Faculty Resource Library

Faculty play a critical role in student success.

The Student Success Center has created this resource library for our faculty with this fact in mind. On this page, faculty and staff who regularly interact with students will find resources to support connection with students that will boost their motivation and investment in their academics while building their sense of security and belonging.

Resources are organized according to when your students will need them and include time-sensitive messaging that you can deliver to your students where they'll see it--in class.


Resources & Slide Decks

Jump to the current week! Just click below. Then, download the slide decks to personalize and share as students come into your classroom and, if you want to learn more about the value and importance of your role in student success, check out the research reported in the articles we share.

Spring Weekly Tips For Your Classroom

Week 1

Week 2 Week 3 Week 4

Week 5

Week 6 Week 7 Week 8

Week 9

Break
Week 11 Week 12
Week 13 Week 14 Week 15

Week 16

Provost's Newsletter: SSC Services & Resources to Know

January: Peer Mentoring

February: Laptop Program

March: Clear Communication

April: Forthcoming

May: Forthcoming

Fall Weekly Tips For Your Classroom

Week 1

Week 2 Week 3 Week 4

Week 5

Week 6 Week 7 Week 8

Week 9

Week 10 Week 11 Week 12
Week 13 Week 14 Week 15

Week 16

Week 1: Navigating Technology for Student Success

Image of slide, click to downloadNavigating new technology can be a barrier for student success. Despite being familiar with many types of entertainment technology, college students are unfamiliar with many of the technology platforms colleges use as well as tasks familiar to us such as converting a file to PDF and uploading an attachment to an email. To help students acclimate, approach technology with students as you would teaching any new skill.

Consider the following:

  1. Check your syllabus and assignments for assumptions about students’ knowledge of practical non-entertainment technology.
  2. Add step-by-step instructions for what students will need to know to navigate technology in your course successfully.
  3. Set clear expectations – if students need to check Blackboard each week for class announcements, etc. make these expectations clear.

To learn more about helping students navigate educational technology to support student success, click here.

Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.


Week 2: Supplies for Success

 Support equity in student success by encouraging students to make use of UofL’s many free resources. Supplies for Success is a program that provides students the opportunity to check out academic items for the semester such as scientific and graphing calculators, lab goggles and more. Simply direct students to the Student Success Center front desk in the Belknap Academic Building to check out these items. All they need is their student ID.

Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.


Week 3: SSC Coordinators Help Students Navigate Obstacles to Success

 Students experiencing academic, financial or personal difficulties have a built-in support system at UofL. Every student has a Student Success Coordinator who will work to help them navigate their college experience, overcome obstacles and complete their path to graduation. Faculty and staff are encouraged to refer students to their Student Success Coordinator at any point during the academic year. Visit the Student Success Center website for additional details.


Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.


Week 4: Faculty-student Connections Promote Student Success

 Students with strong connections to faculty are more likely to stay in school, engage on campus, do well in their classes and graduate. However, students can be reluctant to engage faculty. Reasons include not wanting to appear as though they do not understand the material, believing they are not worthy of a faculty member’s time, or that they are simply shy. Visit the Student Success Center

See below for practical tips on proactively connecting with students and fostering faculty-student connections during the semester:

  • Provide a temperature check to allow students to share their feelings about current course material. This encourages students to bring up difficult topics or questions and provides a starting point for conversation with anyone who indicated they are struggling in the course. Have students share a (family friendly) picture in the discussion board forum of Blackboard describing their current feeling about the course material or provide three to four images for students to choose from using their clickers.
  • Share personal stories during class to help establish valuable connections with students and promote approachability.

Learn more about the importance of faculty-student connections here and here.

Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.


Week 5: Student Success and Mental Health Support

 Mental health in college students is a growing area of attention for schools everywhere and has the potential to greatly affect student success. In a recent Gallup study, three-fourths of bachelor’s degree students considered leaving school due to emotional stress while another study found that 60 percent of college students met the criteria for at least one mental health problem in 2020 and 2021. With K-12 students experiencing unprecedented levels of mental and emotional distress, the problem will continue to persist.

The following are practical tips you can employ to support students’ mental health and well-being:

  1. Support students by adding information about campus mental health resources to your course syllabi.
  2. Set assignment deadlines for late afternoon or early evening, instead of midnight, to help promote student well-being.
  3. Consider embedding mental health discussions into the classroom on topics such as adjustment, stress, and resilience, when it naturally aligns with course content.

Visit the UofL https://louisville.concerncenter.com" for more information on UofL resources and services that support student mental health and well-being.

To learn more about supporting students’ mental health and well-being, click here and here.

Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.


