Enhancing Student Development

The Haverford educational experience is enhanced by myriad programs and departments that support students and enrich their intellectual and personal development. In the next phase of institutional development, we will seek to build on strengths and reimagine areas of student support where we can serve our students in newer or more productive ways.

  1. Enhance and integrate advising. Augment advising to encourage all students, from their first days at Haverford, to be thinking about the possible trajectories that they can create for themselves, pulling together curricular, co-­curricular and off-­campus elements such as internships, international research, and service learning experiences; build on the momentum of the new Center for Career and Professional Advising in encouraging students to take advantage of the many opportunities that faculty, staff and alumni can offer in helping students envision and experiment with a variety of life paths.
  2. Coordinate and enrich student support offices. Support the continuation of the Office of Academic Resources (OAR)/Writing Center through raising funds to sustain the partnership beyond the initial years of the current grant; expand its portfolio to become a true teaching and learning center, where initiatives related to innovative pedagogy and strategies to reach all types of learners could be supported; consider expanding the programs that it currently supports so that student access is centralized; liaise consistently with campus technological initiatives and expertise to maximize the contribution of technology to student learning. Continue to grow programs around oral presentation, resonant with self-­presentation skill building offered by the Center for Career and Professional Advising. Support and extend as necessary current efforts to determine best practices in the accommodation response to disabilities as our student population evolves and presents more numerous and more complex physical and learning challenges; examine whether collaboration with other institutions could help us keep pace with student needs and technological advances, and determine what level and type of coordination on campus will be most appropriate to our size and capacity.
  3. Bolster and broaden support for student well-­being. Conduct a review of Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) and overall mental health support for students that includes (1) institutional policies and practices that bear on and respond to student mental health; and (2) staffing, structure, and services at CAPS. Examine whether the Women’s Center and the Health Center, with some staffing adjustments, could become more centrally involved with the academic direction and scholarly activities of the College; emphasize their educational dimensions while retaining a high standard of provision of student services; consider relocating the Women’s Center to benefit from synergies with offices such as OMA, CCPA, OAR or the Academic Centers. Enhance support of spiritual life and wellbeing on campus.
  4. Build on the success of the Chesick Scholars program. In its initial pilot years, the Chesick Scholars program has proven its value in both attracting and supporting promising and talented underrepresented, under-­resourced, or first-­generation college students to Haverford. The program represents a significant effort to confront directly the achievement gap, to assert the value of academic support as an indication of scholarly strength, and to ensure that our students thrive and benefit fully from their Haverford education regardless of background. We are committed to supporting the program’s continued development and will seek to leverage our experiences in order to fortify and enrich our culture of inclusion, mentoring, and academic rigor across the College.