TURLOCK, Calif. -- California State University-Stanislaus (Stanislaus State), a Hispanic-serving institution that serves more than 8,600 students in California's Central Valley, today announced a major new initiative designed to improve student retention, particularly among low-income and first-generation students at its Stockton campus. Through a partnership with College Possible, a national nonprofit that connects high school and college students with near-peer success coaches, Stanislaus State will provide coaching and mentoring programs for more than 400 students from historically underrepresented backgrounds.
The partnership with College Possible builds on the nonprofit's 20-year history of training AmeriCorps service members as college access and success mentors to help low-income high school juniors and seniors enroll in -- and complete -- college. Dubbed Catalyze, College Possible intends to scale similar, near-peer coaching programs across a growing number of institutions nationwide. Recent results show that 92 percent of first time college students were retained from fall 2018 to spring 2019.
"We are proud to integrate new and innovative approaches to better support our students, which is why Catalyze is such a fitting new model for the unique needs of Stanislaus State students," said Kim Greer, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs at California State University, Stanislaus. "By tapping into the talents and experiences of recent college graduates and the near-peer coaching model, our partnership will enable us to close gaps in resource equity, help first-generation and low-income students navigate the first year of college, and prepare more students for a successful experience in pursuit of a degree."
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