Week 6: Resources for Student Success

 Did you know the Student Success Center offers a multitude of in-person and online resources to help students be successful? Not only can students get personalized help from our Student Success Coordinators or Exploratory and Transition Advisors, but they can access a variety of helpful online resources such as our Savvy Student Guide and UofL Lingo List.

Explore the Student Success Center’s website to learn more about the resources available and designed with our students in mind.

Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.


Week 7: Creating Student Success through Passionate Learning

 While students are not always excited about a course, curiosity and engagement can still turn into a passion for learning. Faculty engagement and passion can be infectious and shape how students think about the course. Consider the following tips to inspire passion in your students for learning:

  • Regularly relate course concepts to recent real-world examples.
  • Dedicate time each week to how class content can be usefully applied in a work setting or future courses.
  • Be direct, ask students what excites them about your course and their college major, and stimulate a discussion during your class.

Learn more strategies for inspiring a passion for learning in your students here.

Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.


Week 8: Beating the Mid-Semester Slump

 If you notice student engagement around mid-semester is lacking, it may be due to students feeling overwhelmed, a lack of motivation or feeling disconnected. The following are practical ways to help students reconnect and engage during this time:

  1. Conduct a mid-semester analysis of their learning experience so far. Make a few adjustments to address their particular needs during the second part of the semester.
  2. Periodically add a learning activity instead of direct teaching.
  3. Incorporate student choice into some assignments and activities left for the semester.

To learn more about recovering mid-semester student engagement, click here and here.

Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.


Week 9: Empowering Student Success: Transferable Study Skills Workshops

 We know that study skills play an important role in students’ academic performance and are transferrable to all subject areas and professional success. But did you know that REACH, UofL’s centralized academic support unit for undergraduate students, offers a variety of free academic workshops online and faculty can request access to any of these workshops for their class? To learn more about REACH’s workshop offerings or the positive impact study skills have on academic success, click here and here.  

Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.


Week 11: Registration Ready for Student Success

 We know students’ minds turn toward the end of the semester push once they return from spring break. A large part of this is taking care of tasks to prepare for registration. Student Success Center staff will be in the BAB lobby on March 21, helping students complete tasks required for registration such as checking for holds, making an advising appointment, completing Duo2Fctr registration and more. Encourage your students to stop by for registration support!

Click on the slide for a copy to share with students.


Week 12: Classroom Meditation Promotes Student Success

Finish the semester strongMeditating before the start of class can lead to better focus, retention of information, and better grades. Classes with heavy freshman enrollment tend to benefit even more from meditation. Often these courses can have more students who need help self-regulating.

With finals approaching, it's a great time to start implementing a short meditation practice in your class. Click on the links below for both text and video meditation options:
To learn more about the value of meditation in the classroom, click here and here.
Click on the slide to the right to download the slide deck.

Provost's Newsletter Tips: SSC Services and Resources to Know

These tips are shared in the monthly Provost's newsletter and offer introductions to services, resources, and research that will help faculty and staff support the success of students at UofL.


January: Peer Mentoring

Students benefit from UofL peer mentoring community 

UofL has a robust peer mentoring community that affords students a multitude of benefits. Mentees in higher education peer mentoring programs benefit from increased retention, greater sense of belonging, increased involvement on campus and better acclimation to the university world. UofL peer mentoring programs typically serve first-year students. All other students are encouraged to consider serving as a peer mentor which provides its own unique benefits.  

To learn more about peer mentoring programs at UofL and to help students engage with these programs, visit uofl.me/become-a-mentor

February: Laptop Program

Keys to Success laptop program 

The Student Success Center provides students access to laptops to support their success in courses.   Keys to Success is a laptop ownership program for undergraduate UofL students who have demonstrated financial and technological need and are seeking their first bachelor’s degree. Interested students can visit the Student Success Center website for additional details and to fill out an application to see if they qualify for the program. Students who don’t qualify for the ownership program or who are interested in short-term laptop usage have the option to check-out a loaner laptop for up to 4 hours while in the Belknap Academic Building. Students can simply stop by the Student Success Center front desk in the Belknap Academic Building and present their student ID to check out a loaner laptop. 

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March: Clear Communication

Clear language promotes student success 
Clear language, with a student audience in mind, is a remarkably helpful tool for students when navigating college. Dense higher education lingo with too many acronyms, abbreviations or complex terminology has the opposite effect. In fact, academic jargon excludes, overwhelms and significantly hinders student success, especially for first-year students. Consider these tips to help eliminate confusion and promote student success: 

  • Write in the active voice 
  • Use concise grammar and bullet points 
  • Explain abbreviations and acronyms 
  • Sub the word “you” for wordy descriptions of students
To learn more about academic jargon hindering student success, click here

Student Success Center

University of Louisville

Louisville, Kentucky 40292

Office Hours

M-F 8:00am to 5:00pm

Phone

tel (502) 852-7969

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