Transfer Project Update: from CCC ‘demo’ to national stage at CCA

 

 

 

CVHEC Transfer Project and PPM moves from ‘demo’ to

CCC ‘Vision 2030’ status; national presentation set

BY TOM URIBES
CVHEC Communications/Media Lead

The demonstration status that the Central Valley Transfer Project was conferred by California Community Colleges Chancellor Sonya Christian in 2023 has been elevated with the inclusion of the project into the CCC “Vision 2030,” the system announced recently.

Simultaneously, the Transfer Project became formalized when the California State Legislature and Gov. Gavin Newsom approved state funding for all colleges to align with the “Program Pathways Mapper” software platform that is the Transfer Project’s central feature.  

Now, CVHEC announces that its team will present the Transfer Project at the Complete College America national conference later this fall along with the Central Valley Math Bridge Program presented by College Bridge.

The Central Valley Transfer Project is the fruit of efforts by a small team of Central Valley higher education leaders convened by the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium (CVHEC) in 2022 who set out to break down the barriers between community college, California State University and University of California campuses to increase successful transfers from community colleges to four-year institutions.  

The project is supported through the PPM software platform, a Cloud-based, public facing application that rides independently on the internet and is accessible to all parties the same as all public applications.

CVHEC’s Transfer Project initiative is also helping eliminate the equity gap among historically underrepresented students, said Stan Carrizosa, president emeritus of College of the Sequoias who is now CVHEC’s Transfer Project co-lead with Tom Burke, chancellor-emeritus of the Kern Community College District

Now the CVHEC initiative will be shared on the national stage at the Complete College America national conference in Baltimore Nov. 18. A CVHEC team will share how the project originated with a pilot effort including UC Merced, Merced College and Bakersfield College.  (CCA line-up)

Chancellor-emeritus Burke will make the trek to Baltimore with Dr. Benjamin Duran, CVHEC executive director, and Jennifer Johnson of California Community Colleges Foundation.

“Our team will present how the process has been refined and streamlined to achieve effective collaboration between all entities,” Burke said.

They will share how CVHEC’s protocols were so successful that CCC Chancellor Christian adopted the Transfer Project as a statewide demonstration project in 2023, first announced at CVHEC’s Higher Education Summit in Fresno that October.

Carrizosa said the Transfer Project process that will be shared at the national conference includes intersegmental convening of faculty, advisors and guidance staff to engage in focused efforts to review, align and approve lower and upper division course sequences as transfer pathways from community colleges to four-year colleges

Through the ease of access to PPM, historically marginalized and underrepresented students have easy access to quality, accurate course sequences to help clearly map their pathway to degree completion, he explained.

“PPM also enables counselors, advisors, high school students and parents to engage with the same official information and start their college planning at any point along their K-12 experience,” Carrizosa said.

“And the Transfer Project is leveraging the implementation of dual enrollment courses in high schools across the system further enhancing timely completion of transfer-level requirements in English and Math and closing the student achievement gap.”

Perhaps just as important, he said, the project now has collected baseline data from 5,000 incoming freshman to Bakersfield College that presents the positive impact the project is having on eliminating the equity gap among historically underrepresented students.

Joining CVHEC at the national conference will be Owyn Lancaster of College Bridge who will discuss in a separate session, “Central Valley Math Bridge: Creating Seamless Pathways for Student Success.”

He will present how the Math Bridge Program, with support from   CVHEC and the Rand Corporation, is redefining math education by creating seamless, equity-driven pathways from high school to college and how, through strategic partnerships between high schools and community colleges, the program aligns curriculum, instruction and support to eliminate learning gaps and boost student success. (See related Math Bridge data article in this issue).

“With an 88 percent pass rate and 248 students earning college credit in 2024–25 alone, the initiative proves what’s possible when systems work together,” Lancaster said. “We will discuss with the national audience how Math Bridge isn’t just about curriculum alignment; it’s about reshaping outcomes, removing barriers and transforming how students experience math, paving the way toward educational equity and degree attainment.”

See CCA full lineup

 

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UPDATE: CVHEC increases transfers the Central Valley Way


Dr. James Zimmerman (center) on the CVHEC Summit panel, “What the CVHEC is Happening in the Central Valley,” May 9 demonstrated how the Central Valley Transfer Project addresses educational disparities in the region by fostering increased access to higher education for students in the Central Valley. Here he is flanked by Dr. Kristin Clark, chancellor-emeritus of the West Hills Community College District and now CVHEC’s dual enrollment lead, and Dr. Benjamín Durán, president-emeritus of Merced College and now CVHEC’s executive director.


