Credity Intensity/15 to Finish Discussion Notes - North Regional Meeting

Credit intensity/15 to finish was one of three shared areas of interest for participants at the North Georgia CCG Regional Meeting held at the University of North Georgia on March 26, 2016. Brief notes from the breakout conversation on this issue at the meeting follow:

Key Concerns

• Not streamlining conversations (interventions too diffused to make an impact)
• Need to be more intentional with interventions
• Students in general are still not graduating on time, if at all
• Needed support for students sometimes isn’t there

Observations

• Regional meetings are helpful in dealing with topics related to completion
• Campuses have a sense of the different ways to shorten time to degree, but need to interact more to find out what’s working well

Solutions

• System Office serving as legislative liaison
• Develop a mini toolkit for strategies to shorten time to degree
• Working together with TCSG and fostering centrality with big ideas

Discussion Notes

• North Georgia
  
  • Implements Move on When Ready, CBE, prior assessment, ALC, CLEP, Foreign Language
    • Military students in particular, veterans affairs
• AP students with no credit can take CLEP exam for English 1101
  
  • 75% pass rate
• Adopting ACE recommendations, giving credit for 3000-level courses
• Mindset that AP is better than college credit (bump in GPA for STEM courses)
  
  • Shift dual enrollment to equal footing
• Faculty for dual enrollment offsite courses – working directly with HS students  
  
  • Quality of instruction is critical
  • These classes sometimes have a mix of students from other high schools
  • North Georgia has a dual enrollment orientation and brings students to campus at least once during the semester
• Concern about foreign language credits sometimes not counting toward degree (students then have extra credits)
• Course availability is a challenge
• Developing other pathways for pre-nursing students at Georgia Highlands College
• Limits on changing majors
  
  • Withdrawals, repeat attempts, and change of major require advisor approval at UNG
• Would like to make a 2-3 year schedule available for students
• Barrier at GGC – students can’t take transient courses elsewhere if course is offered at GGC that same semester
• Ensure programs don’t require more than 120 hours for graduation
• Eliminate graduation requirements (graduation fees, etc.)
• Intervention strategies for students with excess credit
  
  • Especially for pre-nursing students – anatomy and physiology can’t count toward the core curriculum and few places it can fit in Area F

• PELL grants run out in 12 semesters – financial literacy