UNM-Valencia Chief Executive Officer Alice Letteney, and Cindy Shue, senior program manager of Grants and Contracts, were invited to participate in a national convening of minority serving community colleges by the United States Department of Education.

Letteney and Shue represented UNM-Valencia recently in Washington, D.C., in the first meeting for two-year participating MSI’s to help improve overall student success.

“This first-ever convening of two-year minority serving colleges provided a tremendous opportunity for our campus to meet with 13 program officers and researchers from federal and private organizations,” Letteney said.

The purpose of the event was to provide an interactive forum for institutions from across the country to exchange practices on student success, learn about federal programs for MSI’s, get the chance to interact with representatives of the U.S. Department of Education and learn about how to reduce cohort default rates and more.

“We shared best practices and learned about the variety of funding opportunities for our colleges and our students. The Department of Education should be commended for bringing together our MSI’s,” Letteney said.