Transfer student Araceli Tilley testified in the CVHEC summit student panel May 9 that the the Central Valley Transfer Program’s Program Pathways Mapper app not only  helped her, but she uses it to help other students in the Merced College Student Success Program where she now works. She has presented her Transfer Project/Mapper experiences at several conferences statewide.

Consortium Transfer Project moves from CCC

‘demonstration’ status to ‘Vision 2030

strategy

BY STAN A. CARRIZOSA, SR.
CVHEC Regional Coordinator
(President-emeritus, College of the Sequoias)

The Central Valley Higher Education Consortium (CVHEC) is renowned for its effectiveness in fostering regional collaboration among all of the Valley’s higher education institutions.

Most notable, as evidenced by the recent Central Valley Higher Education Summit, is the ability to bring intersegmental partners together from the University of California, California State University and California Community college systems as well as independent/private institutions for the purpose of increasing access and success of Central Valley students in their higher education experience.

At the summit, a more recent and very powerful example of this was the presentation by Dr. James Zimmerman on the panel, “What the CVHEC is Happening in the Central Valley,” where he discussed the success of the Central Valley Transfer Project initiated by CVHEC in partnership with UC Merced (UCM), backed in practice by the testimony of successful transfer student Araceli Tilley’s convincing testimony in the student panel earlier that morning.

Determined to overcome the low number of community college transfers to UCM, this partnership set out to carve a new path in accelerating successful transfers.

Fully launched in 2020 the project focuses on streamlining and enhancing the process of transferring from community colleges to four-year institutions within California’s Central Valley. This project seeks to address challenges faced by students in navigating complex transfer pathways and aims to increase the number of students successfully earning bachelor’s degrees.

Historic firsts: faculty input/ CCC implementation statewide

It was an historic first when CVHEC brought UC faculty to the table alongside community college faculty in convenings structured to review and approve lower-division course patterns for successful transfer to UCM.

Dr. Zimmerman recalled the dynamics of this collaboration at the summit re-telling the message UC Merced conveyed to Bakersfield College to lay what would be the foundation of the Transfer Project:

“ ‘Our faculty want to partner with your faculty to make sure that the courses that you have on your campuses, will transfer to UC Merced with no problems’,” he said. “ ‘Can we have a sit down where your faculty talk to our faculty, and we start having a course-by-course listing that shows if they spend their first two years on your campus, they transfer to our campus for two years and they finish with a bachelor’s degree?’ That’s what the goal was.”

He noted that “the cornerstone of what makes this so powerful is the Program Pathways Mapper,” software app students can use with ease to align classes for transfer.

Enter student Araceli. When Araceli speaks, college chancellors, presidents and university officials in the  Central Valley’s 10-county region – and throughout California — listen.

She first did so at the 2023 CVHEC Summit on the student panel testifying how the Central Valley Transfer Program’s Program Pathways Mapper helped her get from Merced College to the University of California, Merced the year before. We have also taken her to the California League of Community Colleges statewide conference to share her story.

“Because of the Pathways Program Mapper, I was actually able to graduate on time because I didn’t realize that the UC had different requirements for a communications class than the CSU system,” Araceli recounted during the student panel at the recent CVHEC Summit last month. “So on the pathways mapper, I saw that the class that I needed, I had to take my last semester at Merced College. If not, I wouldn’t have been able to transfer to UC Merced.”

But this time she had some new developments to share underscoring the Transfer Program’s growth and success in the 18 months since her first summit appearance.

“Now, I work at Merced College in the Student Success Program, and I’m able to use it to help other students that come for help,” Araceli said. “Just anyone that I run into, I’m able to help them navigate — maybe what college they want to go to, because they can look at different requirements at different colleges, or what the course load is going to look like, what classes they’re going to be required to take depending on where they go. I always recommend the Pathways Mapper to them because they’re able to see what the different courses are going to look like, what their path is going to look like. So I’ve utilized it not only for myself, but to help other students that I come into contact with.”

As CVHEC Executive Director Benjamin Duran said at the summit: it’s one thing when adults talk about its value, it’s another when you hear the youngsters vouch for its usefulness.

These protocols were so successful that California Community Colleges Chancellor Sonya Christian adopted the Transfer Project as a statewide demonstration project in 2023, announced at our CVHEC Summit that October.

