5 Questions with... Caitlin Duda

For today's 5 Questions, we turn it over to Maryland State Liaison, Dana Baker, to introduce our next presenter...

Here we go, MD rocks with Caitlin Duda, Community College of Baltimore County.  She is bringing it to Lancaster with a program you can use.  Look for Caitlin's session in the program and flyers at the registration area.

1. Tell us a little about yourself.

 

I am the Program Advisor for the Towson University Freshman Transition Program (FTP). The FTP is a unique partnership program between the Community College of Baltimore County (CCBC) and Towson University (TU).  FTP students take CCBC classes taught by CCBC faculty on TU’s campus. They get to live in TU residence halls, participate in TU college life, and get the university experience while earning CCBC credits for transfer.

2. What is your experience in academic advising, higher education, and NACADA?

 

I’ve worked in higher education since I was 16 years old.  I was given the opportunity to get my foot in the door with the Placement Testing Center at CCBC.  Once I earned my bachelor’s degree I transitioned to part-time academic advising but soon found a full time job in the private sector.  I quickly realized how much I missed the higher education environment and how rewarding it felt helping students navigate their educational and career goals.  I thankfully got a job with Towson University’s Admissions Office working with transfer students.  After 2 years with Towson, I applied for a job that was too good to be true: the newly creating position of Program Advisor for the FTP. As the program advisor, I work with both CCBC and Towson to prepare first year college students to transition as a Towson student in as little as one semester in our program.  This is my first time at NACADA and I can’t wait to learn what other advisors are doing to help their students be successful.

3. Tell us about your session. What can attendees look forward to?

I will be presenting with my TU advising partner: Robert Karp, TU’s Coordinator of the First Year Experience Program.  Our presentation will provide details on the FTP student profile and transition requirements, FTP FYE Program requirements and timelines, methods of training our volunteer FYE advisors, the unique challenges of a cross-institutional advising collaboration, and a few advising achievements of the FTP FYE program to date.

4. What do you hope attendees gain from going to your presentation?

Hopefully participants will leave the session encouraged to reach out to their fellow 2-year or 4-year institutions with the realization that we are all in this together. With some populations, it takes a village, or in this case, the support of two separate institutions working together for the common good of our students.  We also hope they will leave with the background knowledge needed to explore and establish a cross-institutional advising partnership of their own.

5. What do you hope to personally gain from presenting in Lancaster?

The chance to share what we’ve been doing with our students with other advisors in our region is an amazing professional development opportunity.  I’m sure that other NACADA attendees already have partnerships and success stories of their own to share.  The more knowledge we can pool together from our collective advising experience, the better prepared we will all be to support our students.

 

Thanks Caitlin. It sounds like you have some great collaboration going on. We'll see you in Lancaster!