By Ashley Wood/south news editor
Getting prospective students to enroll in classes and then trying to keep them until they finish is not a new problem, but South Campus is trying to help.
South student development services vice president Larry Rideaux said the Strategic Enrollment Management council has been formed to provide outreach and recruitment as well as to improve retention.
“Part of it is outreach and recruitment so we can talk about, as a council, initiatives whereby we can go out and impact students in a way they see they can matriculate or enroll here relatively easy,” he said.
The purpose for the council is to provide outreach to prospective students so students can actually see themselves going to college, Rideaux said.
“We are working with CACO, which is a district-level department that stands for College Access and Community Outreach,” he said. “Right now, the district has a coordinator in charge of feeder high schools within each service area.”
CACO visits high school history and English classes and talks with juniors and seniors who have shown an interest in going to South, Rideaux said.
“From there, we get them to fill out an application. For some, we get them to take the placement test,” he said. “For others, we give them kind of an introductory student advisement session, kind of like a miniature orientation.”
CACO will call students to find out what resources they might need to make the decision to start classes, Rideaux said.
“The retention piece is once students do come to TCC, they meet a success coach who is responsible for contact through the first year,” he said.
Rideaux said students can be involved with the council as well as administration, faculty and staff.
“Students are asked to participate in all of our campus councils. What I tell students is that there are a lot of skills and knowledge that you will pick up that are transferable in nature,” he said.
South special services coordinator Christopher Darville said his part of the council deals with the marketing initiative to the students.
“It’s really a holistic approach, and it’s a massive undertaking, too, because there are so many components,” he said.
Darville said they are rolling out a new program called Give Yourself a Due Date and Enroll Full Time.
“Somewhere along the way, community colleges and all the wonderful things community colleges have access to, affordability and class times we sort of lost the message of ‘Yes, we love having you here, but we want to see you succeed and leave our doors,’” he said.
The program also includes supplemental instruction, which works with advising and counseling to let them know what courses have supplemental instruction so they can pass the information along to students apprehensive of that course, Darville said.
South office assistant LaVitta Williams said she hopes the students can be better informed as far as what goes on at South and be more productive students.
“To go on and help their peers here on campus to be more productive,” she said.
The council meets once or twice a month, Williams said.
“They’re not rigorous, tough meetings, but they are indepth meetings that keep you in the loop,” she said. “Basically, you get from it what you put into it.”