One year later the “demonstration” label has been lifted, and this process is now embedded in the Chancellor’s “Vision 2030” initiative!

Goals of the Project

The Central Valley Transfer Project is designed to:

  • Simplify the articulation agreements between community colleges and universities.
  • Enhance academic advising to guide students through seamless transfers.
  • Improve the equity and accessibility of higher education opportunities.
  • Reduce the time and cost associated with obtaining a bachelor’s degree.

Key Features

The project incorporates several strategies to achieve its objectives:

  • Structured collaboration among faculty and staff from UC, CSU and community colleges.
  • Development of clear and comprehensive transfer pathways in high-demand disciplines.
  • Collaboration among multiple educational institutions to ensure alignment of curricula.
  • Use of technology software to provide up-to-date resources and tools for students.

Impact on the Region

See live links below.

Also at the CVHEC summit May 9, Zimmerman demonstrated how the Central Valley Transfer Project addresses educational disparities in the region by fostering increased access to higher education for students in the Central Valley. It is part of a broader effort to promote workforce development, improve the economic well-being, and elevate the economic and educational profile of the entire Central Valley region.  He urged community colleges to make the most of funding that is available to them for implementation of the Program Pathways Mapper.

The project has now expanded beyond the Central Valley and is being embraced by higher education statewide. 

 Conclusion

The power of CVHEC’s longstanding expertise in promoting regional collaboration is paying huge dividends for Central Valley community college students through this latest effort to increase successful transfers to upper-division institutions. This strong tradition has been the catalyst for faculty and staff from the UC’s, CSU’s and CC’s to work together like never before, dispelling historical stereotypes of each other and building new collegial relationships focused on student success.

By creating smoother transfer pathways and reducing barriers to higher education, the Central Valley Transfer Project plays a crucial role in helping students achieve their academic and professional goals, contributing to the overall advancement of the Central Valley region.

Table 1 below shows the current status of CVHEC membership implementation

Table 2 shows the impact on successful transfers to UC Merced since the project began in 2020.

Table 3 shows the change in percentage of successful completion of on-path courses to degree. The control factor among 5,000 incoming freshman to Bakersfield College is the use by students of the Transfer Project software platform, Program Pathways Mapper (PPM).

Table 4 shows how the use of the PPM closes the equity gap among all students in the increased percentages of completing on-path courses to degree.

Table 5 shows how participation in the Transfer Project keeps students on a clear pathway to completion and reduces the total number of units to degree.

Program Pathways Mapper

PPM Frequently Asked Questions

TRANSFER PROJECT UPDATE — Persistence

Persistence: commitment with intelligence

With 2025 well into its second month, the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium presents here a look at the success of our Central Valley Transfer Project that was catapulted into the state limelight when it was declared a California Community Colleges Demonstration Project by Chancellor Dr. Sonya Christian in fall 2023. CVHEC’s Central Valley Transfer Project Lead Stan Carrizosa, president-emeritus of COS, reports that 12 of the 15 Central Valley Higher Education Consortium-member community colleges are now on board along with members UC Merced and our three CSU campuses: Bakersfield, Fresno and Stanislaus. Carrizosa updates how “the Central Valley Way” of collaboration and “working smarter, not harder” that characterizes CVHEC initiatives is spreading into a statewide effort to increase successful community college transfers with the implementation of the project’s software platform, Program Pathways Mapper (PPM). He notes that funding to implement the PPM software — which is increasing the rate of successful community college transfers who utilize it to efficiently navigate their journey to a degree or certificate — is available to any community college for their students.

BY STAN CARRIZOSA
CVHEC Central Valley Transfer Project Lead

In 2018, a group of community college leaders, meeting in the annual gathering of the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium Board of Directors, heard Dr. James Zimmerman, University of California, Merced senior administrator, share an update on the number of Central Valley community college students that had successfully transferred to UC Merced.

The results were dismal, Dr. Zimmerman reported, and UC Merced asked to meet with community college officials to enact a plan to increase successful transfers to UC Merced. The Central Valley Transfer Project was born.

A pilot for the project was funded through a state grant that engaged Merced College and Bakersfield College representatives in convenings with UC Merced staff to create successful transfer pathways from community college. In the beginning, the process was slow and arduous as many details and factors needed to be discussed and incorporated into creating those pathways.

