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Coordinator's Guide to the Matriculation Technical
Assistance Visit
Chancellor's Office - California Community Colleges
I. Overview
II. The Technical Assistance Team
III. The Team's Activities
IV. Your Responsibilities
V. Timeline
The Prerequisite Review Process
I. Review of Campus Information Prior to Site Visit
II. On-campus Interview and Follow-up Steps
III. Additional Campus Information to
be Supplied for Prerequisite Review
Coordinator's Guide to the Matriculation Technical Assistance Visit
This guide will explain the matriculation technical assistance visit
to the Matriculation Coordinator. A copy is also being sent to the
Academic Senate President, in the expectation that faculty will
be fully involved in preparing for and participating in the visit's
various activities. The guide is divided into five parts: an overview
of the review and assistance process; a description of the review
team; a description of the team's activities; a discussion of your
responsibilities before, during, and after the visit; and a suggested
timeline for the visit.
I. Overview
The Chancellor's Office uses the six-year accreditation calendar
as the time frame within which comprehensive, structured matriculation
technical assistance visits are conducted at colleges (typically
in the year prior to the self-study, but occasionally in the self-study
year itself). This approach provides the districts with a predictable,
widely-used calendar on which to plan for such assistance. It will
also allow Chancellor's Office staff to better coordinate the visits.
A list of the colleges that will have a technical assistance visit
during this academic year is attached. Colleges and districts are
notified individually of the dates of their respective visit. The
matriculation technical assistance visits have four main purposes:
1. To provide formative evaluation information to colleges and districts
regarding their implementation of matriculation and to assist the
colleges and districts in strengthening their matriculation process;
2. To provide colleges with detailed, useful and timely information
on matriculation and its effects for use in the colleges' accreditation
self-study process;
3. To provide the Chancellor's Office with detailed information
on the implementation of matriculation at individual colleges and
districts and information that can be aggregated for required statewide
reporting (e.g., annual reports to the Legislature; reports to the
Board of Governors, CPEC and other agencies); and
4. To provide matriculation-related staff at individual colleges
the opportunity to exchange ideas and experiences with their colleagues
from other colleges on the review team and with Chancellor's Office
staff.
Every college that has a technical assistance visit will be visited
by a team composed of matriculation-related staff and faculty from
other colleges and an independent consultant. At all the colleges
the technical assistance is based on the college's identification,
prior to the visit, of those aspects of matriculation in which the
college would most like the team to offer suggestions for improvement;
the college's approved matriculation plan and any updates or revisions
to it; the annual progress reports submitted to the state Chancellor's
Office; a review of files and other documentation provided before
the visit and on campus; individual and group interviews with counseling
and instructional faculty, students, staff, administrators; and
team members' observations (where possible) of matriculation services
and activities.
An oral report of the team's observations and recommendations is
presented on the last day of the visit. The report contains component-specific
and matriculation-wide observations. A written final report is produced
and sent to the college within five weeks of the visit. Follow-up
on the report and its recommendations, including the college's subsequent
actions, is a shared responsibility between the college and the
Chancellor's Office.
II. The Technical
Assistance Team
The size and exact composition of the team vary from one college
to another depending on the size of the college, the size of the
matriculation process (e.g., number of staff involved and number
of students served), and the range and complexity of matriculation
services. You will be notified of the size of your team, and the
individuals on it, as soon as it is finalized. Most of the team
members will be matriculation coordinators and other matriculation-related
staff and faculty at other colleges. The team functions as a single
team, with each member having both component-specific and matriculation-wide
responsibilities. In this way, the team's structure and duties closely
resemble the college staff's own structure, i.e., individuals who
focus on one or more components at the same time they are coordinating
with other matriculation services and college-wide operations. This
approach also ensures that the final report contains both component-specific
and matriculation-wide perspectives and recommendations.
Currently the Chancellor's Office is contracting with an outside
consultant (Educational Evaluation Associates — EEA) to assist
in conducting the matriculation visits. Your review team will be
chaired by an individual from this firm. That person will work with
the Chancellor's Office to coordinate all pre-site-visit activities
(letters, instructions, team member assignments, interview schedules,
and communication with the college); all on-site activities (introduction,
team meetings, preparation and presentation of the oral report);
and the preparation of the written report. The chair will also share
information-gathering responsibilities with the other team members
during the site visit, including staff and student interviews.
