> Faculty

Community Colleges Are the Way

For a large and growing population of disadvantaged young adults, the path to higher education seems impossibly steep. Far too many leave high school academically and personally underprepared for college work. For low-income and underprepared students, community colleges represent the only realistic avenue to higher education. Unfortunately, these students have not been well served by our community colleges. We need to find new ways to approach these students with a transformative educational experience that will enable them to overcome their history of low academic achievement.

A Need for Knowledge Professionals

With the world’s economy increasingly driven by digital technologies and a growing demand for knowledge workers with college degrees, the United States can no longer afford to let significant numbers of students drift away from community colleges without the essential knowledge, technical skills, and credentials employers seek.

An Innovative Program

The Academy for College Excellence (ACE) is a full-time, first-semester community college program that targets the needs of underprepared and at-risk students, while equipping them to succeed in the technology-driven, 21st-century economy. With higher retention rates than the average community college student population and improved academic success for students, ACE has proved remarkably effective.  A highly collaborative enterprise that teaches teamwork and personal responsibility, the ACE approach also promotes individuals’ self-exploration, self-improvement, and persistence. The result is a transformational learning experience unlike any its students have previously known.

ACE Outcomes

1. Transform students from within
2. Create tomorrow’s leaders
3. Work within and change knowledge-based cultures
4. Improve social justice in the local community
5. Change the way community colleges work with vulnerable students

ACE’s curriculum includes an array of proven and innovative strategies that give at-risk students the best chance to move successfully into regular community college academic programs. ACE’s semester of college-credit courses lights the fire of intellectual curiosity in students and accelerates the acquisition of skills essential for academic success. Most importantly, ACE helps students take charge of their learning through innovative teaching methods that create conditions supportive of learning in their minds, bodies, and lives. The ACE semester lets students reclaim the educational experience as their own and gives them a secure foothold on pathways to knowledge-based careers.