Student Success Center
The Student Success Center (SSC) serves as the one-stop-shop for academic success and technological support for students. The SSC assists students in college and graduate-level work, thereby creating positive outcomes and improving the culture of student success and retention rates. It also seeks to make academic provisions to accommodate students with registered disabilities. Thus, the SSC seeks to reinforce and promote positive student performance beginning with their first year of the studies and extending to coursework throughout their matriculation. Students should contact the SSC for wrap-around support to help them successfully navigate the college experience. The direct email address for the SSC is studentsuccess@benedict.edu or visit the SSC website.
The SSC is in the lower level of the Learning Resources Center and managed by the Director of Student Retention. The SCC provides the following services to students:
Academic Support Labs (English/Writing Lab and Mathematics Lab)
The English/Writing Laboratory and Mathematics Lab are resources for all students. Professional learning specialists and student tutors support students with assignment completion, examination preparation, study skills, and test-taking skills, and assistance with professional and career writing, as well as assistance in using technology to complete writing or math assignments. These services are only available to graduate students during the fall and spring semesters.
Tutoring Services
Tutoring services are offered for students on a variety of subjects in support of their academic achievement. Students may arrange scheduled or drop-in sessions to receive support. Class exam proctoring, workshops, and orientation sessions for special academic activities are also coordinated for students. In addition, Study Nights events are hosted close to the mid-term and final examination periods to prepare students for successful completion of academic requirements in challenging subject areas. Students are assisted by volunteer faculty, staff, peer tutors, and technology support staff. Knack is an online tutoring program where students have access to a network of qualified and vetted peer tutors who are available to provide help with courses through one-on-one or group tutoring sessions. Sessions can take place via Knack’s online classroom or on-campus at approved locations. The SSC sought to formalize tutoring efforts and implore the use of an online management tool and application such as Knack Tutoring. The use of this platform provides timely data via dashboard and analytics on frequency of visits based on courses, account creation, and completed tutoring sessions. The availability of these services may be limited or unavailable for graduate students, especially during the summer sessions.
Accessibility Services
Benedict College is committed to full compliance with the provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, as amended (“ADA”), and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended (“Section 504”), and the regulations implementing those laws. The ADA and Section 504 require Benedict College to provide qualified students with disabilities with opportunities for participation in the learning environment through the provision of reasonable accommodations and/or auxiliary educational aids or services. Benedict College is responsible for analyzing the appropriateness of an accommodation, aid, or service in its specific context and will make provisions unless doing so would cause an undue burden or fundamentally alter the nature of the service, program, or activity.
Instructional Technology Training and Support
Instructional Technology support staff are available to assist faculty and students in effectively utilizing various applications and platforms in support of our academic programs.
Success Consultations and Success Workshops
The SSC also provides one-on-one and group support for students in achieving their academic, career, and personal goals. These sessions can include an overview of academic programs, learning resources, academic policies, and procedures to assist students in successfully utilizing support resources and services across campus.
Career Development Services (CDS)
Benedict College’s Career Development Services (CDS) recognizes it is no longer sufficient to provide just career skill - but students need to be career ready. Our vision is to implement innovative programming and interactions that prepare Benedict College students for success in diverse local and global communities. The Program’s mission is to transform student scholars into career-oriented, civic-minded, and technologically qualified professionals who represent the best of Benedict College.
We ask our students:
- Who are you?
- What are your strengths?
- What is your calling (passion) and how does it connect to our world?
We create:
- An atmosphere for interactions where student-employer networks can connect, experiment, and grow.
- Synergistic networks that consist of students, faculty, alumni, employers, businesses, organizations, and the community
- Partnerships create trust allowing the students to understand the organization’s values, character, culture, and operations
Career Development Services employs dynamic programming to foster active student engagement in career development.
Our model provides:
- Provide many facets of student, alumni development services, and lifelong learning
- Provide a central repository for access to information and those resources (connections)
- Focus on interactions and relationship: networking with students, alumni, faculty, employers, service providers
- Provide quality experiential learning opportunities for each student
- Provide measurable objectives and understand what drives student outcomes
- 100% STUDENT engagement
Career Development Services include:
- Career assessments
- Resume development and critique
- Study abroad/away career services
- Badging and micro-credentials
- Individualized career counseling
- Mock interview preparation
- On-campus job interviews
- Job-shadowing
- Career exploration
- Career field studies
- Internships
- Alumni networking
- Career fairs
- Virtual and on-site career readiness seminars
- Career technology (Handshake, First Hand, LinkedIn Learning, and Standout)
- Graduate school fairs
- Leadership and service trainings
- Employment, internships, and scholarship information
- Career workshops
- Employer & graduate school information sessions
- Employer recruiting & networking events
- Service-learning & civic engagement
Career Development Services coordinates campus visits of representatives from industry, government, education and graduate and professional schools. Career Development Services hosts career and graduate school fairs and provides assistance to students with career placements after graduation.
