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Created on Sunday, 01 October 2017 10:38

Nebraska Indian Community College has joined Achieving the Dream (ATD), a network of more than 220 colleges in 39 states dedicated to improving student success. As a Network institution, Nebraska Indian Community College will innovate to implement, align, and scale cutting edge reforms, work with ATD coaches to build institutional capacity and connect with peers to foster learning and share information.

The strength of local and regional economies, our ability to rebuild the middle class, and the possibility that a new generation will achieve their goals depends on community colleges, said Dr. Karen A. Stout, president and CEO of Achieving the Dream. Colleges that join the ATD Network show an exceptional commitment to becoming the kind of institution that will lead the nation into the future.

ATD offers a capacity-building framework and companion self-assessment that allow colleges to pinpoint strengths and areas for improvement across seven institutional capacities in areas such as leadership and vision, teaching and learning, and data and technology. With the capacity framework as a guide, ATDs approach integrates and aligns existing college success efforts and offers valuable support in preparing for accreditation, fostering conversation about goals, and making bold, holistic institution-wide changes be-cause initiatives that don't reach most of a colleges student body have not shown strong results.

ATD Network colleges report data using metrics that answer critical questions about who attends college, who succeeds in and after college and how college is financed. To advance goals of social mobility and equity, the metrics provide information on how low income and other underserved students fare. These metrics are categorized into performance metrics, efficiency metrics and equity metrics at points during the student experience from access through post-college outcomes.

As colleges in the new cohort progress, they may apply to participate in initiatives sup-ported by philanthropic funding and managed by ATD. These initiatives help incubate new ideas that help colleges refine practices based on evidence of what works and allow ATD to disseminate knowledge to the broader network and the field. New initiatives ad-dress the challenge of engaging adjunct faculty more deeply as key members of colleges workforces and implementing degree programs using only open educational resources (OER).