This initiative does two linked things. First it inventories the landscape: which student-facing services each of the 10 colleges offers, so we have one shared list of what exists. Then it sets the baseline: how many students actually use each of those services now, out of how many are enrolled. That baseline is the before-snapshot. We capture it today, implement AI tools, and demonstrate the lift later, more students reaching support, and more of them persisting. We are not renaming or reorganizing anything; we are inventorying what exists and who uses it.
The systems every college shares: the SIS (PeopleSoft), Canvas, the financial aid system, the portal and login (MEID/DUO), and any district-licensed platforms. What we all run, and who owns each.
The platforms, practices, and vendor relationships individual colleges have built that others may not know exist. One college’s functioning early-alert workflow or career tool is another’s missing piece.
A grid: 50+ student-facing services down the side, 10 colleges across the top, and each cell marking whether that college offers it. At a glance, what exists where, and what is absent.
Each of the 10 Maricopa colleges is independently accredited, with its own programs, its own organizational structure, and its own names for things, and it remains that way. Nothing in this initiative asks any college to rename, align, or change anything. We are simply inventorying which student-facing services exist at each college and, in the baseline below, how many students use each one. Every college keeps its own identity intact.
It also has to come first because every other initiative leans on it. Initiative 2’s personas need to know which services each college offers to run the journey. The usage baseline below needs a shared list of services to count against. Initiative 3 cannot rank an AI pilot by reach without knowing which colleges offer the service it would touch. The inventory is the dependency beneath all of it.
The value shows up in two findings the inventory makes visible. The first is hidden tools: a platform or program one college already runs that the others do not know exists. The second is the gap: a service present at one college and absent at another. BigInterview, the AI-powered interview and resume platform, is a concrete example. GCC Career Services has access to it; whether the other nine colleges do is exactly the kind of question this inventory answers, and the answer points directly to an immediate, no-new-cost win.
A platform or program one college already runs that the others do not know about. The inventory surfaces it, so a proven tool at one college can be shared with the rest, often at no new cost.
“Not offered here” is a valid, useful answer. It surfaces both quick wins (a tool one college can share with others) and shared gaps no one has solved yet, which feed Initiative 3.
This is the map itself: every student-facing function we have found so far, grouped by where it falls in a student’s experience. In the working spreadsheet each function is a row and the 10 colleges are columns, with each college’s local name filled in and verified by its own representative. Below is the function list the committee reviews. It now includes things students hit that we do not always file under “student services,” such as device and connectivity access, program equipment, and transportation. A finding tag marks a function that appears to be missing or unnamed at most or all colleges, which is itself a result worth confirming.
| Function | What it covers, and what to confirm |
|---|---|
| Onboarding & enrollment | |
| Apply / Admissions | Becoming an official, registered student. Named differently at each college (Become a Student, Get Admitted, Welcome Center). |
| New Student Orientation | The first-step orientation (ROAR, Gecko Gear Up, Puma Orientation, Cougar Kickstart). Required at some, optional at others. |
| First Year Experience (FYE101/103) | The shared first-year course across the district. |
| Enrollment / Registration one-stop | Where a student actually enrolls (enrollment centers, welcome centers, virtual lobbies). |
| Placement / Testing | Math and English placement (EdReady, Accuplacer, testing centers). |
| Dual Enrollment / ACE | High-school and early-college pathways. |
| Adult Ed / GED / ESL | Pre-college and language pathways. Hubbed at Rio Salado; referral at many colleges. |
| Money | |
| Financial Aid | FAFSA, aid packaging, verification, holds. |
| Scholarships | College scholarships plus the Maricopa Foundation portal. |
| Cashier / Student Business Services | Paying a balance, payment plans, refunds. |
| Emergency aid | One-time crisis funds (GCC Cares, Bear Necessities, named emergency funds). Varies widely by college. |
| Records | |
| Transcripts | Ordering official transcripts (Parchment, district-wide). |
| Graduation / Degree audit | Checking completion and applying to graduate (GradTrax, degree audits). |
| Account, email & file offboardingfinding | Saving student email, Drive, and coursework before access ends at graduation. Not a named service at any college; students lose access with no export guidance found. A clear gap. |
| Advising & learning support | |
| Academic Advising | Course planning and program advising (often Cranium Cafe / ConexED). |
| Counseling (personal & academic) | Counseling divisions, distinct from advising at most colleges. |
| Tutoring / Learning Center | Drop-in and scheduled tutoring (Learning Commons, Academic Success Center). |
| Writing Center | Writing help, in person and online. |
| Online tutoring tool | After-hours tutoring (Brainfuse, Cranium Cafe, GoBoard). Hours differ by college. |
| Library | Research help, study space, course reserves, 24/7 chat. At GCC the library also lends WiFi hotspots, which ties into technology access below. |
| Canvas (LMS) | The shared learning platform (learn.maricopa.edu), district-wide. |
| Technology & connectivity access | |
| IT Help Desk / MEID & login | Password, MEID, and login support (service desks, computer commons, virtual tech teams). |
| Loaner laptops / Chromebooks | “I do not have a computer, what can I do.” GCC OIT runs a device-loan program. Confirm which colleges loan devices and how. |
| WiFi hotspot lending | “I do not have internet at home.” GCC lends hotspots through the library. Confirm at each college. |
| Open computer labs / campus computers | The on-campus answer to no device at home: open labs and library computers a student can use to do the work. |
| Campus WiFi & printing | Getting onto campus WiFi and printing an assignment. A common first-week barrier in the GCC survey. |
