Framingham State University Announces Commitment to Expand College Access at White House Event

Today, Framingham State University President F. Javier Cevallos will join President Obama, the First Lady, and Vice President Biden along with hundreds of college presidents and other higher education leaders to announce new actions to help more students prepare for and graduate from college.

The White House College Opportunity Day of Action helps to support the President’s commitment to partner with colleges and universities, business leaders, and nonprofits to support students across the country to help our nation reach its goal of leading the world in college attainment.

For its part, Framingham State has committed to retaining 75 percent of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) majors for the Fall 2019 entering class, an increase of nearly 10 percent over current retention rates.

“Massachusetts is facing a significant shortage of highly educated employees in the areas of science and math,” said Dr. Margaret Carroll, Dean of FSU’s College of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. “The University has done a good job in recent years of increasing enrollment in these important subjects, but more can be done to retain these students and ensure they graduate.”

“Massachusetts is known for its innovation economy,” said President Cevallos in a press release. “The STEM subjects represent areas of tremendous job potential for our students. We want to make sure we are doing everything we can to ensure students succeed in these areas and we are grateful to have the support of President Obama and his administration in this effort.”

To achieve its commitment, Framingham State will take a multi-pronged approach.

• First, they will increase the number of Supplemental Instruction courses to ensure
  that all students have access to these supports. Framingham State implemented Supplemental
  Instruction (SI) in several courses in the Fall of 2011. By spring 2013, SI supported
  fourteen introductory courses in chemistry, biology, math, and economics that regularly
  had D’s, F’s, or withdrawal (DFW) rates greater than 33%. An analysis of SI courses
  found that students attending SI had 25% fewer F grades than non-SI students and
  17% fewer course withdrawals. Framingham State will also hire an SI coordinator to manage this
  growing program.
• Second, Framingham State will increase the number of sections of gateway courses in the
  sciences. This will allow us to reduce class size and to provide students the flexibility of
  starting two course introductory sequences in biology and chemistry in either semester.
  Framingham State has used funding from a Massachusetts Vision Grant to address challenges in our
  STEM gateway courses. Several courses were redesigned based upon Ken Bain’s
  concept of Natural Critical Learning Environments. An evaluation of one of the courses
  involved, Physics II, showed that level of interest in Physics increased substantially from
  pre-course levels.
• Third, Framingham State will offer faculty development opportunities to encourage faculty to
  implement problem based learning in gateway courses.
• Lastly, Framingham State will analyze admissions and course data to allow us to identify those
  incoming students most likely to need extra supports. Framingham State will begin offering a summer
  bridge program for at risk students in the summer of 2016, after completion of their new
  science center.
• Building on existing progress: Increasing the number of STEM graduates has
  been set as a key goal in the University’s Strategic Plan. Framingham State has already begun to
  partner with its major feeder schools to improve STEM readiness. In fall of 2011 20.5%
  of incoming students from our partner schools required math remediation. Through its
  partnerships, Framingham State reduced this number to 10 percent in 2013. Through these efforts and others, the total enrollment in STEM at Framingham State has increased from 660 declared majors in Fall 2010 to 1033 in Fall 2014.

Today’s participants were asked to commit to new action in one of four areas: building networks of colleges around promoting completion, creating K-16 partnerships around college readiness, investing in high school counselors as part of the First Lady’s Reach Higher initiative, and increasing the number of college graduates in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

The President will announce new steps on how his Administration is helping to support these actions, including announcing $10 million to help promote college completion and a $30 million AmeriCorps program that will improve low-income students’ access to college.

Today’s event is the second College Opportunity Day of Action, and will include a progress report on the commitments made at the first day of action on January 14, 2014.

Expanding opportunity for more students to enroll and succeed in college, especially low-income and underrepresented students, is vital to building a strong economy and a strong middle class.

Today, only 9 percent of those born in the lowest family income quartile attain a bachelor’s degree by age 25, compared to 54 percent in the top quartile. In an effort to expand college access, the Obama Administration has increased Pell scholarships by $1,000 a year, created the new American Opportunity Tax Credit worth up to $10,000 over four years of college, limited student loan payments to 10 percent of income, and laid out an ambitious agenda to reduce college costs and promote innovation and competition.