Editor’s note: This story first appeared on palabra, the digital news site by the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.
By Aitana Vargas | Edited by Jessica Kutz
Debanhi Romero, a first-generation Latina student at Georgia State University (GSU), found her first year of college classes difficult to keep up with.
Her parents, who were born in Mexico, never had the chance to go to college. But in the fall of 2022, with the help of an academic scholarship, she began pursuing a Bachelor’s degree with a concentration in studio arts.
She was juggling a part-time job, and with a 2.61 GPA after her first semester, she was on the cusp of losing her scholarship. “It took me a minute to get used to college,” she admits.
But unlike at other schools, where she might have fallen through the cracks, a predictive analytics program called GPS Advising flagged that Romero, now 20, needed extra support from the school. She had to attend mandatory meetings with advisors who made sure she wouldn’t lose her HOPE Scholarship, which required her to maintain a 3.0 GPA.
Advisors provided Romero with a list of resources that could help her, including the university’s Writing Studio, a place on campus where students can meet with tutors to improve their writing and composition. Though she was born in Atlanta, Romero grew up in Mexico, and English is not her first language. Ever since she started college, she’s felt the language barrier has been a major obstacle to her academic progress.
“I think I’m gonna use (the studio) next semester, even if I’m not required to, because I found it helpful,” she says.
The GPS advising program that helped Romero is part of the university’s effort to revolutionize academics by harnessing the power of predictive analytics to provide tailored help when students hit roadblocks. At GSU, the program analyzes historical academic data to identify which students are at a higher risk of dropping out. The ultimate goal is to boost students’…
Read the full article here
Leave a Reply