Overview of “ The Collaborative Practices Evolving out of the Basic Skills Initiative” by Ed Shenk

Amid the wild swings occurring in Congress and Wall Street over the economic crisis, the fall edition of the iJournal examines an area that had been declared a crisis in education in the past, the lack of basic skills in English and math of students entering community and four-year colleges in the state. After many efforts over the years to address this problem, a creative and collaborative plan, the Basic Skills Initiative, was created three years ago and is now beginning to bear fruit.

Sponsor ties into Basic Skill Assessment Needs

I want to thank our sponsor, ACT, Inc., as represented by the Western Regional office in Sacramento under the leadership of Ernest Valdez. The iJournal Editorial Board is especially grateful, as ACT, Inc. has been a regular supporter over the seven-year history of the iJournal. Our sponsor ties into the Basic Skill Initiative by providing information on a product they believe will assist our faculty and counselors better serve the entry level student, COMPASS. In Diagnosing Developmental Needs for Freshman Success by Stephanie Lewis, the author focuses on the COMPASS diagnostic test and how it can help address the key assessment and advising needs of basic skills programs through a customized COMPASS program as a resource to help foster students’ success.

Background and Collaborative Efforts in the Basic Skills Initiative

In “The California Basic Skills Initiative: Three years young and still growing,” by Julie Adams and Barbara Illowsky, the authors claim that the California Basic Skills Initiative (BSI) is one of the most warmly embraced and widespread program ever occurring in the California Community Colleges (CCC) system. The authors provide background on the BSI, as well as the desire for the integration of instruction and student services in implementing the program on local campuses. The idea of integration is picked up in three best practice articles on BSI efforts at Napa Valley College, El Camino College and College of Sequoias.

In “Basic Skills Students Thrive in Learning Communities: Counseling and English Professors Collaborate,” by Lauralyn Bauer, the author outlines how Napa Valley College faced the crisis in developmental education in its classrooms. The author details the changes which resulted in increased rates in retention, course completion, persistence, and learner satisfaction for students participating in the mandatory English and Counseling Basic Skills Learning Communities.

Authors Carol Imai, Margaret Quiñones-Perez and Sabra Sabio, counseling faculty at El Camino College (ECC), detail the latest innovation in basic skills in “A Collaborative Basic Skills Counseling Intervention Program at ECC.” The authors outline how counseling faculty collaborated with English and mathematics faculty to launch a coordinated instructional program that addresses the academic and social needs of students during their basic skills courses.

In “Collaborative Partnerships for Student Success: How College of the Sequoias AddressesStudent Needs and BasicSkills Challenges,” the authors, Jennifer La Serna and Adrienne Duarte, outline the role of two programs, the Essential Learning Initiative and First Year Experience, as they enhance partnerships across campus and develop alliances that result in holistic support for students.
General Interest Articles

While the basic skills of students continue to be a major focus for campuses, our general interest section contains two articles which address two additional issues: student mental health and greening of the campus. Sang Leng Trieu, Sally Bratton and Becky Perelli in “Examining Mental Health Data in California Community Colleges” provide detail on the results of the largest survey of community college students regarding their mental health issues. The authors contend that the results reaffirm the commitment of community college student health services in making an investment to ensure programs are guided by high-quality data.

In “The ‘Green’ Admission Effort at Cal Poly,” author James L. Maraviglia, shows how Cal Poly moved to the “green” admissions effort by moving to electronic communications in 1999 after prospective students said, “Hey, we’re not going to open your mail.”

Staff Development Section

The Staff Development section is chock full of key training opportunities: Basic Skills Initiative trainings, Emergency Preparedness, and the CIO/CSSO Leadership Development dates, plus outlines of specific details for these trainings. Additionally key CSSO meeting dates are listed (including the date for the annual CIO/CSSO Annual Conference on April 1-3, 2009, in Sacramento), along with other important events in CCLC and NASPA.

End Note

In our “End Note, Burnout” by Irving Leung, the author argues that burnout is a serious issue because it causes a disruption to the education of our greatest resource--students--and distorts the path that leads to purposeful teaching. This may be one of the root causes for the lack of solid basic skills of some high school students at graduation.

Summary

I want to thank our contributors to this edition and hope that it will provide ideas for addressing similar problems on your campus. For our winter edition, we would like to see how the concept of change is occurring on your campus due to the economic crisis, enrollment growth and the demands of our new students as well as personal observations. The iJournal will also consider articles focused on student services, collaboration with academic services or other issues in community college education. Articles should be 1500-2000 words in Times New Roman at 12pt font and include an abstract, short bio and the picture of the author. The deadline for the winter edition will be January 15, 2009.

As always, your feedback, comments and inquires are appreciated. If you are interested in providing an article, book review or staff development opportunity, please contact me at editor@ijournal.us or eshenk@alliant.edu.

Thank you for interest and support of the iJournal.