Why Colleges Still Struggle to Implement Priorities | 022 | What to Do About It
Six persistent challenges, six actionable strategies.
Five years ago this month, I released my free guide: Why Colleges Struggle to Implement Priorities & What to Do About It. Today, I want to revisit it; not to reminisce, but to give you actionable strategies you can implement this year. It was August 2020, a year of chaos, change, and for many, clarity about what truly matters in education.
I wrote the guide because after years of institutions reaching out to me to coach them to garner tangible results, I saw the same patterns repeating:
Promising priorities announced with enthusiasm
Committees and workgroups formed, plans written
Momentum slowing…
And then, implementation and results falling short
The guide was meant to be practical. No ivory tower theorizing. Just hard-earned lessons from the field, broken down into six factors that derail execution, with strategies to address them.
Five years later, the factors still hold up. The stakes? Even higher.
Factor 1: Lacking a Culture of Kindness
Kindness isn’t about being “soft.” It’s about creating conditions where people can do their best work without fear or toxicity.
Action Step: Before your next meeting, reach out to someone you anticipate pushback from. Have a “cafecito conversation” first. When you meet informally to understand concerns, formal settings could become far more productive.
Factor 2: Unproductive Committee Structure
If your governance chart looks pretty on paper but in reality looks more like a plate of spaghetti, you have a problem.
Action Step: Pick one major priority this semester. Map how it would move from idea to implementation through your committees. Identify where it bottlenecks, overlaps, or dead-ends. Then, streamline one step in that process. Don’t wait for a complete overhaul to start improving flow.
Factor 3: Lacking a Student-Centered Framework
Many committees claim to be student-centered in their charges, but without a shared framework (like Guided Pathways or Completion by Design or ACIP), conversations drift.
Action Step: At your next committee meeting, identify which part of the student journey your work impacts. Post it on the agenda. Tie every decision back to that phase(s). This alignment builds clarity and coherence.
Factor 4: Silos, Silos, Silos
When instruction and student services don’t collaborate, students pay the price.
Action Step: Implement one cross-functional Student Success Team for a meta-major, division, or program. Include both faculty and student services staff. Choose one shared student outcome, review disaggregated data, and design one joint intervention. Scale later, but start now.
Factor 5: Lack of Teaching Preparation
Many campuses have improved placement and access. But if classroom instruction doesn’t evolve, low success rates and equity gaps will remain.
Action Step: Start a form of inquiry & action teams focused on improving student success rates. Meet twice a month. Identify one promising instructional practice (e.g., culturally responsive teaching), test it, and share results. Keep the cycle going.
Factor 6: Effective Leadership Challenges
Leaders set the tone. If the top is fractured, the campus will be too.
Action Step: Of the many resources for this section of the guide, use my “Five Critical Questions” before launching any new initiative:
Purpose: Why are we doing this?
Assess: Do we have the capacity and resources?
Leadership: Who is leading and how will they be supported?
Expertise: Who can improve the quality of the work?
Impactful Meetings/Settings: What’s the structure to keep this moving?
The Anniversary Challenge
Pick one factor.
Choose one action step from above.
Commit to making progress on it over the next 90 days.
Then, measure the difference in clarity, collaboration, and ultimately, student outcomes.
Because in five more years, I’d love to write a post about how we moved from “Why Colleges Struggle” to “How Colleges Deliver.”
Download the original guide.
If you use these strategies, let me know. I collect real-world stories of how colleges turn priorities into results, and yours could be next.
Strengthen your college’s student retention and completion. Let’s explore how I can help you improve rates, which translates into much needed funding.
Let’s connect on LinkedIn.
Onward…
Dr. Al Solano
Founder, Continuous Learning Institute | About
Host, Student Success Podcast
A meaningful test of success is how helpful we are in contributing to our fellow human being’s happiness.