On Dec. 25, 2009, a team appointed by Cal Poly academic senators and campus leaders created a list of goals to increase student graduation rates by 2015.
Chancellor Charles Reed first announced the introduction of Deliverology to CSU campuses in his report to the Board of Trustees on Nov. 18, 2009.
“[Deliverology] is not a CSU policy or practice, and it is not tied to the CSU budget process,” said Erik Fallis, media relations specialist from the chancellor’s office.
On Jan. 27, the CSU system proposed a bold graduation initiative to increase overall graduation rates and reduce the achievement gap on its campuses, said Fallis.
“The overall goal is to increase graduation rates as a system by 8 percent by 2016. Each campus will work on an individual plan with specific measures,” said Fallis.
A scheduled two-day meeting with Deliverology Specialist Sir Michael Barber and presidents and provosts from the 23 CSU campuses followed Reed’s report, said Cal Poly Provost Marten denBoer.
The presidents and provosts took the discussion on Deliverology’s trajectory and applied them specifically to their campus.
Deliverology is a more sarcastic term, said denBoer. It is a management approach created by Barber and even he was criticized for not delivering under Prime Minister Tony Blair’s second term.
ACE is the Cal Poly delivery program.
The program, Advising, Curriculum and Engagement, labels priorities to close the achievement gap across all Cal Poly students, especially those labeled in the Under Represented Minorities category.
Members of the ACE delivery team include Associate Vice President Ron Fremont, CLASS Associate Dean for Academic Programs Dale Turner, Engineering Department Chair Don Coduto, Associate Vice President for Enrollment Services and Dean of Science Donald Straney, said denBoer.
ACE adopts the management approach of Deliverology by a systematic list and process of achieving long-term goals.
The engagement portion of ACE probes the question of why students abandon or extensively prolong their college education.
“We are looking to see why students drop out,” said denBoer.
Students might be enrolled in the wrong program and would drop out instead of switching to art from engineering, said denBoer.
“Artists are good people, but don’t necessarily make good engineers,” said denBoer.
Prior to college, high schools are blamed for not preparing students in writing and critical thinking skills, said denBoer.
General education units will reinforce the core skills, while simplifying and broadening course units other than critical thinking and writing.
There will be more flexibility with skipping classes for a speedier graduation for certain students, but the team will have to work carefully. The school wants the student to become a responsible citizen and it will make sure to not water down curriculum, said denBoer.
“If you’re paying for [classes], you should get the full extent,” said Brandon Blaydes, a second-year industrial engineering student. “Or at least they should give that part of your money back.”
As a solution Cal Poly will continue to work on courses being offered at the right time for students. Cal Poly is facing entire department cuts, fewer sections offered and the 13-unit cap for winter quarter. Increasing class sizes will also persist, but administration will help plan what to offer, said denBoer.
“Its kind of scary because everything is uncertain,” said Chris Lopez, a third-year kinesiology student. “It brings my morale down.”
Aside from class cuts and the enrollment cap, most students have financial troubles to continue their education. A proposed idea from ACE would make students apply for mandatory financial aid.
“It would be required, but its not yet decided,” said denBoer.
“There’s people who can afford [tuition] and those who can’t,” said Michelle Rodriguez, a first-year political science student. “What if the student doesn’t want to get the loans, because they don’t want to be in debt after college.”
Cal Poly leaders will closely monitor the ACE program over the next five years. The effects will not be immediate, but should be visible within the following two to three years. If no progress is made, Cal Poly will reevaluate achievement goals and deliver a different system, said denBoer.
“[The graduation initiative] desperately needs to be addressed as a state,” said denBoer. “We have to educate all of California, not just some.”
Reach Paul Rosales at: news@thepolypost.com
2 comments
Since Sir Michael Barber was invited by the Chancellor as an outside consultant on teaching and learning (a subject, by the way, that Barber has no direct experience with as a teacher since he isn't a teacher), why would his hosts describe the term that Barber himself invented and uses to describe his own system as "sarcastic"? Certainly Barber doesn't think it's sarcastic. He uses the term without any hint of irony and says it and writes about it, one must presume, with a straight face.
Does our administration think that they will make the program sound more legitimate by calling it "ACE" (Advising, Curriculum and Engagement)?
Between 2003 and 2006 I served on CPP’s Enrollment Management Advisory Council Executive Committee and as Faculty Co-Chair of the Academic Quality and Support Subcommittee. I reported to President Ortiz and Provost Morales in 2006 that graduation rates for male enrollees within six years of entrance of CPP was in the low 30 percentile. I was shocked to find that the figure was so low. This oral report of mine about the graduation rates was part of my larger analysis of the results of an EMAC survey that I played a leading role in initiating and writing in which we attempted to determine what was standing in the way of students' graduation.
The results of the survey indicated that the two most often-cited reasons were both related to the fact that students couldn't get the courses that they needed. Several of the other people within EMAC were convinced, despite what the survey said, that the main reason was that students were frittering away their time and taking courses they didn't need or refusing to take courses that they could take because they didn’t want to inconvenience themselves schedule-wise. This opinion was contrary to the survey findings and was based on anecdotal data alone.
Ortiz and Morales didn't even blink at my report. Morales described it as "interesting." President Ortiz's response was to suggest that we have more online classes.
A hint of the real agenda at work here is the administration’s talk of loosening up graduation requirements. The only way you can accelerate graduation rates in a time when faculty ranks are being sharply reduced, programs and departments and classes cut, and so on, is to make a degree easier to get – and therefore less valuable. Deliverology treats education as if teaching and learning could be reduced to the assembly production of widgets. Thus, its name: Deliverology. It’s aptly named. Education isn’t something you can just deliver. It is, and has always been, a relationship between human beings, between mentor and mentee. It is, and has always been, something that required effort to attain. Teaching is an art and a craft. It’s not something that you can package, reproduce like Xerox, and sell to the highest bidder. An education is not something that you are simply handed. Deliverology is a hoax, whether you call it ACE or you call it by its real name. For more, please see http://defendthecsu.blogspot.com.