LaGuardia and Lehman Honored for Freshman Year Programs
The Policy Center for the First Year of College has just named both LaGuardia Community College and Lehman College as an “Institution of Excellence in the First College Year.” Only 11 other campuses in the nation were so honored, and only one other New York State institution, the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, was among this distinguished cohort, which was chosen from 130 nominees.
The Policy Center, directed by John N. Gardner and based in North Carolina, is funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Atlantic Philanthropies.
Among the criteria for the award are: comprehensiveness of programs, meaningful assessment, broad impact on significant numbers of freshmen, strong institutional support, and the involvement of a broad range of faculty, student affairs professionals, and campus administrators.
At LaGuardia, Dr. Paul Arcario, dean of academic affairs and co-chair of the College’s First-Year Experience Committee, emphasized the linkage of developmental courses such as ESL with credit-bearing courses such as Introduction to Business. “The most effective basic skills instruction occurs,” he says, when it is “closely coordinated with regular college course work.”
Other notable features of the LaGuardia freshman year are its “Quick Start” summer program, common readings designed to create shared intellectual experience, a mentoring program, and the incorporation of technology-based pedagogies.
Lehman College’s Coordinated Freshman Programs (CFP) has been up and running for a decade. It is credited with a significant contribution to the doubling of the five-year graduation rate at the College. Last year 2,100 students participated in CFP.
All Lehman frosh begin with the Freshman Year Initiative (FYI). Among its components are coordinated courses that enable students to take multiple classes together, workshops designed to define and resolve issues that interfere with academic progress, an early intervention system to respond to signs of difficulty, and a partnership with the Lincoln Center Institute to incorporate aesthetic education into freshman studies.
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| Lehman students at Lincoln Center |
The Policy Center, directed by John N. Gardner and based in North Carolina, is funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Atlantic Philanthropies.
Among the criteria for the award are: comprehensiveness of programs, meaningful assessment, broad impact on significant numbers of freshmen, strong institutional support, and the involvement of a broad range of faculty, student affairs professionals, and campus administrators.
At LaGuardia, Dr. Paul Arcario, dean of academic affairs and co-chair of the College’s First-Year Experience Committee, emphasized the linkage of developmental courses such as ESL with credit-bearing courses such as Introduction to Business. “The most effective basic skills instruction occurs,” he says, when it is “closely coordinated with regular college course work.”
Other notable features of the LaGuardia freshman year are its “Quick Start” summer program, common readings designed to create shared intellectual experience, a mentoring program, and the incorporation of technology-based pedagogies.
Lehman College’s Coordinated Freshman Programs (CFP) has been up and running for a decade. It is credited with a significant contribution to the doubling of the five-year graduation rate at the College. Last year 2,100 students participated in CFP.
All Lehman frosh begin with the Freshman Year Initiative (FYI). Among its components are coordinated courses that enable students to take multiple classes together, workshops designed to define and resolve issues that interfere with academic progress, an early intervention system to respond to signs of difficulty, and a partnership with the Lincoln Center Institute to incorporate aesthetic education into freshman studies.
