Dear New York Tech faculty, As autumn is in the air, it is wonderful to continue seeing students, staff, and many of you in person on campus. I wish to thank you all for your hard work and commitment to our students. This fall semester is another “transition” term, but a great deal is being accomplished and learned. With recent article titles such as “Is Campus Life Back to Normal?”, “Higher Ed’s Rocky Reboot,” and “What’s a College Degree Worth?”, we must reconsider what we do, how we do it, why we do certain things the way we do, and for whom. On the whom, an Educause report provided the following: First, today's students are not the students of myth and legend. The new "normal" student is not an eighteen-year-old who is dropped off at the entrance to "Leafy U" in the family minivan to be retrieved four years later with a diploma marking a body of learning that will somehow last a lifetime. Instead, the new normal student is just as likely to be a twenty-five-year-old returning veteran, a thirty-year-old single parent, or a fifty-three-year-old displaced worker who is looking to reskill and retrain. For detailed data (such as 64 percent of students are working either full- or part-time), see Educause’s Changing Demographics and Digital Transformation. An excellent new book, The Great Upheaval, summarized in an Inside Higher Ed article, proposes that “colleges and universities must brace for five new realities—none of which are higher education's own making: New content producers and distributors will continue to enter the marketplace, driving up competition and consumer choice while driving down prices. Institutional control of higher education will decrease, and the power of higher education consumers will increase. With near-universal access to digital devices and the internet, students will seek from colleges the same things they are getting from the music, movie, and newspaper industries. A knowledge economy model based on outcomes will eclipse the industrial era model of higher education based on process. The dominance of time-bound degrees and "just-in-case" education will diminish.” How do we incorporate some of these realities, especially new content we do not have, in our work with New York Tech students? Emerging Technologies: Trying New Things The Emerging Technologies Group would like to congratulate the following faculty recipients of our Fall 2021 Classroom Technology Mini-Grants: Ben Ovryn, Sinan Caykoylu, Jaclyn Cotgreave, Todd Cohen, Melissa Huey and Sophia Domokos, Melda Yildiz and Wenjia Li, Jaqueline Keighron, Nicole Calma-Rodin, and Sung Park. Each group will explore emerging technologies for classroom application to improve the student experience at New York Tech. A new round of grants will be announced soon for faculty wanting to explore such research. For Student Success: Students First Achieving Collegiate Excellence (ACE): As you know, ACE provides academic support to undergraduate students who need to raise their GPAs to meet scholarship qualifications. This semester: 78 students participated 43 academic coaches volunteered (thank you, thank you) Requirements: Coach meetings: over 125 held. Modules: more than 160 completed. Engagement activities: over 100 completed. iAchieve: We will be launching this program of proactive support again to second-semester freshmen who, after their first semester, are at risk of losing their institutional scholarship (cGPA below 2.79). IAchieve provides students with: An academic coach Student Success modules Engaging workshops and events Here are some high-level positive outcomes for our first group of ACE students: Freshmen Entering New York Tech in Fall 2018 and Starting ACE in Fall 2019 (Overall within ACE Comparisons) More Updates from the Advising and Academic Enrichment Center First-Year GUIDE Program: The First-Year GUIDE program was launched in August to help increase persistence, retention, and sense of belonging for first-year students. This program pairs first-year students with a Peer Success Guide (PSG) who will support them throughout their first year, help connect them to a support system as well as resources, and promote engagement with fellow freshmen as well as other peers. Currently, there are 18 PSGs for 724 first-year students (excludes Architecture, which has dedicated, pre-existing program, and B.S./D.O. students), with an average ratio of 1 PSG to 40 first-year students. In addition, this effort was coupled with the design of the “My Guide to Success @ New York Tech” Canvas course, which includes modules on several crucial topics related to students’ transition to college. We look forward to sharing results as the program progresses. Progress Reports: This week, AEC will be sending progress report requests for: All first-year and new transfer students Students who are in specialized programs Students we would like to keep a closer eye on due to prior academic challenges Progress reports allow you to submit mid-semester feedback (current grade, absences, concerns, etc.) on the performance of select students in your courses. The feedback you provide, whether positive or negative, is helpful as we speak to students about their standing in their classes and ensures they are on the right track for a successful semester. For students of concern who are not included in a progress report request, please Issue an Alert (see below). Early Alerts: Are you concerned about a student who may be struggling in your course or displaying poor academic behavior? Our Early Alert System is a great way to support our students through early intervention. Submitting an alert as early as possible is key to positively impacting student success. Take a moment and Issue an Alert. Ongoing Initiatives and Updates Encouraging Student Participation in ETS HEIghten Assessments: As announced on CPI Day, we are administering the ETS HEIghten Critical Thinking and Written Communication Outcome Assessments. These fully online