Quality Health Professions Programs: Path to Program of Merit Designation

In 2015, the AGHE Program of Merit was expanded to implement a voluntary evaluation process for health professions programs that integrate gerontology/geriatrics competencies within their curriculum. These competencies augment students’ competence and confidence in the field of aging, preparing them to work with older adults and their care partners. All health professions and medical education programs are eligible to apply for the Program of Merit designation. This international process of evaluation: (1) Verifies program credibility and quality; (2) Informs campus administrators of global guidelines, expectations, and practice in aging for their health professions programs; (3) Assures quality graduates from POM designated programs; and (4) Clarifies for employers the knowledge and skills imparted to student graduates of POM designated health professions programs. Additionally, graduates from POM programs receive a certificate from AGHE stating the health profession program is a designated AGHE Program of Merit.

Observations and Recommendations Toward Increasing Age-Inclusivity

Some areas of current campus practice better align with AFU principles than others. It may be that age-friendly practices already implemented by campus administrators are either not sufficiently publicized or that the campus constituents are not aware that these accommodations are in place. Specifically, staff members in these institutions appear to have markedly different perceptions of an institutions’ overall age-friendliness than did students and faculty. Lower ratings of age-friendliness by staff suggest that the experiences of ageism could contribute to negative outcomes such as stress and burnout. In line with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the evaluation of campus sustainability efforts, aging should be addressed along with other elements of diversity, equity, and inclusion. There is also a need to support faculty development for designing courses and materials for age-diverse learners. Finally, campuses might organize age-inclusivity task forces and regularly reassess their age-friendly progress.

Who Are Their Leaders? College Students Perceptions of and Engagement with Campus Leaders and Administrators

College students’ interactions with campus leaders is critical to their success, particularly in situations of distress. Yet, little is known about college students’ knowledge, perceptions, and identification of campus administrators, faculty members, and staff as leaders and their interactions with these campus leaders. To fill the gap in the literature, we applied a cross-sectional methodology to gather a combination of quantitative and qualitative data using an online survey. We had 60 first-year students participate in our exploratory research by fully completing our survey. We found that students identified their advisors as leaders on campus. We also found most of our participants avoided campus administrators in fear of judgment, intimidation, and feelings of anxiety. Our results have implications for campus leadership, college administrators, student retention, and campus climate. Following our results, we discuss implications for practice and offer additional recommendations for future research.

Limitations to success in academic data reference support

As secondary data become increasingly integrated into research and coursework across a widening variety of fields and disciplines, data reference is gaining traction as a major area of library research support. To examine the current landscape of data reference, we distributed a survey via regional and international library listservs asking librarians about their experiences and opinions related to their data reference work. For this paper, the full collected dataset was limited to only academic librarians who answer at least one data reference question per month in order to identify the unique needs of respondents doing reference work in academic institutions, with the ultimate goal of improving our own work as academic librarians at our institution. We used a grounded theory approach to analyze the qualitative survey response data, and supplemented this analysis with descriptive statistics and chi-square tests for the quantitative responses. Through this analysis, we identify a theoretical framework consisting of three themes relating to limitations to success where librarians must advocate for change in order to maintain and improve high-quality data reference work in the academic sphere: (1) technology and resource limitations, such as substandard database interfaces; (2) institutional limitations, such as insufficient staff time or resources dedicated to data reference; and (3) personal limitations, such as a lack of data skills. While librarians have varying levels of influence over each of these three areas, identifying and targeting these categories can help librarians and other data professionals focus resources and build cases for additional support from their library and campus administrators.

Leadership Is Political

Just as senior administrative roles in higher education are political, the role of a college student government holds similar responsibility as a function of an institution. The intersections of college student government and social justice are necessary to explore in order for senior administrators to share responsibility with and for students. Issues of social justice are being taken up on college campuses across the United States. It is common for student governments to legislate and engage with local, state, and even inter/national issues. The political nature of higher education has enabled and almost forced student governments to take up a wide array of concerns, leaving campus administrators—and students—to look for cues as to where to spend (limited) time, energy, and resources. This chapter illuminates a range of politics and current events, factors associated with institutional and individual influence(s), and final recommendations for higher education practice.

