Supplemental Instruction

Students in a classroom for an exam review session

Supplemental Instruction (SI) is an academic support program that targets historically difficult courses (those with a high percentage of Ds, Fs and Ws). SI offers free regularly scheduled out-of-class review sessions to all students enrolled in the course. SI improves student performance by teaching students how to integrate course content with reasoning and study skills. Sessions are facilitated by students who have successfully completed the course in the past. They feature collaborative learning techniques and provide students with a model of appropriate learning strategies for the course.

In courses where SI is offered, supplemental instruction leaders will lead your class through a review session of that week's material. Supplemental instruction sessions are not a substitute for class lectures and will not introduce any new material, and are not large question-and-answer sessions. Major components of SI sessions include the following:

  • Collaborative learning techniques.
  • A model of appropriate thinking, note taking and test preparation.
  • Focus on what to learn and how to learn it.

SI sessions are held two or three times each week. SI Leaders document attendance information at each session in order to evaluate the program at the end of the semester. Professors are not provided the specific names of students attending the sessions.

Benefits of supplemental instruction include:

  • Nationally, it has been shown that average grades of students who attend SI are higher than grades of those who do not.
  • A comprehensive statistical analysis of Miami's SI program found a strong correlation between students attending SI sessions and earning a grade of A or B in the course.
  • SI leads to higher re-enrollment and graduation rates.

For more information about supplemental instruction, if you would like to have SI offered in your course or have questions regarding SI, please contact us at 513-529-8741 or via email at carrk@MiamiOH.edu.