Quality Enhancement Plan

Howard Payne University recognizes that some of its students are “at-risk” for various reasons. As the next step in HPU’s efforts to help at-risk students achieve their educational goals, HPU has formulated “Game Plan for Academic Achievement – GPA+: Academic Coaching for Jacket Success” as its Quality Enhancement Plan 2024-2029 [QEP]. The premise is that adopting an “academic coaching” model will increase the effectiveness of the University’s student support services through the Center for Student Success.

The University uses the following definition for academic coaching:

Academic coaching is a partnership between the academic coach and the student that equips the student to achieve academic skills and develop self-regulatory college life skills needed to reach their goals. The partnership encourages the students in areas such as:

• Critical thinking Skills
• Motivational Approaches
• Goal-Setting Techniques
• Time Management Strategies
• Study Tactics
• Stress Management Capabilities
  
  

Critical to this concept is that the academic coach and the student are partners in formulating the student’s individualized plan for success, implementing the plan, and assessing the success of the plan. Another critical element is for the academic coach and the student to work together to equip the student with academic skills and self-regulatory college life skills.

The larger, more general, context in which this QEP was developed is the phenomenon of life coaching and executive coaching that emerged and grew during the final decades of the twentieth century. The smaller, more particular, context in which this QEP was developed is the recent initiatives of Howard Payne University to raise the success levels of its students. Four of the most significant initiatives are: 1) the HPU Strategic Plan 2023-2028 “Enhancing the Student Experience,” 2) the establishment of the Center for Student Success in the fall of 2023, 3) the emphasis on retention and academic success for HPU’s student athletes, and 4) the US Department of Education’s recent naming of HPU as a Hispanic-Serving Institution [HSI].

Howard Payne University has chosen Academic Coaching for the QEP with the overarching purpose to improve students’ retention and overall performance by implementing an academic coaching program for the most academically at-risk students. Two goals guide this QEP to reach the overall purpose:

1. Increase the number of students who maintain satisfactory academic progress (SAP), thereby reducing the number of students who are academically suspended. (Institutional Level Goal)
   
   
2. Support students in building skills essential for academic success including developing and monitoring metacognitive skills, study techniques, effective time management, development of self-efficacy, and to facilitate access to university resources as necessary. (Student Level Goal)
   
   

Utilizing academic coaching to support and enhance student success is a plan widely recognized and utilized by colleges and universities, and therefore is one of the “best practices” for those efforts. The dream, the hope, the belief is that adopting and utilizing an academic coaching model can make a meaningful impact on the student support services and programs that are offered through the Center for Student Success to all students and are particularly needed for at-risk students.

Helping students achieve their educational goals is genuinely “enhancing the student experience.”

Institutional level outcomes examine the effectiveness of the student intervention on overall student retention, persistence to graduation, and GPA. The Institutional Level Goal informs the institutional level outcomes of the QEP.

At the student level, outcomes are defined in terms of student learning objectives for the GEN 1151 Strategies for Success (SFS) course which includes academic coaching sessions. The purpose of the course is to support students in building skills essential for academic success. The Student Level Goal informs the student level outcomes.