Student mental health is a growing issue at colleges and universities. There is a rising prevalence of depression, anxiety, eating disorders, suicidality, and other concerns in student populations over the past decade. According to the Healthy Minds Study, in fall 2020, nearly 50% of students nationwide had clinically-significant symptoms of depression and/or anxiety. Given the state of mental health in college student populations, there is a need to identify students in distress and to help those in need connect with helpful resources.

While most faculty members are not clinicians, college and university professors can play an essential role in supporting students, says Dr. Sarah Kelchen Lipson, co-Principal Investigator of the Healthy Minds Study. Some ways to support students involve simple, practical steps from faculty; telling students you care about their success, sharing mental health resources in the syllabi, and even setting deadlines to discourage all-nighters are just a few examples. “We know that students’ mental health affects their academic performance, and faculty are uniquely positioned to recognize and support students in distress.”

Faculty Resource: Creating a Culture of Caring [PDF]

Lipson, an assistant professor in the Department of Health Law Policy and Management at the Boston University School of Public Health, is now focusing her mental health research on faculty as well. Earlier this year, Lipson and her team published a first-of-its-kind national survey of faculty to better understand their perspectives on student mental health and their own wellbeing. The report, The Role of Faculty in Student Mental Health, shows that the majority of faculty are playing a significant role and having conversations with students about mental health, but many faculty feel ill-equipped and lack the tools and resources to support students. The report also finds that faculty’s own mental health has taken a toll during the pandemic. 

Last year, ACUE and Active Minds, the nation’s premier nonprofit organization supporting mental health promotion and education for young adults, teamed up to release Creating a Culture of Caring: Practical Approaches for College and University Faculty to Support Student Wellbeing and Mental Health. The report highlights the important role that faculty can play and offers an important resource to complement institutional resources. 

We’re excited to continue this important conversation with an interview with Lipson, who shares insights from her research and on the connection between academic performance and student mental health.

What is the current state of student mental health in college? 

We’ve seen an increasing prevalence of mental problems, which includes symptoms of depression, anxiety, eating disorders, non-suicidal self-injury, and suicidal ideation. Over the last five years in particular we’ve seen a sharp increase in prevalence rates. There has been some discussion that the pandemic has dramatically increased prevalence rates, but that’s not what we see in the Healthy Minds data. Instead, we see a continuation of a really troubling trend. 

We also cannot talk about the state of student mental health without talking about the large inequalities that exist. Inequalities are most pronounced when we talk about who is and who isn’t getting help. It’s true that more students are seeking help, but there is still a significant level of unmet mental health needs. Students of color, low-income, first-generation students, on average, have much lower rates of seeking help. 

How does this affect student academic performance? 

We know that mental health is a really important predictor of academic performance. Work lead by my colleague Daniel Eisenberg has shown that symptoms of depression are associated with a two-fold increase in the likelihood of a student’s decision to drop out or stop out, of college without graduating. And more than ever, students are reporting that mental health has impaired their academic performance. In fall 2020 Healthy Minds data, we saw the highest rates of students saying their mental health has negatively affected their academic performance. Over 80% of students said that their mental health has negatively affected their academics in the last month.

From an equity perspective, we also know that many of the students who aren’t receiving mental health support and services are the same students who, on average, are the least likely to persist in higher education: students of color and first-generation, low-income students. So we have these two parallel national dialogues around equity in persistence and equity in mental health. We really need to bring those together.

What are some of the biggest and most important findings from your latest study? 

Faculty are uniquely positioned to recognize students in distress. 

We know there has been very little research on the perspective of faculty, despite the fact that they’re in a unique position. For students, having a faculty member that they can trust, having a faculty member who is supportive, that is one of the strongest predictors of retention and academic success. It’s also likely to be an important predictor of their mental health as well. 

Read More: 4 Ways Faculty Can Be Allies for College Student Mental Health

The survey showed that faculty are concerned about their students’ mental health, and about 80% reported that they’re already having conversations with students about mental health. But only about half of faculty said they feel confident being able to recognize when a student is in distress.  And one of the key findings for campus leaders is that there is significant interest among faculty – 75% – in receiving practical professional development to help them better support students’ mental health in the classroom.

We also learned about faculty member’s own mental health needs. In the pandemic, so many of the safety nets that typically exist on a college campus–athletic coaches, peers, residence hall staff–were suddenly gone. All these different stakeholders normally have eyes and ears on the ground and it was faculty who were some of the only people who were left. From my own experience, from talking with colleagues, and then from this survey data, that takes a toll. It is a lot to realize that you’re maybe the only person in a student’s life who can recognize that they’re struggling. 

