Foundation of Excellence: Improvement Dimension
New Student Orientation Subcommittee Report
University of Northern Iowa
I. New Student Orientations at the University of Northern Iowa
New student orientations at the University of Northern Iowa are designed to provide first-year students with a comprehensive introduction to the academic and co-curricular opportunities and resources available at UNI. During this current academic year, a New Student Orientation Mission Statement was developed by the Coordinator of New Student Programs which states:
Orientation programs facilitate the successful transition of new students to the University of Northern Iowa.
We help students prepare for the rigors of the academic experience, understand the importance of co-curricular involvement, and navigate the adjustment to a new living and learning environment.
We do this by:
• Involving faculty members, academic advisors, academic support services staff, student services staff, and current students in programming focused on student academic success.
• Promoting student involvement through access to student organizations, campus and community groups, and testimonials from current students.
• Fostering student engagement in the process of course selection and self-registration for their first semester of courses.
• Providing information about residence life, both on and off-campus.
New students are invited to attend one of three orientations programs – each with a focus toward a specific population - to transition to a higher educational environment and learning from high school as well as to register for their semester classes.
The new first-year student orientationoptions for students include:
Minority / First Generation / Jump Start Orientation –6 day program
Identified students will receive invitations to Jump Start during the spring. Jump Start offers participants:
- early move in
- course registration in learning communities* (for first year students)
- cluster housing in the residence halls
- social activities to meet other Jump Start students, UNI faculty/staff and Pathfinders, former Jump Start participants
Transfer Students do need to attend Transfer Orientation in April or June prior to participating in the Jump Start Program to register for classes.
International / International Student Orientation – 5 day program
International Admissions and Services Office Mission Statement: Providing caring, knowledgeable, and efficient service to the international community to facilitate the successful social and cultural transition to UNI and the achievement of educational goals
All Other Students / New Student Freshman Orientation – 2 day program
During Student Freshman Orientation, students work with academic advisors, current students, and professional staff members to get ready for the transition to your new campus community.
During the 2-day program, participants will:
- meet with academic advisors to learn about your Liberal Arts Core classes, degree requirements in majors you're considering, and course selections for fall semester
- talk with UNI faculty members about academic expectations
- learn about on-campus living, student involvement, financial aid, and other aspects of the social and academic environment at UNI
- meet and get to know other new students
- receive your student ID card
- learn about computing and technology options on campus
- register for fall semester classes
* a cohort of students enrolled in linked courses
Comprehensive schedules of each of the orientation programs listed above can be found in Appendix A - Schedule/Agenda of New Student Orientations of this report.
In addition to the mission statement referenced above, New Student Orientation Learning Outcomes have also been developed for use with the two-day New Student Freshman Orientation:
Students will…
… learn about the academic expectations they will face as University students.
… receive information about academic support resources and student services. They will receive encouragement from upper level students about using resources, and have opportunities to connect with support staff.
… learn the importance of curricular and co-curricular involvement to their success as a student and as a future professional. Students will have opportunities to make personal connections with representatives of student organizations.
… gain greater familiarity with their new place of residence. Students will gain access to residence halls, and learn about dining options, laundry facilities, policies, procedures, and community life.
… become acquainted with the Waterloo/Cedar Falls community.
Parents and family members will …
… gain information on their role in supporting their student’s academic success.
… become familiar with the academic support resources and student services offices that are available to their student.
… receive information on the laws and policies relating to academic records, and learn how they affect their relationship with the institution.
In the Summer 2008, student attendance in each of these first-year orientation programs included:
Orientation / Students Attending in Summer 2008Jump Start Orientation / 62 students
International Student Orientation / 33 students
New Student Freshman Orientation / 1896 students
Students, who do not or are not able to attend an orientation session, would meet with an academic advisor one-on-one prior to the start of the semester or during the first week of classes. During these meetings the focus of interactions is on registering for classes. Only 5% of students do not attend an orientation session.
One of the changing trends which directly impact the new student orientation programs is the increasing number of credit hours for which students are earning while in high school. Because of this tendencyassessment for new orientation programs should not only examine credit hours earned but also investigate which institution these credits are coming from. The report,Summary of "Transfer" Credits Brought in by First Year "Freshman.", provided an analysis of student records of the 2007 incoming “freshman” class to reveal that students are not necessarily new to the college experience. According to the report:
• 1056 or 53% of freshmen have pre-college course credit that comes in a variety of forms (about 17% of all incoming freshmen come in as second semester freshmen (15+ credits).
• The majority of their pre-college credit is from a college or university, with 49% of all freshmen having this credit. 8% of all students have credit from AP or CLEP, and many of these also have college/university course credit.
• What type of Liberal Arts Core (LAC) courses are students taking prior to entering UNI?
