Phillips Community College in Arkansas won an award recently for Student Success – increasing its graduation and 4-year college transfer performance.
With the plethora of best practices and concepts, programs and pathways, you might think that the Student Success was driven by these proven strategies…but you’d be incorrect.
According to the article PCCUA recognized for student success, the starting point was understanding the student. Who are they? What is their background? What’s the lens through which they see college life and experience PCCUA? Apparently, many students come from generational poverty, and the faculty and staff do not.
This basic fact gets at a core problem with many organizations in the education industry and other industries as well these days. There are leaders, faculty, or staff that know a product, they know a topic, they know a program. But delivering that knowledge effectively often requires that they know the person to whom they deliver. We can’t assume that all students receive and process information in the same way, that they all want the same learning environment and examples.
Sometimes to best impart knowledge, we have to – first – know the student.
Survey your students. Ask them questions. Learn about their past. Then learn what most effectively guides them to a future of possibilities.
Student Success starts with knowing them.
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