A member of the Chancellor's Office Matriculation Unit staff may
join the team as an observer on the last day-and-a-half of the visit.
The staff member would sit in on the formulation of the team's observations
and recommendations regarding matriculation and would join the team
at the exit interview on the final day. The staff member's role
in the site visit is to "touch base" with the team members
and with the college's administrators and matriculation-related
staff and faculty in case there are questions about the possible
ramifications of the team's visit and findings. The staff member
would also spend time with you and your college's or district's
budget officer to review the Staffing Survey and the college's most
recent Matriculation Expenditure Report, including the college or
district match, in case there are problems or concerns with matriculation-related
expenditures. Please plan to set aside time the afternoon of the
third day of the visit to work with the staff member on this general
fiscal review. You will be notified ahead of the visit as to whether
or not the staff member will be on campus.
III. The Team's Activities
The technical assistance visit takes three-and-a-half days. The
team members first review matriculation services and accomplishments
on your campus so that they can later offer the most appropriate,
site-specific recommendations for matriculation improvements. They
engage in a variety of activities, including group and individual
interviews with faculty, staff members and students, review of documents,
direct observation of matriculation services (where appropriate),
and informal discussions with individuals knowledgeable about matriculation.
Together with the outside consultant, the team members share responsibilities
for examining quantitative and qualitative measures of ongoing matriculation
services and accomplishments including staff assignments and student
outcomes They also examine matriculation's wider role at the college—how
it is coordinated with other instructional and student services
programs, the extent of faculty involvement, the college-wide understanding
of matriculation processes, and matriculation's contribution to
overall institutional effectiveness.
Using your college's approved matriculation plan and any subsequent
updates, the recent progress reports, and your identification of
matriculation areas in need of improvement as a guide, the team
examines the following broad questions in each component:
-
Which students are served by matriculation?
-
Which are exempted, and on what basis?
-
What are the responsibilities of the various college
staff and faculty members for those activities and how does
the college assist them to prepare for those responsibilities?
-
How do those services and responsibilities compare
with the matriculation plan, the updates and the progress reports?
-
What are the barriers, if any, in fully implementing
matriculation at your college?
-
What are the qualitative and quantitative issues
that affect matriculation services and effectiveness?
-
What impact has matriculation had on the curriculum,
on instruction, on intra-staff working relationships, on student
success and on the effectiveness of the institution?
-
What recommendations should be made to improve
matriculation's effectiveness?
The results of the visit are communicated in two ways:
1. A summary of team members' impressions and specific recommendations
is shared with the college staff and administrators at an exit interview
on the final day of the site visit.
2. Subsequently, a written report detailing the team's observations
and recommendations is sent to the college. Informational copies
of the report are also sent to the state Chancellor's Office and
to each team member.
IV. Your Responsibilities
As the matriculation coordinator, you have five principal responsibilities:
-
to prepare materials for the team before the site
visit;
-
to facilitate the team's work by making students
and matriculation-related staff available for interviews;
-
to prepare college staff and faculty for the visit;
and,
-
upon the college's receipt of the written report,
to respond to the recommendations made regarding matriculation.
The team's focus. The team's principal purpose is
to help your college implement matriculation in ways that are most
effective for students, faculty and the institution as a whole.
Although they will examine activities and outcomes in all matriculation
components, they will need you to help them focus some of their
time and attention on those aspects of matriculation in which their
experience can make the greatest contribution to your college's
efforts. The Team Focus form (attached) is designed to do that.
First, it will help the state Chancellor's Office select team members
whose expertise best meets your needs. Second, it will help the
team chair develop an interview schedule (see below) that concentrates
team members' time on the areas the college has identified. And
third, the form will be shared with the team itself, to alert them
to the college's specific matriculation needs. Please complete the
Team Focus form with the assistance of your campus and district
colleagues, and return it to Arnold Bojorquez at the state Chancellor's
Office by the requested date.
