Tag Archive for: Merced College
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
· HIGHER ED NEWS: College Bridge to expand Math Bridge; CVHEC Transfer Project
• A-G
Valley’s math ed experts unite to address AB 1705 challenge for student success
Math Task Force Convening Jan. 26:
‘Central Valley Way To AB1705 Success’
With the agenda released this week, over 60 Central Valley math education experts will convene in Fresno Jan. 26 to plan math pathways for student success as they brainstorm within five strands of implementation around Assembly Bill 1705 that goes into effect this summer.
The Central Valley Higher Education Consortium’s “Central Valley Way To AB1705 Success” Convening from 9 a.m. – 3 p.m. at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Fresno Convention Center, will bring together community college math educators, administrators and institutional researchers.
Presented by the CVHEC Math Task Force and facilitated by the Charles A. Dana Center at the University of Texas at Austin, the convening is free with advance registration and includes lunch.
Discussion for the historic convening — with administrators and IR experts joining in the conversation — will center around five strands that the region’s community college math academicians can undertake for student success when the new law goes into effect July 1: Validating Prerequisites; Designing Precalculus for 2025; Math Support Outside and Inside the Classroom; Building an AB 1705 Campus Team; and Guided Self-Placement.
Five Math Task Force members serving as strand leads are: Jeremy Brandl, Fresno City College math professor; Nathan Cahoon and Shelley Getty, both Taft College math professors; Marie Bruley, Merced College dean of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM); and Jay Thomas, West Hills College Lemoore math professor.
After the event opens with a welcome and brief introductions, the strand subcommittees open the discussion by presenting reports regarding preliminary strand deliberations over the past few months that started at three meetings the Math Task Force held in the fall.
Participants will then break into tabletop talks for feedback and to brainstorm new ideas, a timeline and next steps followed by report outs of those subcommittee sessions.
Following lunch, the participants will break into their respective college teams to discuss “Preliminary College Plans” in two parts: “Validating Prerequisites Between Now and July 1, 2024;” and “Developing New/Revised Curriculum to Take Effect July 1, 2025.”
“College Team Report Outs” will follow before the final session “Where Do We Go From Here?” looks towards the future and the role of Math Task Force sub-committees, college teams and CVHEC.
Dr. Benjamín Durán of CVHEC with Dana Center reps Joan Zoellner and Tammi Perez-Rice at the Oct. 13 Math Task Force convening in Fresno.
Dr. Benjamín Durán, CVHEC executive director, said, “We are proud that our Central Valley community colleges are leaning in on the expertise of their own math experts to figure out the best way to support our students within the guidelines of the legislation.”
AB 1705 — passed in 2022 for implementation July 1, 2024 — expands the provisions established in AB 705 (2017) by explicitly requiring community colleges not only to place students directly into transfer-level English and math courses but also to ensure that students actually enroll in those courses.
The legislation also establishes that for students who need or desire extra academic support, community colleges shall provide access to such support. The new law clarifies that a community college can require students to enroll in additional concurrent support if it is determined that the support will increase the student’s likelihood of passing transfer-level English or math.
Community colleges have been tasked with ensuring they comply with both AB705 and AB1705 designed to strengthen support for student success and increase degree completion.
CVHEC helped start the conversation by bringing together its Math Task Force — made up of representatives from CVHEC community colleges — and other math educators to discuss ideas and options regarding implementation within the Central Valley community college mathematics community last fall.
Dr. John Spevak, CVHEC regional coordinator
In three virtual sessions and one in-person convening in 2023, the Math Task Force created a collaborative “Central Valley Approach” to each, said Dr. John Spevak, CVHEC regional coordinator who oversees the consortium’s Math and English Task Forces.
“Now, for the January session, administrators and researchers are joining the Math Task Force to develop data-driven and college-endorsed solutions that help meet the challenge head on and in unity for the best interests of students.”
