Faculty of Arts and Science Retention Project

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Faculty of Arts and Science Retention Project An
Overview Cameron Tilson - Senior Planning
Policy Analyst Office of the President Terry
Too - Director of Enrolment Analysis/Process
Control and Associate Registrar, Enrolment
Student Services
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Concordia University quick facts

• 2 Campus Operation a result of the 1974 merger
  of our founding institutions

Sir George Williams Campus (located in downtown
Montreal)
Loyola Campus (located 7 kilometers west of the
downtown campus in suburban Notre-Dame-de-Grâce)
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Concordia University quick facts

• Faculties (FTE figures as of 2003/2004)
• Arts and Science 12,912 FTE (26 growth since
  1995)
• John Molson School of Business 4,343 FTE (30
  growth)
• Engineering and Computer Science 4,104 FTE
  (125 growth)
• Fine Arts 2,019 FTE (46 growth)
• Overall 23,378 (40 growth since 1995)

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More Facts and Figures (Fall 2004)

• Enrolment
• Undergraduate students 85
• Graduate students 15
• Gender
• Female 51
• Male 49
• Mother-tongue
• English 55
• Other 30
• French 15
• Many immigrants/1st-generation in their family to
  attend university
• Commuter campus

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The Faculty of Arts and Science

• 3rd largest Arts and Science faculty in Canada
  (after U. de Montréal and U. Toronto)
• 15,000 program students
• Generated 57 of Concordias FTEs in 2003/2004
• 470 full-time professors (390 tenure/tenure-track
  80 contract)
• 21 departments and 5 colleges
• 134 programs (82 undergraduate 52 graduate)
• 75M operating budget
• Some of the largest departments in the country
  (Political Science, Economics, Sociology
  Anthropology, Psychology)

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The Student Retention Project

• Work began in fall 2001
• Seconded to the Dean of Arts Science two days
  per week
• Project was initiated partially as a response to
  a performance contract signed with the Quebec
  Ministry of Education in March 2001(these
  contracts have subsequently been scrapped)

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Graduation Rates for Full-Time Undergraduates
required by the Contrat de performance
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Part 1Overview of the Retention Project

• Compilation of attrition rates by program and
  department
• Initial focus on undergraduate students who do
  not return after their first year of studies
• Determine reasons why students leave the Faculty
• Provide recommendations for improving retention

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Why Should We Improve Retention?

• We lose potential tuition and government grant
  revenue for every student that leaves -
  approximately 6 million in foregone revenue
  (based on 25 1st-year attrition)
• Loss of investment in recruitment and admissions
• Unfulfilled potential - Accessibility should
  mean much more than just giving people a chance
  they need comprehensive support to succeed!
• Sink or swim should not be an option!

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Arts Science 1st-year Attrition Fall
1995-97-99 Cohorts
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Arts Science 1st-year Attrition by Student Type
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1st-year Attrition in Selected Departments
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Characteristics of the Early Leavers from the
Fall 1997 Cohort (613 students)

• 47 male 53 female
• Average age 23 Median age 21
• 67 full time 33 part-time students
• 151 students (24) left due to academic failure
  another 38 (6) were borderline failed
• 115 withdrew from all courses (19)
• A total of 309 students (51) left with a GPA
  2.0
• 161 students (27 of total) left with a GPA 3.0
  
• 85 students (14 of total) left with a GPA 3.3
• 38 students (6.2) have a previous degree

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Where Did These Students Go?

• 512 students (83.5) did not re-register
• 101 students (16.5) transferred to other
  Faculties
• 55 students to the John Molson School of Business
• 23 to Engineering Computer Science
• 23 to Fine Arts
• The rest - hopefully . . .?

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What does this tell us?

• The Faculty is losing some very promising
  students (this dispels the pervasive myth that
  dropping out flunking out)
• Perhaps more emphasis should be placed on trying
  to retain good students than providing
  remediation for weaker students
• Most are of the traditional profile for
  full-time university attendance (18-24 years old)

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Part 2 Early leavers survey conducted May 2003

• We hired a consultant (Insightrix Inc. of
  Saskatoon) to conduct a survey of early-leavers
  from the 1998, 1999, 2000 2001 cohorts
• The survey was approved under Concordias Policy
  for the Ethical Review of Research Involving
  Humans
• Survey instrument (51 questions) was developed by
  reviewing questionnaires from other surveys with
  input from internal experts and Insightrix

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Why contract the work to a survey specialist?