Materials for the review team. You will need to prepare
two sets of matriculation-related materials for the team: a packet
or binder of information for each team member, sent to
him or her before the visits (see the Information Packet Sent
to Team Members Prior to Visit list attached); and a set of
resource or reference documents to which the team as a whole will
have access while on campus (see the Materials Available to
Team members on Site list, attached).
Using the Information Packet Sent to Team Members
Prior to Visit list, please prepare six (EEA plus other team
members plus Chancellor's office staff) packets that contain items
1-11: one for each team member (including the team chair) and one
for the staff member of the Chancellor's Office who will join the
team near the end of the visit. One of these six packets also needs
to contain items 12-14 (for the team member who will focus on research).
Another of these six packets also needs to contain items 15-25 (for
the team member who will focus on prerequisites). The team chair
will forward these packets to the appropriate team member (or will
notify you in advance of which team member has those assignments
so you can send the packets directly).
In some cases, your college may not use or have available all the
items on the checklist, while in other cases one item is included
within another (e.g., an orientation handbook within a general student
handbook). Please indicate "not available" or "contained
within __" on your summary page of documentation provided.
Please begin preparing these packets now. When the Chancellor's
Office gives you the names of the team members and the team chair
specifies each team member's component assignment(s), you should
send each an information packet. As noted above, one of the packets
that contain items 1-11 should be sent to Arnold Bojorquez, at the
Chancellor's Office, who may join the team at the end of the visit.
You do not need to send the team members a copy of your matriculation
plan or progress reports. The Chancellor's Office will send these
documents to the team members before the visit.
Using the Materials Available to Team Members on Site list,
you can also begin to assemble a single set of additional materials
for the team members. These are not sent to team members but rather
are made available to them in the "work room" you have
arranged for them to use during the visit. Only one copy of each
of these items is needed. Again, not every college will have separate
materials in each of the identified areas; where this is the case
at your college, please indicate "not available" or "contained
within __" on your summary page of documentation provided.)
A closely related piece of information to be made available to the
team before the site visit, as part of the information packet, is
your own brief description of the strengths of the matriculation
process and the prerequisite process at your college and the areas
that need further development (Matriculation: A Brief Self-Assessment,
enclosed). By design, there are no specific instructions for completing
this page, but please try to touch on each matriculation component.
(And please don't go beyond one side of one page for each of these
two summaries!). The team will be interested in your unique, candid
perspective on matriculation and prerequisites at your college.
Please include the self-assessment as item #9 in the packets prepared
for individual team members.
If you choose, you may develop the Self-Assessment in conjunction
with other staff at the college, e.g., the Academic Senate President,
the Faculty Curriculum Chair, the Matriculation Advisory Committee,
the Curriculum Committee or the President. If the Self-Assessment
represents more than your unique perspective alone, please make
that clear. The team members need to know whose description of the
matriculation process is reflected in the Self-Assessment.
Use of state matriculation funds to expand college staffing. Most
colleges have used some portion of the state funds to hire additional
administrators, counselors, research staff, clerical support, assessment
technicians, etc. to carry out the new and expanded matriculation
services required by the regulations and described in the college's
plan. Chancellor's Office staff will take advantage of the site
visit to review with you your college's use (if any) of state funds
for staffing. Enclosed is the Staffing Survey we'll use for this
purpose and instructions for its completion. Please complete the
survey at least one month prior to the visit and return it to Arnold
Bojorquez at the Chancellor's Office.
Chancellor's Office staff will share the survey with the team chair
and other team members before the visit so they have a more complete
understanding of exactly how and where the college has strengthened
its matriculation services by increasing respective staffing levels.
The Chancellor's Office staff member who may join the team at the
end of the visit would then ask you (and business office staff,
if necessary) to set aside some time on the afternoon of the third
day of the visit to review the survey and confirm the accuracy of
the information. Although one aspect of this review is the state
concern with supplanting (the use of state funds to replace preexisting
district support), the more beneficial purpose is to develop more
detailed, reliable information that the Chancellor's Office can
report to the Legislature the Board of Governors and others about
exactly how the state funds are being used. The general belief that
the funds are being used effectively has helped matriculation gain
a small increase in the statewide allocation each year, but the
Legislature's willingness to simply believe is wearing thin, and
they are asking more pointed questions about, for example, how many
additional counselors have been hired with the matriculation funds.
