a working model for student success: the tennessee technology centers
TRANSCRIPT
A Working Model for Student Success: The Tennessee
Technology Centers
“A review of IPEDS data reveals that of 1,145 two-year, public postsecondary institutions in U.S., only 105 (about 9 percent) can report an average “150 percent of time” graduation rate above 50% for the last five years.”
“There is no other state postsecondary system that comes anywhere close to achieving these outcomes.”-John Hoops
Tennessee Technology Center Mission: The
Tennessee Technology Center continues toserve as the premier provider of workforcedevelopment throughout the State ofTennessee. The Center fulfills this mission by:
Providing competency-based training of the highest quality that will qualify individuals for employment and or advancement in jobs.
Providing high quality training and retraining of employed workers.
Providing high quality training that is economical and accessible to all residents of Tennessee, thereby contributing to economic and community development of the communities we serve.
Program Structure
Competency-based
Student Services
Technology Foundations
Students:
Choose a Program Choose Fulltime or
Part-time Schedule….that’s it!
This absence of choice in the Center students’ program structure has major implications for the student experience; the first being elimination of confusion around what classes to take and in what sequence; second, there is very little choice in scheduling; and third, almost by default, the focus is on learning and completion.
Program descriptions often include the promise that students will “learn by doing” and the promise that the program will prepare students to have the right skills to succeed in the workplace and build a career; learning takes place in environments that are as closely modeled as feasible on real work environments with work environment expectations.
When viewed as a component of the whole educational program at the Centers, student services can be understood as an ‘embedded case management’ system. The faculty, staff and administration maintain a network of information and communication surrounding nearly all the students; personnel of the Centers as a group take responsibility for organizing and providing students services.
In TN 64% of high school graduates enrolling in community colleges are placed in developmental or remedial courses annually.
In Fall of 2007, 20,500 students took a developmental or remedial course
Only 5,500 of these students successfully completed a college level course in the Fall of 2008
A Success Rate of less than 27%
The Centers’ model of integrated Technology Foundations for developmental education is highly effective and is very different than conventional developmental education practices.
Remedial studies integrated into technical programs
Everyone Enters Pre-Assessment Computer based,
Individualized & Self-paced instruction
WorkKeys/CRC
An overarching observation about the Centers is that the kinds of outcomes obtained by the Centers flow from an organization whose core operational principles and practices are designed to produce completion and placement in the labor force.
Community college occupational and technical education programs could explore integrating key elements of a competency based model and the seamlessness of a clock hour structure into their existing technical degree programs.
The Center’s model of integrated Technology Foundations for developmental education is highly effective.
The Centers build in accountability for completion and placement across the whole institution.
James D. King, Vice Chancellor Tennessee Technology Centers, Tennessee Board of Regents
[email protected] Chelle Travis, Assistant Vice Chancellor for
Dr. Carol G. Puryear, Director, Tennessee Technology Center-Murfreesboro
A Working Model for Student Success: The Tennessee
Technology Centers