Redefine the First-Year Experience

Empower students. Build community. Spark success. Deliver content that feels tailor-made for your students. Use Top Hat to customize, enhance or fully author your own text to resonate with your class and campus—with guided support from our Custom Solutions and Instructional Design experts.

Get interactive activities for your first-year experience course

Engage students with 21 interactive questions that spark reflection on academics, wellness, and campus life
Launch instantly in Top Hat with ready-made activities designed for seamless, in-class participation
Identify where students need support and take action to strengthen connection, confidence, and success

Empower every student to recognize their strengths

Composing a College Career by Jeffrey Klausman replaces the “deficit model” of thinking with “Strength to Strength” sections that invite students to identify and transfer their existing life skills and knowledge to the college environment.

What’s inside:

Through diverse “Student Stories,” the text helps learners see themselves reflected in the material—fostering belonging while combating imposter syndrome.

Each chapter opens with a “Strength to Strength” section, leveraging prior knowledge and encouraging transfer-based thinking in students.

More ways to power your course

Slash affordability barriers with interactive OpenStax titles

Whether you’re looking for an affordable, comprehensive text or a fully tailored curriculum, Top Hat offers flexible options to fit your goals.

With Interactive OpenStax: College Success, we’ve elevated trusted OpenStax content using Top Hat’s active learning tools to deliver an affordable, high-impact solution for first-year courses.

Create the exact textbook you need with hands-on support

Can’t find the perfect fit? Build it. Our Custom Solutions and Instructional Design teams will help you create a first-year experience textbook that reflects your unique student body and campus culture.

Real stories. Real results.

See how institutions are using Top Hat to drive student success.

Why students love about First-year Experience on Top Hat

One student shared that this was one of the most well-organized courses they’ve ever seen. Another student said that the Top Hat textbook ‘talked to me, not at me.’

Jenny Billings

Program Chair of Associate in Arts, Division Chair of Study Skills and English, Rowan-Cabarrus Community College

The book [Composing a College Career] works hard to meet students where they are today—to acknowledge the challenges they face, but also to offer some realistic advice on how they can succeed in college.

Bart Welling

Associate Professor of English,  University of North Florida

The thing that really grabbed my attention about Top Hat’s textbook [Composing a College Career] was the opportunity and the flexibility when customizing the text to make it specific to the campus.

Ryan Adams-Barton

Professor of Psychology,  Miami Dade College