| Program equipment & required gear | Some programs require students to acquire costly equipment, for example a DSLR camera in photography, or specialized tools and kits in other CTE programs. Is there a department checkout, loan, or rental option, or must each student buy their own. Where there is no way to borrow, that is a real cost barrier worth naming. |
| Basic needs & wellbeing | |
| Basic Needs hub | The front door to food, housing, and support (Single Stop, Conexión, GCC Cares, The Village). |
| Food pantry | On-campus pantries and markets. |
| Clothing / hygiene | Clothing closets and hygiene supplies. Missing or unconfirmed at several colleges. |
| Child care | On-campus care or assistance (CCAMPIS, Head Start). Referral-only at many colleges. |
| Mental health / crisis | Counseling plus crisis lines and partners (988, EMPACT, Mind 24/7). |
| Student health clinicfinding | On-campus health care. Most colleges have none and refer out; a few have student-run or specialty clinics. |
| Housingfinding | No college offers housing; all refer out. A district-wide gap against a real student need. |
| Access & safety | |
| Disability Resources (DRS) | Accommodations (DRS Connect, district-wide). Students with conditions like ADHD often do not know to ask. |
| CARE / BIT team | Early alert and behavioral-intervention referrals. |
| Conduct / student rights | Conduct process, grievances, and student rights. |
| Police / safety / alerts | College police and emergency alerts (MEMS / Maricopa Guardian), district-wide. |
| Population & identity programs | |
| Veterans services | Veteran and military student support, present at every college. |
| International students | International and global education services. |
| DACA / Dreamers | Dreamer pathways and scholarships. Coverage is uneven; some colleges show district-only resources. |
| TRIO / Student Support Services | Federally funded support. Present at only some colleges; a clear coverage gap elsewhere. |
| HSI / Title V program | Hispanic-Serving Institution programming, named differently or absent by college. |
| American Indian programs | Native student services plus the district Hoop of Learning. |
| Honors / Phi Theta Kappa | Honors and PTK, present at every college. |
| Career & next step | |
| Career Services | Career advising and job readiness. GCC has the AI-powered BigInterview; confirming who else does is a likely no-cost win. |
| Transfer Services | University transfer and pathways (AZTransfer). |
| Job / career platform | Pipeline AZ, district-wide. |
| Internships | Internship and work-based learning placement. |
| Belonging & student life | |
| Clubs & organizations | Student clubs and orgs (Coyote Connect, RioConnect). |
| Student government | Student leadership and governance. |
| Athletics / fitness | Athletics and fitness centers. Online-only colleges have none. |
| Dining | Campus cafes and dining. A finding at colleges with none. |
| Getting here & logistics | |
| Parking permits | Parking access and permits; rules differ (free lots vs decals). |
| Public transit pass / subsidy | Bus passes, light-rail access, transit vouchers, WeRide. Strong at some colleges, none found at others. |
| Learning to drive / license helpfinding | “I never learned to drive and cannot afford lessons.” No college appears to address this, yet it blocks getting to campus and to work. Worth naming even if the answer is a community referral. |
| Vehicle repair via Automotive programfinding | Could a college’s Automotive program service students’ cars at low cost. Not currently framed as a student support; an idea to explore, not an existing service. |
| Bookstore | Course materials and the book advance (Follett, district-wide). |
| Student ID | Getting a student ID card. |
This list is the working draft assembled from each college’s public website. Each college representative confirms or corrects their own column in the spreadsheet, and marks “not offered here” wherever it applies. The transportation and technology-access rows are deliberately broad: we would rather name a real student barrier and find no service behind it than leave it off the map.
The working spreadsheet is the live version of everything above. Open it, find your college, and confirm or correct each service name, then add your baseline numbers on the Baseline Metrics tab. Mark “not offered here” wherever it applies; that is a finding, not a blank.
Open the working spreadsheet →The inventory lists the services. The other half of this initiative counts how many students actually use each one, out of how many are enrolled. That before-and-after number is the point: capture it now, deploy the AI tools, then show that more students reached support and more of them persisted. Without a baseline taken today, we could not demonstrate the lift later.
A baseline matters because usage today is almost certainly low, and invisible. Most students never reach the services built for them: only 55% say their college communicates support well, and at two-year colleges fewer than 10% of students with a disability receive accommodations, versus 28% at four-year schools. The help exists; the connection does not. Counting that gap now is how we demonstrate we closed it.
We do not send a form letter to every department head on campus. At each college, one committee member sits down with their Dean of Student Life, the office that already oversees these services and holds the usage numbers, for a short conversation. The framing is simple and said in person: we are studying whether better student-to-service connection improves persistence, and we need a starting number to measure against. It is not an audit, and it is not a step toward replacing anyone. The premise is the opposite: AI should expand human contact between students and the staff who help them, never shrink it.
The meeting walks through the same handful of questions, roughly fifteen minutes: how many unique students used each service last year, what share of eligible students that represents, how students currently find the service and how they actually do, and where demand outpaces capacity. Counts and estimates are fine. No student-level or identifying data is requested, and nothing is attributed to an individual. The Dean of Student Life can bring whatever numbers are already on hand, and we capture the rest in the conversation.
Sources: only 55% of students say their college communicates support services well (Tyton Partners 2024, via Inside Higher Ed); disability-accommodation provision is under 10% at two-year vs 28%+ at four-year colleges (PLOS One, 2025).