UC Merced graciously broadened the scope of the project to review the already successful Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT) pathways for transfer to CSUs. One-by-one different majors were reviewed, and UC Merced began accepting the ADTs as fulfilling the lower division requirements for successful transfer.

The pilot project ended with both Merced and Bakersfield College having approved multiple ADTs that would fulfill requirements for successful transfer to UC Merced.

The tool for combing combining? these lower division courses with their upper division requirements at UCM is a software platform called Program Pathways Mapper (PPM). PPM is a public-facing, internet-based URL that is easily accessible for students, parents, teachers, counselors and advisors. It is an application that is uploaded on our smart phone that enables us to see the lower division courses required for an ADT and the upper division coursework at the four-year college to complete a degree in the corresponding discipline major.

Taking it statewide – PPM funding available for colleges

PPM has since expanded and is now used statewide by community colleges, CSUs and UCs. It became such an advantage for students that a request was made for the state budget to fund the one-time costs for joining PPM and was approved by the Governor Newsome and California Legislature in 2022. Any community college can receive funding if requested to implement PPM for their students.

This combination of highly efficient convening protocols combined with easily accessible mapping software has spread across the state. In the Central Valley, all but three of the 15 community colleges are now on board along with UC Merced, CSU Bakersfield, Fresno State and CSU Stanislaus.

State Community College Chancellor Dr. Sonya Christian declared the Central Valley Transfer Project a statewide Demonstration Project in her newly adopted “Vision 2030.” The CSU and UC system’s CEOs have also endorsed the Transfer Project and statewide effort to increase successful community college transfers.

Each step along the way, the Central Valley Transfer Team has tried to work smart by leveraging existing structures including ADTs and even dual enrollment for some community college’s by aligning and connecting these structures increasing their effectiveness for successful transfers. This type of intersegmental collaboration requires patience and, more than anything, persistence.

The natural resistance to change is ever-present. A feeling of “initiative overload” and fatigue exist, and the inertia inherent in any bureaucracy requires persistence which we have come to define as commitment with intelligence, often referred to as “working smarter, not harder.”

What the data shows

Baseline data on results are very encouraging. A control group of 5,000 incoming freshman to Bakersfield College were tracked comparing PPM users and non-PPM users over their first two semesters. Leaving all other recruitment services and outreach efforts in place the only variable that differed for these groups were those who used PPM to work their education plan and those who did not.

A review of the percentage of on-path course completion was measured among both groups to see if PPM provided any advantage in increasing students’ completion of required courses on-path to their degree. Both groups were reviewed for the number of units to degree in hopes that PPM would help reduce the number of unnecessary units completed.

Perhaps most importantly, tracking the differences in percentage of on-path course completion rates between subgroups of students by ethnicity addresses equity in success among different groups.

See our results in the graphics above.

Once Chancellor Christian designated this a Demonstration Project in her Vision 2030, the Central Valley way has begun to influence positive results for students statewide and beyond. The success of the project now reaches as far north as UC Santa Cruz all the way south to UCLA and UC Irvine. Community college transfer to the CSU system make up 50 percent of all their successful graduates.

Increasing successful transfers is a very effective strategy in the quest to increase four-year degree attainment!

INFO: Stan A. Carrizosa, Sr., –  scarrizosa44@gmail.com

Ángel Ramírez – 559.278.0576 or centralvalleyhec@gmail.com

CVHEC media inquiries: Tom Uribes – cvheccommunications@mail.fresnostate.edu or text 559.348.3278.

CVHEC’s Central Valley Transfer Project story:

CVHEC DIRECTOR’S MESSAGE (December 2024): Happy Holidays!

Best wishes for 2025 from the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium team: (FRONT) Dr. Liz Rozell,
Priscilla Arellano and Elaine Cash. (BACK) Tom Uribes, Tom Burke, Stan Carrizosa,
Dr. Benjamín Durán, Dr. John Spevak, Dr. Vikash Lakhani and Ángel Ramírez.

Revisiting an eventful year and strategies

for student success the Central Valley Way

Greetings CVHEC friends and colleagues …

Welcome to the end of the fall 2024 semester and the beginning of the well-deserved winter break!

I hope you enjoy the final edition of this year’s CVHEC e-newsletter.  You will have the opportunity to join us in revisiting the highlights of this eventful year and the strategies our colleges and universities have engaged to improve the pathways to retention and timely completion for our Central Valley students. On that note, a hearty congratulations to those who completed their academic journey this month.  And congrats as well to the faculty, staff and administrators who provided the academic guidance to support your success. All the best to you Class of Winter 2024 graduates!

