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Northwest students Harrisen Speck (left) and Kaitlin Corcoran (right) joined MCC Wolf and Bobby Bearcat to introduce a new Paws Scholarship as representatives of Northwest and Metropolitan Community College gathered to celebrate the relaunch of their FastTracks program. (Photos by Todd Weddle/Northwest Missouri State University)
Feb. 22, 2019
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Dr. Kathrine Swanson, the vice chancellor for student success and engagement at MCC, addresses a crowd gather to hear details of the improved FastTracks program. |
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MCC Chancellor Dr. Kimberly Beatty and Northwest President Dr. John Jasinski sign an updated agreement signaling the relaunch of their institutions' collaboration on FastTracks. |
Northwest Missouri State University and Metropolitan Community College (MCC) on Feb. 14 celebrated a relaunch of their partnership to offer a concurrent enrollment model that meets their joint goal of increasing the number of students completing associate and bachelor’s degrees in an accelerated format.
Launched as a pilot program in 2017 by Northwest and MCC, FastTracks has evolved to include additional programs of study and provides students with an opportunity to complete both an Associate of Arts and a Bachelor of Science degree in four years or less.
The concurrent enrollment program allows students to attend MCC and Northwest simultaneously, saving them time and money toward degree completion. Students receive the benefits of attending both institutions, and a new Paws Scholarship allows them to save up to $4,500 toward Northwest classes while attending MCC.
Leaders representing both institutions participated in the celebration and a signing ceremony at Northwest-Kansas City. The schools’ mascots, Bobby Bearcat and MCC Wolf, also were on hand to join Harrisen Speck and Kaitlin Corcoran – two Northwest-Kansas City juniors who transferred from MCC – and introduce the Paws Scholarship.
“The beauty of pilots is that we learn and continually meet, evaluate, learn from our efforts and make adjustments,” Dr. Kathrine Swanson, the vice chancellor for student success and engagement at MCC, said. “This re-signing is about making those adjustments. We learned a lot from the initial rollout and determining that our design was too narrow and that we needed to broaden it.”
The schools identified several areas to address in an effort to improve the program and provide more opportunities for participating students. They expanded the program to create a more flexible and effective sequence of courses, and students may now enroll in any course Northwest offers. The schools also created a more streamlined admissions process and maximized opportunities for financial assistance.
Leaders of the two institutions said the FastTracks program is designed to benefit students.
“Student success is an anchor in the MCC strategic plan and this really strengthens what we should be doing – that is focusing on completion and retention of our students,” MCC Chancellor Dr. Kimberly Beatty said. “One in three MCC students transfers to a university, so anything that we can do in this type of program to add convenience.”
Northwest President Dr. John Jasinski spoke to the University’s long history of partnering with MCC and working together to help students be successful.
“We partner with leaders, those that provide excellence,” Jasinski said. “At Northwest Missouri State University, we talk a lot about our own performance excellence – enrollment is up, retention is record-shattering, graduation rates at the 90th percentile, placement No. 1 in the state. We want to match that with our partners.”
Jasinski added, “This refined partnership agreement is testimony to what we do every day in our educational careers and it’s focusing on our students. We’re bettering our students. We’re bettering our communities and our society.”
For more information about FastTracks, visit www.nwmissouri.edu/kc, email nwkc@nwmissouri.edu or call 855.445.7461.
Founded in 1905, Northwest is a coeducational, primarily residential four-year university that offers a broad range of undergraduate and selected graduate programs on its flagship Maryville campus as well as its Northwest-Kansas City location at the Northland Innovation Center and through Northwest Online. Northwest a moderately selective, public, four-year institution, offers a vibrant and diverse learning community of more than 6,800 students and places a high emphasis on profession-based learning to help graduates get a jumpstart on their careers. For more information about Northwest, visit www.nwmissouri.edu.
Metropolitan Community College is Kansas City’s oldest and largest public institution of higher education with 2018-19 marking its 104th academic year. The college, which is an open-enrollment, public, two-year institution, was founded in 1915 as the Kansas City Polytechnic Institute and became known as the Junior College of Kansas City in 1919. Its five campuses — MCC-Blue River, MCC-Business & Technology, MCC-Longview, MCC-Maple Woods and MCC-Penn Valley — educate more than 30,000 students annually through credit and noncredit courses and business services. For more information, visit www.mcckc.edu.
