Three Maricopa Community Colleges will receive $7.8 million over five years as part of a recent grant announcement made by the U.S. Department of Education.
GateWay, Glendale and Phoenix colleges are receiving funding to support student and academic success at the colleges. These grants enable Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSI) to expand and enhance their academic offerings, program quality and institutional stability.
“Each college’s grant proposal is tailored to the specific needs of the college, ensuring that help is targeted to areas that need it most,” says Dr. Maria Harper-Marinick, Maricopa’s Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost.
At GateWay, the more than $2.6 million grant will fund the “Stay on TrAC” program, which will focus on enhancing academic services like expanding the honors program, service learning and civic engagement opportunities, more transfer resources, more 200-level courses, more tutoring services to students, and professional development and growth for faculty and staff.
“Our first Title V grant focused on developmental education, so we are building on that by creating programs that help students stay on track to complete and then successfully transfer to a university or transition to a career,” says Maria Wise, vice president of Academic Affairs at GateWay and administrator on the grant. “These resources also allow us to capture data on a deeper level to affect better decisions about student services.”
At Glendale Community College, $2.4 million will support the “STEM Connection,” a coordinated and integrated approach of academic and student support services designed to increase completion and transfer rates of high-need students in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields. “STEM Connection” includes the creation of a STEM Success Center where students will find coaching, advising and tutoring, both in person and online. In addition, the grant will allow GCC to build dual-language, hybrid STEM courses that will expand access to high-need students.
At Phoenix College, the grant will focus on supporting completion at every step of the college-going experience. Expanding on a nationally-known framework for driving student success known as the Learning College, an integrated developmental education program will be implemented to help students build a foundation for success, while educational outcomes will be incorporated into all student service programs to support decision-making, planning, goal-setting, and attainment of educational outcomes. The holistic approach includes development of resources for students’ family members to engage them in understanding how best to support their students.
Title V grants provide funding for Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs) to expand educational opportunities for, and improve the attainment of, Hispanic students. HSIs are defined as higher education institutions that have at least 25 percent Hispanic student enrollment. These institutional capacity building grants also enable colleges to expand and enhance their academic offerings, program quality, and institutional stability for the benefit of all students.