Description
Book SynopsisStudent Success: From Board Rooms to Classrooms analyzes the emerging body of scholarly research on student success in an accessible and readable way that community college leaders will find both interesting and relevant. To further illustrate the connections between research and practice, case studies are drawn from community colleges that are engaging in reform. Morest offers a three-pronged approach for community college leaders seeking to improve the success of their students. First, community college leaders need to look around at the technological transformation that has occurred in other service sectors and import some of these ideas to student services. Second, community college leaders need to explicitly socialize their students to become college students and to bond with their community college. Finally, improving the quality of teaching is particularly important with regard to developmental education, where students are attempting to master material that they have ostensibly
Trade ReviewThis book does an excellent job of laying out the major issues that face students as they move through the community college and of thoughtfully assessing the state of evidence on noteworthy solutions that are being offered to address these issues. The discussions of retention, developmental education, occupational education, transfer, and organizational change are sophisticated and yet very clear. Vanessa Morest brings a unique combination of skills and experiences to the analysis of the community college as both a well-established researcher and a senior administrator at a community college. This book is very solidly grounded both in research and theory and in concrete experience. -- Kevin Dougherty, Teachers College, Columbia University
This is an excellent review of the challenges faced by community colleges and their students and current approaches to improving student success. I found the chapter on Organizational Change for Student Success particularly compelling because it addresses a complex subject that receives too little attention: the multiple and sometimes contradictory demands affecting colleges seeking transformational change. This book is a welcome addition to the literature, combining scholarly research with the realpolitik of a seasoned practitioner. It should be on the reading list of both veteran and aspiring community college leaders. -- Trudy Bers, Executive Director, Research, Curriculum & Planning, Oakton Community College
Table of ContentsThe Community College Series Foreword Acknowledgements 1. Understanding the “Community’s” College 2. Transitioning to College 3. Campus Context of Student Success 4. Learning to Work, Working to Learn 5. A Complex Equation: Transfer and Student Success 6. Organizational Change for Student Success 7.Moving the Needle on Student Success About the Author
