2025 CCRSM Partners Connect

Spring Early College Academy and Lone Star College North Harris have worked together to offer students multiple options to complete expected milestones by combining high school courses with college-level opportunities for students to earn their Associate’s Degree, CCMR point, Level I certificate and/or Industry Based certification.

Discover how they collaborate to assess academic options in a constantly evolving landscape and develop strategies to overcome the obstacles hindering student success.

Strand:
Model Management
Academic Infrastructure
Partnerships

How do you help college faculty and ISD teacher understand and/or debunk assumptions about one another and dual credit students? How do you help college faculty and ISD teachers understand the uniqueness of teaching modality and understand the dual credit student? How do you maintain quality without sacrificing communication, collaboration, and commitment? With a significant rise in dual credit partnerships, Northeast Lakeview College's Academic HSP Team has identified several misconceptions between high school dual credit faculty and college dual credit faculty. This presentation aims to explore effective strategies for bridging the gap between these two groups. We will delve into methods for helping college faculty and ISD teachers understand and challenge assumptions about one another and dual credit students. Additionally, we will discuss how to help both groups appreciate the uniqueness of different teaching modalities and the specific needs of dual credit students. By addressing common assumptions and identifying the unique strengths each group brings to the table, we aim to foster a collaborative environment that enhances the dual credit experience for high school students. Maintaining quality without sacrificing communication, collaboration, and commitment is crucial. Therefore, we will highlight the importance of holistic professional development tailored to the specific challenges and opportunities of teaching dual credit courses. By the end of this session, participants will have a deeper understanding of how to create a more cohesive and effective dual credit program that benefits both educators and students.

Participants will gain an understanding of the CCRSM network, and the vital role of Institutions of Higher Education layered in the CCRSM Benchmarks, Design Elements, and Outcome Based Measures. This session will help guide participants in understanding Texas CCRSM and the role of IHE partners. This session is recommended for IHE liaisons, faculty, advisors and other support staff working with ECHS and/or P-TECH models.

Grades, Behavior, Attendance, OH MY! Last spring, Mrs. Villarreal and her team reflected on their growth areas, not only for ECHS and PTech students but also for program policies and procedures. By summer, Mrs. Villarreal began the program's strategic planning process using OBMs, TEA Blueprint artifacts, and student performance and persistence data. The main focus was wrap-around invention services regarding attendance, grades, and behavior expectations. Students needed more support in each category as a whole. Significant change has been observed after new policies and procedures were implemented. In this session, we will review and share documents that contain chain of command systems from student to ECHS Administrator, as well as policies and support procedures that are easy to follow and transparent. Overall, the programs have seen significant improvements.

Located in Baytown, just 20 minutes southeast of Houston, Lee College serves over 3,100 students annually through a variety of dual credit programs. The diverse population of dual credit students includes first-generation, low socio-economic, and underrepresented students. Understanding the unique needs of these students, the Dual Credit Programs Team has focused on fostering positive relationships before addressing the more challenging aspects of the college experience.
Recognizing that early support is key to student success, the team implemented innovative practices to build strong connections with students. This includes a proactive advising model with a comprehensive advising syllabus that encourages early engagement and ensures students are prepared for their academic journey. A customized new student orientation with interactive breakout sessions sets clear expectations and provides tools to navigate college-level coursework. In addition, the college takes time to celebrate student successes and milestones throughout the year, reinforcing the value of positive reinforcement and recognition.
This session will explore the strategies Lee College’s Dual Credit Programs team has implemented to create a positive and supportive student experience, with a focus on relationship-building before the tough conversations arise.

In this session, we will discuss the significance and evolving nature of transfer partnerships and how the Educational Partnerships team at Tarrant County College is working to better connect these to their dual enrollment programs. The majority of dual enrollment students, no matter their pathway, tend to have plans for additional postsecondary education after high school. With this in mind, it's imperative that higher education institutions begin approaching the development of dual enrollment programs with a credit mobility mindset. Join us to learn how your institution might better incorporate transfer planning into dual enrollment programs, and share the exciting ways you may already be connecting dual enrollment students to transfer pathways to, through, and across institutions.

Organizations are complex, dynamic systems in which people affect the success or failure of intended outcomes (Greenberg & Baron, 2003); the more complex the work, the more involvement from individuals and teams is needed to achieve success.

Beginning in 2018, The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley began to partner with school districts within the organization’s geographic region to develop new collegiate high schools, focused on creating educational opportunities leading towards completion of a bachelor’s degree. The concept for the program evolved from longstanding partnerships already in place at the university; however, the new program would entail creating three unique high schools, each with their opportunities and challenges. Developing this program required an “interpreter” who could translate roles, responsibilities, tasks, norms, and expectations between the university and K-12 partners.

This session will explore lessons learned and best practices gleaned over the course of seven years and multiple phases of program development including academics, facility construction, and ongoing continuous improvement.

Participants will leave the session:
1. With an overview of critical elements needed to establish effective educational partnerships between K-12 and postsecondary sectors.
2. Having engaged in substantive discussions on elements needed for effective teams.
3. With examples of adapted project management tools that have proven useful when managing large-scale educational projects.

The objective of the presentation is to teach dual enrollment staff and partners the benefits of the Faculty Concern Record, and encourage them to implement a similar process at their institutions.

Benefits of using the Faculty Concern Record includes:
1. Collaboration between faculty, dual credit staff, and the high school partner
2. Documentation of students' performance
3. A tool to track performance to potentially get ahead of a change in academic standing

ObservEd is an innovative student performance monitoring tool designed to help educators easily track a student's progress within Canvas courses and identify at-risk students early. It provides a real-time view of assignment submission statuses, grades, and participation metrics, allowing staff to quickly spot areas where students may be struggling. Users can also access Canvas announcements and syllabi to stay informed about important course updates. ObservEd ensures privacy by allowing observers to only see the students they are assigned to, making it ideal for high school and college personnel, such as proctors, high school programs office, and advising staff, who need to closely monitor and support students' academic success.

This session will provide an overview of the new Designated - Needs Improvement status, which will be a designated status beginning in the 2025 – 2026 SY. Attendees will learn about the purpose of the Needs Improvement status, criteria for entering and exiting the Needs Improvement status, and the role of the IHE for Designated – Needs Improvement campuses. The session will also offer a space for attendees to ask questions regarding Designation and the Needs Improvement process.

Austin Community College High School Programs conducts monthly advising for students on academic warning and probation plus midsemester advising once a semester which is....a lot. How do you keep that up semester after semester? By getting your head in the game, of course! We're talking spreadsheets, we're talking Google Docs, we're talking Gmail templates, we're talking Calendly- all the tools and workflows to set you up for success. Let's draw up a game plan to win year after year!