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Roueche Center Forum: Helping Hispanic-Latino Students Make a Good Living and Live a Good Life

The Coachella Valley in Southern California is a series of 12-plus small cities linked by a commitment to big ideas. College of the Desert (COD), the local community college, is one of the biggest and best organizations in the Valley that serves the various communities as the epicenter of social and economic justice through a variety of innovative programs.

College of the Desert enrolls 17,000 students, 80% of whom are first-generation college students. Today, the college’s population mirrors that of our community with 73% of students identifying as Hispanic-Latino and 77% qualifying for Pell Grant support. To serve the needs of this population, the College launched a special boutique program in 2012 to reduce the number of students entering the College underprepared for enrollment in college-level courses and to provide special support services to students with the lowest level of educational attainment in the Coachella Valley.

Dr Kinnamon March 2020 DowThe boutique program, initially serving only 22 students on the Indio campus, started as a summer bridge program with counseling services. In year two, the program served 69 students on the Indio campus and operated under the banner of EDGE — Engage, Develop, Grow, Empower. The program began to take off as a successful way to reach this population and began to evolve into a very special program serving an increasing number of students at COD.

As EDGE evolved, dedicated counselors and staff were assigned student caseloads to provide high-touch, full wrap-around support services for first-year students. These services included three mandatory phone calls per semester, weekly contacts through email and social media, as well as mandatory workshops. We also initiated early alert monitoring of students’ progress and coordinated referrals into special programs.

Services added in 2013-14 included career assessment, student and college success strategies, personal responsibility workshops, mandatory student educational plans and transfer exploration. By year three, the number of EDGE students increased by 1000%, from 22 students in 2012 to 265 students in 2014. EDGE was experiencing exponential growth and improving success outcomes across our student population. As a result, EDGE was institutionalized in 2015. 

Although EDGE was showing great promise, many of the students still faced challenging problems with a lack of funds to support tuition and fees. A sister program to EDGE was introduced in 2017, named plEDGE, to provide supplements to traditional financial aid and scholarships. This new program offered EDGE students who graduated from local high schools free tuition and fees for two years at College of the Desert if they enrolled full-time and committed to completing 10 hours of community service per year. 

In 2018, EDGE enrollment reached 1,598 students, with 1,416 of those students qualifying as plEDGE students. The 2018 EDGE/plEDGE student cohort represents more than 80% of all incoming students. By 2019, EDGE enrollment reached 1,894 students, with 1,822 of those students qualifying as plEDGE students. The 2019 EDGE/plEDGE student cohort represents more than 90% of all incoming students.

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