Residence Education Model

Purposeful Communication

• First-Year Students who engage in purposeful communication while living on-campus will able to
  • Effectively articulate their understanding of themselves and their role in their communities to construct meaningful messages/conversations. 
  • Interpret messages to understand other’s ideas and experiences
  • Understand how different communication media influence other’s understanding of messages
• Upper-Division Students who engage in purposeful communication while living on-campus will able to
  • Actively start and participate in conducting meaningful conversations (self-advocacy)
  • Promote awareness of other’s ideas and perspectives to encourage collaboration 
  • Effectively adapt their modes of communication to the needs of others/new scenarios

Problem Solving

• First-Year Students who engage in problem-solving will be able to
  • Recognize and understand when a problem is present and creatively strategize a solution to the present problem
  • Actively engage with peers in a collaborative nature to find a solution with more than one perspective
  • Develop an ability to propose various solutions to determine the most efficient and effective means of success
• Upper-Division Students who engage in problem-solving will be able to
  • Collaborate with others to recognize and address areas of concern  
  • Properly recognize and utilize their resources to effectively support solution development
  • Prioritize tasks and reframe their ideal solution to make it tangible and reachable

Integrative Perspective

• First-Year Students who engage in integrative perspective will be able to
  • Understand their own and other perspectives when creating connections
  • Seek out multiple perspectives to disengage with the singular viewpoint, challenge stereotypes, and value diverse thoughts
  • Aid in inclusive and productive discussions by providing awareness to their communities in an engaging and respectful manner
• Upper-Division Students who engage in integrative perspective will be able to
  • Utilize their formed relationships to encourage a deeper sense of global awareness 
  • Recognize how their viewpoint has changed and what has influenced these changes 
  • Identify the needs of others around them and articulate how to provide support 

Self-Regulated Learning

• First-Year Students who engage in self-regulated learning will be able to
  • Understand the value of an individualistic learning opportunity
  • Develop strategies that will aid in their pursuit of growth and personal success
  • Articulate the importance of taking ownership and setting goals early on in their collegiate experience
• Upper-Division Students who engage in self-regulated learning will be able to
  • Recognize failures and reframe them as goals/ growth
  • Recognize areas of growth and how to take proactive action steps 
  • Utilize their strengths to achieve a higher level of learning and development

Development Strategies are used by Residential Life to engage students in meaningful learning and engagement with their residential community and University. In addition, these strategies support the Habits of Mind and provide a defined approach to accomplishing the Educational Priority.

• First-Year Residential Experience
• Plymouth Upper-Level Student Experience
• Living-Learning Clusters
• Community Experiences & Engagement
• Floor/Community Meetings
• Panther Pauses
• Roommate Agreements
• Community Accountability
• Health & Safety Inspections
• Community Advisor Community Hours
• Assessment / Benchmarking

The First-Year Residential Experience at PSU aligns a revitalized housing and residential operation, based on current best practices, with the tools of integrated clusters.  The program embeds the General Education Habits of Mind, Purposeful Communication; Problem Solving; Integrative Perspective; Self-Regulated Learning in an accessible way for students to apply to their life outside of the classroom.  Fostering non-cognitive skill development and social skill development that supports students who are transitioning to the university community, FYRE builds the foundation for our newest Panthers and allows them exposure and the ability to build pathways to all seven clusters.

FYRE promotes student success by helping to create connections for students to peers, faculty/staff, support services, and ultimately the University as a whole.  The entire program is structured to stimulate intellectual curiosity and help students more easily find their niche, feel a part of the PSU community, and be engaged in our cluster-based learning model.

Intended Goals & Outcomes

• Integrate/Connect in-class learning with out-of-class experiences in residential settings
• Exposure to and increased understanding of the seven integrated clusters
• Increased sense of community/feeling of belonging among residential students 
• Improved residential satisfaction 
• Experiencing a smooth academic transition to college 
• Experiencing a smooth social transition to college 
• Demonstrating openness to views different than one’s own 
• Learning about and acknowledging differences in others
• Increased on-campus retention Fall to Spring, Fall to Fall and beyond live-on requirement
• Develop a sense of increased pride and stewardship in facility quality/condition--in a residential community, resulting in increased personal accountability for facilities
• Decreased initial and repeated student conduct violations

FYRE Benefits

• Be knowledgeable about campus resources, and find your motivation to use them
• Feel an increased sense of belonging, purpose, and connection
• Interact with your peers, faculty members, and staff 
• Experience and respect your new friends’ different perspectives and backgrounds
• Be better prepared for the transition to sophomore year
• Have set goals for what you want to accomplish (personally and academically) in your 4 years at PSU, and a plan to achieve it

Living Your Fire Education (LYFE) Experiences

• LYFE standing for Living Your FYRE Education, is a series of lesson-planned grab-and-go Community Experiences to ensure First Year students are gaining valuable life and campus skills to aid in their success.
• The LYFE Series Experiences cover a range of topics and relate back to the proposed First Year Seminar

Plymouth Upper-Level Student Experience (PULSE) aims to serve the upper-level students at Plymouth State University by continuing the education and development started within the First Year Residential Experience. By creating unity and continuity between First Year and Upper Division students, Residential Life can ease the transition and further prepare students for their latter years of college and life after Plymouth. This will be accomplished by creating programs that aim to foster the growth of life skills while providing a safe and secure housing environment. Under the current Residential life model, upper-division students are left to develop many skills on their own. The implementation of PULSE will help to reinvent the upper-division student experience at Plymouth State University.

Intended Goals & Outcomes

• Residents will be able to transfer applicable skills and knowledge from their first year to their second year and beyond.
• Residents will be able to develop a higher level of thinking related to leadership, social and academic growth. 
• Residents will expand upon their current network in at least one way.
• Residents will be able to identify at least one long-term goal and one short-term goal for each semester.