Why Is Important to Understand Barriers Experienced by College Students

At the beginning of each academic year, I am always energized when I see the faces and new fashions of the incoming students (and returning students). In fact, these students are joining us after having various summer experiences with their lives at home, working for local businesses, interning out of state, studying abroad, summer school, and much more!

In fact, during this past week, I've been watching various videos from NBC News (on Hulu) focused on the Freshman Experience. Here are some of my favorites. I think each administrator, faculty member, staff members, and even members from the external campus community should watch one or more of these videos to gain a glimpse into some aspects lives of the students who are joining their campus community.

Which one is your favorite video? List it in the comment section listed below:

Video - I have always been intrigued by roommate selection at colleges and universities across the country. Do you know how roommates are selected by most higher education institutions?



Video - Most colleges and university students played one or more sports in high school, but then they transition to college and are not as engaged with their health and wellness. This means that the likelihood of students gaining weight is very high. Do you know that the average weight gained by college students during their first years of college is 15 pounds? Find out more...



Video - Student debt is one of the most crushing reminders that students have when they are happy and jubilant after reaching the requirements of their degree. This means that we will need to offer continued financial support and education for students once they graduate from college. Find out why...



These are simple videos, but they are great reminders of the celebrations and perils that college students experience as they graduate. What did the videos miss?

Interested in a specific student success topic or do you need a speaker for an upcoming conference? Contact me via direct message on Twitter or join our Student Success Communication and Technology Institute on Facebook!

Thanks for visiting! 

Sincerely,

Dr. Jennifer T. Edwards
Higher Education Speaker and Researcher

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Using the Education Advisory Board's Navigate Platform to Impact Student Success and Retention

If your campus utilizes the Education Advisory Board's Navigate platform (formerly the Student Success Collaborative), you are extremely lucky. This platform enables faculty, staff, and students to engage electronically with one another. From a Communication Professor's perspective, it is important for me to emphasize that the Student Success Collaborative (Navigate) is one of the most easy student success technology platforms to navigate (no pun intended) for faculty and staff. 


The Student Success Collaborative (Navigate) is an innovative student success technology platform that can enable campuses to provide outreach to students and faculty, measure this outreach, and to make evidence-based decisions about the emerging data. For campuses who want to connect with their students and benchmark the results, the Education Advisory Board's Navigate platform is one of the best technologies for your campus.

Retention, Student Success, Student Success Collaborative, Education Advisory Board, Navigate, How to Use EAB, Retention, 60X30TX, Higher Education, Student Affairs, Student Services

Here's a comparison between the features of Navigate and the Starfish platform:

Starfish	EAB (Navigate)
	We Can Form Appointment Campaigns
We Can Send Email to Students	We Can Send Email to Students
	We Can See a Realistic Preview for Each Student
	We Can See the Public Notes for Each Student
	We Can Perform Advanced Searches and Analytics
Faculty Log-In to Refer Their Students to Early Alert	Faculty Never Have to Log-On to Refer Their Students
Create Your Own Cohort	Create Your Own Cohort
Student’s Picture is Displayed	Student’s Picture is Displayed
	We Can View Midterm Grades and Final Grades

I am eager to discover the newly updated features of the Starfish platform again and I welcome the opportunity to discover this with another campus who wants to invite me as a student success technology consultant.

If your campus is considering how they can integrate a new student success technology for their students, faculty, and staff, please contact me and I will be happy to help. Student success has been why research field for the past 15 years and I am excited about the new technology innovations that are occurring in the higher education field.

Sincerely,

Dr. Jennifer T. Edwards
Higher Education Speaker and Researcher

My Social Media Channels!
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Free Report - Institutions' Use of Data and Analytics for Student Success

https://www.naspa.org/images/uploads/main/DATA2018_DOWNLOAD.pdf

If you love higher education technology and data analytics as much as I do, you will love this report from NASPA (The National Association of Student Personnel Administrators), Educause, and the Association for Institutional Research. This report was written by Amelia Parnell, Darlena Jones, Alexis Wesaw, and D. Christopher Brooks.

The report contains the following:

Executive Summary

Discussion of Findings

Part I: Types of Student Success Data Projects

Part II: Structures in Place

Part III: Level of Coordination

Part IV: Programs, Interventions, and Outcomes

Implications and Recommendations

References

The report also includes a methodology, additional resources, and acknowledgements.

Here are the recommendations from the study:

Recommendation 1: Identify and expand institutionally appropriate roles for IR, IT, and student affairs.

Recommendation 2: Transcend or remove certain organizational silos to improve communication across all position levels.

Recommendation 3: Prioritize measuring student outcomes.

Recommendation 4: Increase the use of qualitative data, especially from students.

My reflection: This report was great and included many institutions. However, as a higher education researcher and former higher education administrator, I think the report would benefit greatly from numerous reflections from higher education adminstrators.

For example, the first recommendation highlights the expansion of institutionally appropriate roles, but most institutions have very limited budgets that cannot accommodate the expansion of positions or add additional responsibilities to roles.

Also, I recommend that institutions provide a set of guidelines for effective communication with students (for student retention efforts), but I am not a proponent of large communication committees or councils. The formation of these groups can slow down progress for retention. Sometimes these councils that usually consist of individuals from institutional research, institutional technology, student affairs, enrollment management, and academic affairs and exist to control the distribution of messages to students.

Also, I wanted to share this infographic that I created about Student Success Technology.

Read the report, view the infographic and digest the information. Feel free to write about the report during the comment box! I would love to read it!

Sincerely,

Dr. Jennifer T. Edwards
Higher Education Speaker and Researcher

My Social Media Channels!
Remember to Follow Me on Twitter! @drjtedwards
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My Research Interests: Customer Service and Social Media, Higher Education Retention, and Millennials at Work
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Three Student Success Action Items for Student Success Collaborative and Navigate Professionals!

If your campus utilizes the Student Success Collaborative (Navigate) platform, consider yourself to be extremely lucky! We had a few awesome training sessions at my university and I was incredibly lucky to facilitate these sessions for the faculty, staff, and students at my university and also Texas A&M University's advising team.

We had several sessions that focused on the features of the Navigate platform. Yes, I know that the Education Advisory Board company will continue to update the platform, but the basic components of the platform will remain the same (I hope). The components are easy for the faculty, staff, and students to navigate, but these important individuals at the university also need special reminders about the key clicks they need to make to "make things happen" on the platform.

So, here are three things that faculty, staff, and students at higher education institutions (colleges and universities) need to know in order to effectively navigate the platforms.

Action Item 1 - How to Boost Your Student Success Collaborative Campaign (2-3 Days After Sending the Invitation)

Action Item 2 - How to Schedule an Advising Appointment on EAB Navigate (formerly the Student Success Collaborative)

Action Item 3 - How to Create Tutoring Appointments on EAB Navigate (formerly the Student Success Collaborative)

Enjoy these three action items and please let me know if you have any questions. I will be happy to help! My contact information is listed below.

Sincerely,

Dr. Jennifer T. Edwards
Higher Education Speaker and Researcher

My Social Media Channels!
Remember to Follow Me on Twitter! @drjtedwards
Remember to Subscribe to Me on YOUTUBE
My Research Interests: Customer Service and Social Media, Higher Education Retention, and Millennials at Work
Instagram - http://www.instagram.com/drjtedwards/
Facebook - Facebook!
If You Love Periscope as Much as I Do...Follow Me There! - http://www.periscope.com/drjtedwards/
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