Gateway Community College (GCC) is one of only four colleges in the country to be validated by the U.S. Department of Education’s Supporting Student Success: Adult Education and Remedial Education Reform in Community Colleges grant, to support student-success programs from 2015 through 2017 that target community college students who are in need of academic remediation.

GCC was recently identified by the U.S. Department of Education as excelling in the area of student acceleration. Gateway’s Resource, Education and Training (GREAT) Center was recognized for several programs including a free 3-week summer and winter intercession Math and English Boot Camp which includes coursework on College Competencies 101, Financial Aid, New Student Orientation and Documents needed for School. Staff also meets one-on-one with students to monitor progress.

The initiative, spearheaded by the  Office of Career, Technical, and Adult Education (OCTAE), supports President Obama’s, and the U.S. Department of Education’s goals for accelerated learning, is “an investment aimed at identifying successful programs at community colleges across the United States in the areas of acceleration, contextualization, hybrid, and student supports.” 

GCC President, Dr. Dorsey Kendrick, Victoria Bozzuto, Dean of Workforce Development and Community Partnerships, and Erika Lynch, Director of Workforce Development will be in  Washington, D.C for the Thought Leaders Summit on September 23. The Summit brings together the four validated sites (LaGuardia Community College, Gateway Community College, Amarillo Community College and St. Louis Community College) with other community college and adult education practitioners and representatives from the U.S. Department of Education (ED) to review the finding of the validation and discuss the next steps moving forward. The Summit will also offer participants an opportunity to provide feedback on how initiatives for the upcoming year can support future efforts of community colleges and adult education sectors.

The initiative, conducted by the Manhattan Strategy Group, is an investment aimed at identifying successful programs at community colleges across the United States in the areas of acceleration, contextualization, hybrid, and student supports. It seeks to identify how community colleges are aligning with adult education programs to support low-performing students in furthering their post-secondary education and employment goals.

The goal of the Reform is to identify community colleges to be validated, identify alignment practices between developmental and adult education, design validation rubrics, convene a task force, validate alignment practices at community college sites and provide technical assistance product development. The validation process involves interviews with key staff as well as document review. The four validated sites including Gateway Community College are also under consideration for a U.S. Department of Education grant to be announced in 2017.

For additional information about the Education’s Supporting Student Success: Adult Education and Remedial Education Reform in Community Colleges initiative contact Vicki Bozzuto, Dean of Workforce Development and Continuing Education at (203) 285-2408