Many of you have been involved in designing MCC’s new Academies. This new student enrollment and retention model that groups students by academic interest into one of six “Schools”: Arts and Humanities; Business, Hospitality, and Entrepreneurism; Community Engagement and Development; Health Related Sciences; Social Sciences and Global Studies; and STEM (a draft pathway diagram can be accessed below). The model organizes a student’s experience along a clear, intentional pathway into and through the college and provides personalized support via cross-functional academy teams. In other words, the Academies model puts the student literally and figuratively at the center of all we do at MCC.
The original Academies implementation plan called for a Fall 2015 pilot with two subgroups of students. Based on the substantial work done to date, the steering committee has now recommended a full-scale implementation for fall 2016. Moving the Academies to scale has many benefits, including simplifying the enrollment process for students, streamlining marketing and communications, and creating a single degree coding/reporting system. A Fall 2016 implementation would also allow MCC to avoid managing two simultaneous systems for supporting students, eliminating confusing and ineffective duplication of our admissions and advisement processes, and college orientation programs.
Given the significant work done by the 75 members of the Academies team, I am pleased to announce that the steering committee’s recommendation has been accepted, and the college will implement the MCC Academies model at 100% full-scale beginning Fall 2016. No pilot phase will precede this implementation.
The Academies project has engaged faculty and staff from every area of the College, all of them dedicated to designing a framework for student success. Their innovative work has laid the foundation for an exciting time at MCC, creating a model—one firmly grounded in academic goal setting and achievement—in which we work together holistically to support our students from admission through completion. In doing so, the Academies team has looked at MCC through the eyes of our students, seeing our College anew. Please join me in thanking the 75 faculty and staff who have been dedicated to crafting this vision and developing an implementation plan. (A list of participants is attached).
Professional development workshops will be coming soon, as will additional opportunities for giving feedback and input into the process. The steering committee looks forward to your participation and involvement as we place high impact experiences at the heart of the student journey with a goal of increasing student engagement, achievement, and completion.
Anne M. Kress
President
11/25/2014
Attachments:
 AcademiesDiagram.pdf.001
98317244.pdf
45659680.pdf
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