Among the many successes of this past year is the historic mission to address implementation of Assembly Bill 1705 with our Math Task Force convening community college math education professionals from throughout our 10-county region to communicate and collaborate for strategies that benefit valley college students. We have also seen great advancement of our Transfer Project which completes its first year as a California Community Colleges Demonstration Project.

These CVHEC initiatives have established what we call “the Central Valley Way,” a movement that his gained recognition in higher education circles beyond our region.  We have had the opportunity to share this great work with audiences at the state and national levels at such convenings as the Complete College America Conference in Indianapolis, Indiana along with California convenings like the Community College League of California and the California Economic Summit.

It has been an honor and a delight to shine the light on the region and our member institutions and we especially commend our Math Task Force members and Transfer Project team for their diligence this past year.

We would also like to take this opportunity to thank our funding partners who make it possible for us to do our work.  Thanks to the College Futures Foundation, Fresno-Madera K-16 Collaborative, the Kern Regional K-16 Education Collaborative, the We Will! K-16 Educational Collaborative, College Bridge, and the CVHEC membership.  These colleagues have been instrumental in transforming the region socially, economically and educationally.

As you enjoy our final newsletter of the year, we wish you a joyful holiday season and a wonderful New Year!!

SPOTLIGHT – CVHEC on the road

Executive Director Benjamín Durán (third from left) led the CVHEC delegation at the Strategic Transfer Summit with Transfer Project Lead Stan Carrizosa, Jennifer Johnson of California Community Colleges Foundation and Dr. James Zimmerman of UC Merced. (Photo below): The California Economic Summit in October was attended by Ángel Ramírez, Elaine Cash, Tom Uribes (back), Priscilla Arrellano posing with Assemblyman Joaquin Arambula.

Strategic Transfer Summit provides showcase for

CVHEC’s Transfer Project as reps make the rounds

Central Valley Higher Education Consortium delegations are making the rounds this fall at several state and national conferences including the recent Strategic Transfer Summit presented by the California Community Colleges Nov. 8 at UC Merced.

Other destinations include the Complete College America National Conference in Indianapolis Nov. 18-20; the American Mathematical Association of Two-Year Colleges (AMATYC) in Atlanta Nov. 14-17 through the Dana Center with CVHEC Math Task Force members Jeremy Brandl of Fresno City College and Shelley Getty of Taft College; and the Community Colleges League of California Nov. 22 in Sacramento.

CVHEC also attended the California Economic Summit held Oct. 8-10 in Sacramento.

At the recent Transfer Summit, CVHEC’s Transfer Project team presented an update on its progress in partnering with the consortium’s 15 community college members using the Program Pathway Mapper software for a smoother transfer process for students. Leading the CVHEC delegation at the UC Merced event was Executive Director Benjamín Durán and Transfer Lead Stan Carrizosa along with James Zimmerman vice chancellor of UC Merced and Jennifer Johnson California Community Colleges Foundation.

Carrizosa said the summit, attended by the chief executive officers of the state’s three public higher ed segments – the University of California, the California State University and the California Community Colleges – provided a prime opportunity to showcase the consortium’s Transfer Project.

“The participation of the statewide CEOs of CCC, CSU & UC — coupled with powerful student testimony — makes this event an inflection point that sets our Transfer Project on its next upward trajectory,” Carrizosa said.

CVHEC’s Transfer Project has been designated as a California Community Colleges Demonstration Project by Chancellor Sonya Christian to serve as a model systemwide.

This month, Duran will also attend the CLCC in Sacramento as well as lead the CVHC delegation to the CAC national conference in Indiana. Attending the CAC with him will be Angel Ramirez, operations/finance director; Elaine Cash, grants coordinator; and Tom Uribes, communications/media coordinator.

For the CA Economic Summit in October, Ramirez, Cash and Uribes were joined by Priscilla Arrellano, administrative specialist.

Central Valley Transfer Project: valley’s four-year colleges collaborating

Fresno State, a founding CVHEC member, joined CVHEC’s historic Central Valley Transfer Project in January with (from left): Dr. Kent Willis, vice president of Fresno State Student Affairs and Enrollment Management; University President Saúl Jiménez-Sandoval; Dr. Benjamin Duran, CVHEC executive director; Tom Burke, CVHEC regional coordinator; and Dr. Sergio La Porta, associate dean of the Fresno State College of Arts and Humanities.

