The CAE - What We Do

The Center for Academic Excellence is an academic advising unit that serves first-generation, low-income, and multicultural underrepresented student populations. CAE strives to foster an inclusive teaching and learning environment that helps students reach their academic potential, attain their undergraduate degrees, and realize their human promise as they become citizens of a global community.
CAE Students are supported in the transition to college life through engagement opportunities, community building, advising and peer and academic mentoring.
The Academic Mentoring program works to empower CAE students to reach their academic potential in historically challenging courses and equipping your students with skills to navigate college and beyond. As an academic mentor, you are working to close the achievement gap that exists between majority and first generation and targeted minority students at our university.
Below you can see retention and graduation rates for the general student population compared with rates for both first generation and targeted minority students. These figures illustrate the reality of the ‘achievement gap’ at University of Wisconsin and highlight the pivotal role of the academic mentor and the potential impact you can have.

For more insight on a similar topic, check out this TED talk:

http://www.ted.com/talks/freeman_hrabowski_4_pillars_of_college_success_in_science.html