Structuring for Student Success and Retention at Cuesta College An Integrated Approach

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Structuring for Student Success and Retention at
Cuesta College An Integrated Approach

• February 5, 2008
• Campus Presentation

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Student Success and Retention Strategic Plan

• Mission
• To provide direction and make recommendations to
  Cuesta College in its efforts to promote and
  enhance student retention and success
• The pursuit of this Student Success and Retention
  sub-committee mission supports goal 5 of the
  2007-2008 San Luis Obispo County Community
  College District Goals
• Goal 5 Align institutional effectiveness
  outcomes with the new state accountability
  measures and incorporate a focus of student
  retention and achievement

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Retention Strategies

• Organize Student Success Retention
  sub-committee as a strategic initiative with
  direct report to Enrollment Management
• Develop a steering committee as a subgroup
• Cross-functional team including faculty and staff
• Develop retention model

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Structure for Comprehensive Student Success and
Retention Model

• Obtain institutional support for campus-wide
  initiative
• Establish structure to oversee the initiative
• Collect relevant data
• Assess key variables
• Student factors, institutional factors, potential
  interventions
• Develop campus plan and criteria to
• Identify goals for success/retention model
• Identify strategies
• Implement retention model
• Evaluate outcomes
• Review and revise

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General Guidelines

• Student focused initiatives
• Total campus involvement
• Measurements
• Systemic support
• Continuous improvement
• Right people on board
• Quality educational experiences
• Intrusive efforts to promote persistence to goal
  completion

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Student Success and Retention Work Group

• We envision campus-wide participation
• Faculty
• Staff
• Administrators

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Role of Student Success and Retention
Sub-Committee
Student Success and Retention
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Some Thoughts on Student Retention

• Vincent Tinto
• Key to retention is integration into the college
  community
• Integration is facilitated by
• Nurturing environment
• Fit Belonging Success Retention
• Skills and knowledge

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CUESTA COLLEGES RETENTION MODEL - DRAFT
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Goal 1 Identifying At-Risk Students

• Objectives
• Identify at-risk students at point of admissions,
  via assessment scores and prior transcripts
  (college and HS)
• Identify special student populations requiring
  services, such as ESL, VATEA, CalWORKS, EOPS,
  other
• Improve student and staff awareness of campus
  and community support services
• Mandatory assessment and counseling, especially
  with low placement scores
• Create a student profile of multiple dismissal
  students

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Goal 2 Improve Student Academic Advisement
Process

• To require probationary and dismissed students to
  utilize appropriate support services and/or
  attend workshops
• To ensure that students are clearly informed as
  to where resources and services (support,
  instructional and community) are available to
  support educational goal achievement
• To consider ways in which interested faculty and
  services can become more involved in the student
  advisement process, and establish a means for
  them to communicate with each other
• To evaluate pilot counseling projects being
  initiated in Nursing and English as a Second
  Language learners
• To create ways to evaluate educational goal
  achievement and/or career placement

• Objectives
• To adequately provide counselor coverage that
  address year round service
• To ensure that a counselor liaison is assigned to
  each instructional cluster/division, to each
  instructional site, cluster, division
• To provide a comprehensive outreach and
  recruitment to all prospective students
• To evaluate and, if needed, improve existing
  orientations (in person and online)
• To expand orientations aimed at special
  population students
• To create multiple methods to promote course
  certificate degree and transfer programs
• To monitor the quality of student counseling
  processes and learning outcomes
• To create methods to identify at-risk students as
  soon as possible
• To establish a referral process for at-risk
  students to counselors and learning staff in
  advance of registration

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Goal 3 Increase Support for Probationary and
Dismissed Students

• Objectives
• Have a referral team of counselors for students
  entering with at-risk grades from another
  institution (college or high school), or those
  with low assessment scores
• Include a 4-week personal follow-up for newly
  readmitted students
• Send notification to reinstated students whom are
  also on Early Alert
• Send invite letter to students whom were
  dismissed the previous semester but never
  re-enrolled at Cuesta
• Consider implementing mandatory SEP policy for
  all multiple dismissal students
• Consider having all readmit students enroll in
  Academic Skills 25 course
• Assign a counselor to all students who need
  remediation. The counselor will assist students
  with academic planning and navigation of the
  college.

• Create a readmission task force, with emphasis on
  ensuring strong advising and encouraging students
  to declare a goal/major during their first year
  in college
• Enhance advising through use of a road map a
  structure of guided sequential steps. A guide for
  students showing what next
• Encourage faculty to utilize the Early Alert
  system for students at high risk of failure
• Via e-mail, mail, or readmit workshops, advertise
  Academic Skills workshops
• Offer professional development for faculty who
  teach gatekeeper courses
• During registration process, disseminate
  brochures on student support services and
  available resources
• Track student data and use the findings to
  strengthen the curriculum, the support system,
  and staff development

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Goal 4 Improve and Promote a Positive Campus
Climate and Sense of Connection for Students

