. The original Starfish Retention Solutions was founded in 2008, before anyone at your college had titles like “VP of Student Success.” We worked with higher education institutions as partners to develop data integration methods to bring campus systems together. We built tools for outreach – early alerts, messages, meetings, Kudos - and basically focused on helping advisors approach their jobs with a student-centric viewpoint. We started seeing improved outcomes right away. Our work resonated with a lot of different types of institutions, who were trying to find ways to accommodate a changing population of students, overwhelmed advising staff, and increased state and federal pressure to produce quality graduates. While that was all going on, a group called the Predictive Analytics Reporting (PAR) Framework was formed in 2011out of an institution-driven research project. The project’s initial challenge was “Can we actually create a set of data definitions that all institutions could use for catalyzing conversations, measuring progress, and benchmarking against one another?” Once they were able to say YES (no small feat), the group stayed together to focus on research, developing rigorous models that tied student risk to established predictors, and helping other institutions manage student success data initiatives on their campuses. In 2015, Hobsons acquired Starfish and, in 2016, acquired PAR. The saying ”the whole is greater than the sum of its parts” has never been more true. Bringing PAR into the Starfish has given us our missing piece. Today, ”Starfish” means ALL of this <<wave at the whole timeline>>. Of course, being at Hobsons has other advantages. Hobsons is famous for its K12 college and career readiness solution, Naviance, and it’s higher ed CRM, Radius. All together, we are a pretty comprehensive suite of solutions for institutions with different needs. Starfish alone works with more than 350 institutions today – the Hobsons footprint in education is much much larger.
- #17 Key Objective: Highlight the necessary components to building capacity for student success, establish a clear commitment to this vision and seek agreement. --- We suggest you start here. Above all else, these four things matter: Evidence, Action, Connections, and Time. EVIDENCE IS ESSENTIAL Real data can challenge some of your assumptions about your students, and validate others. And it’s not always bad news! You may find areas of excellence to replicate across programs, student populations that are getting 2x the interventions, so you can reallocate those resources more effectively, upward trends in course completion among your most concerning cohorts. In today’s higher education environment, the stakes are too high – you can’t afford to make decisions without information. Here’s some evidence: Students who earn summer credits, enroll continuously, without stop-outs, and register on-time for courses? Those are all proven positive predictors of college completion. So those are behaviors that –statistically – you want to encourage. And there are lots of ways to do that. On the other hand, PAR research indicates that withdrawing from one course doubles the likelihood a student will not be retained. That’s just one student, and just one withdrawal. But there isn’t just one student. There are lots and lots of them. And withdrawing from two courses quadruples the likelihood a student will not be retained. Once you know this, once you see this pattern in your data, you start thinking about ways – policies, peer check-ins, orientation, outreach – to better match students with schedules they can handle, make sure your course sequences are set up properly, and provide extra resources so students on the verge of withdrawing make the right choices. Because if evidence is essential… ACTION IS IMPERATIVE Knowledge is power, but we could argue that what you DO with thtat knowledge is the most important part. A list of at-risk students is… just a list of students. They are not helped at all by being on a list somewhere. We did a call with Bowie State (an HBCU in MD) and when we presented the results of our data analysis, the president put us on mute, talked to his people, and came back,s aying “I want a list of those 56 students on my desk in the morning.” He got the data, and now wanted the action. So let’s talk abotu the action, because it can take a lot of different forms, and a lot of it is already happening – and happening effectively – today. Institutions spend 5-12% of their budgets on student supports, by some accountings. Almost everywhere we go, these supports are not integrated... And in many cases, no one actually knows the entire landscape. Wouldn’t it be nice to get a handle on what all those actions are, and who uses them, and how they could be measured, and which ones should be replicated or expanded and which ones can be reallocated? Because THEN you can get to work. CONNECTIONS ARE CRITICAL. Melinda Karp, from Community College Research Center, says to make a difference for students, advising must be “sustained, strategic, integrated, proactive, and personalized.” This means meeting students where they are, at point of need, in whatever modality is most sustainable for you. Community College of Philly has revolutionized the one-stop shop for student advising by adding tax prep services! A university in Florida put academic advisors right in the parking garages to meet with students. Fort Hays State University in Kansas has invested in training students to help other students