September 30, 2024

Dear Colleagues

This semester’s progress report campaign starts today and runs through Sunday, November 3. I appreciate the time you take on these; the reports are important to advancing student success as they help us identify cross-course patterns and develop more specific interventions. Our 2030 commitment to students' engagement and their academic and personal journey helps to center us all around the notion that our students’ success is our success. 

Because we are an R1 institution, our efforts are guided by research on how best to support our students. In part, that is realized by infusing our students' educational experience with research proven high-impact quality features. The practice of discussing academic progress reports with students ensures students receive timely feedback on progress, have an opportunity to reflect and chart a path to success, and reinforce the performance expectations for a course - all high-impact quality features. 

Some quick notes:     

Our priority is identifying students who need additional support.  Please submit reports as soon as possible. In addition, discuss progress reports with your students and highlight the path to success in your course as appropriate. The Teaching, Learning, and Technology Consultants at CETL are available to provide guidance to faculty in need of assistance in ensuring supportive and appropriate instructional design for students in a course. Additional information and resources on advancing the eight key elements of high-impact practices in course design can be found on the CETL website.  

Instructors will be receiving emails soon with course-specific links. Additional context is available below and at uwm.edu/navigate. For support or technical questions contact navigate-support@uwm.edu. Thank you for your help with this important initiative.  

With appreciation,

Andrew P. Daire, PhD
Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs

Student-facing language suitable for Posting on Canvas and Syllabus 
UWM uses Navigate360, a powerful tool dedicated to student success. There are numerous benefits to you as a student to engage with the platform and mobile application, including learning about academic resources, setting up study groups in your courses, making appointments with your academic advisor, getting reminders on important dates, and much more. 

In addition, Navigate360 allows instructors to send Progress Reports to students throughout the term, allowing for updates on your academic progress in a course in addition to your grade. Certain reports may encourage academic advisors or other support staff to provide outreach to you as well. You can log into the platform here:  https://uwm.navigate.eab.com/ or by finding the Navigate360 link under the Current Students tab on the UWM home page. More information on how you can use Navigate360 and the app, including tutorials, can be found on UWM's Navigate360 website.     

Instructions for Students     

To view the progress reports submitted by your instructors,    

For Instructors: How Progress Reports Work     

Explaining. Please post the above message to Canvas and your syllabus and talk to your students about what Progress Reports are and what they do. Let them know when they might expect them from you, and how they can access and read them. Remember, a progress report is a useful tool to support students that may need additional individual attention. They are also a useful tool to consider whether modifications in teaching process or approach may be needed to support students and their learning.   

Submitting. Instructors can submit a progress report or alert for a student at any time by selecting Navigate360 on the Faculty/Staff tab of the UWM homepage (click for a video tutorial). To participate in the campaign, please follow the link in the invitation email you received. When writing the reports, please provide a level of detail that will be helpful to students, advisors, success coaches, and the Student Success Center.     

Routing. When someone submits a progress report on a student who is struggling academically, that student and their advisor both receive a notification from Navigate360. When logged in to Navigate360, the student and the advisor will both see the “Reason” you selected (e.g., “Missing Work”) and any explanation you provided. 

Instructors and others may also submit an “Alert,” which leads the assigned office to create a case and reach out to the student.  More information on alerts can be found here: uwm.edu/navigate. 

Reaching Out. The advisors in your school or college may be contacting students who receive progress reports but that outreach varies by school or college.      

New this year, the Student Success Center will conduct outreach based on the number of unsatisfactory progress reports a student receives as outlined below: 

Additionally, any course supported by tutoring or supplemental instruction will receive ongoing invitations to sign up for weekly sessions. 

Reaching out to students can be a significant challenge. Advisors may attempt to call, text, or email students. Many will make multiple attempts to reach students, but they won’t always be successful.  

It’s also critical that instructors continue, when possible, to reach out to students as well. Progress reports are just one additional tool to aid student success and prompt conversations with students, and when they work they can work very well. But the course instructors are still the most critical partner in helping students succeed. 

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
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Milwaukee, WI 53211