PurdueAgricultures
Pathway To Purdue Agriculture
By Olivia Maddox
When Purdue University announced that it would start raising academic standards for undergraduate admission in 2009, prospective students began to wonder, “Will I still get in?”
Admission to the College of Agriculture has become increasingly competitive as high-achieving applicants vie for a limited number of openings in the freshman class. For those who need to up the level of their academic work, a new “open-access” program that starts fall semester 2010 will help keep a Purdue Agriculture degree within reach.
The Purdue College of Agriculture and Ivy Tech Community College-Lafayette are jointly offering the Pathway Program, an alternative route to earning a Purdue Agriculture degree. Pathway students will co-enroll at the two schools and will simultaneously take courses at both.
“Purdue is the only institution in the state that offers a bachelor’s degree in agriculture,” says Dale Whittaker, associate dean and director of the Office of Academic Programs in Agriculture, who led the development committee. “The Pathway Program will give more students access to a degree in agriculture as well as help them successfully complete it.”
Becoming part of Purdue
Unlike transfer programs, co-enrollment will allow students to immediately become part of the Purdue community. Here’s how it works: Students take general education courses at Ivy Tech and one agriculture course each semester at Purdue. In addition to taking classes with others in their agriculture major, they have the same access to computing labs, libraries, recreational facilities, extracurricular activities and athletic events as other Purdue students. They have a Purdue advisor and can even live in campus housing. When students complete an associate degree in agriculture from Ivy Tech (and continue to meet eligibility requirements), they are guaranteed admission into Purdue’s College of Agriculture to earn a bachelor’s degree.
Admission officials report that interest is growing as prospective students and their families, guidance counselors and agriculture teachers learn about the new offering. Claudia Suarez, who coordinates Pathway admission for Ivy Tech, says that applications started coming in right after the program Web site went up in October.
Approximately 30 students will be accepted for the inaugural year.
Improving the odds
The Pathway Program is not just about student access—it’s also about student success. “This partnership with Ivy Tech improves the odds of success for students who might need additional academic preparation prior to enrolling in the College of Agriculture,” says Jay Akridge, Glenn W. Sample Dean of Agriculture.
Students can take any necessary remedial courses, particularly in mathematics and science, at Ivy Tech to prepare for admission to the program and more rigorous coursework. College of Agriculture majors are required to take a science core, which includes biology, chemistry, calculus and statistics. These courses are often a stumbling block for agriculture majors who are not academically prepared for them. Roughly 25 percent receive near-failing or failing grades or withdraw from these courses the first time that they take them, according to John Graveel, assistant dean of academic programs and professor of agronomy, who heads up Purdue Agriculture’s retention effort. About 15 percent of agriculture freshmen don’t return for their sophomore year.
Whittaker expects the Pathway Program to translate into higher retention and graduation rates at both institutions. “Our goal is that students in the program will graduate in two years and then in four years at as high a rate as—if not higher than—students who begin at Purdue in the College of Agriculture.”
Beyond West Lafayette
The Purdue Agriculture-Ivy Tech partnership reflects strategic initiatives by the Indiana Commission for Higher Education, the state’s coordinating agency for higher education, to develop a seamless system and make transferring among state institutions easier.
Purdue Agriculture had to look no further than a 50-year-old transfer agreement with Vincennes University for an example of a successful academic collaboration between two universities. A Purdue Agriculture faculty member is on site at Vincennes to teach classes and coordinate the program. Students who complete an associate degree in agriculture at Vincennes are then automatically admitted to the College of Agriculture.
The Pathway Program is not Purdue Agriculture’s first cooperative venture with Ivy Tech. Ivy Tech’s designation as Indiana’s community college in 2005 helped lay the groundwork to offer Purdue-certified agriculture classes at several campuses around the state. Students who complete an associate of science degree in agriculture at Ivy Tech can transfer to College of Agriculture bachelor’s degree programs if they meet transfer criteria.
“They are teaching Purdue courses and a Purdue curriculum,” says Graveel, who coordinates with agriculture faculty at other campuses. To make sure everyone is on the same track, all faculty who teach Purdue Agriculture classes at Vincennes, Ivy Tech and the Purdue regional campuses get together with their West Lafayette counterparts annually to talk about the courses and what additional information they need, he says.
Graduation the goal
Whittaker says the Pathway Program and the transfer programs give students more options to find the learning environment that best suits them. “We’re working hard to build capacity, open access and lower cost,” Whittaker says. “We’re interested in student success, and we measure our success by their success. And success is that students get a degree.”
Purdue Agriculture-Ivy Tech Pathway Program
•Take classes at Purdue and Ivy Tech-Lafayette simultaneously
•Have access to Purdue academic resources, student activities and housing
•Receive guaranteed admission to Purdue College of Agriculture
•Earn associate degree from Ivy Tech and bachelor’s degree from Purdue
• Find applications and eligibility requirements at:
Contact Olivia Maddox at
Purdue Agricultures / Story Link/
1