Additionally, about 50% of faculty reported one or more symptoms of depression, and many faculty, particularly faculty members of color, noted that supporting student mental health has taken a toll on their own mental health.

Read More: Faculty Can’t Pour From an Empty Cup

What are some practical things that faculty can start (or stop) doing to support student mental health? 

There are a number of low-hanging fruit approaches, so to speak. 

First, just telling students that you care about their well-being. You can do this at the start of a class, by reminding them that you want them to be successful. This humanizing approach to teaching, I think, goes a long way with students. 

Another is to include mental health resources in the syllabus and pointing them out at the start of the semester. Then, reminding them of those resources, especially around stressful periods in the semester, like during midterms and finals. For students, I think it’s key to hear it come from faculty, to hear them say that mental health matters, that it affects academic performance, and that we want you to be successful here. 

Finally, consider when your assignments are typically due and the impact that they might have on your students’ sleeping and eating habits. If assignments are due at 9:00 a.m., students might be likely to pull an all-nighter. If it’s due at midnight they’re going to work through dinner.

There are exceptions, but the healthiest time for an assignment is 5:00 pm. That probably won’t work for institutions, like community colleges, that serve a lot of adult students who work full-time. Whatever the selected time is, faculty should tell students why something is due at that time and, again, send a message that we want students to eat and sleep because we see them as whole people and value their well-being.

The City College of New York, one of the 25 institutions that are part of the CUNY System.

Across New York, both the City University of New York (CUNY) and the State University of New York (SUNY) have been overhauling developmental education, removing or minimizing standardized placement tests, and giving greater weight to students’ high school grades, a key predictor of success in college. The results were immediately apparent. Both CUNY and SUNY saw dramatic improvements in the numbers of students who placed into, and passed, credit-bearing courses.

The next steps are focused on implementing and scaling evidence-based practices to increase student retention, completion, and graduation. Faculty are at the center of many of these changes. As two of six Strong Start to Finish Scaling Sites, CUNY and SUNY are implementing a range of developmental education reform strategies, from expanding guided pathways to course redesigns that provide corequisite interventions in math and English. By Fall 2022 CUNY aims to phase out all traditional, standalone remedial courses.

Partner Spotlight: The City University of New York

When Felix Matos Rodríguez was named chancellor of the City University of New York in 2019, he had a clear vision. To improve student success, CUNY needed to improve the quality of instruction.

CUNY, the nation’s largest urban public university, serves as a national model for promoting and driving social and economic mobility for the 275,000 degree-seeking students who attend its 25 institutions. The Puerto Rican-born chancellor, the first member of a minority group to lead the university system, started at CUNY in 2000 as a history professor and scholar of Black and Puerto Rican/Latino Studies. He is a vocal cheerleader for faculty and their role in advancing CUNY’s historic mission: “We call ourselves the American Dream Machine.”

But as Matos Rodríguez ascended CUNY’s ranks, he also recognized a greater need to grow a culture that prizes and recognizes instructional excellence. “One part that was missing was a commitment to better teaching.” He communicated his vision widely and celebrated CUNY’s unprecedented response to the COVID-19 pandemic, transitioning nearly 50,000 courses online and equipping more than 30,000 students with computers and hotspots. The pandemic, Matos Rodríguez wrote, underscored why effective teaching was more important than ever.

“How teachers teach, how students learn, and what methods and approaches have proven most effective at elevating student achievement and outcomes.” Improving instruction “is one of our key priorities at CUNY — a way to both boost student success and support the invaluable resource that is our faculty.”

‘Improving Pedagogy at Scale’

Driving the instructional vision is CUNY’s Innovative Teaching Academy, which has provided training to over 4,100 faculty since its inception in early 2020.

“We hope to improve pedagogy at scale across over 7,500 full-time faculty and over 12,000 part-time faculty,” said Annemarie Nicols-Grinenko, the University Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs, during a panel discussion at this year’s ACE Annual Meeting. Nicols-Grinenko is a member of CUNY’s Innovative Pedagogy Working Group, which is charged with leading the Innovative Teaching Academy’s offerings and culture-building activities.

