Wheaton invites higher education expert to discuss community and student success
April 3, 2000
On Monday, April 10, Wheaton[base ']s Educational Policy Committee will host a presentation and discussion by visiting speaker Vincent Tinto, Ph.D., ''Learning Better Together: The Impact of Learning Communities on Student Success in Higher Education.''
Professor Tinto is the first in a series of distinguished speakers on curriculum topics sponsored by a grant from the Mellon Foundation. He will share models for building and supporting collaborative learning communities in an undergraduate curriculum. Learning communities often include linked or coordinated courses or experiential activities, collaborative teaching, and course arrangements that require students to learn more actively together both inside and outside of class.
Professor Tinto received his Ph.D. in education and sociology from the University of Chicago. He is currently Distinguished University Professor at Syracuse University and chair of the higher education program. He is the author of a theory of student leaving which has become the benchmark by which research on student attrition is judged. His book from The University of Chicago Press, Leaving College: Rethinking the Causes and Cures of Student Attrition (second edition) describes that theory and shows how it can be applied to the formulation of institutional policies to enhance student retention.
He has consulted widely with Federal and State agencies, with independent research firms, foundations, and with two and four-year institutions of higher education on a broad range of higher educational issues, not the least of which concern the retention and education of students in higher education. Professor Tinto serves on the editorial boards of several journals and with various organizations and professional associations concerned with higher education. He chaired the national panel responsible for awarding $5 million to establish the first national center for research on teaching and learning in higher education and served as Associate Director of the $6 million National Center on Postsecondary Teaching, Learning, and Assessment funded by the U.S. Office of Education. His current research focuses both on the impact of learning communities on the academic achievements of first year students in differing educational settings and on the character of doctoral persistence in differing fields of study.
The presentation and discussion, both of which are open to the public without charge, will be held on Monday, April 10, from 3:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. in the Hindle Auditorium of the Science Center at Wheaton College. A reception in the Science Center Lobby will immediately follow.
For directions to Wheaton, go to www.wheatoncollege.edu/about/directions or call 508-286-5602. The Science Center and the Hindle Auditorium are accessible to the handicapped. For more information, please call 508-286-8235.