NASH Awards $100,000 to Systems Demonstrating Innovation in Course Sharing

Washington, D.C. – The National Association of Higher Education Systems (NASH) is proud to announce the four public higher education systems receiving awards through its Catalyst Fund focused on system-level course sharing, which involves the collaborative delivery of courses across institutions (i.e., cross-registration). The Louisiana Board of Regents, Pennsylvania’s State System of Higher Education (PASSHE), Texas A&M University System (TAMUS), and The Consortium of Universities of the Washington Metropolitan Area have received a combined total of $100,000 in funding. 

“Course sharing is a transformative initiative that directly addresses some of the most pressing challenges in higher education today,” said Jessica Todtman, Executive Vice President at NASH. “This initiative embodies the essence of systemness, driving student success by promoting on-time graduation, reducing financial burdens, and more. We are excited to witness the impactful work from these systems and the positive outcomes for their students.”

The Louisiana Board of Regents received $25,000 to improve course sharing across public postsecondary institutions, focusing on cybersecurity courses. They will use the funds to upgrade their Canvas LMS for the Louisiana Cyber Academy.

“We are grateful to receive this support from NASH, which will enhance our ability to offer cutting-edge cybersecurity courses to students across our state,” said Dr. Kim Hunter Reed, Louisiana’s Commissioner of Higher Education. “This funding will help integrate campus-level collaboration throughout Louisiana to ensure that our students have access to the best cyber resources and training to succeed in their studies and meet intense workforce demand.”

PASSHE obtained $10,000 to help set up a unified student information system for easier course enrollment across universities, aiming to enhance academic options and workforce readiness. The funding will go towards faculty development and planning.

“With a unified student information system across all 10 PASSHE universities, students at one university will be able to take courses from another,” said Daniel Greenstein, Chancellor of PASSHE. “This will break barriers and give students new opportunities at their home university as they learn from expert faculty from across the State System. The initiative aligns perfectly with our commitment to student success, university collaboration, and innovation. We thank NASH for this funding and its support of this project.”

Texas A&M University System was awarded $25,000 to address course availability and retention issues using Acadeum’s platform. They plan to pilot a student outreach campaign and will spend the funds on technology integration and research on student feedback.

“Addressing course availability and retention is a top priority for us, and this support from NASH allows us to pilot innovative solutions,” said John Sharp, Chancellor of Texas A&M University System. “We are excited to enhance our educational offerings and support our students in their academic journeys.” 

The Consortium of Universities of the Washington Metropolitan Area received $40,000 for two projects aimed at improving course sharing, particularly for minority-serving institutions and underserved populations: ‘Building a Consortium-wide Model for Combining Course Demand Analysis and Course Sharing Infrastructure to Accelerate Student Progression’ (Project 1) and ‘Meeting the Needs of Today’s Learners – Scaling a Streamlined Approach to Course Sharing’ (Project 2).

“This generous funding enables us to launch two pivotal projects to improve and expand our historic course sharing platform. It includes a focused effort to foster collaboration for our minority-serving institutions and underrepresented groups,” said Andrew Flagel, President and CEO of The Consortium of Universities of the Washington Metropolitan Area. “The funding will pave the way for accelerated student progression and success while creating vital savings at institutions transforming student opportunity in our nation’s capital.”

This Catalyst Fund builds on the work of the Course Sharing NIC (NASH Improvement Community), sharing and scaling insights from the improvement science testing completed through the NIC within and across systems. Launched in November 2022, this NIC aimed to expand access to courses across institutions at the Montana University System, Southern Illinois University System, University of Hawai’i System, and Texas State University System. At the start of this NIC, three of the four participating systems did not have an infrastructure to facilitate course sharing. However, by the time the NIC concluded, all four systems were cross-registering students and prepared for implementation and scaling of this work.

About the NASH Catalyst Fund

The NASH Catalyst Fund encourages broad engagement of member systems in sharing promising practices that are leading to equitable student success outcomes scalable to fellow systems. Its impact will be far-reaching but the concept is simple: through pooled philanthropic support, NASH can recognize and incentivize the development of our members’ big ideas that, once proven to work, have the potential to be scaled not only across a single system but amongst peers around the country.

The first round of the NASH Catalyst Fund included $275,000 to recognize hotspots of best practices that demonstrate interventions that are already underway and proving to be successful with the potential to have a catalytic impact in meeting NASH’s measurable goals. More information can be found here. 

About the National Association of Higher Education Systems

Founded in 1979, the National Association of Higher Education Systems (NASH) works to advance the role of multi-campus systems and the concept of systemness to create a more vibrant and sustainable higher education sector. NASH systems are comprised of more than 700 campuses and serve more than 7.5 million students in nearly every state in the United States. To learn more about NASH and its national transformation agenda, the Power of Systems, visit www.nash.edu.