Bachelor to Graduate program at CU-Boulder
More info: Visit colorado.edu/b2g, call 303-492-1418 or email b2g@colorado.edu.
The University of Colorado wants to help low-income and first-generation college students think beyond graduation and picture themselves as doctors, lawyers, researchers and entrepreneurs.
To do that, the Boulder campus created Bachelor to Graduate, or B2G for short, a new program that helps undergraduates prepare for graduate school starting their sophomore year.
The program’s leaders hope to help students reframe their career goals by pairing them with a graduate-student mentor, bringing in guest speakers from an array of career fields and helping them understand what they need to do as undergraduates to be competitive graduate school candidates.
“It’s a common thing for students who come from these kinds of socioeconomic backgrounds to not think of themselves in that way — ‘That’s for other people, that’s for other groups,'” said Michael Grant, vice provost and associate vice chancellor for undergraduate education. “We’re trying to change that outlook so they can say, ‘Yes, I can be that attorney, I can be that dentist.'”
Over the summer, CU randomly selected 42 sophomores who were either eligible for Pell Grants or first-generation college students with a cumulative grade point average of 2.0 or higher. These students also were not participating in any other academic support program on campus.
Each student will receive a $1,000 scholarship per year for participating and is encouraged to cultivate a relationship with a faculty mentor. The program also works with them on writing, finances, time management, how to write a cover letter and other skills.
As the students advance, the program will hone in on steps they should take as juniors and then seniors.
B2G leaders will work with that cohort for the next three years and study the program’s effectiveness by comparing participants to other students. Did they stay at CU? How long did it take them to graduate? How many went on to professional or graduate school?
The program is intended to help further CU’s efforts to improve the campus’s six-year graduation rate. To do that, the campus is focused on retention, or ensuring that students are academically successful and stay at CU.
“What better retention strategy than getting these students aspirational for some kind of professional career that requires a post-graduate credential?” said Corinna Rohse, director of CU’s Student Academic Success Center. “Not only would that help them complete their current undergraduate degree in a timely way, but we could help prepare them for very competitive entry into either academe or a professional school.”
To Lakota Watson, a sophomore studying psychology and neuroscience, the program seems like it will reduce some of the barriers faced by low-income and first-generation students, who may feel uncertain about how to pay for graduate school, when to apply and how to get into the program they want.
“In college, there are two types of students.There are the students who, even if they didn’t have a desire to go to college, their family would highly encourage it and it would never be a question of, ‘Oh, can we afford this?'” Watson said. “And then there’s the category of students who are often uncertain if they’re going to be able to go to college and are here because they’ve done absolutely everything they can.
“It’s really important for education to be open to everyone.”
William Timken, a sophomore studying civil engineering, was also grateful for the help, and said B2G has opened his eyes to some graduate school options he wasn’t aware of before.
“I was definitely thinking about (graduate school), but for me, even with getting a bachelor’s degree, funding has always been an issue,” Timken said. “How nice is it to have people saying, ‘We’re going to help you guys do what you want to do, and we’re going to help teach you some of this stuff you wouldn’t necessarily learn in classes.'”
Sarah Kuta: 303-473-1106, kutas@dailycamera.com or twitter.com/sarahkuta
