MCC’s new focus on academic momentum

Following its participation in a national opportunity program and aligned with a new state-level educational approach, Monroe Community College is becoming what Michael Jacobs has nicknamed “College 3.0.” 

“What we’ve been calling College 3.0, if you will, is really about not just student success while they’re at college, but thinking about post-completion outcomes,” says Jacobs, MCC provost. He uses student advisement as an example.

“It used to be, in community colleges in particular, the approach was not to advise them more than one semester in advance. The attitude was: ‘This is what you’re going to take next semester. If you’re still here, come see us,’” he explains. “With College 2.0, which was called Guided Pathways, we started thinking about the entire journey. We’re going to set you up for your entire time here. We’re going to tell you what classes you need to take, when you need to take them, and how that’s going to help you graduate on time.”

The new advising model is holistic rather than transactional, meaning it considers all aspects of the student. The school will no longer rely solely on instructors to take on that responsibility, as it has hired 13 student success coaches and implemented an advising caseload system.

“As a former faculty member, and rightly so, our expertise and discipline can help students think about their further education, their career trajectory, actual learning in the classroom,” notes Donna Linderman, SUNY senior vice chancellor for student success. “But we need that additional support because there’s multiple dimensions that impact a student’s ability to stay on track.

“And this is not just about students who are struggling,” she adds. “Sometimes students who have tremendous ability can be identified for undergraduate research or internship or scholarship opportunities with more carefully structured supports and monitoring.”

In addition to student advising, classes and curriculum have been restructured to focus on student outcomes. For example, credit-bearing “gateway” classes such as Math 101 or English 101 will be offered at the same time as co-requisite, developmental, or lab courses instead of sequentially. This will both aid students and reduce enrollment bottlenecks, Jacobs says.

Finally, he says, MCC’s curriculum has been reworked to place greater emphasis on the skills, outcomes, and competencies required by the workforce.

This reform effort comes after MCC’s selection in 2023 as one of 10 community colleges in the Aspen Institute’s “Unlocking Opportunity” program. The initiative studied how to improve community college graduation outcomes and connect students with workforce opportunities. The institute released its report on the project in December, providing case studies and a framework for leaders to support their reform strategy.

MCC is also making these improvements to align with the continued rollout of SUNY’s Academic Momentum Campaign. The campaign has set ambitious goals systemwide, focusing on increasing graduation rates, one-year retention, credit accumulation, timely completion of gateway English and math courses, and Free Application for Federal Student Aid completion rates.

For example, on-time graduation rates are targeted to improve from 19.6 percent to 29 percent for associate’s degrees and from 54.3 percent to 60 percent for baccalaureate degrees. 

Campuses launched plans to meet these goals last month and will conduct reviews and check-ins in August, according to the campaign overview. In addition, the campaign has its Academic Momentum Fellows, 24 faculty and staff who have expertise that will also integrate into the plans.

“The Academic Momentum Campaign, which involves all of SUNY’s colleges, is very much built on the type of work that (Jacobs) described taking place,” says Linderman. “One of the best elements of what SUNY set up is greater collaboration between campuses around this work. There’s a lot of good stuff happening on individual campuses in these spaces, but what SUNY has done so well is develop a framework by which campuses can connect and discuss and build with each other on best practices that maybe were happening in institutions.”

“MCC was chosen to host the Western New York Summit,” Jacobs adds. “We had all these great peer institutions and partner institutions developing and sharing out our ideas together in the same room.”

Much of the rollout from SUNY and MCC has been in the academic literature for some time. However, both Linderman and Jacobs agree that any change takes a long time and the reform at this level is huge.

“SUNY, without this being legislated and as the largest integrated public system in the country, has made very good progress in kind of adopting co-requisites more broadly, for example,” Linderman says.

These changes come at a time when enrollment has taken a hit across the state, particularly for community colleges. Since 2016, fall enrollment has dropped by 2.9 percent for four-year SUNY schools, whereas enrollment at community colleges has fallen by 21 percent.

MCC’s enrollment decline has been even more pronounced, dropping by 36 percent in that same time frame. In the last decade and a half, the school has seen both its highest point (2010 with 18,995 enrolled students) and its lowest (2022 with 8,283) over the last 35 years.

(There has been a slight bounce back at MCC recently, with fall 2025 enrollment climbing to 9,143.)

All student demographic categories have seen declines, but the downward trend overall since 2010 has been primarily driven by decreases of 66 percent and 61 percent in white and full-time students, respectively. Currently, MCC is a majority-minority serving institution, meaning over 51 percent of students identify as non-white. Forty-nine percent of students are part time.

Jacobs and Linderman both say there needs to be more consideration of life circumstances, which can include parenthood or full-time employment. Furthermore, events such as the COVID-19 pandemic exposed the scale of food and housing insecurity, mental health issues, and the ever-present challenge of transportation, making an understanding advisory approach even more important.

“With more part-time students it does make you confront how you do things and ask you to do them more effectively in these different contexts,” Jacobs says. “We recognize that when students struggle academically, oftentimes the challenges they’re facing have very little to do with the teaching and learning paradigm and very much to do with non-academic, non-cognitive barriers to success.

“How do you create a comprehensive educational plan for a (part-time) student only taking maybe six to nine credits? And also, to say, ‘Is there anything standing in your way, and how can we help you move from a part-time student to a full-time student?’” he adds. “Because there’s no argument, students who complete 30-plus credits in their first year are in a so much better position in terms of completing their degree than those who don’t.”

Jacob Schermerhorn is a Rochester Beacon contributing writer and data journalist.

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