University of Alaska Southeast Named Winner of 2021 Assessment & Impact Awards in Housing and Residence Life
The award, given by Skyfactor Benchworks, a Macmillan Learning company, recognized UAS for its ongoing commitment to creating a positive residence life experience for students through use of data-driven programs.
Juneau, Alaska
Date of Press Release: July 2, 2021
The University of Alaska Southeast (UAS) announced today that it was awarded an Assessment & Impact Awards in Housing and Residence Life. The award, given by Skyfactor Benchworks, a Macmillan Learning company, recognized UAS for its ongoing commitment to creating a positive residence life experience for students through use of data-driven programs.
Residence life has historically and continues to play an important role in building community, ensuring students' success in college and improving graduation rates. Several studies have documented the connection, including research from Skyfactor, which found that the students who reported that their housing experience helped them make connections with other students in their courses were more likely to report that their housing experience contributed to their overall learning.
Nathan Bodenstadt, Director of Residence Life noted, “UAS Residence Life is humbled to be recognized for our work in assessment and program improvement. We’ve worked closely with our staff and the residential community over the past several years to help create positive change in our facilities, community atmosphere, and programming models. We look forward to continuing this work with our community to ensure that UAS Student Housing is a compelling, inclusive, educational, and comfortable living and learning community in the future.”
“Residence life has never been both more challenging and more important than during the past year, as programs faced profound issues due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But, housing programs carried on and continued their work to improve the student experience. UAS successfully used data-driven insights to make meaningful improvements to the residential experience and we’re proud to recognize their work,” said Steven Ray, Vice President, Macmillan Learning.
UAS strives to be a home away from home for students. A variety of housing options are offered, including traditional residence hall suites, apartments, and family housing. Scholarships are also available to students to assist with housing costs. UAS Housing and Residence Life is committed to meeting the needs of the student population at UAS and provides Gender Inclusive Housing (GIH) throughout student housing to meet the varied needs of our residents. GIH is an option in which two or more students share a multiple- occupancy apartment or suite regardless of their sex, gender identity or gender expression.
The Assessment and Impact Award for Residence Life was established in 2019 to recognize colleges that demonstrate intentionality in using insights from data to improve their residence life programs. The winners were selected this spring by Macmillan Learning’s Analytics & Research Team, who analyzed multiple years of data from the ACUHO-I/Benchworks Resident Assessment to identify programs with both consistently high scores and significant improvements in survey scores. The team then interviewed staff from these campuses to learn about the efforts and initiatives in place at each program. An external review team of experts in the profession then blind reviewed and scored each finalist on a rubric.
About the University of Alaska Southeast
UAS has long been recognized for offering programs of distinction in teacher education and educational leadership, biology and marine biology, environmental science, liberal arts, business and public administration, health information management, mine training, and fisheries technology, and more.
UAS programs take full advantage of the majesty of beautiful Southeast Alaska, which includes the famed Inside Passage—a majestic array of islands, channels, and fjords abutting coastal mountains, icefields, and glaciers. Students have opportunities for field study and research in the Tongass National Forest, in intertidal marine environments, and on nearby icefields. Our Juneau Campus is located in Alaska’s capital city, which provides opportunities for student internships in Alaska’s legislature.
Our foremost goal at UAS is student learning and student success. We pride ourselves on offering programs of high academic quality—both on campus and online—that meet the needs of students and the communities we serve.
Learn more about UAS or call and speak to an advisor at (907) 796-6000.