By Courtney L. Woods
REACH (Resources for Academic Achievement) is the program that every freshman should know about; it is a program that focuses on the needs of the students as they make the often times awkward transition from high school to college life. Judy A. Simpson, who is the director of REACH, explains that there are four main reasons why students transfer colleges or drop-out after their first year; they fail to connect to U of L, they fail to transition comfortably, they have a hard time keeping their grades up,and they can not make a decision on their direction in their majors and degrees. Simpson, who is moving to Texas before the start of the fall semester, hopes that new students will actively use the REACH offices as a resource for advising, mentoring, and guidance for their freshman year where confusion and the tendency to feel invisible run rampant. To avoid these general freshman feelings, REACH encourages the use of “Learning Communities.” Here the students are clustered into small groups to act as what Simpson likes to call “cohorts for two or three classes.” The results of these groupings have been positive; the students come to the study groups better prepared and their attendance is regular and steady. By the fall, REACH hopes to add fifteen more Learning Communities to the existing twenty-five.
As for transitioning, Simpson realizes that many students have the misconception that “academic support is for dummies.” REACH offers students a welcoming environment to help ease them into campus life and into what road they wish to take toward a degree and career. You do not have to be a dummy to not connect with the university, professors, and certain subjects.
Simpson says that REACH tries “never to say no to students.” Many times students will not know what a professor or an instructor wants from them, a lack of communication and a failure to connect. So REACH has a program called “E-COMM for Success (Electronic Community of Mentors and Mentees).” Here, students are paired with a faculty member via e-mail to help ease the transition into college. There are many other programs, such as “Pathways to Success,” “Mathematics Advantage,” tutoring, and workshops on subjects ranging from stress relief to study skills. REACH offers a wealth of helpful outlets that need to be tapped by incoming students. Inside the offices there are e-mail terminals, a math lab, coffee bar, and more labs that will soon offer the ability for students to work on multimedia projects for classes.
REACH can be found in Strickler Hall room 126 and it spans upward to the third floor. As Simpson makes her way to Texas, Cathy W. Liest will be the new director in the fall term. It is full of warm and helpful people who ask the students, faculty, and the various departments of U of L one question, “What can we do to help?”
For more information on REACH call 852-6706
