With increasingly limited resources and high demands from faculty and staff, institutions are finding it difficult to provide training in a cost-effective manner. This session will explore a series of online tools faculty and staff can use to provide training 24/7.

The presentation will include the use of podcasts, web conferencing and videos, all of which are critical to creating a dynamic and engaging learning environment. The presenters will focus on how to utilize these tools to deliver and enhance face-to-face training, online training and on-demand training, so that you can do more with less.

Colleges are facing an overwhelming challenge in developing part-time faculty as an institutional advantage rather than a last minute alternative. Concerns regarding the growing use of part time faculty have been widely studied and analyzed. However, virtually all existing research supports the assertion that part time faculty are as equipped to assist students in reaching their academic outcomes when hired, retained, and supported as a viable workforce demographic (Gappa & Leslie, 1993; Levinson, 2005; Wagoner, Metcalfe, & Olaore, 2005). This presentation will address the need for a more relevant and timely exploration of strategies that support part-time faculty and their role in student success and retention.

Asperger’s is a growing disorder in today’s college population at both community colleges and four years institutions. This program will offer a range of practical, research-based and time-tested techniques for working with students struggling with Asperger’s disorder. Dr. Brian Van Brunt will review how to assist students transitioning from high school to college, helping with social and communication challenges and ensuring proper access to services.

Early intervention is critical to campus retention efforts. Early alert systems offer institutions systematic approaches to identifying and intervening with students exhibiting at-risk behaviors before the behaviors reach the acute stage. Many of these systems rely on a common format for student referral to a central receiving point. Systems at larger institutions use web-based technology to allow for a scalable approach to at-risk intervention. This presentation describes the development, implementation, and assessment of a web-based, fully integrated early alert referral system at a large, public university in the Southwest.

This webinar is designed to help faculty, learning center professionals, and student affairs personnel develop strategies to help students become independent, self-directed learners. A discussion of the characteristics of today’s students will help participants understand why many students lack effective learning strategies when they enroll in college, and how simple it is to teach them strategies for successful learning.

Reflection and think-pair-share activities will introduce participants to cognitive science research based methods that can be used to improve teaching and learning. The session will provide a variety of strategies that have proven successful in helping students experience meaningful, transferable learning.

Transfer and access to higher education are now more intertwined than ever before. Many institutions are looking to transfer students to fill in the enrollment gaps left by fewer high school graduates. Accepting transfer students into the culture of the campus isn’t as easy as simply admitting them. Changing campus climate and culture to accept and value transfers can be a challenge for many faculty and administrators. Building a campus climate that enhances student success and welcomes this ever growing population takes an intentional effort with university-wide support. Participants will be instructed on how to assess the campus environment as it relates to transfer students and their experiences. Based on their campus audit, faculty and staff will hear some creative ways of building a transfer friendly and transfer-going culture on their campuses.

Postsecondary education affirms both access and excellence in education. Both require resources and commitment to achieve. Traditional sources of learning assistance and developmental education are under both strain of limited financial resources and the desire to reduce offerings of developmental-level courses. Instructors of first-year and lower-division college courses are uniquely positioned to increase student achievement and persistence through using Universal Design for Learning (UDL) to embed best practices of learning assistance into their classroom activities. The same UDL principles can also be used within student service units. This webinar will equip educators with a practical toolbox of activities and strategies that can easily be implemented.

As public funding for colleges and universities diminishes in a poor economy, coupled with an increasing emphasis on accountability for retention and graduation rates, academic and student affairs specialists face multiple challenges. To meet these expectations at a large metropolitan university that enrolls more than 10,000 new transfers each academic year, an innovative Peer Mentor program was developed. The successful program assists students as they prepare for transfer, helps them through their transition and guides them as they progress to graduation. Through collaboration with multiple partners, this peer program trains students to be first-level academic advisors, provides them a structure and support to develop transition programming that meets the needs of new transfer students, and creates a bridge for new students into the academic and social life of the campus community.

Early intervention is critical to campus retention efforts. Early alert systems offer institutions systematic approaches to identifying and intervening with students exhibiting at-risk behaviors before the behaviors reach the acute stage. Many of these systems rely on a common format for student referral to a central receiving point. Systems at larger institutions use web-based technology to allow for a scalable approach to at-risk intervention. This presentation describes the development, implementation, and assessment of a web-based, fully integrated early alert referral system at a large, public university in the Southwest.

This 90-minute webinar is designed specifically for classroom teachers who can expect to encounter non-traditional students regularly in their courses. A significant secondary audience would be the academic administrators who supervise those faculty members and who are responsible for training them. The purpose of this webinar is to help faculty members and administrators understand who non-traditional students are, what sorts of special needs they may have and how instructors can help to meet those needs, and how non-traditional students can often make unique contributions to the learning environment. The webinar will be led by a 26-year veteran of the community college classroom who has taught literally thousands of non-traditional students over the years and who has also served as a department chair and an academic dean.