Category% of all freshman% of freshman with credit
1A1630
1B1020
1C1325
2A 714
3B1019
5A, B, C2649
* Note: Other categories of the LAC have fairly low numbers, though there is credit in all Categories 1-5.
In Category 5, 15% of all students have at least 1 course completed (29% of the students with credit), 8% of all students have at least 2 courses completed (15% of the students with credit) and 2% of all students have completed the category (4% of students with credit).
• When did they start earning this credit?
5% - during the summer after graduation from high school
50% - during their high school senior year
39% - starting in their junior year
6% - starting in their sophomore year
0.8% - starting in their freshmen year or earlier
• How much credit are they earning?
The overall average is 12.0 credits per freshmen bringing in college credit.
The breakdown is as follows….
6 credits or less - 32%
7-12 credits – 31%
13-18 credits – 19%
19-24 credits – 10%
25 or more credits – 8%
Highest number of credits is 56.
II. Current Status of Assessment of Orientation for First-Year Students
PI 9.1 Assessment: To what extent does First-Year Orientation include systematic (are appropriately timed, focused, and based on data collection and analysis methods that provide high quality information for decision-making) assessment? Our Grade: 2 Low (based on a 1 Very Low/None and 5 Very High scale)
The 2008-2010 University Catalog (p.37) identifies a “freshman” as any student who has earned less than 30 credit hours. However, the questions utilized to determine a “First-Year Student” varies among individual undergraduate academic units and, as a result, may create discrepancies during the assessment process and impact the generalizability of results.
Currently, orientation programs for first-year students are separately administered and assessed by the administrators and staff of those programs. Consequently, there is no unified model for how to manage and evaluate first-year student orientation, making it difficult to compare or combine results.
At present, assessments are being conducted by the International Services Office,Department of New Student Programs and Jump Start Program in an effort to better understand the needs and expectations of first-year students participating in the orientation process. The use of a satisfaction survey is among the most common method employed by these programs to obtain information.
Types of Assessment:
- New Student Programs – Evidence: New Student Survey. As of now, this assessment hasonly been conducted inthe Fall 2007. This survey was distributed approximately 6 weeks after the start of semester, and assessed student achievement of orientation learning outcomes. Although the uses of theresults are limited and informal in scope, the goal is to collect data to make annual programming changes and to determine if desired outcomes are being met. Summer Orientation Evaluationshave been administered to students for the past 10 summers. The survey is distributed to students who participate in an orientation session within one week of their attendance. The instrument measures both student satisfaction and student outcomes specifically in the area of academic advising.
- International Services Office –Evidence: International Student Orientation Evaluation Form. This evaluation, which is administered to all international students participating in the International Services Orientation Week, is a student satisfaction survey and only measures students’ level of satisfaction with the program. It does not measure student outcomes.
- Academic Learning Center (Jumpstart) – Evidence: Jump Start 2008 Program Evaluation. This evaluation was designed to obtain feedback regarding the 2008 Jump Start Program and to determine how the Jump Start program can better fulfill its mission and meet the needs of new students. This survey is used by the Jump Start program as a means of gaining information to better improve its program. It is a student satisfaction survey and does not measure student outcomes. In addition to the program evaluation, the Jump Start program administers three main personality and placement instruments: 1) COMPASSwhich is an academic assessment tool used to gauge academic preparedness, 2) College Student Inventory (CSI). Questions are used to measure a students potential personal and academic success in college. Students are assigned a ranking in four different areas: academic motivation, ease of transition, receptivity of support services and recommendations and 3) StrengthsQuest, an assessment instrument designed to help students discover their strengths and talents.
III. Areas of Concern
As the current status of assessment of first-year orientation was evaluated, four major areas of concern emerged:
- Lack of formal written goals/objectives for assessing student outcomes (e.g. an assessment plan needs to be put in place for all orientation programs). Although assessments are being conducted for first-year orientation programs, there is no formal assessment plan for assessing student outcomes. An written assessment plan would serve as an overarching framework that provides a way to structure, evaluate and improve the orientation process.
- Lack of a coherent, standardized set of core questions for assessing student outcomes (e.g., create questions to be used on all assessment measures/instruments). Some of the assessment being used to evaluate first-year orientation programs use questions with similar topics, but these questions are not comparable between assessments making it more difficult to provide comparisons among programs and/or overall assessment of orientation for first-year students.
- Assessment measures need to move beyond simple satisfaction surveys and focus on student outcomes assessment. Most of the instruments used to assess first-year student orientation were satisfaction surveys that did not assess student outcomes. If student outcomes questions were included in the survey, only a small portion was devoted to these questions. Although “satisfaction” questions can be beneficial to program improvement, assessments must include other types of fundamental questions that measure student outcomes.
- Assessment results are kept in-house and not shared with the University community and/or key stakeholders. Assessment results should be made public and accessible to university administrators, faculty, staff and students. Open communication regarding the evaluation of such programs may serve to strengthen program effectiveness by allowing for university feedback and input.
