2018-2019 Annual Report – Chancellor’s Leadership Corps

The mission of the Chancellor’s Leadership Corps (CLC) is to provide a student-centered program focused on leadership development and academic success that cultivates an environment dedicated to service-learning that will positively impact the community and global society.

1) Enhance recruitment and retention efforts to increase enrollment

• CLC participated in the following recruitment events
  • Discover UA Little Rock
  • Explore UA Little Rock
  • High School recruitment fairs
• CLC enrolled 111 students for Fall 2018
• Each freshman scholar met with CLC Coordinator in the Fall 2018 semester to discuss scholarship renewal requirements
• From April 2019 to June 2019, CLC Coordinator met with scholars needing summer courses to meet scholarship requirements and to create a retention plan for each individual student.
• For the 2018-2019 CLC Freshman Cohort, there was a 93% student retention from fall to spring semester.
  • That is a 10% increase in retention compared to 2017-2018 academic year.

Program Retention Chart

2) Strengthen student-friendly operations and customer service

• CLC response time to emails/phone calls is 24-48 hours.
• Our coffee bar is provided for students and guests of CLC and SASI.
• CLC will host an Ice Cream Social at the end of July for all incoming CLC scholars.

3) Improve diversity and inclusion efforts to provide a safe and inclusive environment for students

• Semester one of the CLC freshman course helps students understand cultural awareness, diversity, disagreeing with civility, ethics, soft skills, and communicating effectively.

4) Align financial and human resources to operate more effectively and efficiently

• CLC collaborates with the Enrollment Management team to assist scholars with all funding opportunities.
• The Trojan Food Pantry will be receiving a $1,000 donation from the Midtown Rotary Club.

5) Promote student development, engagement, and leadership

• The CLC Student Leaders completed approximately 30 hours of professional development training throughout the 2018-2019 academic year.
• As part of the CLC curriculum, scholars complete a course unit on Financial Literacy. Within this unit, scholars learn the following:
  • Money management and budgeting
  • Importance of savings and retirement
  • Understanding credit and credit cards
  • Loan opportunities for school, cars, and homes
  • Different types of insurance
• In CLC, freshman scholars must take a two semester leadership development course. The focus of this course is to help ensure students are learning the following:
  • Cultural awareness & diversity
  • Self-awareness, self-care, and overall wellness
  • How to map out school and life goals
  • Leadership development and values within a leader
  • Communication, conflict management, and soft-skills
  • Group collaboration and presentations
  • Financial literacy
  • Career readiness (job searching, resume writing, cover letters, how to interview successfully)
• Service Learning (community involvement)
  • Freshman scholars alone completed over 3,000 hours of service learning in the 2018-2019 academic year.
• Student Leaders (campus involvement)
  • Our student leaders are not only involved in CLC, but also Student Organizations, Greek Life, SGA, Orientation Leaders, EIT Leaders, and COB Leaders.
• Every fall semester, CLC hosts four events (Dodgeball Tournament, Constitution Day, Fall Fest & Kickball Tournament, and Battle of the Talents) and a campus wide competition through Reach 13,000. All proceeds donated are given to the Trojan Food Pantry and Staff Senate Helping Hands. Fall 2018, over 15,000 items were donated to Reach 13,000.
•  CLC planned, organized, decorated, and volunteered with the second annual WorldFest Food and Music Celebration Spring 2019, which was part of Diversity Week.
• CLC organized spring 2019 Pancake Dinner for campus
• CLC is currently assisting with the coordination of Trojan Daze Opening Week Activities for Fall 2019

6) Other

• Trojan Marketplace Food Pantry
  • From August 2018-present, approximately 2,500 individuals have been served from the pantry.
  • Trojan Food Pantry will be receiving a $1,000 donation from Midtown Rotary Club

• The CLC program began in 1976 with only 17 scholars; to date, CLC is the oldest and largest scholarship program at UA Little Rock.
• For the 2019-2020 academic year, approximately 100 new scholars will join CLC.
• The CLC program is founded on three pillars: education, leadership, and service.
• For the 2018-2019 academic year, CLC freshman scholars had a 10% retention increase with a 93% retention rate.
• CLC assisted the campus through numerous events such as Trojan Daze, Constitution Day, Kickball and Dodgeball Tournaments, Talent Shows, Welcome Back Week, Pancake Breakfasts, and World Fest, Discover UA Little Rock, Explore UA Little Rock, and high school recruitment events.

