Structured Study

Academic Support’s Structured Study program provides dedicated time with limited distractions and specific work goals for each session.

Sessions are monitored and staffed by peer coaches who are trained to help students develop effective study strategies and task management skills, and to keep the space quiet to help students focus and accomplish more.

Structured Study begins the second week of the semester and will be available most days and evenings in classrooms throughout campus.

Athletic coaches and student organizations often require students to complete weekly study table hours. Similarly, students may simply want a quiet space to organize and complete their work. Open to all, Structured Study can be that solution.

HOW IT WORKS

Students sign up for one-time or recurring Structured Study sessions at MyWCO. Walk-ins are also welcome, pending space availability.

Upon arrival, everyone:

• Signs in and surrenders their smartphone to the staff at the front of the room.
• Writes a goal for how they will spend that Structured Study session.
• Examples: review German vocabulary by making and practicing flashcards. Read and take notes on the first half of BIO chapter 3.
• At the end of the session, assesses whether they met their session goal(s) and submits their goal sheet to Structured Study peer coaches.
• Peer coaches enter student progress data in MyWCO.
• Structured Study is for independent work only and is not an appropriate setting for group work.
  
  

PEER COACHES

Structured Study peer coaches are successful returning students – and many are student athletes – who have been trained by Academic Support to staff and monitor these focused work sessions.

In addition to ensuring quiet workspace, Peer Coaches are equipped to help students:

• Develop realistic goals for each session.
• Organize and prioritize short and long-term tasks.
• Understand and begin using effective learning strategies.
• Remember more of what they read.

Coaches, faculty, and student organizations are invited to contact Academic Support for FERPA-compliant usage and outcomes reports on their students who use Structured Study.

Success Strategies

“Success is not a big step in the future, success is a small step taken right now.” – Jonatan Martensson

Make a weekly to-do list in your notebook, on your phone, on a whiteboard – anywhere!

• Spend about 30 minutes on Sundays going through each syllabus. What’s required this week?
• Plan a specific time to do work for each course during the times you are open. Avoid working in your room.
• Break up coursework. Focus on 1-2 courses per day rather than all courses at once.
• Cross off tasks and work as you complete them. See your progress each week.

Advanced tip: Assign tasks to the same time each week. Examples:

• SOC reading every Monday and Wednesday
• Start your CHE lab report the same day after your lab and come back to it two days later
• Do MTH homework for 30-45 min. most days of the week.

Actively review class information to learn more effectively.

• Start with no notes. Within 24 hours of each class session, go to a whiteboard or open a blank file on your device and start writing and drawing everything you remember from that class. Force yourself to do this for 10-15 minutes.
• Check your accuracy. Use your notes and class materials to see what you got right, what you left out, what needs more detail. Focus on learning those parts for 15-20 min.
• Test yourself again. Erase the whiteboard or delete the file, and write what you learned from that class. Did you acquire the pieces you missed the first time?

Why this works: Forcing yourself to create information is what begins to consolidate class content from short-term memory into more durable memory. You learn it better. The initial test identifies what you haven’t yet mastered so you can focus on those points.

Bonus: Creating content is how you will have to answer test questions, so practice it on your own after each class to lessen test anxiety and increase your grades.

Space out work to create better papers and presentations.

• About one week before the due date: Get feedback from your professor. Are you going in the right direction? Find out before you begin.
• Plan several 30-45-minute windows to write specific parts of your paper. For example,
  • 5-5:45 p.m. Monday: Create my outline for the paper.
  • 5-5:45 p.m. Tuesday: Write the introduction to the paper.
  • Breaking up the work over several days will keep your focus and allow you to create stronger work.
• 2-3 days before the due date: Schedule an appointment at the DWOC. This gives you a target completion date for the first draft.
• Incorporate DWOC feedback for the best final version.
• Presenting? Practice! Don’t memorize scripts, instead focus on keywords or points to make at different times throughout the presentation. Practice a strong intro, hitting your points, and a strong closing. Use transitions. Orally cite your sources.

Plan ahead and stay on track: Review each syllabus early in the semester and add due dates to your planner. Schedule DWOC appointments early in the semester for 2-3 days before papers and presentations are due.

Tutoring

Academic Support provides no-cost small-group tutoring for the University’s most demanding courses for subjects outside of math. All Math tutoring and support is provided through the Mathematics Learning Center. Contact Doug Henry, mathematics lab coordinator at mlc@mountunion.edu, (330) 829-6643 or stop in KHIC 258 for information on math support.

Non-math tutoring begins the second week of classes and runs through final exams each term.

HOW IT WORKS

Students sign up for one-time or recurring tutoring sessions at MyWCO. Walk-ins are also welcome, pending space availability.

Tutors are successfully returning students who have been recommended by faculty members in their major's department.  Students typically tutor within their anticipated major and have earned at least an A- in the courses they tutor. Once hired, Academic Support trains tutors in methods and best practices based on the College Reading and Learning Association (CRLA) standards for providing quality tutoring support to students.

The semester schedule is available to the Mount Union community at MyWCO.

STEPS TO BENEFIT FROM TUTORING

• Visit tutors at least once per week in a subject that you find most challenging. Don’t wait until you fall behind, it may be too late to bring your grade where you need it to be within the time left in the semester.
• Come prepared with specific questions. Work a problem or concept as far as you can, and then ask specific questions to learn how to move forward in that problem or concept. Practice on your own with the tutors available to answer questions. You’ll be better prepared to do the work alone between tutoring sessions or professor office hours.
• Plan extra time to work on your most challenging subjects. Rather than feel stressed or overwhelmed, build additional time into your schedule to work on those problems or concepts a little each day. An even better idea: do the work as soon as you can after the class – preferably the same day – when you are more likely to remember steps and details.
• Visit your professors during office hours. Review with them the steps you are taking on your own to learn and apply the course material, see if you’re on the right track and ask if they have any additional suggestions to help you move forward.

Have more questions or want help with strategies? See your professor or visit Academic Support in HPCC 113.

UMU 100 Raiders Rise

Academic Support leads this 1-credit course required for all students conditionally accepted to the university, and for all students conditionally accepted into the Nursing program.

Raiders Rise is a study skills and college acclimation course designed to help new university students develop effective learning strategies, use campus resources, and work more productively and efficiently during their first semester at Mount Union.

The strategies students learn in Raiders Rise are a 16-week peer mentoring version of the same study skills course that Academic Support facilitates for new master’s and doctoral students in an abbreviated 4-week format before the start of their graduate programs.

PEER COACHES

For Raiders Rise, students are assigned in groups of 10-15 and scheduled for one hour per week at a time that does not conflict with scheduled classes, labs, or practices. Class sessions are led by Raiders Rise peer coaches.

Raiders Rise peer coaches are successful returning students – and many were conditionally admitted themselves – who have been trained by Academic Support to lead weekly class sessions on successfully navigating university life and learning how to be stronger, more effective students.

Peer Coaches are equipped to help students:

• Read course syllabi and identify important obligations.
• Communicate with faculty.
• Develop realistic goals.
• Begin using valuable campus resources.
• Organize and prioritize short- and long-term tasks.
• Understand and begin using effective learning strategies.
• Remember more of what they read.

Conditionally admitted students at Mount Union have achieved more with Raiders Rise*, including:

• Higher first-term GPAs.
• More credits earned.
• More likely to return for the next semester.

*Based on the success and retention data of Raiders Rise students since Fall 2017, the first semester of the program.