Institute/Session Summary:

PROGRAM OVERVIEW

The SLA program is a unique academic support program, offering students up to 45 hours per semester of extra time on task at no additional cost.  Students have the option to select course sections with SLA workshops at registration.  Once registered in the SLA section, students consent to abide by the mandatory attendance policy.  On average, SLA workshops offer three hours of extra course content - specific, directed study.  In addition to the content, study strategies such as note taking, listening, study habits, and test taking are skills reviewed. 

SLA faculty participate on a voluntary basis.  Facilitators are chosen for their knowledge in specific content areas.  They act as role models to foster student responsibility and task commitment.

The SLA program targets courses, not students.  These include developmental, gateway, high-risk for failure or withdrawal, and upper and lower division courses across multiple subject areas.  Some highly motivated and very successful students enroll in SLA courses to help ensure future success in their courses.

CRLA members, particularly academic support administrators and faculty, will be interested in learning about this program because the data show that it has positively impacted students' grades, increased retention rates, and produced high levels of student satisfaction.  It is cost effective as it impacts more students that one-to-one tutoring and the mandatory attendance policy ensures the participation of students who would not normally attend voluntary support such as Supplemental Instruction.

PRESENTATION OVERVIEW

The purpose of the presentation is to offer an overview of this unique and successful academic support program and the positive impact it has made on Ferris students, SLA facilitators and faculty.  Thirteen years of program data collection and analysis have informed many decisions regarding the direction of SLA services.  The presenter will share some of the exciting new directions in which SLA is moving, including the use of classroom technology in SLA workshops, a grant project to assess SLA's effectiveness as standardized test preparation support, and plans to establish a national center. 

The presentation will follow a PowerPoint outline with handouts provided to participants.  The presenter plans to first ask for participants' familiarity level with SLA in order to expand or truncate the general program overview.  The participants will then be engaged in a discussion of participants' current academic support programs and needs.  Finally, the presenter will discuss how SLA may meet participants' needs and further impact student success rates.  Suggestions for SLA program assessment and funding sources will be discussed.

PRESENTER

The presenter has been the coordinator of Structured Learning Assistance at Ferris State University, where SLA was created, for one year.  In that time, she has trained many SLA facilitators, provided ongoing professional development, expanded SLA into new subject areas, performed mid- and end-of-semester evaluations, and written grant proposals and reports. Presentations on SLA include a poster session at the National Association for Developmental Education in March 2007 and a pre-conference workshop at the Association for Tutoring Professionals in April 2007.

Presenter1 Name: Julie Thatcher
Presenter1 Institution: Ferris State University
Presenter1 Bio: Julie Thatcher coordinates the Structured Learning Assistance (SLA) program at Ferris State University.  She has an MA in School Counseling from the University of Iowa and a BA in American Studies from the University of California, Berkeley.