The students traced their roots by recording oral histories, documenting them through genealogical research, which included vital records searches and online investigations, and illustrating findings in family trees, ...]]>

Southern Vermont College's recent first-year seminar, From the Shoes of Our Ancestors, was a collaborative effort with the nearby Bennington Museum and Lincoln High School in Yonkers, N.Y.

The students traced their roots by recording oral histories, documenting them through genealogical research, which included vital records searches and online investigations, and illustrating findings in family trees, graphic poster displays, audio recordings, and displays of family objects. Finally, exhibitors underwent DNA swab testing, and the DNA results provided scientific proof of ancestries.

Students benefited from the support of Ancestry.com and FamilyTreeDNA.com and the help of the museum staff in setting up an exhibit of their work. The displays in the exhibit the students created are the finished products of a process that took students on a dynamic exploration of their personal and family roots. This journey resembled those Henry Louis Gates, Jr., reported for the people highlighted in his PBS documentaries: African American Lives (2006) and Finding Oprah’s Roots, Finding Your Own (2007), as well as in the more recent documentaries Faces of America (2010) and Finding Your Roots (2012).

To review the process the exhibitors undertook through the semester, visit their Facebook site.

The course was offered to high school students at Lincoln High School in Yonkers, in accordance with the wishes of Gates, who wanted to see a postsecondary curriculum that emphasized family history, genealogical research, and DNA testing extended to the secondary level. In keeping with Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream, Gates envisioned such a gesture to be a specific attempt to keep young African American men in high school so they might graduate and seek a college education.

Clearly, such students become engaged in subject matters when those areas relate to themselves as explicitly as genealogy and DNA testing.

For example, the DNA testing the exhibitors underwent helped them verify their haplogroup (European; Sub-Saharan, or African; East Asian; or Native American) and, where this occurred, what percentage of different haplogroups they embody.

All students tested from Southern Vermont College are a mixture, as is Henry Louis Gates Jr., of various ethnicities and haplogroups. In planning the course and working with staff and students at Lincoln High School in Yonkers, we determined, as Gates wanted, that the 15 African American men would undergo yDNA testing to determine ancestry on their fathers’ sides.

Of the 15 Lincoln High students tested, 9 are Sub-Saharan (African) and all but one of those nine have a typical haplogroup designation, indicating that they probably came from Guinea or Angola. One of these 9 students has a significant haplogroup designation (B). According to Bennett Greenspan of FamilyTreeDNA.com, only 5% of African Americans have either a B or an A haplogroup designation. He believes that this student probably came to America on a Portuguese slave ship originating in what was Mozambique.

Two of the 15 students are Western European, probably descended from the English, Irish, or Scottish. One of the 15 students is European—probably descended from East or Northeast of Europe, likely a Viking. Another one of the 15 students has Swedish ancestry. One student is Semitic, though not necessarily Jewish, probably from Algeria. One student is Native American.

In May 2013, these Lincoln High students and their teacher joined my students at the Bennington Museum for a wonderful afternoon focused on our mutual exhibits about family history, genealogy and discussions of DNA testing.

The students from Lincoln High were treated to all that Southern Vermont College has to offer, including discussions with my students and members of the campus about what college life is like. (A memorandum of understanding between Southern Vermont College and Lincoln High School provides that the Lincoln High students will earn college credit, if they finish high school and go on to college.)

As Gates told the Vermont audience: “I believe if we can make people fall in love with themselves by discovering their ancestry both through paper-trail genealogy and the chemistry of DNA, we can motivate them again … You have to pursue all the learning and knowledge that you possibly can; that is the only way to liberate yourselves individually and your people.”

One young man from Lincoln High, Jency Ahedo, sent this poem to me, which he read aloud at the museum. Also note Jency’s description of why he wrote the poem.

Yes, sometimes dreams can come true.

Al DeCiccio is provost at Southern Vermont College.

SVC trustees granted Gross a one-year leave of absence from the college, during which time chief operating officer James Beckwith will be acting president.

A NEBHE delegate since 2010, Gross has authored several ...]]>

Southern Vermont College President Karen Gross was named a senior policy advisor to the U.S. Department of Education for one year, starting Jan. 17.

SVC trustees granted Gross a one-year leave of absence from the college, during which time chief operating officer James Beckwith will be acting president.

A NEBHE delegate since 2010, Gross has authored several articles for NEJHE, including: Helicopters, Lawn Mowers or Down-to-Earth Parents? What Works Best for Higher Education, Saving Pell Grants in an Era of Cost-Cutting, and College Tries “Mini-mesters” and More to Improve Readiness.

