Norwich University Partners with The Affordable College Public Benefit Corporation
NORTHFIELD, VT and ATLANTA, GA (PRWEB) March 08, 2017 -- Norwich University has formed a strategic partnership with The Affordable College Public Benefit Corporation to help more students afford and attain a high-quality degree, certificate, or credential. The partnership brings the transfer-friendly leadership team from Norwich and the entrepreneurial talent from Affordable College together into a network of leaders from other institutions to collaborate on the new national community college platform. The partnership will emphasize helping more students transfer with more credits, earning a degree in less time for less money. The network also focuses on increasing readiness, enrollment, and retention at community colleges.
Other colleges and universities around the country have also been invited to join the network and collaborate on the new platform in an effort to address the challenges with student transfer and mobility well-documented in the National Student Clearinghouse Signature Reports. Christina Robinson, the Chief Strategist for Innovation at Lone Star College-University Park, and Sean O'Brien, the Founder and CEO of Affordable College, will be speaking about the process of openly innovating across institutions at noon today at SXSWedu during a session in the Leadership track entitled, “Open Innovation in Community Colleges WIIFM? Us?”
Robinson said, “More than 10 million students enroll at community colleges every year—nearly 50% of all undergraduates. This session at SXSWedu will address what is unique about community colleges and how we can spark more open innovation among community colleges, 4-year colleges and universities, edtech companies, foundations and investors to benefit all stakeholders, starting with students.”
The partnership between Affordable College and Norwich University launches the first feature of the new national community college platform, a Transfer Student Marketplace, to help community college students find the 4-year college or university with the right degree program that will award them the most transfer credit. The Transfer Student Marketplace incorporates many of the recommendations of the Transfer Playbook published in May by The Aspen Institute and The Community College Research Center namely: prioritizing transfer, creating clear programmatic pathways with aligned high-quality instruction, and providing tailored transfer advising.
Vice President and Dean of the College of Graduate and Continuing Studies at Norwich University, Dr. William Clements stated, “Norwich University’s College of Graduate and Continuing Studies is proud to work with Affordable College in order to shape the advancement of students academically, professionally and personally. Affordable College offers streamlined management of the inquiry to matriculation process on behalf of the student and institutions, which impact the transfer student and overall transfer market.”
O’Brien said, “We are delighted that Norwich University is joining our cause. Like other transfer-friendly universities, Norwich understands that community colleges are a strategic source of proven learners, and that simplified and successful transfer admissions leads to higher completion rates.
O’Brien added, “Former university president and education consultant, Dr. Michael Hillyard, has said that, ‘Those of us who have worked with students have long known through experience … that students have many and varied educational interests, limited time, and scarce resources; yet they share a burning desire to achieve a degree. The path to a degree is oftentimes complicated by their personal factors, and our job as higher education leaders is to alleviate the additional burdens currently experienced in transferring of credits and institutions to help these people achieve their lifelong goal and enable them to more fully contribute to society.’ Today’s announcement is a giant step in that direction.”
About The Affordable College Public Benefit Corporation
The Affordable College Public Benefit Corporation is a B Corp founded to help more students afford and attain a high-quality degree, certificate or credential through its national community college success platform that brings together community colleges and universities in a transfer student marketplace. The community college success platform is designed to increase readiness, enrollment, retention and transfer at community colleges. The Public Benefit Corporation also provides financial support for community colleges through the Community College Success Fund. For more information, visit http://affordablecollege.org.
About Norwich University
Norwich University is a diversified academic institution that educates traditional-age students and adults in a Corps of Cadets and as civilians. Norwich offers a broad selection of traditional and distance-learning programs culminating in Baccalaureate and Graduate Degrees. Norwich University was founded in 1819 by Captain Alden Partridge of the U.S. Army and is the oldest private military college in the United States. Norwich is one of our nation’s six senior military colleges and the birthplace of the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC).
Norwich University’s College of Graduate and Continuing Studies (CGCS) builds upon the institution’s 198-year academic heritage with innovative online programs. CGCS offers master’s degrees in a variety of areas; bachelor’s degree completion programs; graduate certificates and continuing education opportunities. The programs are recognized throughout the industry for their rigor, small class size, high student satisfaction and retention. online.norwich.edu
Sean O'Brien, Affordable College, http://www.affordablecollege.org/community-college-success-fund/, +1 (954) 661-5353, [email protected]
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