Online Advising and Mentoring Tools: Grizzly Peer Mentoring (Grizzly Mentor Collective) and EAB Navigate
The Grizzly Peer Mentoring (Grizzly Mentor Collective) program links new students one-on-one with a peer mentor who has experienced many of the same challenges and gone on to succeed. GGC students who sign up for the program are paired with a peer invested in their success who can help by listening, inspiring, and helping to navigate challenges and recognize opportunities. Participants learn what to expect in school, how to approach challenges, gain career advice and valuable insights, while mentors build their networks and develop skills to become better professionals and leaders.
For more information - Grizzly Mentor Collective: https://www.ggc.edu/student-success/grizzly-mentor-collective/
GGC launched Navigate in Spring 2022. The tools that Navigate provides (e.g., early alerts, mentoring notes, tracking success) build on the GradesFirst application, which was used by GGC’s Student Success Advising Center for the previous few years.
For Grizzly Mentor Collective: During the 2020-2021 academic year, 1,559 new freshmen and transfer students were matched with 351 upper-level students. During the 2021-2022 academic year, 1774 mentees were matched with 334 upper-level students and alumni. As of Fall 2022, 774 mentees are matched with 204 mentors.
Student satisfaction with the program averaged 6 out of a 7-point scale. As an additional marker of success, of the 774 mentees in Fall 2022, 272 were confirmed continuing students, and their average overall GPA was 3.059 as of mid-semester. Note that of the 492 confirmed first-year students being mentored, the vast majority do not yet have an overall GPA at the college as of this report.
EAB Navigate: As of October 31, 2022, 225 faculty and staff made 10,328 appointments for 5,193 distinct students. Progress report campaigns were sent to Momentum Learning Community faculty during the third and seventh weeks of the fall semester. 840 reports were submitted. Students identified in the reports were contacted by student success advisors and faculty mentors to discuss strategies to get back on track. In Fall 2022, the Academic Enhancement Center (tutoring and Supplemental Instruction) staff also trained on and implemented Navigate for scheduling tutoring appointments and providing meeting notes.
Goal or targets: Grizzly Mentor collective: The goal for the 2022-2023 academic year was 1000 matches.
The 22-23 AY was used to provide baseline engagement data with the plan to set targets moving forward.
Time period/duration: Grizzly Mentor Collective was in its third year of implementation during the 22-23 AY. The platform has been discontinued during the 23-24 AY, as the program is shifting to use Campus Groups/Connections module, which is linked with the College’s Student Involvement platform.
EAB Navigate was launched in February 2022. Fall 2022 started the first full academic year of implementation.
For the 22-23 AY, 831 mentees were matched with 208 upper-level mentors. 3039 conversations and 12,496 peer-to-peer text messages were logged through the platform. Mentors submitted 191 flags that were addressed by a Senior advisor. Mentees reported an average sense of belonging score of 3.8/5 and an average academic self-efficacy score of 4.15/5. Mentors reported an average sense of belonging score of 4.46/5 and an average academic self-efficacy score of 4.7/5.
We met 83% of our matching goal. While there is a demand for mentoring, recruiting and getting enough potential mentors to complete the onboarding process continues to be a challenge. Providing meaningful incentives for mentors and establishing a more targeted program would improve these efforts.
EAB Navigate: During the 22-23 academic year, 291 faculty and staff scheduled 26,536 appointments for 8,550 distinct students. Faculty and staff sent 150,836 messages including 114,017 emails and Progress report campaigns were sent to Momentum Learning Community faculty during the third and seventh weeks of the fall semester. The fall 22 progress report campaigns for momentum learning communities generated 1,282 reports. 70% of the students reported during the week 3 campaign earned a grade of A, B, or C and 67% of the students reported during the mid-term campaign earned a grade of A, B, or C.
Peer mentoring: As of Fall 2023, GGC is transitioning peer mentoring efforts to the Campus Groups platform. The peer mentoring program is now G.P.S., Grizzly Peers for Success. Fall 2023 is being used to build out the program in the platform and recruit mentees and mentors. SSAC staff are working with campus partners to use retention and progression data to identify potential student populations for targeted peer mentoring and early alert efforts. Spring 2024 will see the expansion of Peer Mentoring (GPS) using the new Campus Connections module in Campus Groups.
Advising Management System: Although use of the Navigate platform after the 23-24 AY is uncertain, we will continue to work to increase faculty and staff use of and proficiency with the advising management platform.
Peer Mentoring: The new platform requires more manual input for recruitment, matching, tracking, assessment, and reporting. This will decrease the number of students who participate in the program as the program will require more time from those who run the program.
Navigate: Uncertainty about further use of the platform at GGC has resulted in some reluctance by faculty and staff to use the platform. This might also impact the usage of a new platform. Faculty are not required to use the advising management platform and may be hesitant to use a new platform if they do not believe it will be in place long term.
Additionally, if the college decides to transition to a different platform in the future, efforts could be interrupted or delayed while the new system is implemented.
