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Starfish

What is Starfish?

Starfish Logo - Green College can be confusing -- even more confusing than driving through a busy city. Starfish is like that map app on a mobile phone that helps someone know when and where there's trouble, how to find help and resources, and gives guidance on what to do next. The Starfish system's only purpose is to help students reach their goals by using Flags to warn of trouble, Kudos to encourage progress, and Notes to monitor progress.

For Students

Students, use Starfish to:

"Raise your hand" and ask for help
Connect with your instructor
Connect with your success network

Download the Student Getting Started Guide (PDF)
Sign in to Starfish

For Faculty

Student success is not one individual's job, it's everyone's opportunity. Starfish simply helps us all know who is at risk early and allows each student's support network time to intervene.

Starfish also allows the college to gather information on student performance by utilizing both people and systems to create flags (alerts), kudos (encouragements), and notes.

The purpose of Starfish is to connect everyone--the student, faculty, and staff -- and keep them on the same page.

Faculty, use Starfish to:

Complete progress surveys
Raise Flags
Give Kudos (green stars)
Document student interactions
Contact students (both email and phone)

Including Starfish in a course syllabus:

Instructors are encouraged to share information on Starfish and how it will be used in the classroom. Here is a Starfish Syllabus example:

Starfish is an early alert system used to help you succeed in this course. If you receive an email with [STARFISH] in the subject line, please see me so that I can help you succeed in this course. Starfish also lists other academic support services that you may be interested in using. To access Starfish, please log in to D2L-Brightspace and click the Starfish button in the menu bar.

For Staff

Most flags in Starfish do not necessarily require outreach. Flags are mostly informational and the Starfish system notifies students of issues or problems, much like a navigation application.

The "level" of flag will determine how the student support staff are to respond. For instance, staff generally do not respond to level 1 flags. Level 2, 3, and 4 flags require specific intervention measures outlined in the Starfish Advisor Workflow Training Guide.

The staff play a pivotal role in monitoring the Starfish Early Alert Retention System and resolving ongoing student issues related to academic progress. The best way to imagine the role of the Staff role in Starfish is to think of an OnStar operator. A student is moving down her path toward her destination but when there's troubles on the path the OnStar operator calls to notify of an emergency or ask if the student needs assistance. Staff then connect the student with resources or send help to get the student back on track.

Staff, use Starfish to

Connect to students (both email and phone)
Monitor student progress
Document student interactions
Look up student information
Manage, respond to, assign, and clear outstanding flags

Resources for Faculty and Staff

PDFs

MSCS Videos