‘Scaling Instructional Excellence’

During the 2019-2020 academic year, through a grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York, CUNY’s flagship university, the City College of New York, trained and certified 50 faculty in ACUE’s course in effective teaching practices. The experience helped nearly 100% of faculty refine their instructional practices and the successful launch was a driving factor in CUNY’s decision to deepen its investment in professional learning for faculty.

That spring, CUNY was one of four university systems selected to participate in the national Scaling Instructional Excellence for Student Success initiative through the National Association of System Heads (NASH) to train hundreds of faculty in ACUE’s courses (NASH, 2020). In addition, a second grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York provided funding to support 14 faculty cohorts across CUNY’s seven community colleges in the 2020-2021 academic year.

Joining NASH’s initiative helped launch CUNY’s Innovative Teaching Academy, says Nicols-Grinenko. “When we applied for the NASH opportunity, the Academy was just an idea. Receiving this award and being part of the NASH initiative, allowed us to start to make the Academy a reality.”

Much of the training provided by the Innovative Teaching Academy is aimed at best practices in teaching online, but the Academy has also offered opportunities for CUNY faculty to learn more about mindset-supportive practices, open pedagogy, participatory teaching methods in the arts and humanities and alternative forms of student assessment. CUNY has supported the Academy by reallocating internal resources and through partnerships with ACUE and Western Governor’s University, and funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Carroll and Milton Petrie Foundation, Strong Start to Finish/Education Commission of the States.

Faculty as ‘Our Most Important Asset’

To improve pedagogy at scale, CUNY’s academic leaders recognize that providing faculty with professional development opportunities is necessary but not sufficient. To take root and grow, teaching must be embraced by the faculty and leadership of CUNY’s institutions, and assessed and rewarded at the college level.

The CUNY Innovative Teaching Academy plans to deepen its efforts to celebrate faculty who invest in their instructional training, starting with a university-wide event to recognize credentialed faculty. It is also working with the Office of Academic Affairs and the leadership of the University Faculty Senate to develop a plan to explore ways of better recognizing excellence in teaching and the scholarship of teaching and learning in CUNY’s tenure and promotion processes.

“If we invest in our most important asset, which is our faculty, we’re going to get faculty that are more motivated, happier to do the work that they do on the teaching side, and much better outcomes for our students,” said Matos Rodríguez.

State University of New York

Faculty development is a driving catalyst for developmental education reform in the State University of New York, the largest comprehensive system of universities, colleges, and community colleges in the United States.

Through a grant from Strong Start to Finish, all 30 of SUNY’s community college and eight four-year colleges are implementing at least one developmental education reform.

Their strategies are to:

• Accelerate and scale up SUNY’s Guided Pathways reforms
• Scale Math Pathways and targeted corequisite interventions across the SUNY system
• Expand corequisite English Accelerated Learning Program (ALP)

In-depth faculty training and professional development are major levers being used to realize these goals, according to Johanna Duncan-Poitier, the Senior Vice Chancellor for Community Colleges and the Education Pipeline for SUNY. Duncan-Poitier emphasized that there was a strong commitment to faculty development and engagement as part of the implementation. That includes over 60 workshops with over 3,000 attendees. “We are investing in the people who are investing in student success,” Duncan-Poitier said.

Learning from my students

My students have helped me foster learning equity, even before I formally included them in the process. At first they did this without me fully realizing their role in helping me choose more equitable teaching practices. Students would let me know about barriers that were preventing them from successfully completing course activities. For example, early in my online teaching a student informed me that requiring him to save assignments as a PDF (Portable Document Format) created a barrier for students who only had a smartphone. Each time, I would make changes to address a challenge in a way that would support all students. However, as a fairly new online teacher, I needed to know more about the students as humans and to be proactive in supporting their success.

Similarly, my students showed me that I should be checking our collective progress toward increasing learning equity. One student in particular helped me see that, although I had adopted various research-based teaching practices, I did not know how well they actually supported student success. In this case I had adopted the Transparent Assignment Template throughout my entire course. I had seen the research that showed how using the template benefits students—especially first-generation, low-income and disproportionately impacted students. That summer I went through my entire course and converted all of my assignment instructions to follow the template’s format. I also did this with all of the prompts for reviewing content and for engaging in course activities.

The subsequent fall semester went well and at the end I received an email from a student who had gotten an A grade. He had failed the course the previous spring because he had stopped doing the work. He wanted to thank me specifically for revising the instructions throughout the course, closing his note with a powerful statement: “This time I knew what I was supposed to do.”

