University College works to improve Marshall’s retention rate

University College will be at the core of the new changes freshmen will see next fall. 

"The goal of all of this is to try to improve student retention and student success," said Frances Hensley, associate vice president of academic affairs. "It's not that we've had problems with it; we've been working on retention ideas for quite some time. Creating University College and UNI 101 were earlier retention efforts."

New orientation ideas are underway and the director of University College is going to be involved with them, Hensley said.

Freshmen will begin the semester earlier than other students, starting the week before classes start for the new Marshall WOW Days, or Week of Welcome, Hensley said. During this week, freshmen will attend sessions that will incorporate some of the material from UNI 101, which will no longer be a graduation requirement, she said.

An overnight orientation, which will no longer be called orientation, but will be called Up Late At Marshall will begin this summer, said Sherri Stepp, interim dean of University College.

"We're doing two pilot programs with Up Late At Marshall this summer, and we would like to see those be successful, so we can expand that program for incorporation with next summer's orientation," Stepp said.

University College coordinates UNI 101, but Stepp said this responsibility is changing next school year. The new core curriculum will be implemented and a new First Year Seminar for freshmen will replace UNI 101.

"It's a very different course," Stepp said. "First Year Seminar will be a regular three-hour, graded class that will involve critical thinking skills and continue the one book program that has been done in UNI 101. The class will be more academic than UNI 101."

Stepp said they will still coordinate a few sections of UNI 101 and are looking at implementing a couple of other study skills and career counseling classes.

Hensley said the director of University College will probably be the director of the new Academic Success Center. The advisers from University College will also spend some time there helping students.

The Academic Success Center will be a place for students to get assistance, financial aid, career services, registration and admissions information at a central location on campus, Hensley said.

"Instead of having students going from office to office to try to find what they need, there will be one place where students can get information," Hensley said. "It wouldn't take the place of all of these other offices, but sometimes students just need some simple information. If we're able to do that in one central place, we think that it would be a real service to students."

"We have a lot of student advising traffic," Stepp said. "University College does intense advising with University College students and advises the College of Liberal Arts undecided students."

University College also currently coordinates tutoring services, the national student exchange and UNI 101.

"We have to work out a lot of details," Stepp said. "The general ideas have been floating around for a while, and now it's getting down to the brass tacks of who's doing what, what kind of deadlines we have, and who else do we need to get involved at this point."

Elizabeth Adams can be contacted at mccoma36@marshall.edu.