The fall inaugural sessions were facilitated by two Dana Center representatives who will return to Fresno for the Jan. 26 convening: Joan Zoellner, M.A., who is the lead for the Dana Center’s Launch Years Initiative; and Dr. Tammi Perez-Rice, Postsecondary Course Program specialist.
Dr. Erik Cooper, assistant vice chancellor of the California Community College Chancellor’s Office Cooper, also participated in the first virtual session to discuss the recent history of math education reform in California and answer questions as well as present the CCCCO’s AB 1705 Implementation Guide and FAQ webpage.
“With the passage of AB 705 then later 1705 – all designed to strengthen support for student success – CVHEC has been moving full steam ahead in assuring that our member colleges and their feeder high schools have a good understanding of the seemingly turbulent waters of the legislation,” Durán said.
Strand breakdown:
- Validating prerequisites — quantitative and qualitative: creating a Central Valley collaborative approach which would help make a strong case with the state. Point person: NATHAN CAHOON, Taft College math professor.
- Designing Precalculus for 2025: An effective single-course prerequisite for Calculus 1 (especially valuable if the state allows in 2025-26 only one prerequisite course for Calculus 1). Point person: JEREMY BRANDL, Fresno City College math professor.
- Math support outside and inside the classroom: What’s working best in the Central Valley, including math lab centers, tutoring, embedded tutoring, supplemental instruction, etc. Point person: SHELLEY GETTY, Taft College math professor.
- Building an AB 1705 campus team: Who needs to be on the team? Math and English professors, IR/IT staff, counselors, administrators, etc. How does it best function? Point person: MARIE BRULEY, Merced College dean of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM).
- Guided self-placement: Helping ensure with the best possible questionnaire that students are taking the right math class when they start college. Point person: JAY THOMAS, West Hills College Lemoore math professor.
(Links to recordings of the two previous sessions are available below).
REGISTER – “The CVHEC Way to Math Success — Implementing AB1705” (Jan. 26, 2024)
EVENT AGENDA For questions: centralvalleyhec@gmail.com.
For media inquiries: Tom Uribes 559.348.3278 (text msg) or cvheccommunications@mail.fresnostate.edu
SEE:
- Previous sessions recordings:
CVHEC “AB1705 in the Central Valley” Webinar with Dr. Erik Cooper Oct. 6, 2023
MTF meeting Nov. 17 (10 a.m. session)
MTF meeting Nov. 17 (1 p.m. session)
- Coverage of the fall sessions:
Math Task Force begins discussion of AB1705 implementation – Nov. 17 next (with Oct. 13 photo gallery).
CVHEC Math Task Force meets in-person Oct. 13 for AB 1705 follow-up
NEWS RELEASE – CVHEC Math Task Force: Impactful legislation (AB 1705) Convenings Oct. 6 & 13
- The CCCCO’s AB 1705 Implementation Guideand FAQ webpage.
- The CVHEC Math Task Force
Dr. Erik Cooper of the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office zoomed into the Oct. 6 CVHEC Math Task Force session to address AB1705 implementation.
Los Baños Campus of Merced College Celebrates 50 Years Nov. 5
Merced College will celebrate the 50th Anniversary of its Los Baños Campus with a free celebration Nov. 5 from 4 to 6 p.m. in the outdoor quad of the campus (22240 West Highway 152).
“The Merced College Los Baños Campus 50th year celebration highlights our commitment to serving the community and the thousands of people on the west side of Merced County who have advanced their education and created better lives for themselves,” said Dr. Chris Vitelli, president of CVHEC-member Merced College.
Campus Dean Jessica Moran, a native of Los Baños and a graduate of its high school said, “We plan to welcome our community to showcase what we have accomplished over the past five decades.”
The celebration will feature free food including taco trucks and a volunteer barbecue crew led by Merced College Trustee John Pedrozo and Merced County Sheriff Vern Warnke. Free entertainment will include carnival games.