The information you provide on the Staffing Survey, then, will serve
local as well as state purposes.
Preparing an interview schedule for the team. This
is the second major area of your pre-site-visit responsibilities.
Individual and group interviews are the central on-site activity
of the team. Your selected counseling and instructional faculty,
administrators, other matriculation-related staff, students and
other individuals on campus will spend a great deal of time individually
and in groups, talking with team members over the three-and-a-half
days of the visit.
Scheduling these staff and student interviews for
the team is a vital task. It is very important that it be done well.
These instructions will help you, and the staff member(s) you assign
to this task, to begin to organize the interview scheduling process.
There are several points to keep in mind:
1. There will be separate but slightly overlapping
interview schedules developed for each of the team members. You
will need to work closely with EEA and with the team chair to make
sure that all necessary staff and students are scheduled, and that
the schedules do not duplicate or conflict with each other.
2. Members of the team will want to begin the visit
with group interviews with college staff, faculty and students,
to get the "lay of the land" from a broad range of perspectives.
These group discussions about matriculation will then allow the
team members to focus their later individual interviews on particular
topics of interest or concern identified by you and other college
staff.
Among the groups that could be scheduled with the
team are the matriculation advisory committee, the curriculum committee,
the academic senate (or a representative sample of senate members),
the assessment committee, the English or language arts instructional
faculty, the math instructional faculty, and the counseling faculty.
Indeed, there may be other groups on campus that you, as coordinator,
feel the team should meet with; please identify those groups to
the team chair or other representative of EEA when they call to
begin the interview-scheduling process. Where group interviews aren't
possible, individual interviews with various members of the committees
should be arranged.
3. You will also be asked to set up group interviews
with at least five types of students: ESL students, students in
basic skills courses, new students, continuing students and evening
students. (The team chair may ask for additional groups of students,
e.g., students on probation or students without a declared educational
goal, and you may suggest such groups be interviewed, depending
on your particular emphases within matriculation.) Please make the
selection of these students as random and/or as varied as possible;
a homogeneous group (e.g., all student leaders, all student peer
advisors, all students who work for matriculation staff) will not
provide the team members with the broad range of student experiences
they need to hear. Please let the review team know how the students
for each group interview were selected.
4. The team members will individually interview a
number of matriculation-related staff including a sample of students,
a number of campus staff, faculty, some administrators, and possibly
some off-campus individuals such as advisory committee members and
members of the district's Board of Trustees. You can plan on having
staff members spend between 30 minutes (for student workers) and
two hours (for senior staff) with one or more of the team members
at some point between the afternoon of the first day and the afternoon
of the third day of the site visit.
5. Please include the Academic Senate, the counseling department
or division, and the various instructional departments and divisions
in selecting the individual counseling and instructional faculty
to be interviewed by the team. Team members need to speak with a
representative sample or cross-section of college faculty, one that
will give the team the broadest possible view of how matriculation
operates at the college. As such, it is very important that the
development of this part of the interview schedule be a shared,
participatory responsibility.
6. If the college has an orientation video, please set aside time
for one or more team members (particularly the team members responsible
for understanding this component) to view it. Along the same lines,
you might want a team member to sit in on part of an orientation
workshop or course.
Most all the interviews can be arranged before the site visit. Enclosed
is a blank interview schedule similar to the one from which the
team chair will work with you in specifying the individuals to be
interviewed, and by which team member, during the visit. You'll
notice that it does not include evening hours, but the team chair
may ask you to add these when developing the specific interview
schedule with you. Please do not structure interview schedules for
the team until you are contacted by the team chair or a representative
of EEA.
