Abstract:

Bellarmine is Fairfield University’s new two-year associate’s degree launched in the city of Bridgeport CT. It is virtually free for students with high potential and demonstrated need. It will serve students who do not qualify academically at Fairfield U but have potential; students who may have had personal challenges that prevented them from excelling during high school.

Consistent with the research on student success, Bellarmine will provide additional academic and SEL support to bridge the transition from high school. We also had extensive planning meetings and discussions with faculty and staff from two universities that have launched similar programs (Arrupe College at Loyola University Chicago launched in 2015 and the Dougherty Family College (DFC) at St. Thomas University MN that opened in 2017. We will need to be flexible and understand that many students deal with various forms of trauma.

In July 2023, Fairfield Bellarmine admitted about 50 new high school graduates (18-19 YO). These students all have academic potential and demonstrate determination. There is a 27-credit Magis core requirement and four majors or tracks including Pre-Nursing, Business, Computer Science, and Liberal Studies. A cohort model will be employed with ample time for study and work.

We are attempting several innovations to support Bellarmine:
1) Deep industry university partnerships to provide high-paying, professional internships and employment opportunities; and
2) Unique partnership with the diocese of Bridgeport, which provided one of its properties at a low-cost, long-term lease terms

Class size will not exceed 20 in the Bellarmine program. Seat time will be longer - 90 minutes vs 75 minutes per class. Additional full-time positions will be onsite to provide immersive, dedicated services, e.g., social worker, graduate support coordinator, college transfer director, job/career placement counselor, financial aid counselor, admissions director. Help will be provided onsite to assist with registration, billing, acquiring internships, research, and guidance identifying co-curricular opportunities and potential resources.

Sense of Belonging (SoB). Creating a culture where students, especially students of color, feel welcome and at home, is a construct that has been shown in several contexts to increase student retention (Hurtado & Carter, 1997; Museus, 2017; Museus & Quaye, 2009). Developing a sense of belonging requires attention to a number of things, such as close faculty involvement.

In the long term we will measure if a cost-free associate degree with extensive academic/wraparound services improves graduation rates compared to community colleges in CT students of color and what is the return on the investment for such a program. In Year 1, however, we will try to understand Why students stay and persist?

To answer this question, we will examine a number of factors, such as:
- Are we recruiting the right kind of student?
- CIRP Survey. Our Institutional Research Office will administer the CIRP Freshman Survey (HERI) to Bellarmine students to measure student sense of belonging, general satisfaction
- Interviews with students about their self-efficacy, expectations about higher education, the most beneficial/challenging parts of the Program, et., and with program faculty, student life professionals and other stakeholders to learn what was effective, etc.

Keywords:

Educational access, Diversity goals at PWIs, Retention Strategies, Academic pipeline.