Pasco-Hernando C. C. Case Study

The Teaching-Learning Centers (TLC) at Pasco-Hernando Community College (PHCC) is a student academic support center that provides free tutoring, test administration, and various other student support services as needed for college success. In addition to serving the college students on each of our four campuses, the TLC also facilitates an Adult Education/GED preparation program at each TLC for adults looking to prepare for their GED test. The current enrollment at PHCC is just below 18,000 students and in 2012 the TLC’s across all four of our campuses received approximately 70,000 student visits.

Prior to implementing AccuLite in the Fall semester of 2011, the TLC’s used a hard copy sign in sheet to monitor and track all center activity, which then had to be manually tabulated into a spreadsheet and was not differentiated by the student. This was a time consuming process and only provided general numbers. In an effort to maintain more detailed data and improve the efficiency of our reporting, we looked into purchasing Engineerica‘s AccuLite program. This program was able to provide the basics of what we needed while fitting into our conservative budget. Students now come into the TLC, immediately go to our sign in station, either swipe their student ID card or type in their ID number and select their purpose for visit. Staff can easily pull up data for any time period either from our sign in station or desktop computers.

AccuLite has been able to generate data easily and is stored on our college server. The implementation of AccuLite has improved our department in a variety of ways.

  • Implementation of the system has made the sign in and data collection easy and efficient. Students can easily swipe their card to sign in since the program is compatible with our Student ID card system and TLC staff can quickly retrieve the tabulated data for our reports at any time. This has been useful in compiling monthly reports and for reporting department progress at institutional meetings.

           A view of the sign in screen students’ access when they visit the TLC

  •  The electronic sign in station maintains student confidentiality, unlike an antiquated hard copy sign-in sheet.
  • The program has allowed for a more in-depth look at our centers’ activity and effectiveness. The data is easily exported into Excel, which can be used to cross reference with our college-wide student records database. With the AccuLite detailed activity report, we have been able to work with our college’s Office of Institutional Effectiveness to compile a report to compare data such as the variety of uses of the TLC, the average time students are utilizing the TLC, and the average GPA of students utilizing our services. This information is being used to make data-based decisions to enhance the services we are providing to our students. As a result, some of the activities have included visiting specific courses to meet with students, adjusting tutoring times, and a revised process to monitor make-up testing.

           Sample of report created by using the AccuLite data for the Spring 2012 semester at the Spring Hill Campus TLC

  • The reports have assisted the TLC to better target who is using the TLC, and who is not. Before AccuLite, we did not have records to show if the same students were using the services repeatedly or if more students from campus are coming in. Now we are able to see what percentage of our total student body is utilizing the TLC, what services are being accessed, and we have used that to drive initiatives in raising awareness to those who are not. Since we have made adjustments, we have seen a greater percentage of the student body utilize the TLC.

    Sample of an activity summary report generated to show our overall usage for a given time period

  • AccuLite can provide a record of a student’s time spent in the TLC for students or instructors. This has been beneficial to provide documentation when an instructor requests a student to utilize the TLC services as part of their course curriculum.

 

            Sample page of an individual student activity report

Overall, the implementation of our AccuLite tracking system has helped to streamline our reporting process and provide more detailed and meaningful data. We have only had it in place at one TLC location for one full calendar year, but we have already seen the benefits. Now that it is in place at all four of our campuses, the data will be used to generate a report to help review our overall department effectiveness. In a time of heightened accountability and a greater attention to efficiency and effectiveness, the AccuLite sign in station is helping to improve that for the TLC department at our institution.

Tiffany Baricko
Teaching-Learning Center Coordinator
PHCC Spring Hill Campus
Spring Hill, FL