Webinar: Community engagement and college completion

Exploring the Connection: Community engagement and college completion
Colleges and universities face the significant challenge to help students from all backgrounds enter and complete college in a timely manner. This webinar will highlight the potential that community engagement offers to increase college completion rates, using specific research studies that have contributed to the growing body of evidence that connects community engagement with student success for all students.

Lynn E. Pelco, Ph.D., is associate vice provost for community engagement in the Division of Community Engagement at Virginia Commonwealth University where she also directs the Office of Service-Learning. She earned her Ph.D. in school psychology from the Pennsylvania State University and has held clinical, administrative and faculty appointments at the University of South Australia, Bucknell University, The College of William and Mary, and The Pennsylvania State University School of Medicine. Her research interests include university-community partnerships, service-learning, and university student development.

Helen Rosenberg, Ph.D., is Professor in the Department of Sociology/Anthropology and directs the Certificate Program In Gerontology at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside. Throughout her career, she has involved students in experiential learning, first through developing an internship program in the Sociology Department and then through her efforts to involve students in projects in her classes. She is former Faculty Director at the Center for Community Partnerships where she promoted civic engagement as a core University value and worked toward modifying the faculty reward structure to include community-based learning for students.

Travis T. York, Ph.D., is the Director of Student Success, Research & Policy at the Association of Public & Land-grant Universities (APLU). His research centers on issues of college student access, success, and educational equity. His work has focused on examining pathways into and through postsecondary environments for low-income, first-generation, minority students. Currently, York is the Project Lead and Co-PI of APLU’s INCLUDES Project–a National Science Foundation-funded effort to diversify STEM faculty; and serves as a Co-PI on a U.S. Department of Education IES Assessment Grant titled, Affording Degree Completion: A Study of Completion Grants at Accessible Public Universities.

Deborah Scire, Ed.D., is the Executive Director of Campus Compact for NH. Prior to coming to CCNH, Scire served as the Director of Cooperative Education at Northern Essex Community College in Haverhill, MA and was responsible for Cooperative Education, Internships and Service-learning. She served in a similar capacity at Merrimack College, in North Andover, MA. Her research interests include college completion and the extent to which foundations have influenced higher education.

Check out the rest of this year’s webinar series.