Type of assessment (learning outcome or operational)

Operational

Activity or experience being assessed

Training for student leaders to self evaluate leadership skills to determine personal growth

Assessment artifacts

Survey

Time period assessment was done

August 2018 – May 2019

Results

Survey with a scale rating of 1 (lowest) and 3 (highest). Nineteen mentors out of twenty-five completed the survey questions.

1. August 2018, you began the journey of being a peer mentor. Rate yourself on how well you felt prepared to taking on this role (PRIOR to training days).
   • Average rating: 2
2. By December 2018, you had been a mentor for one complete semester and had completed multiple training days on campus and off campus. Rate yourself on how well you felt prepared to continue as a mentor.
   • Average rating: 3
3. By April 2019, you had been a mentor for two complete semesters, completed multiple training days on campus and off campus, led multiple events on campus, and led multiple service projects. Rate yourself on how well you felt you have grown as a mentor.
   • Average rating: 3
4. Reflecting on your communication skills from August 2018 to present (April 2019), rate your level of growth over the course of the year as a mentor.
   • Average rating: 3
5. Reflecting on your leadership skills from August 2018 to present (April 2019), rate your level of growth over the course of the year as a mentor.
   • Average rating: 3
6. Reflecting on your conflict management from August 2018 to present (April 2019), rate your level of growth over the course of the year as a mentor.
   • Average rating: 3
7. Do you feel as though you have grown as a mentor and as an individual over the past year?
   • 19/19 responded yes.
8. Please share any comments that you would like to provide.
   1. “I feel like I have grown as a mentor and learned how to deal with conflict better and also how to provide feedback to students.”
   2. “I have grown as a person and I have learned how to see things through a different perspective which helps when there are disagreements because I am able to see through a different lens.”
   3. “Being CLC Mentor has provided me with significant interpersonal skills. It’s one of the best experiences I have had as a student.”
   4. “I’ve grown and I plan on growing even more as an individual and mentor!”

Continuous improvement process

The data from this assessment showed across the board that our leaders felt they had grown as leaders, mentors, and individuals. Since overall we seem to be hitting our mark, we’re going to use the individual personal growth plans so we can focus more on the growth of the leaders as individuals rather than just the group.

In 2010, as a student, I created the leadership structure which is still used today within CLC. The structure includes:

1. Sophomore Peer Mentors work directly with a small group of freshman scholars.
2. Junior Peer Mentors work directly with two Sophomore groups and plan service projects and events.
3. Senior Peer Mentors work directly with three Junior groups and over-see event planning and operations.

After reflecting upon the past few academic years, CLC will make a change to how the mentoring aspect of the program will be conducted. The new structure will be as follows:

1. Three teams of Peer Mentors will be developed ranging from Sophomores, Juniors, and Seniors.
   1. Team 1: Design and Events
   2. Team 2: Recruitment
   3. Team 3: Newsletters and Social Media
      1. Each team will have six mentors
2. Each team will have a Peer Mentor that will be the team captain to manage assigned tasks.
3. All mentors will have a small group of Freshman scholars.

• The goal is to create a more cohesive team and better serve the freshman scholars.
• The mentors will have one training per month that covers a specific topic to increase marketable skills.
  • Policy Procedures, food pantry, leadership training, team building, conflict management, effective communication, goal setting, etc.
  • Mentors will develop an individual personal growth plan with short term goals that we will monitor throughout the year.
    • Ex: If a mentor wants to improve on event planning skills, we will work together to create a personal growth plan focusing on steps to take to become a better event planner. With each event CLC does, this individual will have a role to practice those skills and then reflect upon the experience.

WHEN: August 2019

Stakeholder involvement / Communication plan

Since this will be the first time changing the mentor structure since its establishment, stakeholder communication will be sharing the results and experiences with other mentoring programs like CWDSA and the SEC, etc.