Benedict College Veterans Resource Center
The Benedict College Veterans Resource Center (VRC) serves as the primary office on campus to assist veterans, active-duty members, and their dependents in supporting their educational needs; assists with educational benefit requirements; and connects them to campus resources.
Vision
To establish and sustain a nationally recognized comprehensive “military-friendly” education support program involving application, admission, matriculation, graduation, and professional placement that successfully attracts military veterans, service members, dependents and survivors to pursue their academic and professional development interests and goals.
Mission
Establish a “military-friendly” education support program that assist veterans, service members and their families with the transition from military service into a positive academic community in pursuit of professional and personal development by connecting students to expert support services and tools to enhance their academic and professional success at Benedict College.
Military Service Schools
Benedict College awards credit for military courses or training reflected on the Joint Services Transcript (JST). The transcript must be requested by the student to be sent directly to the Office of the Registrar. The student must be admitted, and the official transcript must be on file in the student’s academic record before an evaluation is completed and course credit awarded. Transfer military hours are included in the Benedict College credit hours attempted and earned but not in calculation of the Benedict College GPA.
In order to be eligible for a full monthly allowance, a veteran must be registered for twelve (12) or more credit hours per regular semester or nine (9) semester credit hours for the summer. Those registered for less than 12 semester credit hours during the regular semester or less than nine (9) semester credit hours during the summer are eligible for part-time compensation. Veterans are responsible for reporting any changes in enrollment status or schedules to the Veterans Resource Center. All requests for verification by veterans must be submitted by the last day to add classes in any given semester or summer session.
Veterans and Active-Duty Education Benefits
Benedict College is approved by the State Approving Agency for educating service members, veterans, dependents, and reservists under Title 38, U.S. Code for the following VA educational benefits:
- Montgomery GI Bill® (Chapter 30)
- Vocational Rehabilitation (Chapter 31)
- Post 9/11 GI Bill® (Chapter 33)
- Survivors and Dependents (Chapter 35)
- Selected Reserve Educational Assistance Program (Chapter 1606)
A student may apply for VA Benefits online at https://www.va.gov/education/how-to-apply/ to determine eligibility. Beginning students are urged to complete the necessary applications with the Department of Veterans Affairs at least eight weeks prior to enrollment. Upon receipt of the Certificate of Eligibility from the Department of Veteran Affairs, veterans must submit a copy to the Veterans Resource Center to begin the certification process.
Benedict College requires all students who are eligible for military educational benefits to complete the following:
Specific information regarding each Veteran’s program may be obtained from the Veterans Resource Center located inside the Benedict College Business Development Center at 2601 Read Street, Columbia, South Carolina 29204. The Director of the Benedict College Veterans Resource Center can be reached at (803) 705-3258.
Veterans’ Affairs Standards of Academic Progress
Academic progress will be measured at the end of each semester. Failure by a student to maintain satisfactory academic progress (SAP) will result in that student being placed on academic probation for the following term. Failure by the student to maintain SAP during the probation term will result in academic suspension (termination of veteran’s benefits) for one term. A student who failed to maintain SAP may present documentation of mitigating circumstances. The interruption will be reported to the Veterans Administration within 30 calendar days of the change in status using VA Form 22-1999b. (See catalogue for SAP Policy)
Mitigating Circumstances
Mitigating circumstances are those which directly hinder pursuit of a course and which are judged to be beyond the student’s control. The following are some general categories of mitigating circumstances. This list is not all-inclusive.
- Serious illness of the veteran
- Serious illness or death in the veteran’s immediate family
- Emergency financial obligations or change of place of employment or work schedule which preclude pursuit of the course
- Unanticipated changes in child-care responsibilities
- Active-duty military service, including active duty for training
Academic Load
During the regular semester, a student is considered full-time for financial aid and VA purposes if enrolled in 12 or more semester credit hours and part-time if enrolled in less than 12 semester credit hours.
Green to Gold Program
The Green to Gold Active-Duty Option Program is a two-year program that provides eligible, active- duty enlisted soldiers an opportunity to complete a baccalaureate degree or a two-year graduate degree and earn a commission as an Army Officer.
For assistance in the application process, click the U.S. Army Green to Gold Active Duty Option Program Information Booklet. The booklet provides detailed information about the program. It also has a checklist that explains what information is required, sample documents, and waiver request that can help to submit a complete packet.