• Paper-based surveys conducted in-house are
  labor-intensive turnaround time is very slow
  given resources available
• Response rate was poor (15) on 2 previous
  paper-based surveys conducted for the project
• Insightrix has previous experience with
  post-secondary educational institutions

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Survey methodology

• Students selected for the survey (n1,764) had
  not re-registered at Concordia following their
  first year of study
• Students who had entered in 1998, 1999, 2000
  2001 were targeted going back to earlier cohorts
  was not deemed cost effective

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Survey methodology

• Primary method of contact is telephone
  (Insightrixs call centre)
• Canada 411 and other web-based searches were
  utilized to try to track down those who had moved
• A minimum of 5 attempts were made to contact each
  former student

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Survey methodology

• As an incentive to participate, former students
  who completed the survey were entered in a prize
  drawing (25-25 HMV gift certificates were
  awarded
• Former students were invited to participate in
  the survey 2 ways
• Telephone interview (approximately 20 minutes)
  or
• Completion of the survey online

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Survey methodology

• Subjects who chose to complete the survey online
  were asked for their email address and were sent
  a message containing a secure personal link to
  the survey
• Links were de-activated once the survey was
  accessed
• 70 of respondents completed the survey online

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Response rate
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Response rate by cohort
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Profile of Survey Respondents

• Survey respondents were fairly representative of
  Faculty enrolments (in terms of Gender, Age,
  Degree program, PT/FT etc.)
• However, there was a higher proportion of French
  and Other first-language respondents than the
  overall population of these groups in Arts
  Science
• 65 of respondents were aged 22 or younger at
  time of entry to Concordia

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Profile of Survey Respondents

• 82 of respondents were registered in programs
  that do not have competitive entrance standards
  or quotas
• Almost 17 indicated that they never intended to
  complete a degree at Concordia in the first place

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Overview of responses

• 36 of respondents have registered at another
  institution since leaving Concordia
• Despite the fact that 83 originally intended to
  complete a degree at Concordia, only 63 were
  initially registered in their program of 1st
  choice
• This indicates that many students originally
  intended to transfer to another program albeit at
  Concordia

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Overview of responses

• 55 of respondents felt positive about Concordia
  despite their experience
• 20 felt negative about their experience
• 25 were neutral

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Overview of responses

• 50 felt that the university could have done more
  to ease the transition to university
• Top 3 suggestions to help ease the transition
• improve advising and counseling,
• enhance financial assistance
• admission or transfer to the students program of
  1st choice

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Overview of responses

• More than three-fourths of students were
  satisfied with the quality of teaching, teaching
  facilities, library facilities and laboratories
• Conversely, the quality and availability of
  computing facilities were considered much less
  satisfactory (almost two-thirds indicated
  dissatisfaction with computing facilities
  equipment)

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Overview of responses

• Of the students who consulted an advisor in their
  home department (235), just under 50 felt that
  advisors in their home departments were helpful
• Counsellors in the Counselling and Development
  department were considered helpful by 61 of
  those who used the service (82 students)

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Selected comments from respondents

• Many students commented that they could not get
  the courses they needed
• Need more effective advising
• Did not appreciate the bureacratic runaround
• It is difficult to be motivated when the
  professors seem bored
• Thanks for caring to ask!

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Factors influencing the decision to leave

• Students reported difficulties registering for
  the courses they wanted
• Less than half were able to register in all the
  courses they desired
• Of these, more than 60 reported that the desired
  classes were full
• Almost one-third reported scheduling problems

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Factors influencing the decision to leave

• One-third of respondents stated that they were
  not prepared for university work (poor study
  skills time management workload)
• Financial difficulty was apparently not a major
  factor for most of the respondents

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Factors influencing the decision to leave

• Respondents cited the following as major factors
  influencing the decision to leave
• lack of interest or motivation (50)
• uncertain goals (50)
• dissatisfaction with program (45)
• family/personal circumstances (38)

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Suggested Short-Term Action Items

• Investigate and resolve course scheduling
  difficulties mandatory pre-registration
  advising could help
• Better articulation of the realities through
  advising (to prospective and newly-enrolled
  students) of entering 2nd/3rd choice programs
• Improve orientation for Francophone students (à
  la John Molson School of Business)

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Next Steps

• Open-ended comments are a wealth of information
  and will require more analysis
• There is still a great deal of work underway in
  the analysis of the results (e.g. cross
  tabulations)
• Move from talking/thinking to concrete action!
• Tools are under development for enrolment
  managers to gather the data

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Questions or Comments?

• Phone [phone] ext. 7976
• cameron.tilson_at_concordia.ca
• Fax [phone]