Yellow Brick Road to Graduation: A Faculty Aid in Promoting Student Persistence and Retention

Helping students complete a degree in a timely manner is a goal shared by OU and its constituents. The purpose of today's conversation is to equip faculty with some tools to help students successfully navigate college.

While we know that our students are not in high school anymore, our students do not always recognize how their educational world has changed.  The Altshuler Learning Enhancement Center at SMU has done a nice job of summarizing differences in high school and college.

The biggest challenge I see with students is a basic misunderstanding of the out-of-class work expected.  I have found that having students complete the following worksheet helps them understand expectations for college level courses.

There are a number of things faculty can do to help improve student retention.  Based on an analysis of data from the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), Julian Kinzie (2005) identified 20 diverse campuses that had higher-than-expected graduation to examine faculty practices that help students persist and succeed.  Her analysis suggested that student persistence to graduation improves when faculty:

  1. Embrace undergraduates and their learning.
  2. Set and maintain high expectations for student performance.
  3.  Clarify what students need to do to succeed.
  4. Use engaging pedagogical approaches appropriate for course objectives and students' abilities and learning styles.
  5. build on students' knowledge, abilities and talents.
  6. Provide meaningful feedback to students.
  7. Weave diversity into the curriculum including out-of-class assignments.
  8. Make time for students.
  9. Hold students accountable for taking their share of the responsibility for their learning.

I made some specific suggestions in a recent presentation to the Faculty Senate Executive Committee

References and Resources are below. 

References and Resources

To read more about faculty roles in student retention, visit the resources below.

Chickering, A. & Ehrmann, S. Implementing the seven principles: Technology as lever.
American Association for Higher Education. 

http://polaris.umuc.edu/~cschwebe/gsmt800/7principles.htm

Exploring different dimensions of student engagement: The 2005 annual results
of the national survey of student engagement.  

http://nsse.iub.edu/pdf/NSSE2005_annual_report.pdf

Kinzie, J. (2005). Promoting student success: What faculty members can do
(Occasional Paper No. 6) Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University
Center for Postsecondary Research. 

http://nsse.iub.edu/institute/documents/briefs/DEEP%20Practice%20Brief
%206%20What%20Faculty%20Members%20Can%20Do.pdf

Kuh, G.D., Kinzie, J., Schuh, J.H., & Whitt, E.J. (2005). Student success in college:
Creating conditions that matter. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.  

Lotkowski, V., Robbins, S. & Noeth, R. (2004). The Role of Academic and
Non-Academic Factors in Improving College Retention. ACT Policy Report.

http://www.act.org/path/policy/pdf/college_retention.pdf

Tinto, V. (2001, June 19) Taking Student Retention Seriously.
Annual Recruitment and Retention Conference, Texas Higher
Education Coordinating Board. Austin, Texas. 

http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/fsd/c2006/docs/takingretentionseriously.pdf

 Tinto, V. (2003, Nov 5-7) Promoting Student Retention through Classroom Practice
Using International Policy and Practice. An international conference sponsored by the European Access Network and the Institute 

http://www.staffs.ac.uk/institutes/access/docs/Amster-paperVT(1).pdf

          
 

 
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