Fresno State joins in transfer ‘centerpiece’ with

11 CVHEC community colleges, 3 CSUs, UCMerced

 The Central Valley Transfer Project is now partnered with the region’s three California State University campuses after Fresno State signed on in January joining Bakersfield and Stanislaus in the historic Central Valley Higher Education Consortium initiative designed to open new doors for students’ successful transfer from community college.

Along with founding partner University of California, Merced, this means the valley’s four public institutions of higher education are working in unison with 8 community colleges currently through CVHEC’s project using the groundbreaking Program Pathways Mapper software. The project has also gained the full support of the California Community College Chancellor’s Office.

The community colleges already in the CVTP, with several more expected to sign on this year, are: Bakersfield College, Clovis Community College, Madera Community College, Merced College, Porterville College, Reedley College, West Hills College-Coalinga and West Hills College-Lemoore.

The Transfer Project is also expanding participation in the north end of the Central Valley with Modesto Junior College, Columbia College and San Joaquin Delta College scheduled to begin onboard this spring for a total of 11 community college partners said Stan Carrizosa, CVHEC regional coordinator and consortium lead for the project.

All Transfer Project partners are members of the consortium with their respective chancellors and presidents serving on the CVHEC Board of Directors.

“The Transfer Project is now a centerpiece for students to both enter and transfer from community college to their four-year universities,” said Dr. Benjamín Durán, CVHEC executive director. “We are excited to share this latest progress of the project which has been featured statewide and nationally at conferences such as the Community College League of California and Complete College America.”

He added, “This innovative approach is the only one in the state that includes a University of California campus collaborating with partner California State University and community colleges in establishing transfer pathways for Central Valley students to get them to and through college in a timely manner.”

Dr. Saúl Jiménez-Sandoval, Fresno State president and CVHEC board member, said,  “I’m proud that Fresno State will be a dynamic partner in the Central Valley Transfer Project, as this pathway will empower community college students to become visionary Bulldogs.”

The Fresno State agreement was finalized Jan. 17 between Durán and President Jiménez-Sandoval, with Tom Burke, CVHEC regional coordinator and Transfer Project team member; Dr. Kent Willis, vice president of Enrollment Services; and Dr. Sergio LaPorta, associate dean of the College of Arts and Humanities.

At CVHEC’s Higher Education Summit last fall, CCC Chancellor Sonya Christian announced that the statewide system has designated the Transfer Project as a demonstration project as set forth in her Vision 2030 for all California community colleges. The Transfer Project’s participating community colleges are serving as the pilot campuses with plans to implement statewide.

Carrizosa said the state budget continues to support and fund the onboarding costs for all community colleges to subscribe to the Program Pathways Mapper.

Established in 2021 with UC Merced, Merced College and Bakersfield College, the project is designed to open new doors for students to successfully transfer from community college with its Program Pathways Mapper, Carrizosa said.

He said the Program Pathways Mapper — a public facing, internet-based app that can be downloaded and accessed by the public software platform — provides unprecedented ease of access for students, counselors, advisors and parents much more so than other existing platforms.

“There are no typical requirements for access to PPM such as other internal college systems like Degree Works, Assist.Org and the CSU Transfer Planner,” he said. “These are all course tracking systems but in order to use them, students need to be successfully enrolled in college and have a student email address or other form of login to try and plan. Through PPM students simply upload the public PPM app to their devices and have immediate access.”

Carrizosa said the PPM helps simplify the transfer planning process which can be the most difficult task for many students.

“In much of our Central Valley region, as many as seven out of 10 incoming college freshmen will be first generation students to attend college,” he said. “Research shows that the most difficult task for them is often the application process itself and completing the required steps for enrollment. Systems like Degree Works and others do nothing to remove this common barrier because these systems cannot be accessed until a student successfully enrolls.”

He explained that a high school student can start the Transfer Project journey as a junior or senior by enrolling in college dual enrollment courses enabling them to complete their transfer level English and Math courses while still in high school. These units roll up with them as they enter community college and track the completion of their lower division requirements for their Associate Degree for Transfer in their chosen major via PPM.

“Students can easily select a community college they wish to attend and a major they want to pursue and the lower division courses required are sequentially laid out for them through the Program Pathways Mapper software.”

In addition, the PPM then links those lower division courses to an upper division institution of the student’s choice and shows a clear sequence of upper division courses needed to complete the degree, Carrizosa added.

