10 From At-Risk to At-Promise collaboration, library workers, student success professionals, and other cam­ pus leaders can build these structures. Benefits Hub Example Throughout this book we highlight many partnerships that have brought about student success as inspiration and to assist with generating creative ideas to pursue. The University of Washington–Bothell Benefits Hub is located in the Activities and Recreation Center on campus. Though this is not a partnership with an academic library, the Benefits Hub partnership is an idea that could be replicated on other college campuses and that would involve a library and other services. This partnership is between the Univer- sity of Washington–Bothell and United Way of King County. Most impor- tantly, this partnership shows how many resources can be applied to maintain successful partnerships. This Benefits Hub offers resources to assist students in reaching their full potential. The campus took the ideas about what students really need the most, identified the true barriers, and set about creating this space. There are resource coaches that help students learn more and obtain training in key areas, based on the barriers they identified. These include training on finan- cial literacy, credit, and financial planning support in signing up for resource programs like SNAP or FAFSA and learning about other networked campus providers such as food banks. Hodara, Riggs, and Brey (2021), researchers from the education nonprofit Education Northwest, report on research and grant partnerships, including the benefits hubs. Their report, “Early Findings from ECMC Foundation’s Basic Needs Initiative,” focuses on how to meet the basic needs of college students. In a recent study, 60 percent of college students from over 50 colleges and 28 dif- ferent states report that they have basic needs insecurity. Benefits Hubs, like the one in Bothell, “provide housing, food, and financial supports.” Through the partnership and the grant, “Benefits Hubs campuses will receive staffing support from UWKC and participate in a learning cohort with other Benefits Hub campus champions.” This partnership is the best kind—working to iden- tify barriers and simultaneously educate students while connecting them to solutions. Though through this partnership, grant funds are fueling the services, developing mechanisms for ongoing sustenance is important. The United Way is providing staffing resources, and the University of Washington–Bothell provides staff and space. After the grant period ends, it will be important to collect data and decide how to sustain this partnership. In this way, collecting assessment and impact data can help make the argument for obtaining long- term resources. In the next chapter, we will review information about assess- ment and evaluation and how this works into the revision process.
Previous Page Next Page