Please complete the Generic List (enclosed) by the
requested date, and send one copy each to:
Roxanne Lozano Marie Freeman Arnold Bojorquez
EEA 1437 Raymond Ave. Matriculation Specialist
9230 Jellico Glendale, CA 91201 California Community Colleges
Northridge, CA 91325 1107 Ninth St., 2nd floor Sacramento, CA 95814
There is no need to fill in individual names of students
or staff members on the various committees identified on the Generic
List. These individuals can be identified later, when the actual
interview schedule is assembled. At least three weeks before the
team arrives, the team chair (or an associate from EEA) will contact
you to schedule most of the individual and group interviews for
the team members, working from the Generic List above.
In some cases, team members will ask to schedule additional interviews
once the team is on campus and begins to better understand your
matriculation process.
Preparing college staff and faculty for the visit. Well before the
visit, you should begin to prepare matriculation-related and other
college staff for the visit. Since the team will expect college
staff and faculty to be familiar with their own roles in matriculation,
and to have at least a working familiarity with other staff members'
roles, the staff in-service for the visit should be structured around
the matriculation plan and how it is being implemented. Make sure
that each staff and faculty member with whom the team is scheduled
to speak is familiar with his/her duties and responsibilities, what
outcomes (effects) the plan called for as a result of those duties,
and the documentation you expect him/her to maintain regarding those
duties and outcomes. There are several steps that you might take
to prepare the staff:
-
You and/or other staff members from your college
will have participated in a team prior to your own visit and
will thus be familiar with what a team looks for in a matriculation
process, the kinds of questions the team members ask, and the
kind of documentation the team will ask to review. Use this
experience to prepare the staff for the review, e.g., conduct
mock interviews or schedule staff meetings at which staff members
discuss their activities with the whole staff and provide mutual
feedback.
-
Review the matriculation plan and the most recent
progress report. The team members will each have a copy of these
documents.
-
Call on other matriculation coordinators in your
region who have been on a review team and/or whose matriculation
process has been reviewed and ask them to help you and your
staff prepare for the visit.
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Enclosed is a memo from Arnold Bojorquez, which
you may wish to distribute to college staff and students who
will be interviewed by the team. (Its use is entirely optional;
you may also modify it and send it out under your name if that
better serves your needs. )
-
If you have any further questions, call on the
Matriculation Unit staff at the state Chancellor's Office or
the team chair from EEA.
Responsibilities during the site visit. As the matriculation
coordinator, your chief responsibility during the site visit is
to see that the team members are able to carry out their tasks efficiently.
Accordingly, your main task throughout the visit will be to see
that the team members are able to contact the students and staff
with whom they wish to speak and to help arrange a schedule for
other interviews and observations as requested by the team. During
the first day of the site visit your activities are:
1. To arrange for a room on campus where the team
can meet from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. This will be the team's first
chance to meet each other, and they will use the time to review
the on-site materials you have compiled, their respective interview
schedules, each other's roles, the purposes of the visit and the
procedures to be followed. It would be very helpful if this (or
another) room could be reserved for the team's use throughout the
visit, for team meetings and/or scheduled interviews.
2. To organize a short introduction meeting (at 1:00
p.m.) for the team to meet college staff and faculty, appropriate
college administrators (including your immediate supervisor), and
any other matriculation-related staff and faculty with whom the
team will be meeting later in the site visit. Please be sure to
invite the President, the Vice Presidents and/or Deans of Student
Services and Instruction, the dean (or other lead administrator)
for vocational education, the president of the Academic Senate and
the president of the Associated Students.
If the college President cannot attend this introductory
meeting, you will need to schedule a short, separate meeting with
the President and the review team to take place after the tour of
the campus.
3. To provide (or arrange for) a very short tour of
the campus. The tour should focus on matriculation-related facilities
and on the other campus offices and locations used by staff and
students (e.g., counseling, tutoring, learning center, data processing,
admissions and records, administration building, etc.). There is
no need (and usually not enough time) to see everything on the campus.
A good campus map can be used to locate other sites if the team
needs to go somewhere not visited on the tour. Twenty to thirty
minutes should be sufficient for this tour.
4. To meet with the team, for up to two hours, and
go through the matriculation plan and related documents (including
the most recent progress report) to confirm the most appropriate
information sources for the various kinds of questions that the
team will have about matriculation activities and outcomes.
