Donors
Investing in Student Success
Since the mid-1960s, UW-Whitewater has offered free peer-to-peer tutoring services for students. At that time, the focus was to help struggling students achieve passing grades. Today, tutoring is seen by students as akin to preventative medicine — when students start getting help early and often, not only will they survive academically, they will thrive.
Tutoring provides a game plan for students who want to deepen their understanding of the material, improve their written and communication skills, and increase their self-confidence. Tutoring benefits both the student tutor, who reinforces the material by teaching it, and the student seeking assistance. In fact, student tutors have a 98% graduation rate, and students who receive tutoring report a 98% satisfaction rate from these services. But our service goals are not yet realized.
Imagine the success of our student body if the center were able to continue to expand services for high-demand subjects and invest in technologies to support different learning styles. Imagine the message we will send to prospective students and parents about our commitment to ensuring their students do well and embrace academic success. And lastly, imagine how well-equipped students who use these services and those who serve as tutors will be to achieve success in the workplace.
UW-Whitewater is poised to capitalize on new opportunities to set our academic support services apart from its peer institutions and to address our campus strategic goal to increase retention and graduation rates.
As demand for these services rises, there will be increased costs for ongoing needs and new initiatives. State funds and tuition fees will not be sufficient to meet the demand for hiring more qualified peer tutors and supplemental instructors, professional development support of Success Center employees, technology advancement, and other activities to expand the learning experiences and support initiatives for student success and center-based programs.
The Student Success Endowment will provide philanthropic support to ensure all students have access to high-quality academic services and that the services will be able to evolve to meet the future needs of students.
For 150 years, UW-Whitewater has been a campus of access and opportunity. With your help, we will help even more students achieve academic and personal success for generations to come.
The Student Success Endowment fund provides transformational learning experiences for students by enabling growth in programs and future initiatives for student success.
The Mary Poppe Chrisman Student Success Center opened in the fall of 2017 to house Student Support Services. In the fall semester over 45,000 hours of tutoring were completed – one of the highest service levels on record.
Mary Poppe Chrisman
Building Dedication
Evelyn-Hillier Kreisman '38
Conference Room
Fred M. & Barbara J. Arndt
Writing Center
Allen Einerson
Memorial Director's Office