Being more intentional when including students

Ironically, my students were showing me that I should practice what I teach. My general education course, “How 2 Learn w ur Mobile Device,” teaches students about metacognitive strategies, or ways for them to improve their own learning. Together we use a simplified process—Plan, Do, Reflect—to gain self-directed learning skills. Instructors can take a similar approach to creating and facilitating equitable courses. First, seek awareness of equity-based challenges students face. Next, take action—use a strategy that has been shown to address a challenge. Last, conduct a formative assessment. Review the results of your equity-related actions, and determine what worked and what to adjust next time.

Rather than wait for students to report challenges, now I involve students more intentionally. To gain better awareness of the equity-related issues my students face, I use an anonymous survey at the beginning of the term. I ask them to identify or describe the biases, assumptions and barriers that negatively impact their motivation, opportunities or achievement. Early versions of the survey drew ideas from the research-based criteria on the Peralta Equity Rubric. To gauge the effectiveness of specific equity-related strategies, I include questions on evaluations conducted in the middle and at the end of the term. Once in a while, comments or trends inspire a discussion thread in the Community Café forum.

Putting it all together – addressing potential interaction bias

My online class is large—50 to 100 students enroll in it each semester. When I finished reading a research study about bias in online classes, I changed my discussion forum practices. My first thought was, “Do I do that?” With so many students, my practice had been first to reply to students with no replies from classmates, and then to address questions that had arisen in the different discussion threads. However, I did not know if my strategy confirmed the bias found in the Stanford study, so I decided to manage the potential for bias by keeping track of my replies to each student.

There are no learning management system tools or features that allow you to track your responses to each student, so I created a Google spreadsheet to track it myself. In the first column, I pasted the students’ names from my course roster. Then I created a new column for each discussion in my class. Over 16 weeks, we engage in at least 10 discussions, some of which are small group discussions and the rest of which are whole class discussions. After participating in a discussion each day, I put my initials in that column for each reply to a student. Last, I inserted a column right after the students’ names. In this column, I counted the total number of replies I had written to each student. Before I went to the discussion forums each day, I checked to see who had the fewest total replies from me. They were the first ones to get a reply that day.

Some students have fewer replies because they have not posted anything. In those cases, I encourage them to participate. I let them know that I value their contributions and that I understand they may have competing obligations like employment or caretaking for family.

After that first iteration of using a spreadsheet to track my feedback to students, I added a bullet to my syllabus statement about teacher participation: “Discussion forums: This is a large class! While I may not be able to reply to every one of you in every discussion forum every week, I am committed to equity. I will be keeping track of my replies to each of you throughout the semester so that every student will get equal attention and feedback from the teachers.” In my start-of-semester survey, I ask them how they feel about instructor replies and feedback. In the mid-semester (informal) and end-of-semester (formal) evaluations, I ask how well I did in creating an equitable environment that made them feel welcome and included. I still have a lot to learn, but luckily my students are great teachers.

Baker, R.; Dee, T.; Evans, B. & John, J. (2018). Bias in Online Classes: Evidence From a Field Experiment. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford Center for Education Policy Analysis. https://cepa.stanford.edu/content/bias-online-classes-evidence-field-experiment

Winkelmes, M.-A.; Bernacki, M.; Butler, J.; Zochowski, M.; Golanics, J. & Weavil, K.H. (Winter/Spring 2016). A Teaching Intervention That Increases Underserved College Students’ Success. Peer Review, 18(1/2). https://www.aacu.org/peerreview/2016/winter-spring/Winkelmes

Kevin Kelly is an ACUE Educational Advisor and a Lecturer Faculty member in the Equity, Leadership Studies and Instructional Technology Department at San Francisco State University.

I am a self-proclaimed pedagogy enthusiast. It’s something that I like to research and read about on a regular basis. One of the things I greatly missed while teaching at home during the pandemic was the opportunity to collaborate with my peers and regularly participate in professional development events.

Therefore, I was thrilled to be invited to take the Promoting Active Learning Online microcredential course offered by ACUE.

As a performer who became a teacher, I always have audience (student) engagement in mind when creating online content. At the outset of the pandemic I wondered how I was going to help students from 16 different countries, who speak multiple languages, navigate the technology of all of these learning platforms; let alone keep them motivated and engaged.

Although not without challenges, learning to teach online in an engaging way has provided some of the most rewarding professional growth I have had. I cannot possibly cover all the techniques recommended in ACUE’s course, but I would like to share the two that had the greatest impact on my approach to online teaching.