who are struggling– they get an alert, set up a meeting, and literally walk their peers from office to office to get their issues resolved, in a friendly and non-intimidating way. And these are pretty low-tech, but incredibly impactful practices. Technology can help with these connections, of course. Here’s just one; we’ll have more later: Seneca College in Canada was an early adopter of Starfish. It was years ago now, but they used to say “when we just had warning flags, we were only reaching 36% of our student population. Adding kudos meant we were reaching 51% of our students and adding tutorial referrals added another 15%. So, instead of Starfish acting merely as an early warning system, it has become a valuable communication and outreach tool for our faculty and advisors.” Then just the other day, we talked to SUNY Broome in New York, who found that “first time, full-time students who received academic feedback [that’s flags, kudos and referrals] through Starfish, were retained on average 13.4 percentage points higher than those students who received no academic feedback.” So it’s not just that you’re reaching more students, but that when you do so, you are making a real difference. TIME IS VALUABLE Back to SUNY, this is SUNY Empire State, where they told us “We're reporting on statistics that happened in 2015. It's already 2017. We're already 18 months behind, because it takes so long to run the reports and analyze and curate, and in the meantime the student population is progressing and progressing.” Well THAT won’t do. You have students arriving every day. If you wait two years to get your evidence, take action, and connect students to helpful people… well, then you’ve lost two years of students. The truth is, Higher ed has unwritten rules, and it’s kind of a miracle that we expect students to know how to navigate this new world. What is a bursar? I have to pay a key deposit? Is the matriculation ceremony mandatory or optional? If I don’t have enough money to register next term do I go to financial aid, the registrar, my academic advisor, my dean? Deans seem busy – are they available to help me if I’m worried about a teacher? These are questions we can answer, but you’ve got to get to these students right away, before they even become at risk. After all, life happens every day. And those are real people, with real lives, and they have missed a big opportunity to change their trajectories.
- #18 What are students really struggling with?
- #19 UNL: PROBLEMS TO SOLVE: Wanted to show student success as a priority -- Goal: Deploy individual recovery plans for students on academic probation Difficult to share information appropriately -- Goal: Consolidate advising records into one secure system Need for evidence-based decision-making -- Goal: Use data to break down barriers separating units and functional groups SCHOOL PROFILE: UNL centralized advising records for 19.000 students across eight academic colleges at 8 academic colleges 57% six-year graduation rate STARFISH STORY: Launched Starfish EA/CO/AD in January 2012 (12 week implementation!) Integrated Peoplesoft, Blackboard Strategic plan calls for boosting the six-year graduation rate to 70% by 2017 By July 2014 more than 100,000 advising notes (including 13,357 in the very first term they were available) were entered into the Starfish platform Also more than 1,300 success plans were filed in the Starfish platform in the spring 2014 semester, representing 86 percent of the undergraduates on probation. Starfish 360 Award Winner in 2015!! TO LEARN MORE: Archived Webinar w Amy Goodburn (associate vice chancellor for academic affairs) from June 2014 Article in Campus Technology from July 2
- #23 According to a 2016 survey of first year college students, 28% of students anticipated needing tutoring or remedial work in math in their first year. This is a self-identified problem, not something revealed through predictive modelling or an alert flag. These students who know they need help. Do they know where to get it? You need to let students help themselves where able; give your students access to resources on campus, & show them how to connect, remove the obstacles academic and otherwise, teach them how to ask for help when they need it. Kuh identified that students that can clearly communicate what they want to Let them develop a plan, and see the consequences of the choices. Help them identify their aspirations and necessary steps to achieve them. Let students be proactively involved in their education. For many students, this will be enough, this is what they need to be successful. But certainly not for all for all students. SO…. HE has unwritten rules, and it’s kind of a miracle that we expect students to know how to navigate this new world. What is a bursar? What is a key deposit? Is the matriculation ceremony mandatory or optional? Do I go to my faculty member if I have a academic problem, or someone else? Deans seem busy – are they available to help me if I’m worried about a teacher? What do I need to do to keep my financial aid? It’s important that students are able to answer these questions. Did you know that only ONE course withdrawal in the 1sst year can negatively predict a student’s chance of retention
- #24 UMUC: “Having the insights about high-impact ‘obstacle courses’ and their impact on student success is instrumental in making decisions about which courses are the most appropriate for special assistance or interventions.” Denise Nadasen, Associate VP for Institutional Research, UMUC