Both pros and cons of the debate hold value. Pell Grants are what enable many of our low-income families ...]]>

In the context of the recent efforts to arrive at a federal budget, articles abound in the popular media and trade publications debating both the value of Pell Grants and their rising cost to the U.S. government.

Both pros and cons of the debate hold value. Pell Grants are what enable many of our low-income families to send their children to college and, when more and more jobs require a minimum of a bachelor’s degree, the value of these grants cannot be underestimated. While some eligible students still do not apply for these grants (due to the still-existing hurdles of the FAFSA), many more students have sought these grants than ever before (from 6.2 million recipients in award year 2008-09 to an estimated 9.4 million in 2011-12).

And therein lies the rub. With increased utilization, up goes the price tag. It is estimated that the cost of the Pell program has more than doubled over the last five years.

Solutions to this situation are not in short supply either. Apart from those advocating complete elimination of Pell Grant support, officials have suggested everything from grant reductions to changed eligibility requirements.

Recently, a group of well-respected higher education experts proposed solutions in a requested letter to the College Board. While I laud some of the proffered solutions, there is one particular suggestion made by the group with which I strongly disagree, namely that Pell Grants should be awarded only to students enrolled in at least 15 credit hours per semester.

The current eligibility requirements permit students enrolled in 12 credits hours to be awarded a Pell Grant. The group’s rationale for increasing the credit-hour requirements is that “full-time” enrollment at most colleges is 15 credits. So, if we limit the Pell Grants to students enrolled “full-time” and graduating in four years (120 credit hours), we will reduce both the number of enrolled students and the amount paid to each student over the course of his/her undergraduate education.

The authors are not wrong in their conclusion: Restricting eligibility in the manner described will lower the cost of Pell Grants. But the proffered approach suggested fails to address and hence acknowledge the academic and psychosocial context within which Pell Grants are awarded.

Most Pell-eligible students, as pointed out with stunning clarity by Richard Kahlenberg in his book, Rewarding Strivers, will struggle to complete their undergraduate education in six years, let alone in four years. And, students not enrolled at elite institutions will struggle even more. Indeed, one of the best predictors of college success is a prospective student’s socioeconomic class.

For many colleges, while 15 credit hours is considered a full-load, a large percentage of students enroll in 12 credit hours a semester periodically over the course of their college career and are still considered full-time students—a point even recognized by the NCAA.

And why would students lower their credit hours? Lots of reasons and most are not trying to game the aid system.

For some first-generation students, enrolling in four courses for two or three semesters will foster success whereas handling five courses may create information overload, particularly in the first year or two of college. This is particularly true since many vulnerable students need added tutorial help and, importantly, they work part-time to help finance their education, including in Federal Work-Study jobs. Indeed, many institutions, Southern Vermont College included, counsel students to take four rather than five courses in certain semesters depending on their academic preparedness, their family home life in a given semester, and their need to concentrate on a particularly difficult course such as Anatomy or Physiology.

One point is clear: Even if a student can get 80% of a Pell Grant at 12 credit hours, as has been suggested, the loss of 20% of the grant is not insignificant. For many low-income students, every grant dollar matters and without these dollars and with the lack of parental access to credit at reasonable rates, these students will likely be unable to finance their undergraduate education.

Since when is getting through college a race where we only reward the fastest? I appreciate we do not want students taking a decade to complete their undergraduate education. But it seems to me that completing a degree in four and a half or five years is no sin, particularly when a slightly expanded time frame enables success.

Consider how we think about learning itself. It does not matter when you learn something—it matters that you learn it and the light bulb goes on for different students at different times. Children learn to read a different times but it should not matter, in the long run, whether one learns at age four or age eight.

The proffered suggestions by the College Board group are, it seems, geared to those Pell Grant recipients enrolled in America’s elite colleges, which, relatively speaking, do not enroll large numbers of Pell recipients. And for elite institutions, a four-year graduation is the norm. The experts who signed the letter to the College Board themselves hail from some of America’s best institutions of higher learning.

I also cannot forgo mentioning the proffered supportive cross-reference to "incentivizing" student success. To be sure, there are studies that link money with academic progress and achievement levels. But there are lots of variables that contribute to student success, including among others, attitude toward learning, supportive learning environments, mentor access, high school preparedness and rigor. Resting reduction of Pell Grant eligibility on one study about increasing credit requirements to ensure academic progression seems like an empirical reach to me.

