Specialist - Outreach-Continuing

Working/Functional Title

Assistant Program Director - Envision Green

Position Summary

The Michigan State University Office of Undergraduate Education oversees undergraduate academic policies and facilitates institutional wide initiatives focused on enhancing undergraduate learning. We engage in everything from the orientation and welcome of first-year students to the enhancement and oversight of selected academic programs and co-curricular initiatives. Focused around the five opportunity areas for student success https://undergrad.msu.edu/strategy-retention/sues, Undergrad Ed seeks to ensure every student MSU admits can learn, thrive, and graduate.

Program Overview

Envision Green is a partnership between Michigan State University and Michigan-based community colleges, with Lansing Community College as its flagship partnership program. Envision Green is designed to support students as they explore, prepare for, and successfully navigate transferring to Michigan State University. Through intentional academic, professional, social, and support connections, Envision Green helps students build a sense of belonging, strengthen transfer readiness, and develop clear pathways toward becoming a Spartan and succeeding at Michigan State University.

The program leverages collaborative partnerships, student engagement strategies, and data-informed practices to improve student participation, transfer success, persistence, and degree attainment. Envision Green contributes to the university's commitment to student success, educational access, and degree completion.

Position Overview

The Assistant Program Director (APD) serves as a key member of the Envision Green leadership team and reports directly to the Program Director to ensure the seamless execution of the Envision Green strategic plan, including student and community engagement goals. The APD provides leadership for Envision Green partnerships and serves as a primary liaison with designated partners.

The APD serves as the primary coordinator of programming activities at Lansing Community College (LCC) and a co-designer of student engagement initiatives and outreach efforts in support of transfer student success.

Working collaboratively with the Program Director, the APD helps develop and implement strategic initiatives that support student participation and transfer readiness. A core responsibility of this role is to closely track students from their time at LCC through their retention and degree completion at MSU and lead program evaluations to measure student engagement and outcomes against established objectives.

This position engages with community college students and work takes place primarily at Lansing Community College.

This position requires transportation of students to and from program events through MSU’s Motor Pool services. This position also requires occasional evening and weekend work to support program activities and events.

Outreach (50%)
Strategic Leadership, Partnership Development, and Representation

• Support leadership of Envision Green partnership initiatives and contribute to the development and strengthening of strategic partnerships.
• Serve as the programming lead for Lansing Community College partnership and support engagement with other designated partners, as assigned.
• Serve as a key liaison between Lansing Community College and Michigan State University.
• Partner with campus and community stakeholders to develop events that support program goals.
• Develop and maintain collaborative relationships with faculty, staff, and administrators at Lansing Community College and other designated partners, as assigned.
• Develop and maintain collaborative relationships with MSU faculty, staff, and administrators focused on transfer student success.
• Represent Envision Green and Educational Partnerships at university, community, regional, and statewide events.

Other (30%)
Student Engagement and Success Initiatives, Operations

• Collaborate with the Program Director on strategic planning, implementation, and continuous improvement of Envision Green initiatives.
• Lead Envision Green student programming and event development at Lansing Community College and with additional community college partners. This function includes developing events and programs from start to finish, accounting for all related logistics such as transportation, necessary supplies, event registration, event promotion (in partnership with communications staff), and programming evaluations.
• Organize and coordinate academic, professional, social, and support-focused programs and events.
• Develop and implement student engagement strategies that support transfer readiness and successful transition to Michigan State University.
• Provide 1:1 student engagement with community college students to foster continued participation in Envision Green activities and services and ensure successful transition to MSU.
• Provide support to and participate in activities related to the Envision Green Advisory Group as directed.
• Assist with budget planning, purchasing, expenditure monitoring, and resource allocation.
• Supervise student employees and graduate assistants

Research (20%) 
Assessment, Reporting, and Continuous Improvement)

• Collect, analyze, and interpret program data to assess student engagement and transfer outcomes,
• Contribute to program evaluation and assessment strategy.
• Monitor student participation, engagement, transfer, retention, and completion data in partnership with MSU’s Institutional Research and Undergraduate Research Assessment teams as well as institutional counterparts at community college partners.
• Develop program surveys and hold focus groups as directed.
• Prepare reports, summaries, presentations, and institutional communications that capture student engagement and student success metrics
• Provide data-informed recommendations for program changes and improvements
• Seek out research and better practices around transfer student success, community college leadership, partnership development, community engagement, and student engagement strategies.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, citizenship, age, disability or protected veteran status.

Required Degree

Masters -Higher education, student affairs, or other related field

Minimum Requirements

• Master's degree in higher education, student affairs, or other related fields.
• Three to five years of professional experience in higher education or related areas that may include, but are not limited to: student services; academic support programs; educational program coordination; community outreach; academic advising; student advising
• Experience using data to inform decision-making and evaluate program effectiveness.
• Experience coordinating educational, outreach, or student support programs.
• Experience with comprehensive event planning
• Experience managing projects, schedules, records, and reporting
• Experience leading or working with student success initiatives
• Demonstrated commitment to undergraduate student success.
• Experience working collaboratively with internal and external stakeholders.
• Excellent communication skills; including the ability to work diplomatically and effectively with campus partners.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills
• Demonstrated competency in workplace technologies including Microsoft Office Products Proven commitment to undergraduate student success.
• Demonstrated ability to work with students and colleagues from diverse backgrounds and evidence of promoting effective teamwork
• Ability and experience managing and supervising student staff towards program goals.
• Ability to access, interpret, document, and track data from multiple sources to facilitate and promote student success through pro-active and innovative student services to promote student success.

Desired Qualifications

• Experience working with community college students and transfer pathways.
• Experience managing partnerships between educational institutions.
• Experience with budget management
• Ability and experience managing and supervising staff towards program goals.
• The ideal candidate will have extensive experience within a college or university setting; knowledge of undergraduate student success concepts, theories, and/or practice; and experience teaching, advising, leading, and/or mentoring diverse undergraduate students.

Required Application Materials

A complete application packet will contain a resume or CV, cover letter and contact information for three professional references.

Website

https://undergrad.msu.edu/strategy-retention/envision-green

Department Statement

Founded in 1855 as the nation's first land-grant university, Michigan State University (MSU) enrolls over 50,000 undergraduate, graduate, and professional students. MSU is known internationally as a major public research university with global reach and extraordinary impact. Home to nationally ranked and recognized academic, residential college, and service-learning programs, MSU is a multifaceted community of dedicated students and scholars, athletes and artists, scientists and leaders.  The Office of Undergraduate Education seeks to help lead MSU's undergraduate student success initiatives by operationalizing MSU's stated beliefs that every student it admits has the capacity to learn, thrive, and graduate and that it is MSU's responsibility to provide an environment with the academic, social, wellness, and financial support our students need to persist in college and succeed after graduation.

MSU Statement

Michigan State University has been advancing the common good with uncommon will for more than 160 years. One of the top research universities in the world, MSU pushes the boundaries of discovery and forges enduring partnerships to solve the most pressing global challenges while providing life-changing opportunities to a diverse and inclusive academic community through more than 200 programs of study in 17 degree-granting colleges.