A student told me last week that she is passionate about working with animals in a zoo, and that she needs a 4-year degree in Zoology to achieve that life goal. So why is she in my Massage Therapy program? She had a vague idea that she might want to do massage on the animals, and maybe she could support herself doing massage while she worked her way through her Zoology program. But now she's wondering why she is here. I think what she needs is a specific vision for her future and a roadmap to help her get there. And in my opinion these should have been in place *before* she enrolled. So that when the inevitable stresses come, she could look on her fridge and see exactly what her plan is and why she's doing it. As program director, it falls to me to become her de facto guidance counselor and help her clarify her goals. If we determine that massage therapy is not a good match for her goals, she will leave with my blessing and our retention numbers will take yet another hit. She is not alone; a great many of my students only have a vague idea of why they are here. I'm wondering if a screening interview is needed to set expectations before we accept them into the program. Any thoughts?

intentionally make a part of my effort to asses the state of the individual and/or the total classroom. When either or all are in a poor state of mind their potential for learning is drastically decreased and thei impacts not only the individual but offer an opportunity for others in a more positive state to be dragged down. Sometime the notice that you notice and are making an effort to assist is enought to raise momentum on the emotional level and other times the state may involve some more direct intervention. it is a win-win situation for the student(s),classroom, and school environment.

I believe that beyond the course syllabus you can change a students life by interjecting life skills as well as encouraging them to read books that will help mold their attitude and outlook.

I believe that people don't care about how much you know as much as they know how much you care!

I believe that in any situation where you are teaching a course all technology should be paired with personal interactions as well.

We did not know, prior to this course, that our mystery shopper should be providing us data rather than opinion. This would definitely change the way we attack this process in the future. We can have them on a fact finding mission rather than doing our management job of evaluation of what was discovered.

Without our knowledge some of our staff sent a mystery shopper to our institution. When we heard the objective results of their visit, the shopped employee was watched more closely and ultimately fired for unacceptable behavior .

Parents have tremendous influence over their children's school choices so should they be invited into the process with a different approach toward customer service?

How can you build a loyal website user like Amazon?

I always when doing lecture try to use real world experinces, asking my students if it has ever happened to them, then explaining exactly where im going with it. It really seems to help them understand what im tring to say and they grasp the concept ten times better.

Hello, One of the topics mentioned is to pair up new students (late enrollees) with current students. I was wondering if anyone does this and how sucessful they feel it is. We have current students come to orientation and meet new students then, but they are not paired up on a buddy system. Thanks for your feedback!

The issue that I the most frustrating one of the most frustrating issues that I come across frequently is the students ability to get to school I have on several occasions tried to implement a car pool program, but a huge percentage of our student body is not willing to participate. The Las Vegas area is unique. The local bus transportation often finds our students that live only minutes away bar car (20-30) will take up to 3 hours if not more to get to school not to mention the cost is sometimes up to $80.00 + dollars to have a monthly buss pass, and the discount they offer is only 5% if we have more than 250 students using the bus system, this is the reality of the public transportation in Las Vegas. Also students, who can drive, are not willing to car pool, because it is an added expense and the gas prices are too high to go out of their way to help. I believe this is due to students not wanting to drive someone they may not know and feel uncomfortable giving rides without the guarantee that they will be compensated. Are we at any point going to have a system in place where we might maybe offer funds as part of their student loans to help with a transportation problem?

For me at least I find it the most difficult to help a student, when they do not self-identify, because of FIRPA it is seek out a troubled student, because we may violate their rights, and insult or embarrass them. What can we do to foster a relationship and diagnose in order to help these types of students?

It would be nice if there was a class or once a block training session to (a round table if you will) have an open discussion that the students could sign up for, they may find that they are not alone and have more in common with their fellow student. They may find answers to their questions. For example, a very real issue is not meeting not just the schools expectations, but their own as well. This type of forum may help them to meet students they can study with, and open up a whole new realm of possibilities and answers for them to stay and not leave, when they may have otherwise felt there was no other way than to quit. This could be either voluntary or mandatory depending on the history of the schools retention and attrition rates.

At my school it is difficult to keep track of the students; we have a large range of age, gender, and financial status. Most of the time, when one of our students leave, if it is not due to a medical or family emergency it is due to financial hardships, that at this point we have no resources to help. It is very frustrating that we do not have some sort of emergency funds set aside for these students who are for the most part academically talented and very good students. On the other hand the students who are struggling because the course work might exceed their level of education, what is the focus for them, if our job is to keep the students in school, how with this particular student so you keep them focused and on track?

How do you deal with a student who will not open up to another person besides the instructor?

One of things that I believe almost everyone wants is a sense of being a part of a community. In a traditional college setting, there is an infrastructure in place to assist in building that community. In the career focus sector, I haven’t found too many places that build a community. To be fair, most students who attend a career college just want to learn the basics tenets of their program. They have little or no time to get socially involved. However, there is a pocket that does seek out the social component of a collegiate career. At my institution, a collaboration of faculty and student came together and created such an organization. As in any new endeavor it took constant coaching and cheering to get the students on board. For the first year and half we hovered between 5 and 25 students. To date, we have a quarter of the student population as active members. Students are implementing the skills they learn in the class to furthering the mission of the organization as well as building programs that are relevant to their needs. We have a small but active alumni group that pitches in whenever we have an event. Students have also moved from our associate degree program to our bachelor program. How do you build a community?

Being aware of the students' goals and expectations helps me to tailor my approach to them.

My experience with students over the years has taught me that in order to keep students involved, you have to let them know that you care about their success. One way of doing this is to interact with them on a personal level.

I don't get the quote from joe Pace and I even watched the video. We change lives, our job is second? I know we are here to change lives, but I don't understand the part about our job being second... This makes no sense to me. Please clarify. If you can get Joe to call, maybe that would help. LOL. Thanks!