Dear Members of the SUNY Oswego Community–
We conclude this year with our Winter Commencement ceremony on December 13, and I look forward to personally congratulating the more than 400 students who will complete their degrees.
Commencement puts student success front and center. It is both a celebration and a powerful reminder of why we come to work each day: to help students persist, make progress, and reach their goals. Every graduate represents years of effort, growth, and determination, along with the support of a university community that teaches, advises, supports, and encourages students through challenges and milestones alike.
Commencement clarifies our mission and renews our shared responsibility to help more students find a clear path to completion and provide the support they need to stay on it.
With that focus in mind, I am reaching out today to share an important next step that builds on last month’s message about academic momentum: SUNY Oswego is forming a partnership with the National Institute for Student Success (NISS). NISS helps colleges and universities strengthen the systems that support students in persisting, making progress, and completing their degrees, while maintaining a focus on equity.
Recognized nationally for its student success initiatives and grounded in evidence-based strategies developed at Georgia State University, NISS helps campuses improve the student experience. This includes streamlining degree pathways, providing earlier check-ins when students begin to struggle, and improving coordination so students aren’t bounced between offices in search of answers. NISS also shares public results showing that many partner institutions have improved outcomes, such as first-year retention and progress toward graduation, making this a strong, practical partnership as we enhance our academic momentum efforts and provide clearer, earlier, and more consistent support for students.
Just as commencement celebrates our students’ achievements, this partnership is about expanding the conditions that make those achievements possible. In practical terms, working with NISS will help us better identify where students run into obstacles, align our supports across academic and student services, and intervene before small challenges become major detours. Most importantly, it will help us strengthen our ability to support more students to graduation, with a continued and measurable commitment to closing equity gaps.
This collaboration is not meant to replace the valuable work already taking place on our campus. Instead, it seeks to connect and enhance those efforts, making sure our students receive consistent, proactive, and easily accessible support. Academic progress depends on a campus environment where students can make informed decisions, recover quickly from setbacks, and stay on track even when life becomes complicated, as it often does.
Partnering with NISS will help us boost student success by enhancing coordination across campus so advising, academic support, student services, and classroom learning work smoothly; using data more effectively to identify obstacles and bottlenecks early and target support where it can make the biggest impact; expanding proactive guidance and communication at key transition points so students stay engaged before small challenges turn into major setbacks; and strengthening our commitment to equity by ensuring our systems and practices support all students and close outcome gaps with clear purpose and accountability.
In the upcoming weeks, we will share more about this partnership's structure and how our community members can get involved. You will have opportunities to listen, provide feedback, and collaborate. NISS will bring expertise and proven frameworks, but the core of this effort will remain with Oswego: the daily commitment of our faculty and staff, along with the perseverance and talent of our students.
Academic momentum is more than just a single initiative; it is a shared commitment. This is demonstrated through clear expectations, responsive support, inclusive learning environments, and a campus culture that constantly affirms to every student: you belong here, and you can succeed here. This new partnership will help us strengthen that commitment in practical, measurable ways, so that future commencement ceremonies reflect not only individual achievement but also the success of a university that is continuously improving how we help students reach their goals.
My engagements for November and early December in service of our university are listed here.
Thank you for everything you do to support our students and each other. Wishing you a joyful holiday season filled with rest and special moments with family and friends. Here's to a fantastic 2026 for you and your loved ones.
Remain well,
Peter O. Nwosu
President