Faculty and Staff Monthly Degree Pathways Update

Dear Highline Community,

Welcome to winter quarter. The intent of this email is to provide you with an update as to the Degree Pathways work that has been completed so far this year as well as to update you on what will be happening this quarter.

Fall Quarter Recap

A Campus Update and Quarter End Celebration was held on December 14, 2021. You can view the presentation Materials or Recording. Some fall quarter highlights are listed below.

Entry Advising
New location on the top floor of building 6
New entry and advising experience for all incoming students

Pathway Advising
New Student Orientation redesigned
Career and Transfer Services move into Pathway Advising area

Pathway Maps
Over 150 program maps developed
College 101 pilot launched

Faculty Advising
All faculty assigned at least five student advisees
Professional development and advising resources developed for faculty advisors

New Degree Pathways Website for Faculty and Staff Launched

The Degree Pathways Communication Team is excited to announce the launch of a new internal Degree Pathways website.

The intention of these web pages is to give our college community an overview of the transformative Guided Pathways model we are implementing as a means to improve equitable student success and on-time program completion, to keep the campus informed as to the progress we are making in applying this new framework and to provide useful tools and resources to support you in this work. It is our goal that these web pages become the go to source for all your Degree Pathways questions and needs.

These web pages are a work in progress. As you begin to use the website, please let us know if you have any suggestions to improve the site. All recommendations can be sent to degreepathways@highline.edu.

A big thank you to Jack Harton for his work on creating the first internal Degree Pathways website, for developing the content and curating the guided pathway resources, to Tony Johnston for his support, and to Blake Stagner and Shawna Freeman for creating the new site.

Aviso Implementation Timeline

ITS is currently working with Aviso to get it connected to our internal systems and working through how to move data from ctcLink into Aviso. We held a Discovery Visit on January 20th, which served as the kickoff for the Aviso configuration work. Our plan to train-the-trainer in Spring Quarter is contingent on the collaboration of advisors across campus for the configuration of the system. Moving forward the team will be working on processes, a communication plan for students, faculty and staff. Stay tuned for further updates.

Faculty Advising Update

Faculty advising implementation through Guided Pathways is in full swing. The Degree Pathways Core Team is incredibly thankful for everyone’s perseverance in navigating advising changes during the pandemic.

An important area to acknowledge is that the Degree Pathways Core Team is recognizing that we do not yet have the necessary resources to implement faculty advising as imagined. Faculty advising capacity and technology resources are limited at this time and may affect our proposed timeline; however, we are working with our Degree Pathways work teams to determine equitable solutions. More information will be shared soon, and we will keep everyone up to date as changes occur.

Entry Advising Hired Two New Advisors

Join us in welcoming two new advisors to Entry Advising. Angela Thao is our new Entry Advisor and Kareen Maloney is our new Program Manager of Entry Advising. These two positions are funded through Guided Pathways and the Title III grant, both focused on breaking down historic barriers to student access and success in order to equitably increase student enrollment and degree completion. One way Entry Advising supports this is by actively engaging and navigating students before and during the admissions process and pre-enrollment steps. We will provide opportunities to explore and connect students’ goals, interests and strengths to our Degree Pathways, such as Explore Highline! Orientation starting this Spring.

Stop by the Entry Advising office in building 6, on the top floor, to welcome our new Entry Advisors and to see how we’ve transformed the space and the services students are receiving. Stay tuned for an Open House in February.

Exploratory Sequence & College 101

For students, the first 30 credits at Highline is a time for making connections and gaining skills to be successful in college. For students who are “undecided” at Highline and enter our Exploratory Pathway, they will get core intro courses and guidance in order to move onto an actual pathway with the goal of transfer or employment.
When fully implemented, all students in the exploratory pathway will take College 101 (3 credits), which was developed last year and is in the pilot stage this year.
Right now, we are developing College 105 (5 credits) because some student groups (like Running Start) really need a 5-credit course.
Even if a student is not an “exploratory/undecided” student – they know what pathway they want to be on (healthcare, business, etc.) – they should still have valuable navigation experiences at the beginning of their journey and engage in a meaningful exploration of the world of work related to their pathway of choice.
Highline’s goal:
College 101 (or 105) as part of the introductory sequencing in specific program maps OR
Another introductory navigation course (or courses) developed by a program or pathway as part of the introductory sequencing for its students (e.g. Business 199 or STEM 100).

Program Mapping

Completed program maps are currently available in a Google Drive advisors can access from the Advising web site under Faculty and Staff Tools. As more maps are finalized, they will be added weekly to this drive. We are in the process of linking the PDF maps to the Degree Pathways website. The maps will be linked under the Associates Degree headings (or BAS degree heading). You will see a list of the available maps for each program (as they are finalized). See the below example of maps for the Geology program.

In these examples you see three maps for the AA-DTA degree and one map for the AS degree. Students will be able to see a number of maps created by departments that are transfer school specific, math placement specific. These maps are guides and should always accompany meeting with Pathway or Faculty advisors to ensure students’ individual needs are met.