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Career and College Planning for Underrepresented Populations

Career and College Planning for Underrepresented Populations. About the Presenters…..

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Career and College Planning for Underrepresented Populations

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  1. Career and College Planning for Underrepresented Populations

  2. About the Presenters….. Lisa Hinkelman, Ph.D. is the Founder and Director of Ruling Our eXperiences, an evidence-based empowerment program for girls that focuses on equipping girls with skills to effectively negotiate the challenges of adolescence. Started in 2006 in Columbus, Ohio, ROX has grown to a regionally operated program with hundreds of participants in urban, suburban, and rural schools. Hinkelman has spent years working with girls, parents, and educators in both educational and counseling settings and has been aggressively researching the experiences of diverse girls for the past five years. Dr. Hinkelman is a graduate of Chatham College in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where she earned her degrees in Psychology and Education. She earned her M.A. and Ph.D. in Counselor Education from The Ohio State University. Dr. Hinkelman completed training in mental health counseling and school counseling and currently serves on the Counselor Education faculty at The Ohio State University. She has authored numerous publications, book chapters, articles, and educational curricula on topics including: self- esteem development, motivational interviewing, sexual violence prevention, career exploration, and study skills. Dr. Hinkelman also operates Equip Your Mind, LLC: A Counseling, Consultation, Training and Evaluation practice in Columbus, Ohio. You can reach her at hinkelman.1@osu.edu or 614-488-8600.

  3. About the Presenters….. Amy Martinez, M.A.joined OSU’s College of Arts and Sciences as an Academic Advisor for Social Behavioral Sciences in February 2009. In this role, she advises undergraduate students with academic planning and navigating through the college experience. She also teaches the SBS College Survey course for incoming freshmen. Amy brings a variety of experience within higher education as a college recruiter, career counselor and academic advisor. She has also worked in Human Resources within the private sector as an internship coordinator and recruiter. Amy received her Master of Counseling degree from Oakland University in 2005 and her Bachelor of Arts in Human Resource Management from Michigan State University in 1999. In her role as Career Advisor, Amy is interested in assisting students explore their interests and aligning their career with their personal goals and values.

  4. “Our nation is no longer well served by an education system that prepares a few to attend college to develop their minds for learned pursuits while the rest are expected to build their muscles for useful labor. In the twenty-first century, all students must meet higher achievement standards in elementary, secondary, and post-secondary schools and thus be better prepared to meet the challenges of work and citizenship.” (Katie Haycock, The Education Trust)

  5. Fast Facts:First Generation College Students • First-generation students are less likely to complete the necessary steps to enroll in a 4-year college: • only 36% aspire to a B.A. or higher vs. 76% of non-first generation students; • 45% take the SAT or ACT vs. 82%; • 26% apply to a 4-year college vs. 71%. • 47% began their education at a community college, and 34% started at a four year institution.

  6. Fast Facts:First Generation College Students ❖ First generation students are more likely to delay enrollment in postsecondary education, which inhibits degree completion (29% vs. 73% of those whose parents have at least a B.A.)

  7. Fast Facts:First Generation College Students ❖ Every year, over 200,000 low income high school graduates who could succeed in college aren’t going (College Summit, 2005)

  8. SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88/2000), “Fourth Follow-up, Postsecondary Education Transcript Study (PETS), 2000.” 0.6% 4.7% 16.9% 13.7% 64%

  9. SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88/2000), “Fourth Follow-up, Postsecondary Education Transcript Study (PETS), 2000.” 39.8% 60.2%

  10. Challenges Facing First Generation College Students ❖ Applying to College • First-generation students face the task of applying to college without assistance from their parents, since most parents have no knowledge of the process (Choy, 2001; Wimberly & Noeth, 2004). ❖ College preparation • College preparation, during high school, provides a greater impact for first-generation students. Unless the secondary school addresses what to expect of college life, the students are disadvantaged (Noeth & Wimberly, 2002).