AGHE Program of Merit for Gerontology Programs

The POM designation provides gerontology programs with an AGHE “stamp of approval,” which can be used to verify program quality to administrators, to lobby for additional resources to maintain a quality program, to market the program, and to recruit prospective students into the program. This worldwide process of evaluation for both Gerontology programs verifies for students that the program is consistent with globally vetted criteria in gerontology endorsed and recognized by AGHE; assures the public of the quality of programs and their graduates; clarifies for employers the knowledge and skills imparted to students who graduate from POM designated gerontology programs; informs campus administrators of global guidelines, expectations, and practice in gerontology education programs; and indicates to interested students that the program is of high quality. Those interested in the Gerontology Program of Merit will be able to ask questions, understand the application process, and ask for technical assistance.

Analysis and Identification of Students with Financial Difficulties: A Behavioural Feature Perspective

The identification of students with financial difficulties is one of the main problems in campus data research. Effective and timely identification not only provides convenience to campus administrators but also helps students who are really in financial hardship. The popular using of smart cards makes it possible to identify students with financial difficulties through big data. In this paper, we collect behavioural records from undergraduate students’ smart cards and propose five features by which to associate with students’ poverty level. Based on these features, we proposed the Apriori Balanced Algorithm (ABA) to mine the relationship of poverty level with students’ daily behaviour. Association rules show that students’ poverty level is most closely related to their academic performance, followed by consumption level, diligence level, and life regularity. Finally, we adopted the semisupervised K-means algorithm to more accurately find out students with financial difficulties. Tested by classical classification algorithms, our method has a higher identification rate, which is helpful for university administrators discover students in real financial hardship effectively.

The Development and Piloting of a Digital Checklist to Increase Access and Usage of Campus Online Sexual Violence Resources

As colleges seek to respond to campus sexual assault, administrators are making policies, programs, and resources related to sexual violence available to students and members of the school community online. Keeping this content current and accessible can be challenging in the context of rapidly changing information and competing priorities across campuses. In response to this challenge, we developed a free, online protocol for campus leaders to quickly assess gaps in their online sexual violence resources. The “Digital Checklist” delineates action steps that campus administrators can take to determine whether information related to campus sexual assault is easily located, current, relevant, and accessible. We found that while schools made an effort to increase the availability of information online, the checklist helped identify gaps that, if remedied, would allow more students to access that information. The overall goal for the checklist is to provide schools with actionable, real-time, and trackable data regarding the utility and accessibility of online sexual violence information and resources and to complement other campus sexual assault prevention and intervention efforts.

Branch Campuses of State Universities and Colleges in Region III

The whole world is one in making education accessible to all. It is in this mission that gives birth to the existence of different branch campuses. The guidelines in the establishment of the branch campuses are reflected on the Manual of Regulations for Private Higher Education of 2008 and CHED Memorandum Order no. 27 series of 2009. At present, there are 388 public branch campuses in the Philippines. However, it has to be emphasized that the public branch campuses in the Philippines are temporary and are not part of the charter of the SUCs. This study analyzed and evaluated the present conditions of the branch campuses of the State Universities and College in Region III. Evaluative research was employed, with the use of a questionnaire adopted from AACCUP, interview, documentary materials of Accreditation results to gather data from the campus administrators. Results showed that the branch campuses were built to make education accessible to the nearby communities. The SUCs Branch Campuses were outstanding in their administration, VMGO, faculty, curricular offerings and instruction, and support for students. The laboratories and facilities were evaluated as inadequate. Also, no variations were identified on the branch campuses’ researches and extension services. The area of library was found to be adequate. Funding was the main problem that led to some other problems, issues, and concerns.Policy makers should create a manual for the establishment of branch campuses where uniformity on operations and allocation of budget should be clearly stated so that improvement on their infrastructures, facilities, laboratories, and equipment can be planned and actualized. Also, marketing strategies should be effective and long-term development plan should be conceptualized to assure sustainability