Learning in a Community: Evidence of the Effectiveness and Challenges of Learning Communities (original) (raw)
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Freshmen Learning Communities (FLCs) or Freshmen Interest Groups (FIGs) recently emerged on the landscape of higher education as an innovative means of improving educational outcomes. Building around a cohort-based pedagogical model, FLCs use thematic foci, block scheduling, and faculty collaboration to ease the transition into the first-year college experience. This paper outlines the logic and structure of a criminology/criminal justice-based FLC. It details how pedagogical variations such as writing across the curriculum and web-based design can be included. A large body of input and output data is considered that measures how students respond to the FLC experience.
High impact practices – Student engagement and retention
Community college students face special challenges that can impede their academic progress, resulting in lower grades and persistence than students in selective four-year colleges. Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn, New York, successfully addresses these challenges with learning communities: small cohorts of students in a blocked program of study, which includes developmental or basic English, a one-credit student skills course, and a social or behavioral science course. This research analyzes the short-term effects of the model by comparing a sample of 267 students enrolled in four learning community and four regular sections of sociology and psychology classes. The results demonstrate a high positive impact for learning communities on student success as measured by grades and course completion rates, with higher levels of engagement and lower rates of absences in learning community sections as the key causal mechanisms. That is, statistically significant correlations between mode of delivery and grades are reduced when controlling for absences, elaborating on and perhaps explaining the well-established relationship between learning communities and short-term student success.
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In spring 2013, the Washington Center administered a national survey to find what campuses assessed when they assessed their learning community programs, how they assessed those outcomes, and what they did with the results. Sixty-six campuses responded to the survey. Most campuses assess at least one measure of student success (pass rates, course completion, GPA) during students' learning community enrollment. Some campuses track student success after their learning community enrollment, and more campuses would like to if they had the means to do so. Nearly all campuses assess student engagement, and the few campuses that do not would like to. About half the campuses responding to the survey assess integrative and interdisciplinary learning. Most campuses associate teaching in learning communities with professional development benefits, and nearly all associate the learning community program with achieving key institutional outcomes. Discussion of these results highlights potential areas for further work in order to strengthen practice across the field of learning community practice.
Effects of Learning Communities on Community College Students’ Success: A Meta-Analysis
Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies, 2014
Low graduation rates are a significant issue for colleges. The majority of higher education institutions in the United States offer learning communities (LCs), which have been found to be effective for improving course success and persisting to the next semester. However, there is a gap in the literature regarding the effectiveness of LCs with different types of populations and different types of LCs. The purpose of this meta-analysis was to identify the most effective types of LCs. Research questions addressed the effects of different types of LCs on different student success outcomes for community colleges. The study was based on Tinto’s interactionist model of student departure and Astin’s model of student involvement. Studies examining the relationship between student success and participation in college LCs provided the data for the meta-analysis. A random effects model was used to generate the average effect size for 39 studies and 50 individual effect sizes. The results showed that LCs are most effective with community college students when they include additional support strategies, counseling is available to students, one of the linked courses is an academic skills course, at least one of the linked course is developmental, and the focus is on increasing course success or student engagement. The implications for positive social change suggest that LC programs implement two linked courses, include an academic skills course, focus on developmental courses, and provide access to a counselor and additional student support strategies. In addition, LC programs are most effective when the goals of the program are student engagement and course success.
In spring 2013, the Washington Center administered a national survey to find what campuses assessed when they assessed their learning community programs, how they assessed those outcomes, and what they did with the results. Sixty-six campuses responded to the survey. Most campuses assess at least one measure of student success (pass rates, course completion, GPA) during students' learning community enrollment. Some campuses track student success after their learning community enrollment, and more campuses would like to if they had the means to do so. Nearly all campuses assess student engagement, and the few campuses that do not would like to. About half the campuses responding to the survey assess integrative and interdisciplinary learning. Most campuses associate teaching in learning communities with professional development benefits, and nearly all associate the learning community program with achieving key institutional outcomes. Discussion of these results highlights potential areas for further work in order to strengthen practice across the field of learning community practice.
