LITTLE ROCK — What would $1 million mean for a school like College of the Ouachitas in Malvern or National Park Community College in Hot Springs?
Both of the schools in the Tri-Lakes region could get the opportunity to find out, after being named among 120 top community colleges by the Aspen Institute in Washington, D.C., a national organization that encourages ideas that define a good society.
With the designation and being part of the top 10 percent of twoyear colleges in the nation, the two schools and the other 118 community colleges named on April 25 are being challenged to compete for a $1 million fund called the Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence.
“It is an honor to be included in this group,” said Stephen Schoonmaker, president of College of the Ouachitas. “This is not something you can apply to or get nominated for; it is based on data and performance. It is a resultof all the work the faculty and staff have done over the last few years.”
Schoonmaker said making the list is recognition of the work the college has done in the Lumina Foundation’s Achieve the Dream program.
Before he retired in December, Barry Ballard, former COTO president, said the program helped the college make great strides in student success.
“The Achieving the Dream program is dedicated to helping students succeed, particularly minority and low-income students,” he said. “When we started working on Achieving the Dream, our transfer rate to other colleges was 9 percent, and the graduation rate for adult education was 11 percent. So the combined rate stood at only 20 percent.”
At the close of the 2011 school year, the combined rate has grown by 155 percent.
Schoonmaker said he was contacted last week by Achieve the Dream officials.
“We were asked to apply for leader college status,” he said.“Then we can take the lessons we have learned and share them with other schools.”
In Hot Springs, Sally Carder, president of National Park Community College, said she had not received official notification about the Aspen Institute designation but that she is honored to be included among the top two-year schools in the country.
“We are excited andsurprised to have been named,” she said. “Working with the Achieve the Dream program, we have been able to gather and look at our student data, and we are making real decisions about not only resources but based on confirmed information when it comes to student success.”
She said repor ts found that using Achieve the Dream funds and criteria resulted inmore students at NPCC fitting the role of traditional students.
“More that 60 percent were a year or two out of high school and were continuing their education,” Carder said, “rather than the older person who was coming to us to advance their education for work or a career change.”
Carder said the new information moved the college touse different teaching strategies and technologies at the school to better reach the students enrolled.
“We found some programs we thought were successful were not working,” Carder said.
The success of our nation’s community colleges is more important than ever before, said Josh Wyner, Aspen Institute College Excellence Program executive director, when he announced the names of the 120 top community colleges in the competition.
“At a time when a college degree is essential to entering the middle class, communitycolleges like those in Arkansas offer the most promising path to education and employment for literally millions of Americans,” he said.
Arkansas State University-Beebe is also one of the schools named in the competition.
The three Arkansas colleges and the other community colleges will be winnowed to eight to 10 finalists in September, based on how much students learn, how many complete their programs on time and how well students do in the job market after graduating.
The schools can submitan application containing detailed data on these criteria, which must demonstrate that the school delivers exceptional student results, uses data to drive decisions and continually improves over time.
Schoonmaker said he would complete COTO’s application this week.
The Aspen Institute will conduct site visits to each of the finalists in the fall. A distinguished Prize Jury, co-chaired by John Engler, president of Business Roundtable, former Michigan governor and former president of the National Association of Manufacturers; and Richard Riley, formerSouth Carolina governor and U.S. secretary of education, will select a grand-prize winner and four runners-up, to be announced in March 2013.
Schoonmaker talked about the possibility of COTO winning the $1 million prize: “We would invest in the campus and programs to improve the work we’re now doing to help students be successful employees when they complete their education here.”
Staff writer Wayne Bryan can be reached at (501) 244-4460 or wbryan@arkansasonline.com.
Tri-Lakes, Pages 49 on 05/03/2012