I have no problem reflecting on how to curb the growing costs of Pell Grants to the U.S. government. I have no problem pondering how to get more students through college in a shorter time frame. What I object to is making full Pell Grants something that will, in practice, principally be available to the highest low-income performers at our more elite institutions, with the result that we will be ignoring the many low-income students enrolled at less elite institutions—for whom Pell Grants are the gateway to success.

It’s worth remembering that, as the story goes, the tortoise turned out to be wiser than the hare and did proudly cross the finish line.

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Karen Gross is president of Southern Vermont College.

Oscar-nominated screenwriter and scholar of communications ethics Richard LaGravenese will keynote Emerson College’s 131st commencement exercises on Monday, ...]]>

Neurosurgeon Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine will keynote Southern Vermont College’s 84th commencement on Saturday, May 7, at 1 p.m. Ethiopian-born, Swedish raised, award-winning chef and food activist Marcus Samuelsson will also address graduates.

Oscar-nominated screenwriter and scholar of communications ethics Richard LaGravenese will keynote Emerson College’s 131st commencement exercises on Monday, May 16, at 11 a.m., at Boston's Citi Performing Arts Center Wang Theatre. Clifford Christians, professor emeritus in the College of Media at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and former director of the university's Institute of Communications Research, will address the graduate ceremony at 3 pm.

Frank G. Cousins Jr., sheriff of Essex County in Massachusetts, will deliver Northern Essex Community College's 49th commencement address on Saturday, May 21, at 11 a.m., on the quadrangle on the college's Haverhill campus.

Newark, N.J. Mayor Cory A. Booker will deliver the University of Rhode Island's 125th undergraduate commencement address on Sunday, May 22,  at 12 noon, on the URI quadrangle.

Jorja Fleezanis, the former concertmaster of the Minnesota Orchestra and professor at Indiana University, will deliver the commencement address at New England Conservatory on Sunday, May 22, at 3 p.m., in NEC’s Jordan Hall.

Related Posts: Vt. Gov Shumlin to Address Green Mountain College Grads... and More Commencement News; More Caps and Gowns: NE Colleges Commencement Season Shifting into High Gear; Spring Peepers: NE Campuses Begin Naming Speakers for Commencement

The Vermont Community Foundation’s 2009 report on postsecondary education asserts that college graduates live longer, healthier, more lucrative lives than their peers who did not graduate college. But the report is harsh in its assessment of the readiness of Vermont high school students for college, revealing that: one in three juniors is not proficient in ...]]>

The Vermont Community Foundation’s 2009 report on postsecondary education asserts that college graduates live longer, healthier, more lucrative lives than their peers who did not graduate college. But the report is harsh in its assessment of the readiness of Vermont high school students for college, revealing that: one in three juniors is not proficient in reading; seven in 10 are not proficient in math; and six in 10 are not proficient in writing. Vermont’s expenditures for high school students are among the highest in the nation, yet these students lag in college preparation. These are troubling data about the possibilities for Vermont youth to achieve the goals of college graduates.

These data become even more disturbing in view of a 2001 report by the National Center on Educational Statistics on academic preparation and postsecondary success. That report focuses on the challenges confronting first-generation students, noting the sizable success gap between college students whose parents graduated from a four-year college and those who did not. The report points out that a person’s graduation from college is correlated to his or her parents’ completion of bachelor’s degrees. Interestingly, first-generation students who undertook a rigorous high school curriculum, one that was aligned with the core expectations of college, were able to reduce that identified gap significantly. In short, a rigorous high school curriculum aligned to the college curriculum is an antidote for failure.

Given the need for a bachelor’s degree for many future jobs, improvement in collegiate graduation rates could not be more important. Nevertheless, if there are weaknesses in college preparedness among Vermont high school students, which the VCF report suggests, and if these weaknesses are exacerbated by misaligned and non-rigorous curricula, then Vermont’s first-generation students will struggle mightily if and when they progress to college.

At Southern Vermont College, more than 60% of our students are the first in their families to progress to a bachelor’s degree. We are acutely aware of the challenges facing our students, and we have been deliberate in our efforts to provide them with needed support across the institution. That support takes many forms: a first-year course emphasizing civic engagement, an academic advisor/counselor, a retention committee, improved residential life, peer tutors and peer mentoring, professional tutors, and specialized tutoring for those with learning differences. We are adjusting our entire curriculum to facilitate hands-on, laboratory learning across the curriculum. We will continue to explore ways we can increase student success.