• Objectives
• To organize on-campus social and community events
  in order to encourage out-of-class interaction
  among students and between students, faculty, and
  staff.
• To provide increased opportunities for
  first-generation students to meet faculty and
  other students
• To review the results of the Noel-Levitz to
  analyze how students are feeling about their
  campus experience
• To continue engineering facilities in which the
  layout promotes opportunities for faculty,
  students, and staff to interact
• To provide access to technology for all students,
  but specially for those who do not have the
  technological resources at home
• To ensure that with the advances of technology
  students still have the opportunity to engage in
  face-to-face interactions with faculty and staff
• To make sure that availability of faculty office
  hours are well posted
• To survey students to learn about what they see
  as important for creating a positive campus
  climate
• To stimulate a campus-wide conversation about
  what we could do to improve campus climate (as
  individuals, departments, divisions, and
  programs)
• To honor and celebrate students accomplishments
• To bring students skills more visible (e.g.
  campus website, displays, etc.)
• To recommend to include Positive Campus Climate
  as part of the Colleges mission and values

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Goal 5Curriculum Support

• Objectives
• Identify success by course by student
  demographics
• Access prerequisite validity and quality of
  articulation with intra and inter-disciplinary
  meetings among faculty (paid by Matric?)
• Provide early and frequent assessment in each
  course in order to flag at risk-students. Support
  the use of Early Alert and, more importantly,
  pre-registration identification of at-risk
  students
• Link at-risk students to academic support
  services
• Provide ongoing opportunities for faculty
  professional development in the areas of
  pedagogy, cultural sensitivity, learning theory,
  learning styles, etc.
• To evaluate student course offerings and
  scheduling of those courses
• Development of appropriate bridge courses after
  identification of poorly matriculated course
  sequences (e.g., between ESL 6 and English 100)
• Integrate academic support modules into other
  academic courses

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Goal 6 Improve Student Recruitment and
Awareness of Cuesta College and Its Programs

• Objectives
• Analyze the effectiveness of informational
  brochures, promotional materials including the
  Cuesta website
• Use a centralized common look of internal and
  external marketing/communication tools
• Analyze and make revisions to current outreach
  activities with local high schools, community and
  out of county prospective students
• Update the Outreach Calendar and improve
  utilization in an effort to create a master
  calendar of outreach/recruitment to achieve
  collaboration among Cuesta programs/services who
  conduct outreach
• Analyze Cuesta Admission process and the level of
  ease of our online application and other
  admission documentation. Improve access for
  non-English speakers by evaluating materials,
  processes and available bilingual staff. Focus on
  evening and off-site locations
• Develop an outreach/recruitment database using
  Banner so that on going and timely electronic
  communication occurs among families/prospective
  students and Cuesta College
• Introduce academic skills during orientations,
  assessment letters and recruitment activities, in
  an effort to address foundations in learning
• Review and communicate to college personnel
  involved in recruiting and outreach minimum
  program entrance requirements
• Evaluate the access by non-exempt and exempt
  credit and non-credit students in terms of
  application, assessment, orientation and
  counseling/advising matriculation components
• Review outreach activities such as College Night,
  campus tours, open houses and other on-campus
  recruitment activities

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Goal 7Non-Academic Support

• Objectives
• To enhance, promote, and utilize student career
  and career choice planning services
• To encourage faculty participation in student out
  of class activities and orientation
• To provide improved student services leadership
  training
• To encourage a review of course material costs
• To increase faculty awareness of support services
• To increase access to financial advice for
  students
• To promote and increase on-campus student
  employment opportunities
• To develop alternatives for students with family
  support issues

• To develop a division, and campus-wide
  coordinated effort of college support service
  activities
• To promote student accessibility to all students
  with qualified disabilities
• To develop a student mentoring program with
  participation of campus staff
• To work closely with Marketing and Communication
  to encourage campus and community understanding
  of student support services
• To improve current accessibility of student
  services by evaluating hours and locations
• To create a level of services that supports the
  ever changing student demographics at Cuesta
• To intensify efforts to increase the diversity of
  college staff

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Goal 8College-Wide Training and Development

• Objectives
• To provide training sessions for all Cuesta
  Faculty and Staff on retention strategies
• To provide training sessions for faculty and
  staff on effective advising tools and
  supporting/mentoring of at-risk students
• To establish a pilot mentoring program targeted
  to at-risk students
• To assist faculty in the development of
  strategies to improve student success
• To promote increased collaboration among all
  sectors of the campus community in regards to
  retention initiatives.
• To support faculty in the development of student
  mentoring initiatives (i.e., students mentoring
  students, faculty mentoring students, etc)
• To offer seminars and workshops for faculty on
  the incorporation of retention strategies to
  course design

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California Retention and Success
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California Persistence to Degree Rates
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Cuesta College Student Retention/Success
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Cuesta College Persistence to Degree Rates
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Cuesta College Final Grade Distribution
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Cuesta College Student Retention/Success by
Ethnicity
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Cuesta College Student Retention/Success by
Gender
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Cuesta College Student Retention/Success by Age
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Cuesta College Fall to Fall Persistence Rate
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Cuesta College Fall to Fall Persistence Rates
by Ethnicity
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Cuesta College Fall to Fall Persistence Rates
by Gender
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Cuesta College Fall to Fall Persistence Rates
by Age
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Student Retention Data