This meeting is also the opportunity for you and the
team to begin discussing in greater detail those matriculation activities
in which you are a major participant. Because of the large number
of activities in which you are involved, several additional interview
times will probably be scheduled with you and various team members
during the visit.
As the site visit progresses:
5. A final interview with you will be scheduled for
the late morning of the third day of the visit to review any remaining
concerns or questions the team may have including clarification
of matriculation activities, data and outcomes. This meeting between
you and the team members is also an opportunity for you to bring
up any other issues or concerns that may have developed in the course
of the visit.
6. On the morning of the fourth day, about two hours
before the exit interview is scheduled, the review team will meet
with you alone for a pre-exit interview. This informal meeting is
an opportunity for you to hear and comment on the team's observations
and recommendations before they are presented in the more formal
setting of the exit interview. The pre-exit interview allows you
to correct or clarify any information that will be presented by
the team, or to shed new light on an issue of importance that is
touched on in the review team's observations and recommendations.
The pre-exit interview also serves as the time and
place to discuss any off-the-record concerns the team might have,
for example any personnel matters that seem to affect matriculation,
or doubts, issues or findings that must be said but not necessarily
in front of the college president or your supervising administrator.
As befits an informal session, there are no minutes or recordings
of the pre-exit interview.
After meeting with you, the team will have a pre-exit
interview with the president.
7. You will be expected to attend the exit interview
at the end of the site visit. The exit interview will include the
college president, other college administrators, and those matriculation-related
and other college staff and faculty you feel should attend. We strongly
encourage you to invite everyone with whom the team has spoken.
The purpose of the exit interview is to present and discuss the
review team's observations and recommendations. If you wish to tape
or video record the exit interview, please check with the team chair
before the site visit.
After the site visit. Within five weeks of the site
visit, the full report will be sent to you, your supervising administrator,
the college president, the academic senate president and others
on campus, the district chancellor and district matriculation coordinator,
the state Chancellor's Office, and the team members This report
will contain the team's major observations and the specific recommendations
for improving the college's matriculation process in the same form
as they were stated at the exit interview. Particular attention
will be paid to the aspects of matriculation that were identified
by you and other college staff before the visit as those in which
you wished additional ideas and suggestions. Since this is the full
report, it should serve as a basis for beginning to take any steps
that are needed to improve matriculation at your college.
Within thirty (30) days of your receipt of the final
report, you (or the college or district administration) are asked
to respond in writing to the Chancellor's Office regarding each
of the review team's recommendations. The response should restate
the recommendation, and then discuss in some detail the college's
reaction to the recommendation and describe the steps that have
been taken, or planned, to implement it. The college does not have
to accept or implement every recommendation. But, if the college
chooses not to accept the recommendation, the Chancellor's Office
will expect a discussion of the reasons for choosing not to, and,
where appropriate, a discussion of other steps that have been considered
to deal with the shortcoming identified in the technical assistance
report.
The Chancellor's Office takes the matriculation technical
assistance visit very seriously. The report's observations and recommendations,
and the college's response to them, will become an integral part
of the Chancellor's Office review process for your college's current
and future matriculation plans, proposed revisions to the plan,
requests for new matriculation-funded activities, and so forth.
The college's follow-through on all of the report's recommendations,
as outlined in the response letter(s), will complete its responsibilities
to the technical assistance process. Congratulations!
V. Timeline
The team's visit lasts three-and-a-half days. Team members will
arrive the morning of the first day of the site visit and will meet
as a team on campus from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. The introductory
meeting with you and other college staff will take place at 1:00
p.m. Attached is a suggested schedule for the site visit. It is
important for you to complete your pre-site-visit tasks on time
and to follow the suggested site visit schedule as closely as possible
because the review team members will depend on you to help them
complete their own tasks in a timely manner.
9/7/96
Supplemental Guide: The Prerequisite Review Process for Matriculation
Technical Assistance Program Reviews
1996-97
I. Review
of Campus Information Prior to Site Visit
The campus has been requested to supply you, the team member focusing
on prerequisites, with additional information regarding prerequisites.
(See Appendix C of the "Team Members' Guide to the Matriculation
Technical Assistance Program Review.") If an item of requested
information does not exist, a statement to that effect should be
included on a separate sheet.
