Achieving the Dream (ATD) Core Team Mtg. – October 15, 2013
Attendees
Bill Storms
Melissa Harrison
Scott Marsh
Marleen Ramsey
Doreen Kennedy
Darlene Snider
Karen Kirkwood
Chad Miltenberger
Susan Palmer
Jill Emigh
OLD BUSINESS:
Policy, Practices, Procedures Updates
 Leads Deadline for Recommendations Oct. 30th
 Susan & Jill are hoping to compile and share the recommendations with the Core & Data teams
prior to Stan & Mark’s visit - likely at the Nov. 12th mtg.
 Jill sent out a blank form for committees to use to input their recommendations - copy/paste
policy info from initial doc.
 Are we looking at athletes and success? It seems that pre-college courses have not been
successful for athletes as they are all consumed with the sport. Response: In the past, our
athletes have been very successful academically; we can certainly look into current success
rates.
 The decision has been made to abandon Google Docs and switch to Canvas due to struggles with
Google Docs. We will make the transition as soon as possible. Stan & Mark should be able to be
observers on Canvas.
 Preliminary Inventory of Recommendations
 Jill & Susan have received about 6 of the 30 recommendations from policy areas. If your
recommendation is that you need data, please provide all info to assist with gathering data –
you do not need to submit the data to submit the recommendation.
 Anne Nelson’s Class Project
 Anne Nelson’s students are going to create questions to ask as a secret shopper. Six key areas
have been identified for pairs of students to formulate questions.
Focus Groups and other activities for Nov 14 & 15
 TRiO
 First time students at WWCC Fall 2013
 Newly forming Latino Club
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Our ATD coaches are returning November 14th & 15th. We have invited them to have breakfast
with a small group.
We have asked Stan & Mark to hold focus groups with the above listed student groups and will
have a discussion with Mark regarding number manageability.
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Do we want Clarkston representation with the groups listed? If so, we may want to have a
Clarkston specific focus group as Clarkston faces its own equity issues. Would it be possible to
have Stan & Mark travel to Clarkston for focus groups? We will check with them.
What are we trying to ascertain from the focus groups? First time students - what was their
experience like? Latino Club - ethnic population experience. TRiO - low-income, first
generation population experience.
What about the almost completer’s perspective? We can ask Josh to pull data to see about
pulling students from this group.
Possible question for focus groups – what have they heard regarding ATD & what do they need
to know?
It would be good to have a mix of all ages in the focus groups.
Incentive for participants – bookstore gift cards – Melissa has ten $10 gift cards left over from
Orientation we could use and she can see about providing additional incentive (needs to be a
reasonable # of students).
A summit event was held a few years ago that generated information and data that we could
use. Darlene will look for and provide the information.
Webpage Design
 Timeline?
 Completions?
 Minutes?
 Data?
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Who are we targeting - external or internal audience? Both.
We need a safe place to fail and not have it out there for the world to see - Canvas can be our
“safe” place to fail.
Can we have our button slogans scrolling on home page – you could click a button for a
description of what the slogan means.
Should we have a blog? Blogs are good because they show progress over time. We could have a
different team member responsible for posting a weekly blog post. The video we showed at our
kick-off event would be a great blog post.
NEW BUSINESS:
 We were able to hire a Federal Work Study student to assist with ATD projects and support. The
student’s name is Nikki Diaz, she is a pre-nursing student and is available on Monday’s and
Friday’s. We are hoping to have her located in the Admin II area.
 Federico Diaz, our community member representative for the ATD team, is unable to continue
his participation due to other commitments. We are currently looking for a replacement.
Data Team Report
 Fact Sheet
 The new WWCC Fact Sheet is out. On prior fact sheets, there was a large differential between
attainment and equitable outcomes, this time the gap has closed somewhat.
 Math Avoidance
 There is a concern with regards to Math Avoidance. Jill indicated that in her history, this
conversation often happens in the first advising session.
 Other
 Requests for data are going to increase with ATD. Having access to a data dashboard will create
ease of use with data and be very helpful. We do have a reporting function on our website,
however there are access rights and it is not user friendly for the novice.
 We need to make sure we are keeping the data “reputable”.
Finish Line Feedback
 We have been asked by the game creators for feedback. Jill has a very detailed feedback piece
from a faculty member, but would like additional feedback. Melissa had sent feedback from her
group to Marleen after the kick-off event, she will send on to Jill & Susan. If anyone has any
other feedback, please provide to Jill & Susan.
Brainstorm Research Questions
Postponed
Next meeting: November 12th, 2013
Coaches visit: November 14th & 15th, 2013
Core Team Members: Susan Palmer, Jill Emigh, Steve VanAusdle, Marleen Ramsey, Wendy Samitore,
Nick Velluzzi, Josh Slepin, Melissa Harrison, Chad Miltenberger, Bill Storms, Darlene Snider, Karen
Kirkwood, Linda Lane, Denise Kammers, Anne Nelson, Rocio Delatorre, Federico Diaz, Mark Figueroa,
Stan Arterberry, Doreen Kennedy