Present and past Los Baños Campus staff and students will be honored, as well as emeritus board member Gene Vierra and several adjunct instructors who have worked at the campus for many decades. Previous deans of the campus will be acknowledged including John Spevak, former Merced College president of instruction, who is now a coordinator for the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium.
Dean-emeritus Spevak contributed to this series of columns on the history of the Los Baños Campus published in the Merced Sun-Star:
- Merced College’s Los Baños Campus opened in 1971 with great expectations
- The second decade of Merced College Los Baños Campus begins in tumult, ends in success
- As new millennium began, plans for Merced College Los Baños campus took shape
- Spevak: A new permanent Los Banos Campus opens during its fourth decade
- During its fifth decade, Merced College’s Los Banos Campus expands, looks to the future
See Merced College press release: http://www.mccd.edu/news/press-releases/items/2021-10-19-los-banos-50-years.html
(CVHEC members are encouraged to submit items for this column: centralvalleyhec@gmail.com).
Charting Better Maps to Degrees
Historic UC Merced transfer initiative with Bakersfield, Merced Colleges launches Nov. 4
A hybrid convening at the University of California, Merced Nov. 4, “Charting Better Maps to Degrees,” will launch the historic UC Merced Transfer Pathways initiative between three Central Valley Higher Education Consortium member campuses and demonstrate how the new Program Pathways Mapper can revolutionize positive outcomes across enrollment, completions and equity for students.
UC Merced Chancellor Juan Sánchez Muñoz will be joined by Bakersfield President Sonya Christian, Merced College President Chris Vitelli and CVHEC Executive Director Benjamin T. Duran. Also speaking will be Dr. Craig Hayward, dean of Institutional Effectiveness at Bakersfield College and Wayne Skipper, president of Concentric Sky.
The pilot transfer project and the hybrid in-person/virtual event are the result of a $500,000 grant from the California Educational Learning Lab to Bakersfield College, Merced College, and UC Merced for the development of 2+2 transfer maps that streamline and guide the transfer of community college students to the University of California system.
During the event, which will be from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the UC Merced Conference Center, the grant team will unveil the UC prototype of the Program Pathways Mapper that will make online, interactive transfer maps freely available for current and prospective students.
The convening also will be digitally mediated allowing both virtual and in-person attendees to interact and participate together while providing a higher education bridge across the valley floor.
“UC Merced was created in the Valley to help serve the Valley and we are dedicated to fulfilling that mission,” said Chancellor Muñoz, who will welcome the participants at 9 a.m. followed by the community college presidents and Duran. “This project to simplify transfer pathways means that more young people from our region will recognize a UC education as an achievable goal, and will help students, educators and families chart a course to that goal.”
Duran will discuss CVHEC’s support for the regional roll-out of the Program Pathways Mapper for colleges and universities in the Central Valley. CVHEC consists of 29 colleges in the nine-county region from Stockton to Bakersfield with the presidents/chancellors of each member institution serving as the board of directors.
He said this groundbreaking project, which supports CVHEC’s core mission to improve college completion rates while also supporting the valley’s only UC campus in collaboration with member community colleges, is unique in the state.
“Nothing like this is taking place anywhere else in California that I’m aware of,” said Duran a former Merced College president. “This kind of collaboration, especially intersegmentally, just isn’t happening. This is a big win for the Central Valley.”
Work is well underway to implement the same type of partnership transfer agreements between CVHEC’s CSU member campuses at Bakersfield, Fresno and Stanislaus, he said, with the intent to make this new model available for community college transfers in other regions of the valley.
Members and prospective members of the Program Pathways Mapper community are invited to attend the free event that will include breakfast and lunch. Space is limited but registration is available at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/program-pathways-mapper-convening-tickets-168987649609.
For additional information and updates, including details on speakers and breakout sessions, see www.foundationccc.org/ChartingBetterMapstoDegrees.
Additional event questions may be directed to Lori Ortiz, executive secretary for the Office of Institutional Effectiveness at Bakersfield College at lori.ortiz@bakersfieldcollege.edu.
