Thriving Students

CSUDH will serve the principle of educational justice by empowering all students to be critical thinkers and communicators who excel academically, graduate career-ready, and demonstrate a passion for lifelong learning that encourages and supports meaningful engagement as local and global citizens. We achieve such equitable academic excellence and holistic student empowerment through community-engaged, experiential, and integrative curricular and cocurricular experiences that reflect and leverage students’ strengths, identities, values, voices, and goals.

Goal 1: Through shared governance processes, create and implement institutional policies, procedures, and structures that ensure that all students have equitable access to high-impact, community-engaged, culturally responsive, and equity-centered curriculum that prepares them for collaborative, real-world problem-solving and personal and professional success.

Key activities:

• By Fall 2023, external advisory boards will be established at the department or college level for regular consultation regarding ways to embed experiential learning and career exploration and preparation into the curriculum.
• By Spring 2023, the campus will create cross-divisional teams (faculty, advisors, learning support and career center staff) that will work to align learning support programs, co-curriculum experiences, and career exploration with the undergraduate curriculum in ways that ensure equitable access and support a culturally engaging and anti-oppressive campus learning environment.
• By Spring 2024, the campus will establish a community-engaged learning requirement for undergraduate students.
• By Spring 2024, the campus will establish faculty-led structures and provide resources to support the curriculum approval, implementation, and assessment of at least two high-impact practices in every major undergraduate program of study. Such high-impact practices may include, but are not limited to, community engaged learning experiences, global learning experiences, writing intensive courses, and faculty mentored research and projects.
• By Fall 2024, the campus will create a cross-divisional team of faculty and staff that will design and implement culturally-sustaining first-year learning communities of pre-enrolled first-time, first-year students who take, as a cohort, at least two G.E. courses that have learning supports, co-curricular experiences, and career exploration built-in.
• By Fall 2025, the campus community will revise its Institutional Learning Outcomes for graduate and undergraduate students to align with the campus’ mission, vision, and values and develop a plan to assess these outcomes on a five-year cycle.
• By Fall 2026, the campus will research and implement an e-portfolio system that will provide students with opportunities to reflect on and integrate their learning experiences, demonstrate and reflect on their thinking and skill development over time, and share their work and these reflections for a variety of audiences, including potential employers; such a system will be intentionally embedded in the undergraduate curriculum, available to all graduate programs, and could be used for both institutional assessment and credit for prior learning.
• By Spring 2027, each student-facing unit (including all academic programs) will perform a data-informed, intersectional equity assessment and create a plan of action with recommendations to address any equity gaps uncovered. Particular areas for review include but are not limited to: recruitment and retention of Black, Asian, Pacific Islander, Latinx, and Native American students; academic outcomes and support structures for diverse student populations, such as students of underserved communities, veterans, older adults, and LGBTQ+ students; limitations on academic and cocurricular involvement for undocumented, mixed-status, and low-income students.
• By Fall 2027, all undergraduate programs will include at least two required courses that have been approved to include at least one HIP.

Goal 2: Support students to overcome barriers and navigate CSUDH by providing programs and services for holistic success at all levels.

Key Activities:

• By Fall 2022, the campus will restructure advising and other support structures with the goal of offering students holistic, coordinated support and guidance from first and second year advisors, major/faculty advisors, career advisors, graduation specialists, case managers, and internship coordinators all in one, clearly identified space.
• By Fall 2023, the campus will ensure all affinity centers (Women's Resource Center, Toro Dreamers Success Center, American Indian Center, Rose Black Resource Center, Queer Culture and Resource Center, Latinx Center, Asian and Pacific Cultural Center) have functional space and operating budgets so they can cultivate supportive communities that help students develop a sense of belonging and acquire the tools and resources needed to successfully navigate CSUDH.
• By Spring 2024, the campus will establish cross-divisional working groups to review and revise policies that serve as inequitable administrative barriers to student success.
• By Summer 2024, the campus will collaborate to redesign New Student Orientation and First-, Second, and Transfer-year experiences so they are more integrated and focused on major and career exploration, student leadership and engagement, and making a plan for their full CSUDH journey and beyond.
• By Spring 2025, the campus will begin assessing the new advising realignment with a full assessment report on the advising restructure submitted to the President’s cabinet with recommendations for responding to its findings by Fall 2026.