In reviewing campus information, make notes regarding
apparent non-compliance or poor practices. Anticipate who among
those you will interview could best address these deficiencies.
If follow-up is needed with staff or faculty not on your interview
list, request appointments to be set up.
1. Check catalog and schedule. Both should have each of the following.
-
Explanation of prerequisites should be complete
and in plain English, not just a quotation of Board policy or
Title 5. Be sure the statement complies with Title 5 and the
Model District Policy (as amended locally).
-
Explanation of the assessment process should be
thorough and also should cover how it affects placement. Check
for compliance, especially with the use of multiple measures.
(This prerequisite review assumes a separate and complete review
of the assessment process. Assessment deficiencies will impact
prerequisite compliance. Such problems will require coordination
between team members responsible for these two areas.)
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Explanation of the challenge process should contain
all required criteria and be specific enough to direct student
action.
-
Listing of prerequisites, corequisites, advisories
and other limitations should comply with Title 5 and the Model
District Policy. Read them all!
-
Note any limitations on enrollment (performance
courses, block enrollment, honors courses, statutory limitations)
for later follow up.
2. Review the Board policy and Matriculation Plan
for compliance. Note any differences from the Model District Policy
and be sure these were cleared with the Chancellor's Office.
3. Review the research and content review policies
and procedures for compliance and efficacy. Compare the process
used in the examples submitted with the written procedures.
4. Check that the challenge process is in compliance
and seems workable.
5. Orientation material should explain assessment
and prerequisites clearly and cover student rights in the challenge
process.
6. Be sure that curriculum committee minutes show
separate action for course and prerequisite approvals and that documentation
is complete and appropriate to both the research, equivalent UC/CSU,
and content review policies.
7. Review the training materials for completeness
and effectiveness. Be sure that the full range of staff are trained
(curriculum committee, counseling faculty, and instructional faculty
in disciplines using prerequisites).
8. Review the submitted examples of non-course prerequisites
for compliance. Cross-check that catalog and schedule information
is correct and complete for each example. Particularly, performance
limitations should give students complete information on any auditions
or try-outs (date, place, and nature of skills assessed). Block
enrollment (GAIN, EOPS, etc.) should be listed for particular sections
in the schedule of classes with appropriate language. The same is
true for honors sections listed in the catalog. These must emphasize
OPEN ACCESS. Information should be referenced on how students become
eligible for GAIN, EOPS, honors, etc. Be sure that course outlines
list prerequisite skills in a separate section.
9. For program prerequisites:
-
be sure that documents refer to program enrollment
rather than program admission (students are admitted to the
college, not its programs),
-
be sure that program prerequisites have gone through
the appropriate level of scrutiny, and
-
be sure that enrollment procedures beyond prerequisite
limitations are non-evaluative (first-come-first-served, waiting
list, or lottery).
10. Review the campus procedures that assure teaching
to the course outline and regular review of programs. Basically,
colleges just need to have such procedures and use them! You may
wish to comment on the appropriateness and efficacy of these procedures.
11. With questionable areas and weak points in mind
from the above review, re-examine the Matriculation Plan. It may
be that the college is aware of these issues and has developed plans
to resolve them.
II. On-Campus Interview
and Follow-up Steps
1. Groups/individuals to interview: (Note: The Team Leader will
work with the campus Matriculation coordinator to set up these interviews
for you.)
-
curriculum committee,
-
matriculation advisory committee,
-
faculty curriculum chair/co-chair,
-
chief instructional officer,
-
institutional researcher,
-
faculty senate president,
-
faculty department chairs and administrative deans
for math and English,
-
dean of counseling plus one or two counseling
faculty, and
-
others to meet needs identified in review of campus
documentation.
2. General interview approaches:
-
Use your notes from the review of campus information
to target particular issues.
-
Assess who best could speak to these concerns.
-
Always follow up with at least a second individual
on each topic.
-
Write down in advance questions to resolve those
issues.
-
Bring the documentation with you for reference.
-
Take a positive approach. In most cases practices
are fairly good and the problem consists of poor documentation
or that the college has not reached that point of implementation
in its matriculation plan.