• Institutional Profile of Persisters and Leavers
• Academic Factors
• High school GPA
• Cumulative prior college GPA
• Units attempted
• Educational goal
• Placement scores
• Major
• Enroll status

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Student Retention Data

• Demographic Factors
• Traditional/non-traditional need data
• First generation college need data
• Ethnicity Anglos and Asians
• Gender - females
• Age - curvilinear relationship
• Socioeconomic status need data
• Cuesta needs to construct its own model, but
  until we can collect SES, first generation
  status, HS GPA, etc. as well as the affective
  measures of engagement, any model we create will
  be misspecified

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Student Retention Data

• Affective Factors
• Achievement motivation
• Engagement
• Academic self-concept
• Emotional intelligence
• Social support
• Goal clarity and realism
• Learning and study skills/habits
• Social and academic integration
• Social support
• Satisfaction

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Understanding Departure

• Reasons
• Personal (including various options to further
  define personal e.g. health, family
  responsibility, illness)
• Academic skills deficits
• Alienation
• Over extended
• Goal change
• Comfort/adjustment

• Service issues/quality
• Financial
• Work related conflict
• Transferred (specify institution)
• Study skills/habits
• Future Plans
• Plan to return
• Other plans

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Success Indicators

• Graduation Rates
• Associate Degree attainment
• Certificate attainment
• Fall-to-fall retention rates
• Grade Data (Institutional and Individual
  Indicator)
• Grade Distribution including drop, fall, and
  withdrawal rates (Institutional Indicator)
• GPA
• Percentages of Successes (C or better)
• Work and Education
• Workforce placement
• Transfer outcomes
• Enrollment Goal
• Attainment of attendance goal outcome as
  specified on application

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Disciplines with the Lowest Success Rates
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Disciplines with the Lowest Retention Rates
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Data to Support Initiative

• Correlation of results to course success
• Trend analyses
• Grade analysis
• At-risk courses
• Placement at time of entry

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Some Thoughts on Student Retention

• Simple but complex!
• If we can STUDENT LIFE AND LEARNING (goal) to
  meet STUDENT NEEDS AND EXPECTATIONS, IMPROVED
  STUDENT SUCCESS and RETENTION (outcome) will
  follow!

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Some Thoughts on Student Retention

• Noel-Levitz
• Comprehensive campus-wide systematic effort
  rather than disparate initiatives
• Set of strategies that combine to enhance the
  quality of student life, learning and
  satisfaction
• Focus on high impact, high value-added strategies
• Although attrition is typically greatest during
  the first year, institutional efforts should
  extend beyond that

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A Good FitBest Interventions to Promote a
Connection Between Student and the Institution
Greatest congruence on the most important factors
Greater satisfaction and best adjustment
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Strategies for Success

• Focus should be on the major areas that impact
  the students experiences
• Instructional program
• Institutional policies and procedures
• Institutional culture
• Services and supports

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Instructional Program

• Relevant programs for career and educational
  goals
• Concerned involved faculty
• Culture focused on student learning
• High quality course content
• Appropriate use of technology
• Delivery options
• Academic support system
• Options for development of under-prepared
  students

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Policies and Structure

• Early Alert
• Require placement testing for all non-exempt
  students
• Expand and refine course placement
• Remedial coursework
• Orientation
• Learning communities
• Standard of academic progress
• Mandatory advising for at-risk students

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Institutional Culture

• Service excellence
• Engagement (academic, social, psychological)
• Culture of caring
• Fostering connection (integration)
• Student centered philosophy
• Option and flexibility

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Services and Support

• Intrusive academic advising
• Supplemental instruction
• Tutoring
• Comprehensive learning assistance centers
• Career decision making and goal setting
• Employment services

• Financial Aid
• Affective assessment and intervention
  (institutional and individual levels)
• Counseling services
• Life skills training
• Learning Skills instruction (time management,
  study and testing skills, note taking,
  decision-making, etc.)

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Strategies

• Practices having greatest impact on retention
• Academic advising (intrusive targeted)
• Learning support services (tutoring, labs,
  required developmental coursework)
• Assessment (including mandatory course placement)

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Cuesta Implementation Objectives

• Pre-planning, planning, implementation, review
• Gather your input
• Follow-up
• First layer of implementation
• Probation/dismissal students
• Students with low assessment scores

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Getting Your Input Today

• List 2 best practices you employ for student
  success and retention
• List 2 questions or concerns regarding student
  success and retention at Cuesta
• Interest sheet for goals 1-8 on the Cuesta
  Student Success and Retention Model

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Thank you! Student Success and Retention
Sub-CommitteeTeri Sherman- ChairSandee
McLaughlinCande MunozPatrick SchwabRyan
CartnalJane MorganGlenda Moscoso