Off the Hook: Where is Your Tuition Going? (2.15.11)
With all the recent budget cuts, the Strategic Plan will help determine where your money is going to be spent. Now’s your chance to learn more about the Undergraduate Student Success Task Force and how its initiatives will affect you. This is an abbreviated version of the Undergraduate Student Success Task Force Report, as interpreted by members of Student Government:
Initiative 1: Proactive Advising
- Require all academic advisors to go through basic and cross-curricular training
- Increase the number of advisors to allow for a 120:1 student-to-advisor ratio
- Annual evaluations for all advisors
Initiative 2: The First-Year Inquiry Courses
- Add more FYI sections and increase enrollment from 10% (current) to 100% (by 2016)
- Enrollment would be capped at 19 students allowing for a small class setting
- Intended to develop critical thinking and communication skills as well as allow first-year students to develop a connection with a faculty member and group of peers
Initiative 3: Living & Learning Villages
- Increase the number of first-year students living in one of NC State’s residential villages: move from 25% (current) to 50% (recommendation) by adding 4 new villages and expanding the existing 9 villages
- Examples: Alexander Global Village, Students Advocating for Youth (SAY), Women in Science and Engineering (WISE), Impact Leadership Village, Arts Village, Entrepreneurial Village (currently under development)
Initiative 4: High-Impact Learning
- Include more high-impact learning, giving students the opportunity to get more hands-on experience by requiring all students to complete one of the following activities:
- Study abroad, service learning, internship/co-op, Capstone courses, and undergraduate research
- The requirement would be balanced out by dropping the “additional breadth” general educational program (GEP) requirement
Initiative 5: First-year Transition
- Change orientation for first-year students from an “event” to a “process”
- Example: Summer START Program, which allows students to jumpstart their undergraduate careers by taking academic courses as well as workshops on skills that are critical for success.Let the Planning Committee know what you think.
Additionally, the task force also saw a need to improve “intracampus” transfer, and has initiated a committee to examine this issue.
Send your thoughts to the Planning Committee or, as always, email me with any questions or comments you may have.
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Don’t forget, the Student Success Forum is tomorrow night in the Talley Student Center Ballroom. It’s a great opportunity for students to learn more about NC State’s Strategic Plan and “white papers” – the initiatives put forth by nine University task forces. You can learn more in today’s issue of Technician.
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