The Lounge

Two federal laws protect students with disabilities from discrimination at the postsecondary level.

The first law is found in Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (implemented in 1977). As it applies to higher education, the critical portion of Section 504 essentially says that if you are a school that receives any kind of federal funding, you may not discriminate on the basis of disability. If the opportunity is available to one student on your campus, it must be available to all qualified students, regardless of their status as a person with a disability.

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Social media has become a game changer for how career services departments interact with and reach their constituent groups yet many career services representatives may not know how to develop and implement an effective social media strategy.

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In one of my previous columns I discussed how educational institutions are creating a compliance culture within their organizations. This discussion prompted many questions from readers about an online compliance training course that MaxKnowledge has developed in partnership with the National Association of State Administrators and Supervisors of Private Schools (NASASPS). Based on the questions that I’ve received, I am focusing this column on the learning objectives of the NASASPS compliance course.

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Student retention continues to have a major focus in our sector and, in a sense, has become “king” as our institutions strive to maintain and enhance the quality of their programs amidst a decrease in new student enrollments. The challenge is that we need to continue  allocating more resources to ensure academic quality, maximize faculty and staff performance and, hence, positively affect student retention outcomes at a time when institutional budgets are significantly reduced.

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As institutions look at different ways to ensure compliance at every level of their organizations it has become clear that sharing regulations with employees and asking them to comply is simply not enough. Employees need to learn and understand the regulations with the goal of providing the best possible service to students. This requires institutions to provide effective compliance training for their employees in a positive and enjoyable environment. Compliance training should be provided in the context of improving quality and service with “prohibited acts” being a natural result of ethical behavior and processes.

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In light of recent events in the higher education community, private sector colleges and universities are placing a much stronger emphasis on employee training and development, particularly in the area of admissions. Career college executives are seizing the opportunity to improve and enhance their admissions training programs to reflect current realities in our sector of higher education.

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Over the past few years, I have developed a sincere appreciation for our state regulatory agencies and the important work that they do for our sector. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting many state officials who care deeply about our schools and are genuinely interested in our sector’s well-being. I’ve seen state officials hard at work to streamline their regulatory processes and have observed collaborative efforts between various states to develop common standards.

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In one of my previous columns, I mentioned the doctoral study of Dr. Michale McComis, Executive Director of the Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges (ACCSC). The study focused on the relationship between leadership characteristics and student achievement in private career colleges. Dr. McComis found that leadership has a significant relationship to student success and concluded that leadership development should be recognized as a requisite part of both institutional development and operations.

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Postsecondary instructors must possess the expertise in their respective disciplines as well as the knowledge, skills and abilities to help adults learn. Effective teaching requires specific instructional skill sets (competencies) to ensure that quality learning is taking place. Likewise, competent instructors that use learner-centered teaching methods in their on-ground and online classrooms help to enhance student retention and success.

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At MaxKnowledge, we’ve had the honor to work with over 700 career colleges and universities representing over 1,000 campus locations. Our goal has been to maximize employee and organizational performance through effective online and blended training. We’ve been totally focused on developing highly structured programs and processes to achieve performance results for our institutional clients.

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