St. Mary’s College of Maryland was recently recognized by Campus Labs—a leading company that works with institutions to transform higher education through data and analytics—as an All Star Award winner in its annual awards program. The Campus Labs awards recognize institutions using the Campus Labs platform to drive improvement and innovation on campus, from streamlining administrative processes to enhancing overall student experience.
St. Mary’s College implemented Beacon, a Campus Labs product, two years ago. Within Beacon, the Student Success Network was created in order to connect full-time students with their academic adviser, head coach, program director, and employer. A Student Strengths Inventory was also introduced within the network. This inventory garners information from incoming first-year students and transfer students and that information is shared with the students’ academic advisers and for those students engaged in special programs or on varsity teams.
According to Joanne Goldwater, associate dean for retention and student success, “My first responsibility when I started the job was to ensure that Beacon was implemented. We wanted to replace our homegrown early alert system with a more robust system while increasing our ability to connect with students early if and when they are experiencing academic difficulties, financial concerns, and more. This helps us initiate retention strategies.
Our ability to reach out to students early has been greatly enhanced. Through the data insights that we receive, we’ve been able to proactively assist students who are worried about their study skills, financial issues, or even making friends,” continued Goldwater. “This has helped many of those students with their transition to college and allowed us to engage in good conversations with them.”
Each of Campus Labs’ more than 1,400-member campuses is eligible for awards in five categories: All Star, Rising Star, Trailblazer, Collaborator and Champion—with each category recognizing campuses or individuals in different stages of implementing projects across campus. In recognition of their achievements, winners are awarded more than $10,000, in total, in educational grants and prizes, including funds to further advance the successful adoption and impact of Campus Labs tools on campus.
Read more about the Campus Labs award program and all winning submissions at https://www.campuslabs.com/awards/.
