Your College Experience, Two-Year College Edition Strategies for Success

Your College Experience, Two-Year College Edition has been built from the ground up to offer today's diverse students the practical help they need to make the transition to college and get the most out of their time there. For this new textbook, authors John N. Gardner and Betsy O. Barefoot, leading authorities on the first-year seminar, are joined by Negar Farakish, Provost at Union County College, who shares their commitment to institutions, instructors, and students. The book maintains the hallmark authoritative, research-driven approach that have made it a bestseller, yet every aspect of it has been crafted to address the specific needs of 2-year students, from content coverage and organization, to activities, assessment, and design. Each new copy of the text can be packaged with LearningCurve, a new adaptive, online assessment tool.

A full package of instructional support materials — including an Instructor's Annotated Edition, Instructor's Manual, PowerPoint slides, videos, and a Test Bank — provides new and experienced instructors all the tools they will need to engage students in this course and increase student retention

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John N. Gardner brings unparalleled experience to students as an author. The recipient of his institution's highest award for teaching excellence, John has over forty years of experience directing and teaching in the most widely emulated first-year seminar in the country, the University 101 course at the University of South Carolina (USC), Columbia. John is universally recognized as one of the country's leading educators for his role in initiating and orchestrating an international reform movement to improve the beginning college experience, a concept he coined as "the first-year experience." He is the founding executive director of the National Resource Center for The First-Year Experience and Students in Transition at USC, as well as the Policy Center on the First Year of College and the John N. Gardner Institute for Excellence in Undergraduate Education (www.jngi.org), both based in Brevard, N.C. Betsy O. Barefoot is a writer, researcher, and teacher whose special area of scholarship is the first-year seminar. During her tenure at USC from 1988 to 1999, she served as codirector for research and publications at the National Resource Center for The First-Year Experience and Students in Transition. She also taught University 101 and graduate courses on the first-year experience and the principles of college teaching. She conducts first-year seminar faculty training workshops around the world and is frequently called on to evaluate first-year seminar outcomes. Betsy is codirector and senior scholar in the Policy Center on the First Year of College and Vice President of the John N. Gardner Institute for Excellence in Undergraduate Education both in Brevard, N.C. In her Policy Center role she led a major national research project to identify institutions of excellence in the first college year. She currently works with both two- and four-year campuses in evaluating all components of the first year.

Negar Farakish is the Provost and Assistant Vice President for Academic Affairs at Union County College in New Jersey. She has served in various administrative and faculty positions at a number of community colleges and is familiar with the student population at these institutions. She has worked with students from diverse backgrounds and is fully aware of their academic and non-academic needs. Negar possesses a doctorate degree in Higher and Post-secondary Education from Teachers College, Columbia University.

Part I: First Steps

Chapter 1: Making the Transition to College and Planning Your Academic Journey

Chapter 2: Managing Time, Energy and Money

Chapter 3: Discovering How You Learn

Part II: Study Strategies

Chapter 4: Getting the Most Out of Class

Chapter 5: Reading to Learn from College Textbooks

Chapter 6: Studying, Comprehending, and Remembering

Chapter 7: Taking Tests Successfully

Chapter 8: Gaining Information Literacy

Chapter 9: Writing and Speaking

Part III: Your Path to Success in College and Beyond

Chapter 10: Thinking Critically

Chapter 11: Managing Health, Emotions, and Relationships in a Diverse World

Chapter 12: Making the Right Career Choice