Sept. 30, 2022 — CSU Channel Islands (CSUCI) is the first college in California to earn Seal of Excelencia recertification, which is awarded for a high level of commitment and effort to serve Latino students.
CSUCI President Richard Yao this morning attended the Washington, D.C., ceremony where Excelencia in Education recognized the first nine institutions of higher education in the nation to earn recertification along with six others that earned the Seal of Excelencia for the first time.
There are now 30 U.S. colleges that hold the Seal of Excelencia certification. Combined, they enrolled 13% and graduated 14% of all college-going Latinos in the U.S. in 2020, and they plan to continue increasing their efforts to lead the nation.
“Excelencia in Education created the Seal of Excelencia to differentiate institutions that became Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI) because of demography and geography from those that are Hispanic-Serving because of intentionality and impact,” said Deborah Santiago, CEO of the 18-year-old Latina-led organization dedicated to accelerating Latino success in higher education.
To earn the three-year certification, colleges must demonstrate through their data, evidence-based practices, and leadership how they are intentionally serving their Latino students.
“Recertification was a way to double down on our commitment to serving Latinx students,” Yao said. “This means we are on the right pathway, but true success will come when we eliminate all equity gaps between students. We want to be a national HSI model.”
Nationwide, the proportion of Latinos attending a four-year university full time starting in Fall 2010 who graduated within six years was 10 percentage points lower than that of their non-Latino white peers, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. The gap was 13 percentage points when comparing four-year graduation rates.
CSUCI employs several strategies that support Latino students, who make up 57% of the student body, and other historically under-represented students as well. The newest of these strategies is the CSUCI Initiative for Mapping Academic Success (CIMAS). During its Spring semester launch, the program provided academic skills workshops to struggling students, 73% of whom were Latino, and awarded summer course scholarships to those who completed the program. Preliminary results show that the students’ average GPAs increased more than half a point and the percentage of students who graduated or returned for the Fall 2022 semester was nearly seven points higher than that of the general student population.
Since 2020, the Academic Student Success Excellence Team (ASSET) Scholars Program has provided first-year students, those who are the first generation in their family to attend college, and those who haven’t declared a major with faculty, staff, and peer mentors to help them connect with resources and opportunities. ASSET Scholars, 85% of whom were Hispanic/Latino in 2020-21, reported improved understanding of many successful strategies including academic planning, time management, and communicating with professors during the program’s first year. This year, Excelencia in Education identified it as a “Program to Watch.”