  11. Challenges Facing First Generation College Students ❖ Rigorous Academic Preparation • First-generation students often lack the rigorous academic preparation of their peers with college-educated parents, since their parents do not understand the importance of taking challenging courses (Martinez & Klopott, 2005; Warburton, Bugarin, & Nunez, 2001). ❖ College Completion • First-generation college students often perceive college education as a means to a good job and often chose a college close to home that is not necessarily a good fit for the student which then leads to leaving college before completing the degree (Choy, 2001; Horn & Nevill, 2006).

  12. Challenges Facing First Generation College Students ❖ Personal Characteristics, Values, Needs, and Choices • Many first-generation students often have different personality traits (i.e. differences in self-esteem and social acceptance) and more often live at home and work part-time, while attending college (Horn & Nevill, 2006; Warburton, Bugarin, & Nunez, 2001).

  13. What Do We Know About First Generation Students Attending 4-year Colleges? ❖ First-generation students were more likely to attend a high school where three-quarters of the population were underrepresented minority students. ❖ Ninety-two percent of first-generation students attended public high schools. ❖ First-generation students were more likely to come from middle- or low-income families. Only 4 percent of first generation students came from high-income families.

  14. What Do We Know About First Generation Students Attending 4-year Colleges? ❖First-generation students took less rigorous high school coursework than those whose parents had attended college. Only 20 percent of first-generation students took Calculus in high school compared to 34 percent of students whose parents had a college degree. ❖First-generation students scored lower on college entrance examinations than those students whose parents had some college. ❖First-generation students were more likely than students whose parents had bachelor’s degrees to work full time while attending college.

  15. 5-Steps in the Path to CollegeEnrollment 1. The decision to pursue postsecondary education and the type they wish to pursue; 2. Academic preparation for college-level work; 3. Taking SAT or ACT entrance exams; 4. Choosing and making application to one or more institutions; and 5. Gaining acceptance and making arrangements to enroll including financial arrangements.

  16. Economic Barriers ❖ Parenting ❖ Resources ❖ Network ❖ Access and Exposure ❖ Finances Information GAP ❖ “College Knowledge” ❖ Preparation ❖ Options Environmental Barriers ❖ Risk Factors vs. Protective Factors Cultural Barriers ❖ Perceptions and Stereotypes ❖ Expectations ❖ Behavioral Patterns ❖ Peer Influence Academic Barriers ❖ Access to Rigorous Courses ❖ Tracking ❖ Quality Teaching ❖ Guidance Barriers to Access and Success

  17. Focusing on deficits and barriersrequires us to identify deficits in astudent's life… How do we move from adeficit model to a strengthsperspective?

  18. Focus on the positives that thestudent possesses… • What is going well in the student’s life? • Where does the student have support? • Who are the people that care for and support the student?

  19. What is Resiliency? • Resiliency is “the ability to bounce back successfully despite exposure to severe risks” (Benard, 1993). • The process and experience of adapting to disruptive, opportunistic, stressful, challenging, or informative life prompts in a way that provides the individual with more protective and coping skills and knowledge than prior to the disruption (Richardson, 1995).

  20. A Resilient Community… • A “resilient community” is a community focused on the protective factors that foster resiliency for its members: Caring High expectations Purposeful support Ongoing opportunities for meaningful participation

  21. Protective Factors • Characteristics within the individual or environment that reduce the negative impact of stressful situations and problems. • Make more of an impact on the life course of children than do specific risk factors or stressful life events. • The goal is to build in enough protective factors to offset the impact of stressful life events.

  22. Protective Factor Strategies ❖ Peer mentoring ❖ Business partnership mentoring ❖ Collaboration with local colleges and Universities ❖ Parent presentations ❖ Community service ❖ Job shadowing and exploration ❖ College visits/tours

  23. “Effectiveness in schools should be measured by the school’s ability to deliver the goods to whomever happens to be the client, regardless of sex, race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status” and other factors.

