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A Maine-based office of the insurance company Unum Corporation intends to give $300,000 to the University of Maine.
According to Dean of Students Robert Dana, the money will be used to create “The Unum Ladder: A Step Up for Success,” a program that will target students identified as being “at risk” of failing to graduate. Dana expects to launch the program in the fall.
Unum Corporation, which has its closest office in Portland, brokers disability, life, long-term care and supplemental health insurance policies. The company was first chartered in Boston in 1848 and has since expanded into an international corporation with offices in the United Kingdom.
Dana said the development of The Unum Ladder was an even partnership between the corporation and the university. Identifying those at risk, such as transfer or non-traditional students, will be the first rung on the ladder.
He described at-risk students as those who struggle to adapt to college life.
“For a lot of people it looks easy, but it isn’t easy for anybody,” he said. “[Some students] figure out how to go to class. They take notes. If they’re hurting, they know who to ask or help … and then there are some students — they’re more dazed in some ways. They’re frightened. They’re just sort of keeping below the radar.”
The program will start with students in their first year of undergraduate study, and for that reason, Dana said, the vast majority of the ladder climbers will be first-year students who live on campus.
“It will be diffused throughout the population,” Dana said, adding that the type of student targeted by this program will vary from the iconic small-town-Maine student sitting in a lecture hall.
“A veteran, for instance, who’s returning from time away” could be targeted, he said. “A student who comes from a large inner city and isn’t used to a rural environment … or a student who has financial concerns” could be identified as being at risk.
According to the National Dropout Prevention Center / Network at Clemson University, a successful mentoring program can increase a student’s class attendance, improve the student’s grades and make it more likely for the student to graduate.
“The impact of mentors in a well-structured mentor program is boundless and serves as a powerful low-cost, low-tech strategy to rebuild the dreams of youth in at-risk situations,” according to the center’s website.
UMaine’s Career Center has run the Maine Mentor Program since 1986. Approximately 600 alumni volunteering as mentors are available to “discuss their jobs and work-related questions with individual students”; however, that program is designed to help a student mature beyond graduation. The Unum Ladder will help students make it to graduation.
“We’re pleased to be able to support this program,” said Cary Olson Cartwright, director of corporate social responsibility for Unum. “This is a work in progress.”
Cartwright said Unum’s role will be primarily to provide financial backing at the outset and was not able to give many specifics on where the program currently stands. She said Dana will be responsible for crafting the program before telling Unum how its employees can help.
Cartwright expects Unum to send employees to campus as volunteers and mentors as well as guest speakers, “especially in that first year, the transition year. We’re happy to do that,” she said.
The Unum Ladder will combine aspects of programs already seen on campus, such as Residence Life’s First Year Experience and academic advisors, with a peer-to-peer approach to create a new campus experience that will be housed by the Office of Student Affairs. The program will create jobs for students to serve as peer mentors.
“I think it will be a little more focused” than the Residence Life approach to engaging students, Dana said. “They’ll have less individuals to be responsible for and they’ll have a more specific set of events and programs to bring them to.”
Dana said the differences lie in Unum’s commitment to mentor students rather than take a hands-off approach to the program. The program may affect students at the six other University of Maine System campuses, as well as campuses in the community college system, according to Dana, who said the program would be studied and presented to other institutions.
The Unum Ladder will be showcased for higher education administrators statewide once a year, according to Dana.
