TOM'S ESSENTIAL SURVIVAL TIPS

Fellow Colleagues:

I am a member of the college's ad-hoc Student/Faculty Advising/Retention committee. Over the past year, we discussed many aspects of the retention issue, and it is my belief that we can best serve (and hopefully retain) our students by getting them to realize why they are here, what college is about, and what it takes to succeed in college. While some of you may be going over some of the things I will be covering, I find that many students have really not given much thought to or have not been exposed to the "whys" and "whats" and "hows" of college life.

Instead of requiring all new students to attend an orientation session to expose them to the "answers" to such questions, the committee has decided to first get faculty involved in the process by suggesting that you try discussing the following on the first day of classes or sometime during the first 2 weeks of classes.

Through the years, I take students through a "reality check" so they know what to expect of me and the college experience. Although many of you are doing some of the following, the committee believes that if we all establish some basics related to our own classes, students will perhaps "get the message", take their college learning more seriously, get better grades, and be more prepared to face the future. Hopefully, this will translate in a "reality check" which will increase our retention rates. So, here is a list of things I do in the first few days of the semester.

The first thing I do is to tell my students a true story. I tell them that my wife (a college graduate) is at the mid management level at one of Hawaii's largest banks. She tells me all the time that she hires (and then sometimes eventually has to fire) college graduates who can't think or don't have a clue as to how to begin to solve a problem in her area of banking. They are unable to offer alternative solutions to problems and also cannot write or cohesively present a logical explanation or argument of their work. Some the people she hires even have master's degrees in business administration!

After I relate this story to my students, I then ask and discuss with them, checklist of questions. I call them:

Tom's Essential Survival Tips for students on the first day...the first "reality check"

Q: Why are you coming to college?

[Call on students to get some of their answers]

Q: Why do employers hire college graduates and pay them more?

[Solicit student responses]

My A: Employers pay college graduates (more money) to use their brain. Using your brain means that you will be paid more to be able to think and solve problems. In addition to learning the content (information) in the variety of courses you will take, keep in mind that the main purpose of attending college is to learn to think and solve problems, in many different ways. Each course you take teaches you to think (analyze the world around you) in different ways. Some of these ways are:

• Quantitatively through the study of math and science
  
• Qualitatively by studying humanities and social sciences, art, music
  
• Ethically through philosophy, religion
  
• Logically in all disciplines
  
• Temporally (analysis through time) as in history
  
• Spatially (analysis of Earth) through geography
  
• Socially

[Add your own for the discipline you teach]

In order to learn to think, solve problems and truly train your mind, you will need to put in some study time --- much more study time that went into passing your high school classes! Getting "good grades" is more a matter of how much "sweat" you put into a course rather than "how smart you are".

Q: How many of you got "A"s and "B"s in high school?

[Show of hands]

Q: How many of you who got "A"s and "B"s had to really study hard to get those grades?

[Show of hands]

Q: How many of you expect to get "A"s and "B"s at HCC?

[Show of hands]

Q: How many of you expect to get "D"s and "F"s?

[Show of hands]

Comment: Of course, none of you raised your hands and most of you think of earning "A"s and "B"s because all of you have very high expectations at the beginning of the semester. Yet, sadly, many of you will be "D"s and "F"s; and, of the two other students sitting around you, one and perhaps even two of you won't be here at the end of the first semester! [HCC has over 60% attrition!]

Q: WHY?

My A: Because many of you will treat your experience here as an extension of the high school experience.

Q: Can you get the same "A"s and "B"s IN COLLEGE by devoting the same amount of study time that you did in high school?

My A: I think most of you intuitively know you need to devote more time to studying, but most of you will fall into the same habits you formed in high school: get by with the minimum effort. The reality is that you MUST spend more time studying for college courses than you did in high school.

Here are the "realities" of college vs. high school which require more studying, and getting right down to business "from the get go":

Meeting days:

HCC: A 16 week semester course which meets twice a week, will meet for a total of only 30 days! If classes were held daily, the semester would only be 6 weeks long.

High school: Courses are held daily over 10 month period. There are 182 class days in the high school academic year - 6 times the number of days of the HCC semester!

Conclusion: The end of the semester is deceptively distant, but very close! You need to get into it as soon as possible.

Study time:

HCC: With "time compression" (from the previous discussion of meeting days), you must study daily. Two to three hours for each hour of class time is a good "rule of thumb". No class time is available for "review" before exams.

High school: Learning occurs over such a long period of time (and so slowly) that students devote little or no time to studying. In addition, teachers often have time to review material before a test.

Homework and assigned reading:

HCC: While some courses assign daily "homework", most courses do not assign homework, so there is a perception that there is a lot of time to read and study the information. There are also no "reading assignments" per se during the semester, so reading is often left to the "last minute" and texts often go unread.

High school: Homework or reading assignments are constant reminders for students during the school year.

Result: High school: "A"s and "B"s without studying
HCC: "D"s and "F"s without studying

Q: What do we mean by studying?

A:[You may have your own definition and tips, but here are some I discuss with students.]

Studying is understanding the material. Understanding the information and concepts means that you can apply the information in the solution of problems. The more you don't understand the terms, concepts, or problems, the more, not less, you will need to study. If you don't understand your notes or the text, see your professor.

Simply reading all of your notes and the text is not studying. You must understand what you read. Again, if you don't understand the material, you can't really say you've studied the material.

Studying for an exam is not simply reading or "going over" your notes the night before an exam. Studying for understanding required of exams requires studying and continual review of the material throughout the semester; not on the night before the exam.

As I end my session with them, I ask them the following to consider about their experience and preparation for the future:

"How many of you would feel comfortable going to a professional (mechanic, doctor, hair stylist, teacher, financial advisor, or whatever) if you knew that they got mostly "C"s and "D"s in college? Would you place your trust or money in them?" As I retire, I will be relying on what you learned, on your skills, and on your qualifications and expertise as I pay for the services you will be provide me.