  24. Who influences students? ❖ Most students (84 percent) perceived their mother as being the greatest influence in their college planning. The parents were described by some students as “cheerleaders” but not always having “the necessary tools and resources to help them with postsecondary planning” (Noeth & Wimberly, 2002). ❖ School counselors (73 percent) and teachers (73 percent) were identified as equally important in assisting the students in planning for college. ❖ Principals were identified as being helpful by one-quarter of the respondents.

  25. Influencers: Family Members ❖ “My mom and dad, they did not go to college and they told me, ‘look at how I’m struggling to make ends meet and you don’t want to do that with your life. You have your whole life ahead of you.’” ❖ “I decided I was going to attend college ever since I was a child. I’ve always wanted to be a doctor or lawyer. I knew that I had to go to college….My mom always motivated us to do whatever we wanted to do and she talked to us a lot about going to college even though she didn’t go to college.”

  26. Influencers: Peers ❖ If students feel that academic achievement is important to their peers, they are more likely to achieve at a level that will support postsecondary aspirations (Akey, 2006). ❖ First-generation students serious about pursuing their education at the secondary level often distance themselves from peers who do not support those goals and instead develop a circle of friends that share and support their desire to continue their education (Cushman, 2005). ❖ One third of students said their friends were helpful in influencing them to attend college and in college planning (Noeth & Wimberly, 2002).

  27. Schools are places where all students should feel a connection to at least one adult in the building. Schools can provide an environment where students feel safe to take the risks necessary to improve their academic skills. (Robinson, Stempel, & McCree, 2005).

  28. Influencers: School Counselors ❖ 92% of participants reported the school counselor as playing an important role in their college decision-making process. “If it wasn’t for…one of the guidance counselors at the career center, I really wouldn’t know as much about [ ] University because she was the one who told me about [it]. It’s a great school…she got me interested and we were talking and stuff like that and she said you should visit the campus.” “She was always on me. Every time I turned around, she was giving me scholarship after scholarship application, applications for grants, information on different colleges, telling me here is this deadline. She was on top of me making sure I turned everything in so that anywhere that I did choose to go, I had the money to do it. “

  29. A Graduation Gap Exists Among students enrolled in 4-year colleges, first-generation students had a college-graduation rate of 44.9%, non-first-generation students had a 59% graduation rate.

  30. Academic Preparation is NotEnough! ❖ A recent study (2008) from The College Board found that there is a college graduation gap for first generation college students regardless of level of high-school preparation. ❖ High Schools offering rigorous course work: FG 58.6% grad rate, NFG 69.3% grad rate. ❖ SAT scores of 1500 or higher: FG 65.1% grad rate, NFG 72.7% grad rate ❖ High school GPA of 4.0 or higher: FG 63.6% grad rate, NFG 71.6% grad rate

  31. Academic Preparation is NotEnough! ❖ It is important that first-generation students develop not only the academic skills but also the social skills to navigate two worlds and bring those worlds together within themselves, to redefine their identity in the context of both worlds (Gerstl-Pepin, 2003). ❖ Not always understanding the “rules of the game or even what the game is”.

  32. Challenges in College Students’ success depends on extra support through programs such as academic advising, tutoring study skills workshops, mentoring, and career counseling. (Kleiner & Lewis, 2005) “Study habits in high school. I didn’t study. It was so easy not to study because we had the worksheets. If I could go back, I’d study more and make my own notes so that when I got to college, I’d be prepared to study already…” “I think it’s about time management. When I was in high school, I didn’t study so I didn’t know how to. Now I can sit down and study for like two hours, take a break and study again. At first I would sit down all night and try to cram everything and it wasn’t helping. I was still not getting everything in. So studying [over time] was good. I leaned that now and that’s helping me.”

