Week 5: Issue impacting HE

Trying to think of an issue, I thought of the major ones like budget cuts, going green, but I knew that others would talk about them and didn't want to repeat others thoughts. A major issue I feel is impacting Higher Education on many levels is the preparation of students entering higher education institutions. We are finding that more and more high school students are not prepared both academically, socially, and have realistic expectations of college when they enter their first year. Along with preparations for high school graduates entering directly into college, there is little preparations for students entering higher education institutions from the work force and have not been in an educational setting for many years.

I ask myself what needs to be done to help prepare these students and what leadership styles need to be used in order to make this initiative successful? Some suggestions that I feel would be helpful for students entering directly after high school are working in the high school; teaching students about realistic expectations of college, what to expect, teaching them studying and time management, and offering college prep. classes for high school credit. If higher education institutions offered night college prep. classes or worked with communities to offer these classes as well. These classes could focus on the same areas as the high school classes but presented in a more suitable way to the clientele.

The leaders for this initiative need to have both a style approach and path-goal theory. Style approach focuses on both task behaviors and relationship behaviors. The task behavior helps the student achieve their goals and the relationship behavior helps the student feel comfortable with themselves, others, and with their situation they are in. It is important for a leader to make the student to feel comfortable and not ashamed of needing to go to college prep. class, which could be a stigma that they face. When the student feels comfortable they will then be able to work with the leader to achieve the goals that they have established for themselves. Northouse states that Path-Goal Theory suggests that subordinates will be motivated if they think they are capable of doing the work, believe their efforts will bring them a certain outcome,and that they payoff from their work will be worthwhile. The challenge for the leader is to determine what leadership style to us, and that will depend on the students in the college prep. class. The leader does need to support students, let students help make decisions, and to guide them to their goals. Leaders should support and inspire the students so they believe in themselves that they can do the work. The leader also needs to show that the work they are doing will help lead to the goals and outcomes the students want. I do not think that there is only one leadership style that could be used; leaders will always have to adapt to subordinates/students to be able to better serve their subordinates.