{"id":11629,"date":"2024-11-13T09:04:58","date_gmt":"2024-11-13T15:04:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin-new\/?post_type=campus_story&p=11629"},"modified":"2024-11-13T09:04:58","modified_gmt":"2024-11-13T15:04:58","slug":"great-teaching-striving-to-make-college-possible-and-meaningful","status":"publish","type":"campus_story","link":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/story\/great-teaching-striving-to-make-college-possible-and-meaningful\/","title":{"rendered":"Great teaching: Striving to make college possible and meaningful"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Photo<\/a>
Associate Professor of Biology Anneke Lisberg at Upham Hall on July 10, 2024. (UW-Whitewater photo\/Craig Schreiner)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Soon after Anneke Lisberg came to the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater 13 years ago, she began to realize she had a front-row seat to her students every day \u2014 along with an opportunity to help make college doable, possible and meaningful for them.<\/p>\n

Lisberg, an associate professor of biology, was interested in student success beyond her own classes. She learned that nationally, three categories of students were finishing college at a rate dramatically less than their peers: first-generation college students, students from underrepresented minority groups and students with low socioeconomic status.<\/p>\n

In 2012, Lisberg and her then-colleague Brett Woods set out to do something about that with a summer program for incoming first-year students at UW-Whitewater. This bridge program, called\u00a0STEM Boot Camp<\/a>, has improved graduation rates among these key categories and has become a learning laboratory on student success.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would get students before day one \u2014 before they started their freshman year \u2014 and we would keep talking to them,\u201d said Lisberg. \u201cA lot of what I was able to learn was because I was fortunate to be able to build relationships with students and hear from them long-term.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Anneke
Associate Professor of Biology Anneke Lisberg, rear at right, and Associate Professor of Biology Stephen Levas, center, with student mentors in the 2024 STEM Boot Camp at Upham Hall. The student mentors are, from left, Alexis Morissette, left, Nelson Cowan, second from left, and Janiya Heard. (UW-Whitewater photo\/Craig Schreiner)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cOver the years we would see all of the reasons why students were pushed to the edge of deciding whether they could continue or not,\u201d she said. \u201cEvery time we would see a challenge that seemed like we could do something about, we would address it in the program. These were things we could talk about \u2014 these were things we could help students avoid or prepare for.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lisberg discussed what she has learned about the challenges these students face in \u201cBridge to College<\/a>,\u201d a Tedx Youth @ Wrigleyville talk she gave in 2019.<\/p>\n

UW-Whitewater Chancellor Corey King saw a link between Lisberg\u2019s work with students in the STEM Boot Camp program and the role of assistant chancellor for inclusivity and belonging. Since being tapped for the opportunity in 2023 through the Chancellor\u2019s Leadership Fellows Program (LFP), Lisberg has continued teaching biology and running the STEM Boot Camp program as she has helped to bring together\u00a0six special chancellor committees<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 Disability Concerns, Inclusive Excellence, LGBTQ+ Inclusive Excellence, Mental Health, Student Success and Veteran and Servicemember Success \u2014 and help those groups communicate and realize goals related to retaining students.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe exciting thing about moving into this position is that I am able to see the landscape from a broader view,\u201d said Lisberg. \u201cI\u2019m talking and working now with people from across the university, with people who have the capacity to see all these other moving pieces and make some changes.\u201d<\/p>\n

In her role as assistant chancellor, she has focused on lines of communication from classrooms to campus decision-makers.<\/p>\n

Lisberg said change is easier to identify and achieve at Whitewater because of the way students are committed to their own goals. She recalls feeling this commitment and a spirit of collaboration when she first came to campus 13 years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have career goals in mind or they see it as a path,\u201d she said. \u201cThey don\u2019t always know how to do it or how to make college work for themselves. That\u2019s a really great thing to be around because they are bringing the energy and doing the work\u2013it\u2019s easier to get to a place where we can help connect the dots and make the university work for them the way they need it to.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI just felt like students here were wanting to get it (college) done,\u201d she added. \u201cBecause we have so many first-generation students here, college isn\u2019t just the next step that you\u2019re expected to do. There are a lot more students who are taking college seriously as a way of getting to where they want to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although Lisberg was not a first-generation student herself, she recalls hitting some of the same walls as an undergraduate.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt like my experience as an undergraduate was one where I had to figure out how to make the system work for me,\u201d she said. \u201cHow do you \u2018be a student\u2019 in college? It was something I figured out with a lot of trial and error.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"A
Savion Heaston-Stewart, computer science major from Milwaukee, participates with other incoming first-year students in a summer STEM program prior to the fall 2023 semester at UW-Whitewater. (UW-Whitewater photo\/Craig Schreiner)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

This August, Lisberg and STEM boot camp program co-director Stephen Levas, associate professor of biology, are giving another group of first-year students a head start on subject matter and study skills before the fall semester begins.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe see how much they grow and how much they change in their time here,\u201d said Lisberg. \u201cIt\u2019s just an incredible thing to be able to witness.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cStudents need to learn a lot from each other to succeed,\u201d she said. \u201cInclusivity means intentionally creating classroom and campus environments where students are more likely to collaborate together, with faculty, and with other key people.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Story and photos by Craig Schreiner<\/p>\n

Link to original story: https:\/\/www.uww.edu\/umc\/great-teaching\/anneke-lisberg<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Soon after Anneke Lisberg came to the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater 13 years ago, she began to realize she had a front-row seat to her students every day \u2014 along with an opportunity to help make college doable, possible and meaningful for them. Lisberg, an associate professor of biology, was interested in student success beyond her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":11634,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","institution":[84],"story_category":[],"class_list":["post-11629","campus_story","type-campus_story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","institution-uw-whitewater"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/campus_story\/11629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/campus_story"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/campus_story"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11629"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"institution","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/institution?post=11629"},{"taxonomy":"story_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/story_category?post=11629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}