Vocational Identity and Talent in Academic Learning

Project Activities

There are multiple components within Project VITAL that are being carried out through campus channels of faculty and staff. Learn about each activity below.

Focus Mentorship

The Focus Mentoring program will pair new Hispanic students and low-income students with faculty and staff mentors to support students sense of belonging. The mission of the program will be to provide targeted coaching to support students’ adjustment to University life as valued members of the community, with a clear sense of identity and purpose. Focus mentors and mentees will engage in approximately eight hours of structured activities and 10 hours of unstructured activities each semester.

Internship Program

The Internship Program will create stronger connections between the internships and the academic curriculum, create new internships opportunities, in particular, the Project Director will facilitate greater opportunities for Hispanic and first-generation/low-income students to chart their collegiate and post-collegiate journeys by creating a strong conduit for faculty and staff to advise students about majors, career options and graduate school, and to familiarize students with the concept of vocation. The ultimate goal is to require a one-semester internship of every student, thereby ensuring that all students have equitable access to internship opportunities.

Faculty Learning Circles

Faculty Learning Circles (FLCs) help train faculty in advising and mentoring programs, grounded in DEIJ principles, that lead to discernment of vocation and purpose. The goals of the FLCs are threefold: 1) develop each faculty member’s mentoring capacity; 2) engender a collaborative learning culture to support student mentoring; and 3) produce departmental mentoring plans.

Strong mentoring plans will address strategies to facilitate student research, sponsor internship opportunities, oversee capstone projects, serve on thesis committees, and support student presentations at professional conferences.

Learn more about Faculty Learning Circles

Supervising Student Workers

The goal of student supervisor training is to empower supervisors to work more actively with students in exploring career interests, develop competencies, and apply lessons from academic coursework in a supervised, professional setting. Further, student supervisors will build their capacity to work with students from manifold backgrounds and experiences, demonstrating the cultural dexterity to increase students’ sense of belonging and self-determination.

Peer Advising Program

Revitalize peer advising program with new training in DEIJ concepts and practices. Upper-division students interested in the program will be selected through an application process administered by the Office of Student Life and will serve as co-teachers in the First-year Seminar course. Peer mentors will contribute to new students’ sense of belonging and affirm the cultural wealth of incoming students from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds.

To apply to be a Peer Mentor contact Student Life.

Redesign of Online Courses

Redesign courses for online instruction for post-traditional students in the Bachelor’s Degree for Professionals. The goal is to develop a curriculum in the Bachelor’s Degree for Professionals program for post-traditional students, who are overwhelmingly Hispanic and low-income, that may be completed online, in-person, or both.

Financial Literacy

Each year one financial literacy workshop will be offered to 75 students. Family members will also be welcome and Spanish interpretation will be available.

The Financial Aid office will start a chat platform to provide 24-hour, real-time interactive services to students and families. Special effort will be made to promote the program to Hispanic students and students from first-generation/low-income families.

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