assessments launched on October 13 and will provide New York Tech with valuable information about our students’ performance, including benchmarking our student outcomes against similar institutions. We will be able to identify student strengths and challenges, use this information to inform teaching and learning, and evaluate improvement over time. Please encourage your students to participate by mentioning it in your classes, labs, and meetings with them. Students have been asked to complete the Critical Thinking or Written Communication assessment before November 30. All undergraduate students have been invited to participate, but a maximum of 60 students per class level will be permitted to complete one of the assessments (30 for Critical Thinking and 30 for Written Communication). A $20 incentive is being offered to students who complete the assessment, and those who perform at the proficient or advanced level will earn a certificate and an electronic badge. Information is available via the following links: Critical Thinking Overview Written Communication Overview If you have any questions, please email Shifang Li, Director of Institutional Effectiveness, at sli09@nyit.edu. Campus Climate Survey: Almost 1,500 students, faculty, and staff have already responded to New York Tech’s first-ever campus climate survey, which is ongoing. We would, in particular, like to hear from more of our undergraduate students. Please ask your students to respond to the October 4 survey invite from Brian L. Harper, M.D., M.P.H. [NewYorkTech@hedsconsortium.org]. As a reminder, the purpose of this survey is to help New York Tech assess and improve our culture and environment as it relates to diversity, equity, and inclusion. The survey uses short, multiple-choice questions and should take no longer than 15 to 20 minutes. All responses will be anonymous. Note: this survey must be completed by October 31, 2021. Student Engagement and Development: Please encourage your students to submit a proposal for the Winter 2021/Spring 2022 Edward Guiliano Global Fellowship. The program, funded by Edward and Mireille Guiliano, provides students with the opportunity to broaden their perspectives by engaging with the world beyond New York Tech and their local communities. Grizzly Cupboard Grand Openings: Ribbon cutting ceremonies were held to celebrate the official opening of the Long Island and New York City Grizzly Cupboards on Friday, October 22. The Grizzly Cupboard, New York Institute of Technology’s food pantry, is part of the university’s Bear Bytes program and is a welcoming, inclusive, and confidential on-campus location offering free, wholesome, and healthy nonperishable food items. Culture + Media + Academia: The Impact on the Gen Z Learning Experience on October 27 and November 3: Attend an exciting new two-part virtual series, featuring an engaging student panel discussion and prominent national guest speaker. October 27, 4:30 – 5:30 p.m.: Listen in on a conversation with our students and New York Tech Social Media Strategist Paulana Lamonier, moderated by Assistant Professor Melissa Huey, to discover the best ways for faculty and staff to educate, engage, and communicate with college students as they prepare for their careers. Register here. November 3, 4:30 – 5:30 p.m.: Trevor Muir, Professor at Grand Valley State University and Andrew Gomez Dream Foundation speaker, will talk about discovering the purpose in our work and using that intrinsic motivation to grow as energized learners, professionals, and leaders. Register here. Celebration of First-Generation Students: Faculty and staff are invited to join in our National First-Generation Student Celebration, including fun activities, information about first-gen support and resources, and New York Tech giveaways and swag. Two panels with students, staff, faculty, and alumni sharing experiences and tips on navigating college as a first-gen student will be held on November 4 and November 10. Faculty and staff can also register to receive a #BeTheFirst button in support of New York Tech’s first-generation students. Click here for more details. In Memoriam We mourn the passing of Vice President Nada Anid, Ph.D., on September 28. Nada joined New York Tech in 2009 as the first female dean of what is now the College of Engineering and Computing Sciences. In that role, she spearheaded the creation of New York Tech’s NSA/Department of Homeland Security National Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense Education, the federally and state-funded Entrepreneurship and Technology Innovation Center (ETIC), and the Empire State Development’s Division of Science, Technology and Innovation-certified business incubator. As dean, she overhauled the CoECES’s academic offerings and research facilities and recruited many outstanding faculty. The CoECS forged important partnerships, created undergraduate honors and research programs, increased its enrollment, and produced an unprecedented research output. Globally, she led the U.S. State Department sponsored U.S.-China EcoPartnership with Peking University and the Pathways for Cleaner Production projects with seven higher education institutions across Latin America. An advocate for the advancement of women in the STEM fields, she joined Catherine A. Allen, founder and CEO of The Santa Fe Group and member of the New York Institute of Technology Board of Trustees to establish the Women’s Technology Council to help empower women throughout their careers, beginning with their time as college students. We will all miss her energy, her leadership and vision, and her kindness and compassion. Nada's legacy and dedication to students will live on via a scholarship for women in STEM, which has been established by Nada's family in her name. See more information here. Sincerely, Junius J. Gonzales, M.D., M.B.A. Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Copyright © 2021 New York Institute of Technology