about LCLCA
The purpose of LCLCA is to create a network of college learning support professionals in postsecondary institutions operating in Louisiana.
Our objectives include supporting learning assistance professionals, promoting professional standards in our field, acting on learning assistance issues at local and state levels, assisting new and developing learning centers, enhancing existing learning centers, providing professional development, and coordinating efforts with other organizations to support and promote our profession.
2026 LCLCA Symposium
GUEST speaker:
Dr. Saundra McGuire
Dr. Saundra Yancy McGuire is the Director Emerita of the LSU Center for Academic Success, Professor Emerita of Chemical Education at LSU. and retired Assistant Vice Chancellor and Professor of Chemistry at LSU. Prior to joining LSU, she spent eleven years at Cornell University, where she received the coveted Clark Distinguished Teaching Award. She has delivered keynote addresses or presented workshops at over 400 institutions in 46 states and ten countries. Her book, Teach Students How to Learn: Strategies You Can Incorporate into Any Course to Improve Student Metacognition, Study Skills, and Motivation, was released in October 2015 and is a Stylus Publishing bestseller. The student version of this book, Teach Yourself How to Learn: Strategies You Can Use to Ace Any Course at Any Level, was released in January 2018.
The most recent of her honors include the 2017 American Chemical Society (ACS) Award for Encouraging Disadvantaged Students to Pursue Careers in the Chemical Sciences and induction into the LSU College of Science Hall of Distinction. She also received the 2015 American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Lifetime Mentor Award and the 2014 Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Organization for the Professional Advancement of Black Chemists and Chemical Engineers (NOBCChE). She is an elected Fellow of the ACS, AAAS, and Council of Learning Assistance and Developmental Education Associations (CLADEA). In November 2007 the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring was presented to her in a White House Oval Office Ceremony. Additionally, she has achieved Level Four Lifetime Learning Center Leadership Certification through the National College Learning Center Association (NCLCA).
She received her B.S. degree, magna cum laude, from Southern University in Baton Rouge, LA, her Master's degree from Cornell and her Ph.D. from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, where she received the Chancellor's Citation for Exceptional Professional Promise. She is married to Dr. Stephen C. McGuire, a professor of physics at Southern. They are the parents of Dr. Carla McGuire Davis and Dr. Stephanie McGuire, and the doting grandparents of Joshua, Ruth, Daniel, and Joseph Davis.
Keynote address
Closing the Metacognitive Equity Gap: The Key Role of Learning Centers
Colleges and universities have been attempting to close the academic achievement gap between students from different demographics such as socioeconomic status, race, and generational college attendance for more than five decades. Despite the most well intentioned efforts, the gap has persisted and has even widened since the COVID pandemic. In this interactive keynote, we will explore the meaning of “metacognitive equity” and discuss why learning centers provide the best opportunity for our institutions to close the metacognitive equity gap, thereby closing the academic achievement gap.
