The Guided Pathways Scale of Adoption Assessment (SOAA) is a self-assessment tool that walks colleges through a variety of guided pathways practices.
College teams use a scale of 1–5 to indicate how far along their college is on each of the practices. The scale ranges from “not occurring” to “at scale” and allows colleges to be specific about their current implementation. For example, one practice might exist but be informal or optional while another might be on the way to being mandatory for all students.
College teams use the findings to measure progress toward their implementation goals. The NC SSC uses findings to inform future professional development and technical assistance needs for each college. The NC SSC also provides aggregated and anonymized data to organizations tracking the implementation of guided pathways nationwide.
Each NC guided pathways college begins its first SOAA at the first guided pathways institute it attends, and it works with its coach to complete it. The college completes a second SOAA 18 months later and at least one more 18 months after the second one. After each SOAA, the college reviews findings with its coach, discusses how to apply what it learns from the SOAA, and identifies technical assistance that can support its next steps.
See the SOAA
Developed by the Community College Research Center, the SOAA evaluates four key areas of pathways implementation: mapping pathways to students’ end goals; helping students choose and enter a path; helping students stay on their path, and ensuring that students are learning.
