Developmental Education Task Force at CCCS

Below, more news from our Academic Team! This important task force’s official mission, goals, and contact information are below:

The Developmental Education Task Force (DETF) has been charged with reviewing developmental education practices throughout the Colorado Community College System (CCCS) and making recommendations about what steps the system will take to become the premier purveyor of developmental education in more streamlined and efficient ways, resulting in greater student success.

Through data and research, the DETF will holistically examine the role that developmental education plays in overall student success. The DETF will:

1. Review and clarify the purpose of developmental education and analyze implications for policy and practice resulting from a clarified purpose.
2. Review current system policies and practices related to developmental education and propose revisions that will promote greater student success in alignment with sound academic principles and practice.
3. Investigate and analyze measures of success, data reports and studies on success of developmental education students.
4. Examine structures for developmental education, highlighting innovative and successful strategies, improving the student experience and identifying barriers to success.
5. On the basis of a comprehensive review, recommend broad strategies and specific initiatives related to developmental education that should be pursued by Colorado's Community College System Colleges, leading to enhanced outcomes for student learning and success.

The DETF is led by Dr. Casey Sacks, Interim Dean of Developmental Education for CCCS, and has 30+ members from across the state. CCCOnline is represented by Heidi Barrett, who serves on the Online Learning Subcommittee.

To learn more about the DETF and its current research, visit http://www.cccs.edu/developmental-education/index.html. If you have questions or comments, please contact Heidi Barrett at Heidi.oberle-barrett@cccs.edu.

CCCS Participating in Landmark Analytics Project

This week, we’re excited to share that the Colorado Community College System is one of six academic institutions participating in the groundbreaking PAR (Predictive Analytics Reporting) project. Led by WCET (WICHE Cooperative for Educational Technologies) and funded by the Gates Foundation, the project aims to help institutions improve students' progression and completion through a better understanding of student success factors.

Jonathan Sherrill, CCCOnline Data Analyst Professional, is a project participant. He says the group is bringing the idea of “big data” to the study of student success; and indeed, the scale of the project is big: “We’ve already brought together 640,000 anonymized student records and three million course records from these six institutions – we can go very fine looking at this because there’s so much data,” reports Jonathan. This multi-institution collaboration is also exciting, he explains, because analyzing such a great number of records from multiple sources invites broadly meaningful conclusions.

The other PAR project participants are Rio Salado College, the University of Illinois at Springfield, the University of Hawaii system, the American Public University system, and the University of Phoenix. As the project continues, additional institutions will join, allowing for even broader analysis. Preliminary results from the proof of concept already are being released, and the next phase likely will conclude in late 2014.

"I believe the hope of the Gates Foundation is for it to ultimately become self-sustaining,” Jonathan concludes, “a valuable service provided to educational institutions long after their direct involvement ends."

Welcome to Our New Dean of Academic Instruction!

We at CCCOnline are very pleased to introduce our new Dean of Academic Instruction, Terry Reeves. Terry has been with CCCOnline since last fall as interim Dean of Academic Instruction, and when given the opportunity to stay with us, she was excited to accept.

Terry has an extensive teaching and leadership background with the Colorado Community College System; she was Math faculty at Red Rocks Community College for 18 years, mentored adjunct Math faculty for 10 years, served as Department Chair for five years, and was faculty adviser for RRCC’s Transfer Program to the Colorado School of Mines. Terry also served as state discipline Chair, representing Math for all system colleges, and in addition, served a four-year tenure as Co-Chair for RRCC’s HLC Accreditation Committee. Her faculty experience includes teaching with CCCOnline for several years before RRCC created its own online Math department.

At CCCOnline, “the quality is so high and the standards so high,” she says, “much higher than people realize.” She adds CCCOnline, beyond being devoted to online education, is devoted to all-around academic excellence, and teaching for us is an active, dynamic, and professionally rewarding experience.

Terry looks forward to collaborating with our state community colleges, impacting the quality of online courses system-wide. In her role as Academic Dean, she continues to strengthen this partnership, representing and advocating CCCOnline as a valuable resource to the entire community college system.

Terry earned her Bachelor’s degree from Oklahoma State University and her Master’s in Applied Math from the University of Colorado. She and her family are huge Denver Broncos fans.