Mdrc, 2008
Over the past few decades, a postsecondary credential has become increasingly important in the labor market, and college attendance has become more common. Unfortunately, however, many students leave college before receiving a degree, particularly those who are academically underprepared for collegelevel work. Many postsecondary institutions operate learning communities to promote students' involvement and persistence in college. Learning communities typically place groups of students in two or more linked courses with mutually reinforcing themes and assignments. They seek to build peer relationships, intensify connections to faculty, and deepen understanding of coursework. While learning communities are increasingly popular, little rigorous evidence on their effects exists.
Learning Communities: Examining Positive Outcomes
Journal of College Student Retention: Research, Theory and Practice, 2007
Learning communities, designed primarily to increase student persistence and academic achievement, are a common first-year initiative on university campuses. Assessments of learning communities frequently examine indicators that are easily quantifiable such as student persistence and academic achievement, but also examine factors thought to affect these outcomes such as student involvement and satisfaction. This article reviews published studies to determine the degree to which learning communities successfully affect involvement, satisfaction, achievement, and persistence, and attempts to identify the characteristics that produce positive results. The review concludes that first, learning communities do attain positive outcomes, but second, that it is difficult to determine which characteristics of learning communities (i.e., integrated course content, coordinated assignments, academic skills training, mentoring) account for their success due to the small number of studies, the heterogeneity of programs, and self-selection effects.
I wish to thank many people for their assistance in helping to make my thesis a reality. First, I would like to thank Dr. Rebecca Burnett for her patient understanding of my questions and ideas, and mentoring my progress through the years. I would like to thank Dr. David Wallace, who has provided many hours of support and advice. His input will long be remembered. I also wish to thank Dr. Michael Mendelson for his help in providing vital learning community material for my study, and Dr. Corly Brooke for her insight into learning communities and her aid in creating my survey. I would also like to acknowledge Dr. Lee Honeycutt for his help with the online version of my survey and the many teachers who participated in my study. A special thanks goes to my spouse Jan who has supported me in my endeavors and my daughter Mikayla whose insistence on being a five-year old kept me grounded in certain realities of life, A special thanks also goes to my father who was unable to see me complete my schooling, but knows I have finished. CHAPTER 1: LEARNING COMMUNITY ISSUES AND PROBLEMS "I like the simplefact that I have some ofmy classes with the same people every day, and I can lookforward to seeing those samepeople whenever I need to. IfI should need, to ask a question about a class orform a studygroup, it's really easy to do when the same people are in a couple ofyour classes and are going through the same conflicts as you are. " Tammy (learning community student in agriculture) In recent years, American colleges and universities have paid increased attention to undergraduate education. As part of this attention, numerous efforts have been made to enhance the first-year college experience and keep retention high throughout each student's college years. Part of the reason for the increased interest in undergraduate education is public demand for more accountability by the schools and teachers as well as continued interest in improving both student learning and resulting outcomes. Recent years have produced extensive educational research about things such as how to actively engage students, how individual and group knowledge is constructed, and how alternative assessments can be designed (Bruffee 1993, Caine and Caine 1997, Tinto 1996), so students are able to retain more meaningful, usable knowledge and are actively engaged in learning. Students at commuter colleges, community colleges, and large universities feel a need to be connected to their learning and develop a sense of community with other students as well as with the campus as a whole. Additionally, many interested teachers also wish to connect with their students and create opportunities for students to connect to course material. Making meaningful connections to course content is made difficult by a number of factors, including large lecture classes. While many schools still rely on lectures for delivering course material, large lecture classes hmit options for more active learning to take place and limit potential for both students and teachers to become better connected to each other, the course content, and the school environment. In a recent presentation, Vincent Tinto (2000) noted that "higher education is, for most students, still very much a 'spectator sport' in wiiich faculty talk dominates and where there are few active student participants." Active learning techniques that go beyond lecture and are available to educators range from responding to student learning styles and brain-based research to implementing various delivery systems-from mnemonics to technology integration, from the standard lecture to cooperative learning, and from teacher-centered classrooms to collaboratively constructed student-centered classrooms. As colleges make an effort to address these various teaching and learning styles, greater emphasis is being placed on teachers to increase involvement in such things as learning communities in order to improve students' learnings increase retention, and make the first-year college experience more meaningful. Students, faculty, and institutions all share in the benefits of learning communities as research points to increased student retention, higher GPAs, and greater student satisfaction (Lenning and Ebbers 1999). Therefore, if