The Important Work of Student Success Innovation

We were thrilled recently to co-host a lively webinar with the Chronicle of Higher Education on the importance of academic advising. The conversation stemmed from our randomized control trial study of proactive, predictive analytics-enabled advising for first-generation and Pell-eligible students across 11 campuses. In addition to insights from the project’s principal investigator, Dr. Tim Renick, we were honored to hear from former U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan; Melinda Anderson, executive director of Nacada; and CJ Powell, special assistant in the Office of Postsecondary Education at the U.S. Department of Education.

Most importantly, we were delighted with the engagement and participation of thousands of people across higher ed. They asked insightful questions rooted in their own experiences, which added to the shared understanding of the challenges facing academic advisers and students, as well as potential solutions and innovations to improve the advising process for advisers and students.

The participation from high-level officials and daily practitioners alike showed us that there is significant demand for this kind of deep content on important topics like advising. You can watch (or re-watch) the discussion at this link. We also invite you to read and share our Proactive Advising Playbook, which dives into what we learned during the project and provides recommendations and considerations for universities thinking of adopting proactive advising, including five key components that helped campuses make the most of proactive advising.

We have also been thrilled with the reception to our Completion Grants Playbook, which offers timely insights as higher ed institutions, administrators, and students continue to navigate financial repercussions from the pandemic.

As we develop playbooks for the broader higher ed community, we strive to be guided by the following considerations:

1. A good playbook is not about what you did, it’s about what you learned.
2. A playbook is about the user, not the writer.
3. Think: what advice do I wish I had before I started this project?
4. Identify the key questions, the big chunks of work required to focus on answering these questions, and distill the content into smaller categories for the user.

We’re always looking to make our resources more insightful and useful for people who are doing the important work of student success innovation every day. If you have a moment, let us know some of the best examples of playbooks or templates you’ve used, and how you think future playbooks can be most helpful in your work.