The aforementioned data suggest, however, that our internal collegiate efforts are not enough; something has to happen at the K-12 levels. In consideration of these studies, Southern Vermont College is turning more attention to its links with its K-12 neighbors. The college has had a history of partnering, and we already have several programs in place with K-12 students. These include reading programs in elementary schools, a poetry contest for elementary school students, a math program tying collegiate athlete statistics to elementary school problem-solving, and an Upward Bound program that has been operating for 30 years to prepare high school students for college. These initiatives, however, have focused on K-12 and SVC students; they have not been part of comprehensive efforts to promote collegiate success through year-round K-12 faculty development and K-16 programmatic alignment.

As we move forward, we are relying on a proven practice in our nation’s teacher-preparation colleges and universities, that is, the idea of a K-16 “professional development school” arrangement between higher education institutions and neighboring schools. Within that model, we are trying existing approaches, but also developing some new initiatives that we are testing on a pilot basis. Our programming involves, among other strategies, aligning high school and collegiate curricula, assisting with state-identified teacher-development needs, and introducing a different type of involvement with high school students—namely their participation in a credit-bearing “mini-mester,” a variant of bridge programming and Upward Bound’s residential programs that focus on academic readiness.

Here are some concrete examples of our new initiatives.

We have begun to connect faculty at SVC with teachers at Bennington’s Mount Anthony Union High School (MAUHS). Our immediate hope is to establish an SVC/MAUHS partnership so there may be ongoing teacher-inquiry groups comprised of MAUHS teachers and SVC faculty. In these groups, best practices and current theories will be shared for better preparing Vermont students to achieve success in college. To that end, we have already conducted a workshop at SVC on preparing writing assignments to which MAUHS English faculty have been invited. A related hope is to help students from MAUHS achieve those core competencies that are expected at a college like SVC, including reading, writing, critical and creative thinking, speaking, ethics, information technology and respect for the globe. Our ultimate hope is to create a strong partnership between the two schools, not just so more students from MAUHS will elect to attend SVC, but so that MAUHS students are as prepared as possible for ongoing academic success in college.

We have also engaged in similar partnering discussions with MAUHS’s neighboring technical high school: the Southwestern Vermont Career Development Center (SVCDC). To inspire SVCDC students to consider college, we have created a college atmosphere by enabling SVC students to take college-level laboratory courses on site at the SVCDC, as they are doing this term in a forensic criminal justice class. In addition, as with the MAUHS teachers, we are making it possible for teachers at the SVCDC to work with faculty at SVC to align curricula so the transition for college-eligible students becomes more negotiable. We are considering offering some co-branded courses at the SVCDC site and having some SVC faculty teach SVCDC students.

Our new efforts expand how we include elementary and middle schools. The twist here is to prepare students early to meet challenges for state-identified deficits, for example, in reading. To that end, we have a number of courses now in which SVC professors and their students work with area elementary- and middle-school teachers and their students. Examples include SVC’s reading program with Mount Anthony Middle School, titled “Questing for Literacy: Guiding Middle Schoolers in the Search for Wisdom Within and Without.”

In addition to these initiatives, the mini-mester program offers high school students a brief, intensive, on-campus academic and residential life experience that has a career focus and opportunities for students to try out their navigational skills in a safe, caring and controlled environment. This program will be especially beneficial for those who are the first in their families to consider a four-year residential collegiate opportunity.

Based on the stories told in Ron Suskind’s book, Hope in the Unseen, this program will enable students to gain familiarity with the complex aspects of the collegiate experience that often make college transition difficult and uncomfortable. Some attention, depending on the age group, will be paid to the college admissions process itself. If successful, this program will mean more Vermont students will attend college and, more importantly, progress effectively toward graduation.

To extend the idea of partnering using the mini-mester idea, Southern Vermont College and Wheelock College are collaborating to pilot a one-credit mini-mester this summer geared towards high school juniors from both urban and rural settings. It will provide these students a unique opportunity to learn about and engage in hands-on experiences related to health care, with problem-based learning that demonstrates the difference between urban and rural health care delivery systems. Spanning two weeks and one weekend, students will examine a timely healthcare question and discover approaches to its answer by examining urban clinical healthcare sites, rural clinical healthcare sites, experiences in SVC’s Simulation Laboratory and experimentation in several science laboratory sites.

Partnering is one way, in addition to SVC’s current on-campus efforts, to help more Vermonters succeed in higher education. The stakes are high, but the rewards for students and the larger community are clear: longer-living, healthier, wiser, more engaged citizens. The very future of the state depends upon the success of such partnering initiatives.

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Karen Gross is president of Southern Vermont College. Albert DeCiccio is provost of the college.