teachers and schools like Iowa State University can enhance the sense of connectedness and community for students through learning communities, more learning should take place. For example, the increased interest in learning communities at Iowa State has been brought about by a grassroots effortthat has grown out of the interests of faculty and staff (Krapfl 2000), but with no formal centralized infrastructure. A recent article in Inside Iowa State points out teachers' commitment by reporting that"IowaState faculty have sponsored learning communities since the fall of 1995" (November 17, 2000); since that beginning, first-year composition in the Department of English has seen a rise in involvement in learning communities. A total of 36 learning communities were scheduled for the 2000^2001 school year, a total of 43 were scheduled for the 2001-2002 school year, and, accordmg to Krapfl (2001), the number of leaming communities is projected to increase. Part of the reason for Iowa State's growing involvement in leaming commimities , might be found in Tammy's statement at the beginning of the chapter. This first-year composition and agriculture student's response represents those made by otherlearning community students and reflects a need students have to see the interdependence and interconnectedness of their college experience. One method that teachers might use to help students make meaningful connections betweentheir course material is faculty collaboration. By engaging in collaboration, teachers may begin to make the same types of connections they wish to provide their students, which, in turn, will provide opportunities for teachers to create better lessons and activities within the leaming community. The grass roots effort to make connections through leaming communities was started by interested teachers in the mid-1990s and has resulted in a growing awarenessof the impact leaming communities have on student achievement. The challenge facing teachers, and the purpose for this study, is to identify the frequency, type, and role of faculty collaboration, which is critical to the growtli of linked learning communities at Iowa State. Iowa State needs to promote these positive characteristics, while at the same time recognizing and then reducing or eliminating non-productive characteristics in order to maximize student development and provide teachers an opportunity to develop professionally. Therefore in my study, I explore the following critical characteristics of faculty collaboration and the nature of teaching practices resulting from faculty collaboration in planning of first-year composition and linked courses in learning communities at Iowa State University. Specifically, the exploration focuses on two questions, one dealing with the nature of faculty collaboration and the other dealing with the nature of teaching in linked courses: ♦ What characterizes the nature offaculty collaboration in courses linked with firstyear composition? Specifically, what are the firequency, type and perceived role of faculty collaboration? ♦ "What characterizes the nature ofteaching in teachers who teach courses linked with first-year composition? Specifically, how are course goals, class time and assessment use by teachers? These questions enable me to focus on two components that I feel are the essence of collaborative teaching: what faculty collaboration looks like and how faculty collaboration affects the nature of teaching, which is central to my concerns about whether or not faculty collaboration is considered a fundamental component of learning communities at Iowa State. Rationale for the Study The following sections explain what learning communities are, why they are beneficial, and why faculty collaboration within the linked learning communities is critical to improved student learning. My study shows that while interest in learning communities grows among teachers and schools and collaborative projects among students in learning communities increases, Iowa State needs to promote the positive characteristics, while at the same time recognizing and then reducing or eliminating non-productive characteristics of collaboration among teachers and view faculty collaboration as an important first step procedure toward maximizing student learning. What are learning communities? Faculty and staff have various definitions of learning communities, ranging from freshman interest groups to clustered classes. Because such a wide variety of definitions of learning communities exists, confusion, misunderstanding, miscommunication, and a lack of collaborationoccur at many levels. For ex^ple, one departmentmay view"a learning community as some number of classes thathave something in common, such as a residential or clustered component, while another department may have fully integrated and involved administration, teachers, and students. At the core of learning communities is the "hope of making college a more holistic, integrated learning experience for students" (Cross 1998). Toward that end, I establish what I mean by a learning community and thefaculty collaboration associated with it. ♦ A successful linkedlearning community includes both teacher and student collaboration as a foundational component of a course that engages students in activities that extend beyond discipline-specific content. ♦ Barr and Dailey (1996) provide a definition offaculty collaboration', "the process of shared creation: two or more individuals with complementary skills interacting to create a shared understanding that none had previously possessed" (qtd. in Lenning and Ebbers 31-32). The stimulus behind my research questions comes from a desire to...
Examining the Impact Learning Communities have on College of Education Students on an Urban Campus
Journal of College Student Development:, 2013
Student retention, at this urban, research intensive university, has been of concern for the past nine years. A grass roots movement of learning communities, with support from the provost’s office, has emerged as a powerful vehicle for addressing retention gaps among students. This study examines the influence of learning communities on increasing student retention in the College of Education.