“The PPM contains clear and accurate information directly from course catalogues from all participating colleges,” Carrizosa said.  “The Central Valley Transfer Project is becoming an alternative continuum of courses to the traditional high school A-G or Career Technical Education continuums and is unprecedented in the state’s community college system. We call it ‘The Central Valley Way!’”

“Through the use of PPM, students complete exactly what is required of them to successfully transfer to their four-year university and they follow PPM through their last two years to degree/certificate completion,” Carrizosa said.

Baseline data results also demonstrate the promise that PPM delivers in the Transfer Project.

In a sample of 5,000 incoming freshmen to Bakersfield College in 2022 the students using the PPM increased their “percentage of on-path course completion” to over 80 percent which also closed the equity gap in this statistic for ethnic minority students when compared to their white counterparts, Carrizosa said.

“The same sample showed students using the PPM reduced the ‘number of units-to-degree’ from an average of 87 down to 67,” he added.

The project is now gearing up to expand the partnership with the College Bridge Math Project and to onboard community colleges from the northern region of the Central Valley.

For more information about the CVTP, contact Carrizosa at centralvalleyhec@gmail.com.

 

CVHEC media inquiries: Tom Uribes – cvheccommunications@mail.fresnostate.edu or text 559.348.3278.

Fresno State media inquiries: PIO Lisa Bell – lbell@csufresno.edu.

See:

·  Pilot CVHEC/UC Merced Transfer Project improves process for students  

·  CVHEC Web Site Feature: Transfer Project

·  Historic Transfer Project spurs statewide movement to increase transfer rates

·  WHAT THE CV-HEC IS HAPPENING BLOG (January 2024): CVHEC 2023 — surging forward for Central Valley students

·  HIGHER ED NEWS: College Bridge to expand Math Bridge; CVHEC Transfer Project

•  A-G

·   Career Technical Education

WHAT THE CV-HEC IS HAPPENING BLOG (January 2024): CVHEC 2023 — surging forward for Central Valley students

To kick off our 2024 “What the CV-HEC is Happening” Blogs, CVHEC Regional Coordinator Stan Carrizosa, Sr. follows up the year-in-review published in our December newsletter issue by offering a perspective of the consortium’s progress in 2023 that sets the stage for a productive new year. Carrizosa, who is president-emeritus of CVHEC member College of the Sequoias and an integral part of the CVHEC team, serves as the lead for the consortium’s Central Valley Transfer Project. The CVHEC blog features perspectives about the higher education community and issues. Submissions are welcome for consideration: Tom Uribes, cvheccommunications@mail.fresnostate.edu.

Propelling successfully, purposefully like a guided rocket

 

BY STAN A. CARRIZOSA, SR.
CVHEC Regional Coordinator
(President-emeritus, College of the Sequoias)

 

As a child, I remember watching a weekly science show called “The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau” that explored the ocean and marine biology.

One fascinating episode depicted how an octopus at any moment could be moving wildly with all eight legs and not advance at all. But once the octopus contracted its core by simultaneously snapping all eight legs in the same direction, a burst of air coming from the fish propelled it successfully and purposefully through the water like a guided rocket.

Stan Carrizosa, Sr. (left) and CVHEC Central Valley Transfer Project team partner Tom Burke presented at the Community Colleges League of California in November along with UC Merced grad student Araceli Tilley who discussed her success with the project’s Program Pathway Mapper software and Jennifer Johnson of the Foundation for California Community Colleges (right).

Over the course of the past 12 months, CVHEC has flexed its octopus legs and undertaken otherwise separate projects like Math Bridge and Master’s Upskilling (dual enrollment) and the Central Valley Transfer Project. By aligning them and their sub-parts, CVHEC has achieved the snapping of its octopus legs successfully surging us forward in the form of real achievement results for higher education in the Central Valley and for our region’s students specifically.

As we move into 2024, the work of CVHEC continues to be more aligned in ways that leverage each element and make the wholistic effort more cohesive and successful. This reminds me how effective it was to do this same thing as a college president. It was important to have clear goals and objectives and planned actions designed to address specific aspects of an issue to ensure greater success.

This past year, CVHEC acted like an organization with big-picture goals for improving student achievement region-wide and a measured plan of actions all designed to work together as a system to achieve success.

The two key drivers of this system for CVHEC success are strong intersegmental partnership commitments to:

  • a robust dual enrollment;
  • increasing successful community college transfers to higher education institutions.

