STUDENT SUPPORT STRUCTURE
According
to the plan, each student awarded a NSF scholarship will be advised by an
identified faculty member in the Computer Science Department. A member of
the second year class in the Computer Science Department will be assigned
to be the student's mentor. Tutors will be hired, trained and will begin to
work with the student participants within the first weeks of the semester.
This team of support persons will be available to help the student overcome
roadblocks encountered in academics, student life, and industry applications
and experiences. The team will be available to the scholarship recipients
through the completion of the degree program.
Academic Support
In addition, all participants will be encouraged to utilize the following
services, which will be available to provide appropriate academic support:
- Western
Maryland Online Information Technology Center, which provides on-line access
to students, faculty, and industry representatives for discussion, advising
and mentoring as well as on-line classes and study and chat groups.
- Allegany
College's state of the art computer hardware and software as well as technical
expertise and instruction through the student labs, available in the Computer
Science Department.
- The services of peer tutors, classroom assistants and full-time professional tutors, whose training is accredited through the College Reading and Learning Association. These tutors will be available for in-class assistance, out of class tutoring, and study group tutorial sessions.
IT
Industry Involvement
In order to develop industry and workplace understanding and experiences,
scholarship recipients will have the following opportunities available to
them:
- Bi-monthly speakers from local and regional IT companies who will provide workshops designed to increase the students' understanding of industry climate, opportunities, and expectations.
- Work-based learning opportunities designed to provide students with hands-on experiences in the professional community of the Information Technology Industry.
- Traditional and on-line research experiences based on an understanding of industry journals, such as ZD Publishing materials
Retention
To increase retention rates among the scholarship recipients, the following
program services will be available.
- An academic alert advisor will be available through the instructional Assistance Center who will assist those students who are experiencing concerns with grades, work and school conflicts, time or stress related issues, or family concerns. These services will include, but not be limited to, visits with the students' academic advisors, conversations aimed at intervention with instructors concerning work issues, tutoring schedules, appointments for free counseling sessions, and prioritization assistance.
- The Principal Investigator will supervise the student evaluation system, which will function to document the successful mastery of required skills, and identify areas of weakness. This will enable the co-PI's to make recommendations to the students in specific skill areas to address the need for special attention and academic support intervention.
- One of the responsibilities of the second year students who are scholarship recipients will be to serve on the mentoring teams of assigned first year students.
Transfer Advising Services
In an effort to provide scholarship recipients with every advantage if they choose to transfer to a four-year institution after their graduation from Allegany College, each of them will have available the services of the Instructional Assistance Center's Transfer Advisors. These services will be introduced to the students during their first semester. In many cases, this will involve visits to four-year campuses which are of interest to the student, an evaluation of the courses which will transfer, and the requirements of the transfer institution to help the student choose courses at Allegany College which parallel that college's requirements. Instructional Assistance Center staff will then send the student's plan of study to the transfer institution for review and approval. The student will be notified of the final matriculation requirements and agreement during the first year of their academic program.
