By Brenda Selman, AACRAO Vice President for Admissions and Enrollment Management - Board of Directors
The momentum to support achieving excellence and equity in the higher education community continues as the Department of Education released the new “Attaining College Excellence and Equity” guide for providing wrap-around services for students and announcing the Raising the Bar: Attaining College Excellence and Equity initiative. The goal of these efforts is to collaborate with key stakeholders at national and state levels and institutions of higher education to reimagine how we help students navigate the higher education landscape and our institutions on a personal level.
The initiative has three focus areas: supporting data-driven improvement, recognizing institutional success, and investing in success at scale. Each focus area has actions to support and enhance its delivery and use across the country. There’s a push to ensure that the opportunities and support spread across diverse populations.
Focusing In
The student data-driven improvement focus will include a series of summits highlighting how institutions are raising the bar for success. The goal is to share examples that have been implemented and yielded results. The Department wants to develop resources to share these promising practices with others. Much of the effort in this focus area will be on developing data dashboards to help institutions set and achieve improvement goals relevant to the students they serve or seek to serve.
Recognizing institutional success will focus on promoting and celebrating institutions that have shown success serving under-served populations. Organized campus visits to successful institutions will allow others to see the programs in action. This will become a national recognition program for colleges and universities that set new standards of success.
The Department plans to invest in success at scale through grants and other resources that build upon evidence-based work. This will include enhancing funding through a variety of current programs and providing technical assistance activities. The Department is renewing the Project Success initiative, which supports efforts by major guarantee agencies to help Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Tribal Colleges and Universities, and other Minority-Serving Institutions.
Watch for more information on the summits and look for the supporting materials on the U.S. Department of Education website.