When sailors leave port and lose sight of land, they need some sort of mechanism to help them find their way - that is, if they plan to make it to the next port. Ancient mariners relied on the position of the sun and stars to guide them along their journey. And while today's navigational tools are far more sophisticated - and still function under cloud cover - keeping sailors on a desired course remains pretty much unchanged.

In many ways, students are not unlike those early sailors. As they leave home port, often the comfort of the shoreline disappears into the horizon, and those without a keen sense of direction or support from family and/or friends can easily lose their way. Some even turn back.

But for Colorado SUN students at the Durango Adult Education Center, musician, scholar, translator and Navy veteran Tim Birchard is that critical compass to those lost in a complex academic sea.

As part of the Colorado Community College System Foundation's Success UNlimited (SUN) initiative, a college transition program designed to move students ahead, reduce time in remedial training and build confident learners, Birchard embraces his title of "Navigator" with great fervor. Navigators at each SUN program have essentially taken the traditional role of counselor and transformed it into a unique, multi-faceted job that nurtures the "whole student."

On any given day, the soft-spoken University of Texas graduate can be found cast in a variety of roles including recruiter, financial aid guru, curriculum specialist, career counselor, social worker, cheerleader, and life coach.

"A Navigator's main job is to be a mentor in the broadest, most general sense of the word," explains Birchard.

Birchard spends many hours talking to students about the importance of college to get them on their chosen career path.

"I stress that while it's an achievement to be proud of, getting a GED in and of itself does not increase the student's earning power enough to rise above the poverty line," he says. "The way to truly increase earning potential is to use the GED as a springboard into college - and then on to a degree."

Birchard considers it his responsibility to help identify challenges that impact academic success and exhaust all resources to help the student find or create healthy and empowering solutions. "It's important for me to honor and value their life experiences and to respect each student as an individual as I mentor him or her."

The Navigator can help the student through referrals to local organizations that assist with life's non-educational issues such as food stamps, and affordable housing.

"For most students, simply understanding how to access the many resources available to them is the key that unlocks a new world of opportunity," says Birchard "This is where the Navigator comes into play. I help build the informational and social networks the students need while teaching them to build these networks themselves. My goal is to help students learn to self-advocate. When a student is able to access various community resources to get things done with less and less help from me, then I know I'm doing my job.

Navigators in the SUN program are also a valuable resource in the classroom. Because the classroom can be a very different place for returning students, Birchard helps them adapt by working closely with the instructors to create opportunities for team building and networking.

"I try to speak daily with instructors to monitor the progress of SUN program students to identify any potential signals that may need attention. For example, if a student is chronically late, I may speak with him and discover that he works every night in a restaurant until midnight. Or if a student seems to have a negative attitude for days or weeks on end, an earnest interest in his well being may reveal his kidneys are failing and he has no medical insurance. There's almost always more to a situation than meets the eye."

While Navigators in the SUN Initiative bring value to students' lives, they also provide Colorado with substantial value for its dollar by guiding at-risk and under-prepared students into community college degrees and certificates that lead to higher-demand, higher-paying jobs and careers. Birchard suggests that almost any educational program could benefit from a position such as his.

"The SUN initiative plays a vital role in the education process here in Colorado," says Birchard. "People who previously may have believed that they weren't 'smart enough' to make it in college are discovering that with the right support, they can succeed. It's sad to think of how much human potential is lost every time a student falls through the cracks of the educational system. It's a frightening trend that's been going on for too long. The SUN program is making a difference right now. And with the right kind of support, it's a difference that will be felt for generations to come."