Developing Effective Modules and Microlectures

The use of microlectures to introduce my class was, hands down, the things that my students responded to most positively. Microlectures are a way for instructors to break up larger chunks of content into shorter video lectures.

At first, I thought it would be incredibly time-consuming to make these videos, but I had it completely wrong! Making these videos ended up saving me time because I wasn’t spending as much time after class, or during my office hours, having to explain the content I had covered during synchronous class sessions. These shorter videos allowed students to watch, multiple times if needed, at their own convenience, to deepen their understanding.

Learn more: How to Record Effective Microlectures

I created three or four videos per concept for each learning module. Students commented that it was easier for them to pay attention when watching shorter videos than when I explained the concepts in our live class sessions. They knew that there were short quizzes at the end of each video, so they were motivated to pay attention and listen more actively.

But the most beneficial result is that class time became a chance to apply and practice what they had learned together. The increase in student enthusiasm was palpable when engaging with the course content this way. Most importantly, it resulted in significant improvement in student outcomes.

Learn more: Engaging Students in Readings and Microlectures

Teaching Powerful Note-Taking Online 

Were you ever instructed on how to effectively take notes? I certainly wasn’t. When I was a college student, I all too often relied on my memory to cram for exams because I could not make heads nor tails of the notes that I had taken.

In the earlier stages of their academic careers, many students try to capture everything in their notes as they have a difficult time distinguishing what is important. ACUE’s module on Teaching Powerful Note-Taking Skills Online was an excellent reminder that by providing structures for note-taking, students can focus on what was important and learn more deeply.

As a result of this module, I provided an organizing framework for students to take notes on course content. In addition, I provided focus questions for the course readings to guide their notes. I also began incentivizing note-taking by allowing the students to use their notes when taking their online exams. Consequently, I found that my students began taking better notes, more frequently. They started to compare their notes with their fellow classmates, without prompting from me, to make sure that their notes were as thorough as possible. The students started to practice note-taking when having group discussions and would upload their discussion notes to a shared Google folder, so that they could all succeed together.

Learn more: How to Help Students Take Better Notes

This was all done without my prompting. It truly amazed me that, with a little guidance, how much improvement my students made on their note-taking skills in such a short period of time.

I can say with great confidence that I have become a more confident and reenergized online instructor as a result of studying with ACUE. Thank you for adding tools to my teaching toolkit that help me to keep my students more actively engaged.

Jennifer Ault has been working as an ESL/EAL professional for over 20 years. She is currently an instructor for the CUNY Language Immersion Program (CLIP) at Queensborough Community College.

ACUE is saddened to mark the passing of Dr. Vartan Gregorian, a legendary figure in the world of education and long-time president of The Carnegie Corporation of New York. ACUE was first brought to Dr. Gregorian’s attention by CUNY Chancellor Emeritus, Matthew Goldstein, who received the Corporation’s 2007 Academic Leadership Award. Goldstein also served as founding chairman of ACUE’s board of advisors and shares these remembrances:

The passing of Vartan left a hollow feeling in me, for it is hard to imagine a world without this bright light leading the way.

When Vartan was President of the Carnegie Corporation, he and I became close. We often met for breakfast, usually at 9:30 am, so that he could first make sure his wife Clare was cared for. His sui generis nature, his kindness, and wisdom were gifts to all who knew him well. We served on a number of committees together, which was always a joy.

His work in higher education, especially at Brown University where the endowment grew significantly and star faculty members were recruited, is well known. But perhaps his signature achievement was as President of the New York Public Library. He transformed a beaten down institution into the intellectual and cultural powerhouse that it is today.

It was my pleasure to introduce Vartan to ACUE.  He was intrigued by our mission, believing that higher education must to do a much better job preparing its faculty to teach well. He said as much throughout his career, as recently as the Carnegie-supported report The Future of Undergraduate Education, The Future of America.

Vartan’s endorsement lead to financial support that has allowed ACUE to credential hundreds of faculty across the City University of New York, to the benefit of tens of thousands of New Yorkers. For that, and so much more, we thank you Vartan.

Matthew Goldstein

Chancellor Emeritus City University of New York

In California, the work to systematically overhaul remedial education is well underway. A new chapter began in 2017 with legislation and an executive order that compelled community colleges and many of the state’s public four-year institutions to end remedial education.

