Texan Mosaic

By Gracie Harvey

South Plains College student Elena Hart-Deleon plans to transfer to West Texas A&M in the fall.  She’s in her last semester at SPC.  So far, she says, the transfer process has not gone smoothly.

“So far, I’m kind of confused on what to do,” she says.

As it turns out transferring can be a difficult process for many students. That’s why something called “transfer guides” were introduced.

Lissa Sharp, who started working at SPC more than 20 years ago, has been busy hammering out these transfer guides for almost two years. As the Title V Pathway Advising Specialist, she says the idea behind creating these began as early as 2019 with the newly appointed Dean of Arts and Sciences Alan Worley.

“So, he started the process of developing these transfer guides ,” Sharp says.  “And really our goal was at that point in time to really work on our five major transfer partner institutions.”    

SPC’s five major transfer partnership institutions, she explains, are Texas Tech, West TX A&M Wayland Baptist, Lubbock Christian University and Eastern New Mexico University.

The reasons the transfer guides were needed, Sharp explains, were pretty clear.

            “80% of the students come in with the intention of transferring on to a four-year institution,” she says, “and only 23.9% of those are actually transferring.”

Hart-Deleon is part of that 23.9%.  She says if she had known about the transfer guides it would’ve made the transfer process easier.

“Yes, it would’ve made it a lot easier,” she says, “just because I didn’t know where to start to begin with.”

The SPC transfer guides can be found on the SPC website under the Degrees and Programs tab. From there, the five major transfer partner institutions are listed with their respected majors and guides. Sharp says the guides are updated every school year.

Sharp says there’s some talk about adding more universities and areas of study to the list of schools that are already included.  “We’ve got actually two in the works right now that we’re adding; just specific programs,” she says.  So, for instance, she says Sam Houston State is being worked on now.

“We are in the works right now of putting together some transfer for criminal justice only for Sam Houston State University,” she says, “but there’s just not that many students that go on and that’s a pretty big undertaking.”

South Plains College has been receiving the Title V grant since 2005 Sharp says. This grant is awarded to improve the education for Hispanic students, but in turn, she points out, it also benefits every student and staff member on campus.  One of the reasons why, she says, is it support student transfers.

“And so that particular part of the grant is set up to specifically look at providing professional development for faculty,” Sharp said. “So that they can become better teachers in the classroom, which in turn is going to impact those students and help them to perform better in their classroom and then have a more likelihood of going on and transferring.”

The advisors on campus also go through professional development. This allows for them to be better equipped to help students throughout the transfer process Sharp says.

The September 2023 issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education focused on how difficult transferring can be.  One of its key takeaways is how important the teacher/advisor role is.  It wrote, “Community-college students more often come from low-income, first-generation backgrounds and meaningful, informative conversations with advisors are critical to their success.”

But the same issue also adds that, according to the Community College Research Center, only half of transfer students actually seek advising to help with transferring.

Elena Hart- Deleon says she did seek advising help and her process was still difficult. “I barely had time to speak face-to-face with my advisor,” she said.

While the idea of transferring out of SPC as soon as possible may sound nice, Sharp says it is important for students to get their associate degree.

“If you set a goal for yourself, and then you’re able to achieve that goal,” she says, “makes you feel good, right? And so, setting a goal of saying, ‘hey, I’m going to get that associate’s degree and it’s going to take me two years to do that,’ and then it’s like, ‘Oh, you know what? I did it and I got there, and I got that degree,’ and then I set another goal.  I’m going to get my bachelor’s degree.”

Not only does graduating with an associate degree help students, as Sharp says, it is also good for the school. The Chronicle of Higher Education points out the U.S. Department of Education mainly tracks graduation rates at individual institutions, and it doesn’t effectively monitor students who transfer.  The September issue reports, “If a student starts at a community college, completes 30 credit hours, then transfers before earning an associate degree, that student would not count as completing a degree through the departments’ metrics.”

As a final note about SPC resources, under the Degrees and Programs tab on the SPC website is another link called “Student Pathways to Success.”

Inside this link, the SPC to University transfer guides are one out of three resources to help students succeed. The other resources include Career Coach, which can help students find a major, research careers, and build a resume.   Also included is a Financial Literacy page. This section offers information about how to establish a budget, build credit and save money.

By this fall, when she gets to West Texas A&M, Elena Hart- Deleon says she wants to do something with communications, broadcasting and journalism.

Would she recommend transferring to other students who are considering it?

Her answer is yes, but… “Yes, I would, just because it gives you the experience of doing things on your own,” she says.  “But with a guide to help you do that it would make the process less stressful.”