  33. First Generation CollegeStudents Need Information on: ❖ Knowledge of the campus environment - Encourage campus visits & utilize resources such as Welcome to College.com - Princeton Review: “Best of 373 Colleges” to view college profiles - Researching their options & connecting with colleges; CollegeExpress.com ❖ Academic expectations and bureaucratic operations - Will be different than high school & no do-overs; key is connecting with resources ❖ Campus support services - exist but students need to seek help ❖ Time management and study skills–urge to take Freshman year ❖ College finances and budget management -Host parent workshops on FAFSA & advertise common deadlines for scholarships

  34. Conquering the Challenges • Managing expectations - feeling like a little fish in a big pond - Advanced preparation for the experience is crucial to college success - Help students identify niche groups in advance to create smaller community - Clubs, honors/scholars, academic support groups, minority initiatives - Encourage students to leave comfort zone & stay on campus over weekends • Practice smart decision making & study habits now - choices they make lead to specific consequences – no second chances - friends, study environment & academic/work/social balance all impact success - other influences/demands make students lose sight of priority (academics) • Become familiar with resources available - most campuses have support services for specific needs - Ex: OSU’s Office of Diversity & Inclusion has mentoring, single-parent assistance, individualized tutoring services and Young Scholars Program for students grades 6-12 in underrepresented populations from 9 largest urban school districts in Ohio.

  35. Other College Prep Tips • Strong writing skills are key to success in coursework -encourage any opportunities to strengthen this skill prior to college • IF student is pursuing community college first or taking post-secondary credit while in HS: keep syllabus!! • Those students should also inform advisor they plan to transfer to X school so they can get assistance in selecting courses that will directly transfer-U.Select.org • AP/IB courses need to be sent directly to college each year – 3’s and higher accepted; if AP is not offered encourage dual enrollment with local college for advanced coursework.

  36. Career Advising • Academic & Career advising often overlap - need to have sense of strengths, interests & values to pursue goal • College success vs. Career success - book smart tends to follow set path & conservative in choices=ok but sometimes inflexible - career success &happiness involves more risk; no set path - encourage students to take path that leads to most options until narrow down • Planned Happenstance – the idea that it’s not just about luck or being in the right place at the right time, but that you create opportunities for yourself by acting on your curiosity & chance events (Kathleen Mitchell, Ed.D.) • Great rewards require great risk – it is not enough to be comfortable; often times great opportunities come about from disappointments or perceived failures

  37. Career Advising Biggest Mistakes Students Make • Students are afraid to make mistakes or fail - therefore never learn process of getting up & trying again or rejection • Get labeled with one strength/skill & assume they have to select major based on that-may not be good fit & then miss out on exploration & learning about self in the process • Current generation has sense of entitlement - they assume once they earn the degree the job will automatically follow • Students get so caught up in the daily routine they forget the big picture & fail to invest time in laying the groundwork for a career -students wait until they need/want something and by then it’s too late

  38. Career Advising4 Steps in Career Planning • Self-Awareness–assessments to discover their interests, values & strengths - critical step before the exploration & job search can be effective • Exploration - gather data to make an informed decision - conduct job shadows, informational interviews & join clubs to gain information - be aware of how knowledge of self fits into the information you are gathering - weigh pros & cons of options and narrow down by most realistic path • Choice & Preparation – choose a path even if you’re not 100% sure; select the path with the most options available - identify specific job titles for the path you have chosen & requirements - create job search tools such as resumes & coverletters to market yourself • Commitment – Implement your plan of action, set realistic expectations, anticipate bumps in the road, determine how you will overcome these obstacles, continue the process; persistence is key! Remember to step back & re-evaluate.

  39. Advising Resources • OACAC – Ohio Association for College Admission Counseling • CollegeSummit.org – resource for both students & HS staff • OCAN/Students/KnowHow2Go– College Planning Timeline for parents • Faces without Places.org – resources for homeless children/youth • Doing What Works (http://dww.ed.gov/) – “comprehensive support” tab -> Helping Students Navigate the Path to College • Http://whatcanidowiththismajor.com/majors • Appalachian/Rural schools -http://www.learningpt.org/rel/archive/111010_PostsecondaryAccess.php • Strengths Finder – www.strengthsquest.com • Career books – “Do What You Are” by Paul and Barbara Tieger -- “What Color is My Parachute?” by Richard Bolles

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