Implementation of the policy-enabled changes is still early and far from complete. But the positive impact was immediately apparent after the first year. Community college completion rates increased significantly across student demographic segments. Across the California State University (CSU), nearly 7,800 more students completed college-level math courses—compared to 950 students the previous year.

Spotlight on the California State University

Increasingly, faculty development is seen as a priority for sustaining strategies that increase student retention, completion and graduation. “The efforts are being led by faculty, because they are the ones who best understand that [remediation] is not good for students,” said Alison Wrynn the system’s associate vice chancellor for academic programs, innovations and faculty development.

Under Wrynn and Director Emily Magruder, The CSU Institute for Teaching and Learning (ITL) has seen its mission and scale expand dramatically in recent years. As part of the CSU’s Graduation 2025 Initiative, the CSU Institute played a central role in helping campuses redesign entry-level mathematics and writing courses to eliminate pre-requisite remediation.

The ITL worked closely with the CSU Faculty Development Council, as well as cross-campus teams, to link reform of remedial education to systemwide efforts to increase student success with equitable and engaged teaching and learning. Campus teams consisted of institutional researchers, directors of academic support centers, advisors, chairs of departments offering the courses, and directors of faculty development or teaching and learning centers. These teams supported faculty by organizing in-person summits, producing a webcast series, and cultivating digitally-supported professional learning communities.

Center for Effective Teaching and Learning A “Crucial Lever”

On one CSU campus, Cal State LA, much of that work is centered in Cal State LA’s Center for Effective Teaching and Learning (CETL), recognized as a “crucial lever” in the university’s plan to achieve its ambitious student success goals set through the Graduation Initiative 2025.

To support implementation in response to CSU Executive Order 1110, Catherine Haras, executive director of the CETL, with the support of Michelle Hawley, Cal State LA’s associate vice president and dean of undergraduate studies, designed a hybrid professional development program that forced faculty to “blow up all of their assumptions” about their courses, from structure and materials.

Building to Scale

Hawley and Haras also needed a scalable mechanism to support and train nearly 60 math faculty in their program. “With ACUE, we were able to run programs systematically for these larger multi-section courses and involve faculty in redesigning a common course at the same time,” said Hawley. “That’s when we began to see impact to scale.”

Cal State LA is evaluating the impact of its faculty development work in several ways:

• Through mid-course surveys, students note that their professors are providing regular feedback, assigning more meaningful work, and keeping class well organized and well paced, among other evidence-based teaching practices.
• An analysis of course completion data found that the percentage of first-year students who completed their math requirement increased by 25% every year between 2016 and 2018.
• As a measure of economic equity, Cal State LA found that the overall achievement gap between Pell-eligible and non-Pell-eligible students was eliminated from a high of 6%.

Spotlight on California Community Colleges

As the largest system of higher education in the nation, the California Community Colleges is at the center of the state’s reform of developmental education. These colleges are launching pads, helping nearly 80,000 students annually transfer into the state’s public four-year institutions. Serving 2.1 million students across 116 colleges, they also annually produce hundreds of thousands of highly-trained graduates who enter the workforce as nurses, technicians, chefs, counselors, engineers, machinists, and many more.

Strong Workforce and Faculty Development

In 2017, Grant Goold, a full-time faculty member at American River College was tapped by the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office to help the system implement the Strong Workforce Program—a new annual recurring investment of $200 million to spur career education in California’s community colleges. The program is charged with creating one million more middle-skilled workers in California.

Goold saw high-quality professional development for the system’s Career and Technical   Education (CTE) faculty as a crucial piece of the implementation. “Once I started to really look at the quality of instruction, I found that many of our faculty were not exposed to professional-level, high quality development in pedagogy,” said Goold.

After two years, nearly 500 faculty across 28 community colleges became ACUE-credentialed in Effective College Instruction. At one campus, the College of the Desert, newly hired faculty are required to earn the credential as part of their first-year onboarding programs. A regional consortia in northern California, made up of rural community colleges, are combining their resources to design cohorts across multiple institutions.

“The proof is in the pudding.”

From the start, Goold was determined to evaluate the ACUE program’s impact, in part because he knew that expansion was dependent on hard data that showed demonstrable impact. For example, at City College of San Francisco, there was a significant increase in the rate of students receiving As and a significant decrease in the rate of students receiving Fs in sections taught by ACUE-credentialed faculty, relative to comparison data. “The proof is in the pudding,” Goold said. “We had incredible outcomes. We had a shift in mindset for many of our faculty.”