- Lack of a common mission statement to guide programs. In collaboration with all orientation programs, a common mission statement should be established for New Student Programs, International Services and Jump Start that comports to University’s overall mission statement.
IV. Current Use of Assessment Results
PI 9.2 Use of Assessment: To what degreehave the assessment results been used to improve practices across first-year orientation programs? Our Grade: 2 Low (based on a 1 Very Low/None and 5 Very High scale)
Although limited in scope, assessment results are being used informallyby the Office of Vice President of Student Affairs / Coordinator of New Student Programs, International Services and Jump Start to critique and improve programs. These results are typically used internally (within the department or college) and are not distributed or shared, for the purpose of collaboration, to the university-wide community.
The Coordinator of New Student Programs uses the results gathered from the Summer Orientation Evaluation and New Student Surveyto change and implement new programming as well as improve program sessions for first-year students and their parents (e.g., a resource page for parents was developed as a result of this assessment). The International Services Office uses the results of their International Student Orientation Evaluation Form to change and improve programming for international students. Jump Start utilizes the results of the COMPASSto evaluate academic preparedness in order to register students in appropriate courses. For the CSI, the results of this assessment are used for advising and class purposes and for referrals to other academic departments.
V. Recommendations
- All orientation programs need to collaboratively establish evaluation/assessment outcomes to help evaluate the effectiveness, feasibility and desired standards of the new student orientation program.
- Assessment needs to continue to be conducted on an annual basis and be linked to strategic planning within the institution. Programs working with orientation need to develop, identify and execute assessment on a routine basis student outcomes assessment. Results from the existing surveys as well as other measures should be reported as part of an annual or bi-annual Orientation Student Outcomes Assessment.
- Written assessment plans need to be created for all orientation programs. The use of assessments devoid of a formal written assessment plan can potentially create haphazard reporting and, as a result, inconclusive results. To avoid these pitfalls, an assessment plan needs to be put in place for all orientation programs.
- Assessment results need to be communicated to all persons involved in the orientation process and should be made available to the university community. This will establish a more transparent assessment process and may eliminate redundancies.
- Collaboration of all orientation programs to enhance program efficiencies and evaluation.
It is recommended that all orientation programs report to/collaborate with the Coordinator of New Student Programs or a university committee to ensure that student outcomes assessments are underway (e.g., reorganize/restructure the reporting structure). For all first-year orientation programs, a designated coordinator (e.g., the Coordinator of New Student Programs) or a committee should be appointed to monitor and evaluate orientation assessments.
- Use of different assessment measures (e.g., different methodologies). When assessing orientation programs, the use of both quantitative and qualitative methods should be incorporated. The New Student Survey is a good example of an assessment measure that evaluates the orientation program from a student outcomes perspective using a quantitative approach. Qualitative measures could also be used to enhance the assessment.
- Create core questions to be included on assessment measures for all orientation programs. A core set of questions will allow for comparative results. The use of a standardized assessment (e.g., Student Voice; NOTA) should be considered.
Appendix A: Schedule/Agenda of New Student Orientations
Jump Start orientation
Day 1 – Monday
8:00 a.m. – Noon Jump Start Kick-Off / Academic Responsibilities
NoonLunch with Faculty/Staff
1:30 – 4:00 p.m.MyUniverse Training / Variety Show Explanation
5:00 p.m.Dinner
6:30 – 8:00 p.m.WRC Tour and Activities
Day 2 – Tuesday
8:00 a.m. – Noon Financial Information / Budgeting Activity
NoonLunch
1:30 – 4:00 p.m.Student Advising
5:00 p.m.Dinner
6:30 – 8:00 p.m.Variety Show Practice
Day 3 – Wednesday
8:00 a.m. – Noon Student Activities Presentation / Student Involvement Fair
NoonLunch
1:30 – 4:00 p.m.Taking Care of Business
5:00 p.m.Dinner
6:30 – 8:00 p.m.Variety Show Dress Rehearsal
Day 4 – Thursday
8:00 a.m. – Noon Keys to Academic Success
NoonLunch
1:30 – 4:00 p.m.Staying Safe on Campus Residence Hall/ University Apartments & Off Campus
Information / Compass / E-write
5:00 p.m.Dinner
6:30 – 8:00 p.m.Variety Show
Day 5 – Friday
8:00 a.m. – Noon Lifestyle Changes
NoonLunch
1:30 – 4:00 p.m.More Resources / Returning Jump StartPanel / Jump StartProgram Evaluation / Jump
Start Program Adjournment
International Student ORIENTATION (Sample from Spring 2009 Orientation)
Day 1 – Tuesday
4:00 p.m. Campus Tour
Enjoy a look around UNI’s beautiful campus and learn where to go for your classes,
activities and other parts of your campus life. The tour will stop at the Department of