 

Biggest DE challenge: qualified instructors

Armed with direct feedback from our first Dual Enrollment Summit held three years ago, we heard that one of the biggest challenges to implementing dual enrollment courses was the ability to find qualified instructors to teach college courses on high school campuses.

CVHEC responded by creating an upskilling project where high school teachers in math and English could earn a master’s degree in their content areas and be qualified to apply for and teach dual enrollment college courses on their high school campuses.

Early results from dual enrollment courses showed that students were more successful when the teacher for their college courses was a member of their regular high school faculty. Under the leadership of Dr. John Spevak, CVHEC regional coordinator and vice-president emeritus of Merced College, who facilitated an impressive package offering high school teachers the opportunity to earn a MA degree in their content areas through our partner universities, this opportunity had many residual benefits such as:

  • improving the quality of teaching for their high school classes,
  • earning higher salaries at their high school,
  • creating a professional learning community between high school and community college teachers,
  • and most importantly, changing teacher attitudes about the ability for high school students to succeed in college-level work.

The benefits for high school students are enormous.

Those enrolled in college dual enrollment courses experience pass rates of 80-plus percent while mainstream college students pass rates are in the 50 percent range. Finally, dual enrollment has proven to be a game-changer for first-generation college students in closing the equity gap among them and their college prep peers.

If students are able to take their college math and English courses before graduating high school, they start their college career on a level playing field by having completed their first required courses in transfer-level math and English. This enables them to get on the right pathway and stay straight toward their degree completion.

 

Incentivizing the efforts to increase transfers

The second key driver for CVHEC in 2023 and moving into the new year is the Central Valley Transfer Project!

The breakthrough moment in this project came when UC Merced agreed to review the CSU ADTs and approve these lower-division sequences as meeting the requirements for successful transfer to UCM. Central Valley CSU’s including Bakersfield and Stanislaus have bought in to the Transfer Project as well.  Over the past three years CVHEC has worked to complete implementation in eight of our CV community colleges with three more joining the project this year.

Again the student benefit stands clear: early results show that students in the Transfer Project increase their percentages of on-path course completion each semester by 20 points to 80-plus percent. The same students also reduce their number of units to degree from a high of 85 down to 62.

Meanwhile the new statewide Student Funding Formula starts to provide enhanced per/FTES revenue for successful transfers to four-year institutions, further incentivizing the efforts to increase transfers.

We know that of all the successful graduates earning degrees from CSU’s, 50 percent started their education at a community college. Most recently, California Community Colleges Chancellor Dr. Sonya Christian unveiled her VISION 2030 which includes the Central Valley Transfer Project as a Demonstration Project for the entire state. As a result, CVHEC is now being recruited in both southern and northern California to share the success of the CV Transfer Project with those regions through presentations at various convenings.

 

Thoughtful and effective continuum creating unprecedented leverage for success

In summary, in addition to tracking and assessing our efforts as individual projects, it is equally if not more important to step back and see the bigger picture in the CVHEC body of work for 2023 that sets the stage for promising 2024.   We can see there is a thoughtful and effective continuum that links these efforts together creating unprecedented leverage for success:

  • CVHEC started by looking at the data and listening to the practitioners in the field to develop an agenda of work to support our colleges.
  • Dual enrollment shows great promise but needs more qualified instructors.
  • High school students in dual enrollment courses can close the equity gap between them and their peers thus advancing their personal confidence and capacity to succeed in college.
  • Most higher ed students start in our community colleges and now through the Transfer Project they have a clear pathway of courses to take for a successful transfer to four-year universities.
  • Once our community college students successfully complete their transfer, statistics show that they represent 50 percent of all university graduates.

So, looking back over the past 12 months, CVHEC – like the octopus snapping our legs to successfully surge forward – has successfully linked together major initiatives to build upon and strengthen each other allowing students to experience a continuum of effectiveness and success in achieving their higher education goals and objectives. To close out 2023 and look ahead, our executive director Dr. Benjamín Durán sums up the CVHEC spirit best in his newsletter director’s message published in our December issue:

“This year we are happy to salute and greet our K-12 partner districts who have joined us in creating meaningful pathways from middle school and high school to college.  As we prepare to welcome 2024, stay tuned as we continue to nurture many roads leading to one destination – getting students to and through college in a timely manner!”

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  • cvhecinfo@mail.fresnostate.edu

  • 559.278.0576

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