On the heels of record-setting retention rates, Tennessee Tech wants to do more to intervene with students struggling with classroom work.
Launchpad Student Success Center Director Angie Briggs said the advising team will increase the usage of its alert system for earlier notifications. Briggs said the program alerts advisors and students when student grades or attendance begin to slip. Briggs said the alerts allow advisors to intervene and connect specific students with the resources they need to get back on track.
“We get alerts all throughout the semester as the advising team. However, sometimes they don’t come until mid to late semester,” Briggs said. “By that time the student may not have as many options.”
Briggs said advisors look for frequent absences, missed exams, financial and mental health needs. When a faculty member issues an alert, Briggs said, advisors and students can see it immediately.
“As an advisor if we notice that the student has gotten more than one alert or they’ve gotten an alert for multiple reasons, then we’re going to reach out to that student,” Briggs said. “And its never anything punitive. It’s more supportive, like let’s make a plan.”
Briggs said the first alert could take care of a miscommunication issue between a professor and student.
“It may be the student has been attending class but they haven’t been checking in the right ways,” Briggs said. “So they can talk through that with their professor.”
Briggs said advisors respond within 48 hours, scheduling meetings. In serious cases, those meetings happen the same week the alert is issued.
Briggs said advisors can receive alerts on students as early as the first two weeks of classes. Briggs said attendance alerts and missing the first assignments are common around that time of year.
“At midterm we’re getting alerts that, you know, they have a low average in the class,” Briggs said. “And so maybe they should consider dropping the class, or maybe they should go to tutoring right now.”
Briggs said the key component of this program is getting a response from the student body.
“There are things we can do to help them have a successful first semester, even if it’s gotten off to a rocky start,” Briggs said. “So we really rely on them responding to us so that we can go ahead and get them involved in those interventions.”
Briggs said the most common alerts the program receives are attendance and grade-related.