Type of assessment (learning outcome or operational)

Student learning outcome

Activity or experience being assessed

Monthly events to increase student involvement on campus and leadership in freshman scholars

Assessment artifacts

Survey

Time period assessment was done

April 2019 survey reflecting over the freshman academic year

Results

Survey with a rating scale of 1 (No) to 3 (Yes), multiple response, open response. The number 2 represented “maybe,” “I don’t know,” “no impact,” or “no change,” depending on the question.

Sixty out of One hundred and five freshman scholars completed survey

1. Do you participate in any of the following? (Select all that apply)

• Greek Life – 12 scholars said yes
• Student Organizations – 37 scholars said yes
• Campus Rec – 5 scholars said yes
• Future RA – 9 scholars said yes
• Current or future campus mentors (CLC mentors, CWDSA mentor, EIT mentor, etc.) – 11 scholars said yes
• Orientation leader – 3 scholars said yes
• Athletics – 2 scholars said yes

2. Has attending campus events impacted your decision to participate in an on-campus organization, mentor program, RA, Orientation Leader, etc.?

Average rating: 2

3. How has being a part of an on-campus organization impacted your decision to return to UA Little Rock for Fall 2019?

Average rating: 2

4. Compare yourself from August 2018 to April 2019, do you feel your leadership skills have improved?

Average rating: 2

5. Compare yourself from August 2018 to April 2019, do you feel a drive to become more involved on campus?

Average rating: 2

6. How has being a part of a mentorship program shaped your decision for joining an organization, RA position, Mentor position, Orientation Leader, etc.?

Average rating: 2

7. As a result of leadership experiences, do you plan to take on a leadership role within your organization, etc.?

• 26 scholars – yes
• 13 scholars – already in a leadership role and plan to continue
• 21 scholars – no

Continuous improvement process

The plan for this assessment was to have multiple guest speakers brought to campus to interact with the students with a focus on leadership development; however, due to budgets, we were unable to bring guest speakers to campus. As a result, we encouraged students to attend all on campus events that were occurring throughout the year.

Moving forward, we will still encourage students to attend on campus events throughout the year and further develop the CLC program to include additional leadership development opportunities.

WHEN: August 2019

Stakeholder involvement / Communication plan

With an ongoing effort across campus to increase student involvement, data results will be shared with CWDSA, SEC, Multicultural Center, and other key stakeholders working with the student experience.

Type of assessment (learning outcome or operational)

Operational

Activity or experience being assessed

Recruitment team effectiveness with outreach

Assessment artifacts

Data comparison and observation

The original goal was to compare data from interviews in Spring 2018 vs. Spring 2019. The interviews weren’t done, however, due to funding and low applicant pool. All we were able to compare is enrollment and retention numbers.

Time period assessment was done

August 2018 – June 2019

Results

August 2018 began with 111 scholars. Currently, CLC has 113 scholars planning to attend August 2019 with the expectations of confirming at least 100 scholars. CLC’s enrollment goal is to continuously enroll between 100-120 scholars each academic year moving forward. Currently, we are on track with the CLC enrollment goal.

Continuous improvement process

Spring 2019, CLC partnered directly with Enrollment Management to assist in improving recruiting efforts through the use of the CLC Peer Mentors. For the spring, CLC Peer Mentors attended six high school recruitment events from March-April 2019.

Working with Enrollment Management, the following partnerships are being developed:

• Dedicated team of six peer mentors will work with the UA Little Rock recruiters to attend high school visits, campus tours, etc.
• Continued efforts in supporting Enrollment Management with Discover UA Little Rock and Experience UA Little Rock
• As meetings continue, additional plans will be established

WHEN: August 2019

Stakeholder involvement / Communication plan

Results will be communicated with Student Affairs and evaluated for further involvement

• Remodel mentorship program to provide more effective support to freshman students with a goal of 95% or higher for retention rate.
• Further define CLC curriculum to reflect % increase in pre/post assessments and to introduce a research component with CLC.
• Establish additional internal and external partnerships for CLC.
• Begin the process of reintroducing overnight orientations for incoming freshman.
• Enhance cultural awareness of CLC scholars beyond classroom curriculum through additional collaborative events with Multicultural Center.
• Grow World Fest to include additional activities, restaurants, and music
• Expand Reach 13,000 to become a year-round food drive with highlighted events for both fall and spring due to the needs for the food pantry.
• Further develop the Career Closet and evaluate the overall campus need