Learning Resources Center
The Benjamin F. Payton Learning Resources Center (Library) provides adequate and appropriate library and information resources, services, and support for its mission and that of the College to fulfill its obligations to students, faculty, and staff to serve as a strong informational resource for the community in which it serves and resides.
Named for Dr. Benjamin F. Payton, the 10th President of the College, the Learning Resources Center was completed and dedicated in 1974, replacing the old J.J. Starks Library built in 1937. In 2010, the Learning Resources Center was renovated to its present-day decor. The library is a 66,972 gross square feet facility which has a seating capacity of 540. A ramp is conveniently located for accessibility to the building and an elevator is accessible from all floors. The library is comprised of a technology- enhanced Mobile Multimedia Center and an Archives Center. The library is open 81 hours a week, including nights and weekends.
The Learning Resources Center book collection consists of more than 130,000 printed volumes with access to over 300,000 electronic books (eBooks). The library maintains 3,436 owned eBook titles and are making pivotal advances toward the growth of this collection. The Mobile Multimedia Center’s (MMC) media collection provides access to 30,000 educational streaming videos through Kanopy and owns 2,650 physical media pieces. The library subscribes to both electronic and print scholarly journals, electronic databases, eBooks, online journals, and streaming educational videos. These resources are accessible electronically and are readily available to students, faculty, and staff, both on campus and remotely. The library’s electronic resources can be accessed from any technology device with internet capability- 24 hours, 7 days a week. The currency of library collections as well as their formats are continuously evaluated by faculty and librarians through collection development policies.
The Benjamin F. Payton Learning Resources Center makes available a variety of technology-oriented and resource sharing services. Through the College’s website and library’s web page, students and faculty have access to the library staff; online catalog; electronic and online resources; reference, government, media, archival resources; reference, research, and online assistance; PASCAL’s book delivery services; interlibrary loan; library policies and procedures, and other types of related services. The library’s integrated library management system (ILMS), ExLibris (June 2020), allows students, faculty, and staff to search Primo, the library’s online catalog. Books, journals, government publications, and media resources, in both electronic and print formats, are accessible from the library’s online catalog, from campus or remotely. The ILMS also provides an interconnected platform for shared resources among 55 South Carolina academic libraries. Through membership, these libraries comprise the Partnership Among South Carolina Academic Libraries (PASCAL) Organization, which structurally maintains a shared library platform system that provides students, faculty, and staff at each institution with access to nearly 12 million collective print resources.
The library’s Computer Research Center (CRC) is located on the main level of the library. It serves as a computer lab for the students to access the library’s electronic resources and services through the internet. The Mobile Multimedia Center (MMC), located on the library’s court (ground) level, boasts a variety of media hardware and software that augments students, faculty, and staff needs for interactive tools and instruction. The Learning Resources Center receives system support from the Library Information Technology Manager as well as the College’s Chief Information Officer and information technology staff.
The Benjamin F. Payton Learning Resources Center offers student-focused library services to include: 1) reference, 2) circulation, 3) research instruction, 4) computer access, 5) print, copy, and document scan, 6) media, 6) archival, 7) PASCAL Delivers book service, and 8) interlibrary loan (ILL). These services encompass reference and circulation services which are accessible from the centrally located information services desk on the main level of the library.
The library’s Information Literacy Program is tailored to meet the needs of students and faculty through informal and formal library instruction. Formal library instruction programs place emphasis on research methodology and critical thinking, and the development of lifelong research skills for students. Media Services provides access to a collection of visual, audio, and digital resources that augment the college’s academic curriculum. Archival Services provides access to the College’s historical materials that document the origin and development of Benedict College and the achievement of its officers, faculty, staff, students, alumni, and the greater community. Acquisitions and Collection Development Services provides faculty, staff, and students with the opportunity to contribute to the development of the library’s collections. In addition, the library is a selected federal depository for U.S. government publications. All services are offered during regular hours of operation.
The Benjamin F. Payton Learning Resources Center engages in cooperative initiatives that serve to broaden the scope of academic resources for its library constituents. The Partnership Among South Carolina Academic Libraries (PASCAL) organization and the Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) Library Alliance are invaluable collegial library partnerships. The library is also a member of LYRASIS, the nation’s largest cooperative regional network, and OCLC, Inc. (Online Computer Library Center, Inc.), an international bibliographic network. The library is also an active member of the Society for the American Archivist. The library adheres to the standards of the American Library Association.
The library reports to the Office of Academic Affairs and is under the leadership of the Vice President for Academic Affairs and the Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs.
Computer Facilities
The Benedict College graduate students have ready access to a computer facility in any of the College’s computer labs.
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