-
Where insufficiencies exist, ask for future steps
planned to address them.
3. Typical topics discussed in interviews: (These
are guidelines only. Campus practice and responsibilities vary widely.)
-
Curriculum Committee. Go over the prerequisite
process in general (and briefly) emphasizing curriculum committee
responsibilities (separate approval of prerequisites to the
appropriate legal of scrutiny, proper documentation, prerequisite
skills section in course outline, and catalog course descriptions).
Then positively reinforce good practices and bring up problematic
areas by first describing the issue in general terms and then
giving a specific example from the documentation you reviewed.
Try to schedule the individual faculty curriculum chair and
CIO prior to the curriculum committee.
-
Matriculation Advisory Committee. Go over the
prerequisite process in general (and briefly) emphasizing in
particular the relationship to other components (orientation,
assessment, and research) and the need for policies and procedures
(Board policy, research, content review, challenge, program
review, teaching to the course outline). Then positively reinforce
good practices you have encountered in reviewing campus information.
Finally, bring up areas of concern, first with an overall statement
and then with a specific example from your review.
-
Faculty Curriculum Chair and CIO. Go over what
you will discuss with the curriculum committee. Try to straighten
out any discrepancies and get a good idea what plan the college
has to correct deficiencies and fill in missing areas.
-
Institutional Researcher. Go over levels of scrutiny
policies and procedures, bringing up any problematic areas.
Use specifics from research and content review documentation
submitted by the college. For gaps, be sure the college has
committed to the staff time and resources needed for research.
Try to have this interview before meeting with the Matriculation
Advisory Committee so that you can go over research needs with
them.
-
Academic Senate President. Policies and procedures
related to prerequisites should have senate approval. Be sure
that either the president has obtained this approval or that
a process is in place to obtain it. Policies and procedures
for the operation of the Matriculation Advisory and Curriculum
Committees, especially faculty appointments, should be handled
by the senate.
-
Math/English Faculty Chairs and Deans. Be sure
they are comfortable with the assessment process and the prerequisites
within the course sequences. Raise any issues from your review
of campus documentation in this area. Use these meetings as
a "reality check" on what others say in interviews.
Is the college really doing—at the department level—what its
policies say it is doing?
-
Counseling Faculty and Dean. Discuss the impact
of prerequisites on orientation, assessment, and challenges.
Does the process work or do students "fall in the cracks?"
Are there instructional areas where faculty use prerequisites
inappropriately? Is catalog and schedule information clear to
students?
III.
Additional Campus Information To Be Supplied For Prerequisite Review
If an item of requested information does not exist, a statement
to that effect should be included on a separate sheet.
1. Board policy on prerequisites.
2. Chart of Math and English course sequences.
3. Research policy and procedure for highest level of scrutiny,
plus one complete example, including course outlines of record for
both target and prerequisite courses.
4. Content review policy and procedure plus one complete example,
including course outlines of record for both target and prerequisite
courses.
5. Challenge policy and procedure including implementation forms.
6. Example of curriculum committee minutes showing separate action
for approval of a course and its prerequisite, including documentation
submitted by discipline faculty to justify the prerequisite (copy
of UC/CSU catalog listings, documented content review, and/or research
outcome).
7. Prerequisite training information including: time, date place
and attendees by name and title; names and titles of trainers; and
examples of training materials.
8. Examples of college use of limitations other than course prerequisites
(course outlines and documentation), if any, for:
-
corequisites;
-
block enrollment limitations;
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performance course limitations;
-
honors course limitations;
-
health and safety prerequisites; and
-
statutory or regulatory limitations on enrollment.
9. For each program that has prerequisites:
-
materials explaining program prerequisites beyond
that listed in the catalog, if any;
-
forms required to be submitted by students prior
to enrolling in the program, if any;
-
for courses used as program prerequisites, course
outlines of both the target and prerequisite courses; and
-
for non-course prerequisites, research results.
10. Campus policies and procedures to assure that
courses with perquisites are taught to the standards in the course
outline.
11. The college program review process demonstrating
regular prerequisite review.
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