Pilot CVHEC/UC Merced Transfer Project improves process for students
Rollout of Program Mapper software app for transfers set for Nov. 4
A pilot program developed between the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium and three member institutions — UC Merced, Merced College and Bakersfield College — is showing promise for outstanding results that can enhance a community college student’s transfer experience including a new web-based software application, Program Mapper.
This new initiative, the CVHEC/UC Merced Transfer Project, was presented to the CVHEC Board of Directors, made up the presidents and chancellors of CVHEC’s 29-member institutions, at its quarterly meeting Sept. 3.
Tom Burke, chancellor-emeritus of the Kern Community College District, has been recruited to serve as the Transfer Project coordinator, Dr. Ben Duran, CVHEC executive director, also announced to the board.
The specific aim of the initial pilot project is to increase the number of successful and timely transfers from the Central Valley member community colleges in CVHEC’s nine-county region to UCM, reports Stan Carrizosa, southern regional coordinator for the consortium.
And work is well underway to implement the same type of partnership transfer agreements between Bakersfield College and CSU Bakersfield with the intent to make this new model available for community college transfers to the region’s other California State University campuses at Fresno and Stanislaus as well, Carrizosa reported. Project resource teams are currently being solicited from each community college with the goal to eventually begin replicating the faculty convenings and admissions/articulation alignments developed through the pilot.
“All of CVHEC’s 17 community college members have accepted our invitation to participate in the process developed by the colleges in the pilot project with the tentative timeline for completion projected for the end of the spring semester and summer,” added Carrizosa, a former superintendent/president with College of the Sequoias. “This tentative timeline would position all final transfer admission pathways to be approved by UC Merced for full implementation beginning in the fall semester, 2023.”
Duran said this groundbreaking project, which supports CVHEC’s core mission to improve college completion rates while also supporting the valley’s only UC campus in collaboration with member community colleges, is unique in the state.
“Nothing like this is taking place anywhere else in California that I’m aware of,” Duran reported to the board. “This kind of collaboration, especially intersegmentally, just isn’t happening. This is a big win for the Central Valley.”
This new initiative builds on the 10-year effort by the state’s community colleges to expedite a successful transfer by implementing the Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT) agreement, specific lower-division course sequences for approval by the California Community College Chancellor’s Office and CSU campuses, to fulfill the 60-unit transfer requirements for various majors offered throughout the colleges in the CSU system.
Specifically for this pilot, UCM faculty were invited to review the CSU-approved ADT’s developed previously, and which are becoming more widely known by Central Valley community college students. They were asked to consider approval of selected ADTs to fulfill the lower division transfer requirements for these same discipline majors at UCM.
“To date, the work of the pilot project colleges is progressing nicely,” Carrizosa reported. “These intersegmental teams have reviewed and approved up to 15 different ADT discipline majors. They adjusted and aligned course syllabi where needed — to be approved by UCM faculty — to fulfill the lower division requirements for successful transfer admissions to UCM.”
In addition to the review and approval of the various ADT discipline majors, Carrizosa said the teams are also identifying the specific upper division courses required for students once admitted to UCM and aligning these with the ADT to show a four-year sequence to be called the “UCM transfer admission pathways for students.”
Once completed and approved, the courses are being uploaded into the new web-based software application Program Mapper.
“This application enables students to select the community college they are attending and identify the ADT they may be interested in being enrolled in,” Carrizosa said. “From there, Program Mapper will automatically display the required community college courses for their ADT and the required upper division courses for that major at UC Merced in the format of a four-year Transfer Admission Plan (TAP).”
Plans are underway to unveil the Transfer Project and Program Mapper application at a special event Nov. 4 at UC Merced. (Event details of the Program Mapper and launch will be forthcoming in the October CVHEC e-newsletter).
Funding for the Transfer Project is provided in part by the Fresno K-16 Collaborative with support from California Governor Newsome’s office and by the College Futures Foundation.