Reflecting and Aspiring

I received an award last week. It was completely unexpected and beyond humbling because it came

from our students. I truly had no idea, but I'm not here to brag. The year-end award (our spring term ends the 19th) made me start thinking about how far we've come in the last year since we committed to a poverty-informed approach to serving students, and of course it made me think about how far we have to go. In the last 12 months we have lived with the dichotomy of radically changing our mindset toward student success, while at the same time being overwhelmed with what lies in front of us. I have had some opportunities this spring to share our story, and I've been pleased to see the positive reaction, but I have also been amazed at what we see when we really start to look. So today, I'd like to share about our successes thus far and the mountain of work we see ahead. There is no turning back.

Acceleration is one of the core principles of our poverty-informed practice. A redesign of developmental education in favor of just-in-time support has made a difference for students, but our most successful effort so far has been the emphasis on Credit for Prior Learning (CPL). Helping students earn credit for what they know when they arrive is a wonderful method for immediately creating a sense of belonging and starting them down a college path. CPL validates life experience for a population that has been marginalized, and gives them a dose of self-confidence. People close to me often describe me as having a secret chip on my shoulder, which I can only

attribute to growing up with less than the people around me. That chip on my shoulder can make me defensive even now, and it can cause me to misinterpret people's actions as questioning my credibility. I'm 20 years from any serious financial struggles, and it is still there, so I often think of our students who are in the crisis of poverty. How do they feel, and how do they interpret our actions? What would we do differently if we understood their behavior in their context? Anyway, I think CPL is a wonderful way to begin undoing the inherent power differential in our educational system and acknowledge the value of adults who have learned things along their life path. Valuing the life experience of students is why we set a goal of awarding 222 CPL credits this year to adult education students (which would be a 100% increase), and I am pleased to say we are poised to shatter that number (we track it on the board pictured, in real time). It is a win on every front. Not only do we create self-efficacy, we eliminate the financial burden of unneeded coursework, and the college benefits because earning credit propels students toward earning more credit. We've been fortunate our college has not put financial barriers to CPL in the way of students without means. CPL isn't a silver bullet, but it feels pretty close some days.

Partnerships have been another success in our work this year. We reached out to a local workforce

agency and partnered by offering space to their staff. They in turn began enrolling students in Food Share Employment and Training (FSET) and Title I of the Workforce Investment and Opportunity Act (WIOA). Are you thinking you maybe don't know a lot about FSET and WIOA? Well, I thought I did, but I have learned so much since we began working together. There is no escaping the reality that poverty is a resource issue at its core. Partner agencies bring resources to the fight we would not have otherwise, and the agencies benefit by serving their mission in a location where consumers are plentiful. And who better to serve with these important supports than people demonstrating the courage to pursue college to escape poverty. I've written before about how important those programs were for my family, but I also know programs are often burdened by stigma in today's world. It is a poverty-informed win to offer these services on campus. Not only are they needed and useful, but there is a dignity to having them attached to getting an education. Until we normalize help and remove stigma, this feels pretty important.

Another recent partnership worth noting is with our sustainability office on campus, and its forward thinking leader, Dr. Casey Meehan. Casey has told me on several occasions the issues he is working on related to climate change, resiliency, and sustainability will hit people in poverty first and disproportionately. We also discussed the generous nature and sharing culture which so often exists among people without much, and how in many ways it is a model for a sustainable future. So, we began to look for things we could do together and came upon a small but significant first step. Casey has identified funds to regularly add fresh fruits (purchased locally) to our snack offerings to students (AKA "The Bowl"). One of the things we are learning about partnerships is you just don't know who your partners might be. You can't be afraid to tell your story and see who stands up to help. I think historically we were almost apologetic about advocating for people in poverty, and we were dead wrong. People with barriers will expose our areas for improvement faster than anyone else could. They help us improve our college for everyone, and I'm grateful to visionaries like Dr. Meehan who understand and invest in the future of our community.

Speaking of vision, where do we go from here? As I said at the beginning, we cannot go back, simply because we know too much to be silent (credit Dr. Donna Beegle for that one). While it is overwhelming, I can also say I am completely energized to see where we go in the next year. Our growth in enrollment and the success of our CPL initiative gives me confidence what we are doing isn't just right, it's smart. In the next year, we need to grow exponentially because it is disrespectful to ask people to wait. I want us to coalesce on campus (and off) and eliminate life barriers because life barriers are completion issues. False walls between academic supports and other supports must come down. They don't make sense to students, so we need to let go of them. Help is help, no matter where it comes from, and we must resolutely remind people help is normal, natural, and needed by everyone at some point. I want a united front relentlessly focused on retaining students in new and creative ways, and a culture which believes retention is the job of every single human being on campus. A culture dedicated to meeting basic needs, creating a sense of belonging, and moving people quickly to better economic realities changes everything. I'm excited we are taking a team to Amarillo in May, and I hope we return on fire and ready to change the world. Let's get to work!