EDUCAUSE Annual Conference 2017: Reflections on the IPASS Grant Progress and Challenges

It has now been two and a half years since the IPASS grants were awarded. Since that time, grantee institutions have selected and deployed new technologies in support of advising reform and student retention and completion efforts.

The journey has been an incredible one, and much has been learned and shared throughout. Recently, many grantees convened in Philadelphia for the EDUCAUSE 2017 Annual Conference, and they shared their journey highlighting outcomes and challenges in posters with the over 7,000 attendees who were there.

Here are some of the highlights of their work:

• Austin Community College has redesigned programs for guided pathways, allowing students to have a much clearer and direct path to completion. ACC has integrated its work with academic and career planning software to enable efficiencies and support the progress of students completing what they start. ACC reports an increase of seven percentage points in students completing their first 15 credits — a promising first step — and the graduation rate for full-time credential-seeking students is also rising, moving from four percent to eight percent.
• Colorado State University is all about leveraging the technology for a "high touch" advising experience. As advisors work to evolve their student support practices through their new technology solution, they have witnessed a 93 percent decrease in students on "planned leave" and a 82 percent decrease in nonregistered students for spring 2017. Technology plays just a very small piece in this puzzle, however; the largest hurdle is in getting people to change practices, and at CSU they've done this by involving Academic Success Coaches in reimagining how they can better serve their students.
• Delaware Community College has witnessed increased awareness and recognition of the importance of advising. This is key for advising reform to take place and should not be overlooked and should be celebrated along the journey. Advising reform at DCC has led to earlier intervention, and results are trending in the right direction, with fall-to-spring full-time student retention increasing from 76 percent to 77 percent and an increase among part-time students of 57 percent to 65 percent.
• Montgomery County Community College has been on this journey for some time, and the evolution of its holistic approach to support students shows. At MCCC, degree-seeking students have a career plan, financial plan, and an academic plan by the completion of their first semester. This ensures that all students have well-grounded, multifaceted plans to support their success, not only to completion but beyond to a chosen career. MCCC has witnessed a 14 percentage-point increase in first-year credit completion for full-time degree-seeking students.
• Ramapo College evolved its efforts in supporting students by introducing the use of predictive analytics that allow the college to customize first-year student "success plans." Advisors use the plans to track their advisees, and the plans require students to complete to-do items that are built to ensure students are getting the support they need to succeed and adapt to campus life. Mandatory academic advising for first-year students has already shown some positive signs, with a decline of two percentage points in students on academic warning by the end of their first semester and a decline of 11 percentage points in students who continue to academic probation.

Are there challenges and barriers to this work? Of course there are, and sharing them is as important as sharing the successes. Grantees had an opportunity to highlight some of the challenges they are still working through, as well as discuss and collaborate on some of the solutions.

Among the most common challenges we heard was project/initiative fatigue, wherein people feel like the effort never ends. They also cited a need for the integration of multiple systems, as we need systems that "talk" to each other. Changes in advising and student support require many policy and procedural changes to align various university departments and silos, and the urgency of this work needs to be elevated and supported throughout the institution.

Interested in learning more and connecting with the institutions doing this work? You can do all of this as well as access resources we've authored by visiting the EDUCAUSE IPASS Grant Challenge page.

Ana Borray is Director of IPASS Implementation Services at EDUCAUSE.