When you have a former TV and broadcast journalist at Purdue it’s a good idea to leverage their expertise for students who have an interest in that field. Liz Evans, assistant to the assistant vice provost for Student Life and an overload lecturer in the Brian Lamb School of Communication, has included Steps to Leaps in her work with Purdue students. She has taught COM 114, COM 408 and 409, as well as special topic courses COM495 or COM497. Since the infancy of the Steps to Leaps initiative, Evans has worked to integrate the purpose of Steps to Leaps in each of these courses.

Evans’ first courses aligned with the beginning of the Steps to Leaps framework. Evans found Steps to Leaps “a good framework, not only for the students, but for me as a new instructor to incorporate into my teaching and my instruction.” It helped her to reach students and connect with them about areas she knew would help them succeed. The Grit pillar seemed to be the one that initially created the best opportunity for her to connect her students with resources. It was the spring of 2020 and all of her students were, like her, trying to find a way to navigate a new type of educational approach. She used the language of the Grit pillar to talk to her students about going through struggles and the resources they needed to get themselves back on track.

The Network pillar has also been a large part of her class. She has helped her students, especially seniors in the portfolio class, understand just how important building your network can be. She invites presenters to engage with her students and encourages them to connect with the presenters via LinkedIn and email. She leverages these types of conversations, framed with the Steps to Leaps language, at the beginning of her classes to help drive engagement at attentiveness. She says that these five-minute conversations “pay dividends […] for the rest of the two hours that we meet because all the sudden they're awake, they're interested.” 

Evans has also seen a return on investment for integrating Steps to Leaps language. She’s found that her student feedback in her evaluations reflect the student’s understanding of her intent to connect with them and help them grow both academically and individually. While they may not note a specific pillar, they will reference the ways that she has help them build their Networks or Grit. 

Integrating Steps to Leaps in the classroom does not take a lot of work but can have great benefit for students. Evans has done small things like referencing Steps to Leaps in her syllabus and including the pillars and their icons. She has taken incremental steps to intentionally provide resources within each pillar.  These small steps can dramatically increase a student’s awareness of the areas they can grow in to thrive at Purdue and beyond.