Symposium Schedule of Events

A well designed and delivered first-year experience (FYE) course has the potential to operate as more than just a stand-alone course; it can serve as the centerpiece and connective tissue for a comprehensive and well coordinated first-year experience program that: (a) provides students a meaningful introduction and gateway to the college experience, (b) serves as lynchpin for integrating students’ curricular and co-curricular experiences, (c) builds cross-divisional partnerships among faculty, support staff and program directors, and (d) supplies baseline data for value-added assessment and development of student learning portfolios. This session will examine how to actualize these potent, but often overlooked, systemic benefits of the FYE course.

Research clearly suggests that success in college is multifaceted and involves both cognitive and affective dimensions of the self; therefore, promoting success requires a comprehensive, holistic (whole-person) approach that includes attention to academic and personal dimensions of student development. A first-year experience (FYE) course that is intentional in its purpose, and involves campus-wide collaboration, is one of the most proactive and intrusive ways to supply students with the holistic support they need. However, lack of quality instructors, an extremely diverse student population, and little institutional support often pose institutional challenges to getting an FYE course off the ground or keeping it afloat. This session will introduce you to a step-by-step approach for marketing, designing, refining and delivering a viable and sustainable FYE course.

Research shows that students often respond better to, and learn more from, active learning techniques than traditional lectures. This session will focus on engaging first-year experience (FYE) course practices that promote active and collaborative learning. The session will be highly interactive, with participants experiencing the active learning techniques presented. The practices showcased will be targeted and tailored specifically to FYE course content, such as utilizing campus resources, goal setting, relationships, and wellness. The active learning strategies to be experienced in this session are applicable to students at all levels of academic preparedness and are adaptable to hybrid and on-line classes.

Continuing advances in educational technology are expanding the number of new pedagogical tools available for engaging students in independent and interactive learning. This session will focus on how technology may be incorporated into a first-year experience (FYE) course to enhance student engagement, personal reflection, self-assessment, and course evaluation. Strategies will also be discussed for delivering FYE course content via online and eBook formats, which have the potential to scale up the course’s outreach, increase student access to the course, and allow students to experience the course asynchronously.

First-year experience (FYE) course instructors can have a significant impact on the transition and success of first-year students. Not only do they teach important concepts and skills to the newest members of the campus community, they also serve as academic advisors, mentors, and translators of the institution’s culture. Paying careful attention to instructor recruitment, development, and recognition is essential for maintaining and retaining a cadre of quality instructors. First, we will discuss how to position the FYE course to attract highly qualified faculty and staff to teach it. Then we will discuss methods for establishing an instructor development program with reward systems that continuously incentivize participation. We will wrap up the session with a discussion of strategies for formalizing an instructor recruitment-retention process and assessing an instructor development program.

For students who arrive on college campuses underprepared, who are members of underrepresented groups, and who are first-generation or low- income students, the goal of earning a college degree may go unrealized unless campuses develop intrusive initiatives that are intentionally designed to increase college completion rates. One such initiative is the first-year experience (FYE) course a proactive approach that can promote student success not only by supplying students with college knowledge and cultural capital, but also by promoting learning through diversity, cultural competency, and critical thinking. These skills are also important for career success in the 21st-century workplace, where employers who are seek college graduates who can communicate across diverse cultural groups, solve problems, and generate innovative ideas. This session will examine practical strategies for infusing diversity, cultural competency and critical thinking into an FYE course, via both course content and course pedagogy.

Embedding educational and career planning activities in the first-year experience (FYE) course can support student success and learning goals at two-year and four-year campuses. Integrating structured curricular and co-curricular initiatives into the first-year experience in ways that guide students to develop and complete education plans is an essential component of pathways efforts, and helping students make informed educational and career decisions are proven methods to promoting retention and graduation rates. This session will explore how the FYE course can be designed and deployed to (a) engage students in educational and career exploration and planning, (b) holistically support academic advising and career development goals and (c) enable your campus to achieve important student learning outcomes.

A plethora of national (cross-institutional) research supports the power of the first-year experience (FYE) course; however, local skeptics are still likely to raise questions about whether evidence gathered elsewhere applies to “our students” on “our campus.” Thus, “home grown” (campus-specific) course assessment is critical to secure initial buy-in for FYE course adoption and ongoing support to ensure course survival. This session will examine how FYE course assessment can be used for two essential purposes: (a) summative evaluation—to “sum up” and prove the course’s overall impact (value) for use in bottom-line decisions about adopting, continuing, or expanding the course and (b) formative evaluation—to “shape up,” fine tune, and continually improve the quality of the course.

Large numbers of college-bound students continue to be unprepared for the expectations and rigor of college. If postsecondary educational reform efforts aimed at increasing college-completion rates do not include collaborative relationships with the schools, the impact of national college access-and- success efforts will remain seriously compromised. Higher education needs to work with high schools to foster students’ college and career readiness. One strategy for doing so is by offering high school students a college success course that will enable them to “hit the ground running” when they begin college and enable first-year (FGYE) experience courses—which are often limited to one or two units—more time and opportunity to address the full range of factors that impact college persistence and completion. This session will focus on the design and delivery of a pre-college student success course at feeder high schools that may be used in conjunction with, or in lieu of, a college-level FYE course.

Peer leaders and peer mentors are currently being used in postsecondary campuses of all institutional types, and their use continues to grow. The power of peer leadership is well-documented and benefits both peer mentors and their student mentees. This session will examine ways in which peer mentors can be most effectively integrated into an (FYE) course to promote the success of first-year students, while at the same time, develop their own leadership and career-readiness skills. Specific strategies for recruiting, selecting, and rewarding peer leaders to participate in and FYE course will be discussed, as well as the particular leadership and mentoring roles they might play in the course, both inside and outside the classroom.