Colleges team up to make school more accessible

NWA establishments are taking steps to make it simpler to get into and afford school.

What’s occurring: NorthWest Arkansas Group Faculty, the College of Arkansas’ Walton Faculty of Enterprise and Springdale college district’s Don Tyson College of Innovation entered into an settlement this week that may permit highschool college students on the College of Innovation to earn school credit score by way of NWACC that will probably be accepted on the Walton Faculty.

• NWACC will supply the credit at a lowered price, Christine Davis, dean of enterprise and laptop info programs at NWACC, instructed Axios.

Context: That is a part of NWACC’s early school expertise program, which permits college students at numerous NWA excessive faculties to earn school credit score.

• The College of Innovation is a STEAM-focused (science, expertise, engineering, arts and arithmetic) college that emphasizes flexibility in studying, similar to digital studying or electives geared towards in-demand careers.

What it means: Upon highschool commencement, college students in this system may have sufficient credit to both spend only one semester at NWACC finishing an affiliate diploma earlier than making use of to switch to the U of A, or they will apply to go straight to the U of A as a second-semester sophomore, Davis says.

Sure, and: The U of A could quickly drop ACT necessities for incoming college students who’ve at the least a 3.2 highschool GPA, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette studies.

• The college senate will vote on the matter Could 4, and it’ll want ultimate approval from the provost, chancellor and board of trustees.

The intrigue: Lessening the emphasis on standardized assessments is a shift in academia. GPA is a greater indicator of retention charges, and poorer college students have a tendency to attain decrease on the ACT, in keeping with a presentation by Suzanne McCray, vice provost for enrollment administration and dean of admissions on the college.

• “I’ve a historical past of believing in scores. However I do not anymore,” McCray instructed the Democrat-Gazette, including that different universities such because the College of Kansas and the College of Oklahoma even have made testing non-compulsory.