CSUN Approach to Supporting the Educational Success of Midcareer Professionals in this Program

CSUN’s programs for midcareer professionals provide the kind of responsive support services that one would expect to find only at high-priced private and/or for profit universities. CSUN recognizes that midcareer professionals undertaking advanced professional education need to focus on their academic work to be successful in the program, which prompted the development of a level of support services rare among public universities with moderately priced programs.

As CSUN sees it, students should not have to spend much time trying to figure out and navigate the university’s administrative systems. With that in mind, the program manager/coordinator assigned to each cohort works with the students from the point of application through graduation. This ensures that each will have direct personal support with a specific person to email or call with any questions or concerns at any time during the program. That assigned manager/coordinator is also a proactive part of the cohort experience, providing ongoing information, regular reminders and consistent encouragement. This level of personal support reflects CSUN’s special commitment to student success.

Each degree program for midcareer professionals also has an assigned academic lead. This is a faculty member with specific responsibilities for coordinating the work of all the faculty teaching in the program and responding to the academic questions students may have that go beyond the scope of an individual course. Participants in each cohort know their academic lead well and can take advantage of this dedicated resource for guidance at any time that they face an academic challenge.

CSUN also has financial aid professionals who focus exclusively on addressing the needs of participants. Financial aid issues are often complex for a part-time student in a non-standard term program. CSUN has dedicated a financial aid counselor to work exclusively with students in its programs for midcareer professionals, including this online master’s degree in education.

A wide range of additional support services are available to make program participation administratively simple for midcareer professionals. For example, CSUN library services employees have more than 10 years of experience supporting advanced degree students in online degree programs; there is a specialized online application system for programs for midcareer professionals that allow timely response to applications and easy communication with applicants; and participants in a cohort degree program are enrolled as a group, term to term, so that registration is done with ease.