Students with merit-based scholarships and strong high school GPAs typically have high retention rates. Yet, many high ability students did not need to study in high school, and never developed effective academic skills. Such students may expect to excel in college with the same limited effort. Unfortunately, institutions may unintentionally…

In this study, we explored predictors of community college re-enrollment after Hurricane Katrina among a sample of low-income women (N = 221). It was predicted that participants' pre-hurricane educational optimism would predict community college re-enrollment a year after the hurricane. The influence of various demographic and additional resources…

The majority of college students are not ready for college-level math courses, which, when completed, have been shown to increase graduation and transfer rates. To address this problem, the Math My Way (MMW) program was developed to integrate module-based curriculum and mastery learning approaches. The program is based on Seidman's retention…

Many factors can influence a student's decision to withdraw from college. Intervention programs aimed at retention can benefit from understanding the factors related to such decisions, especially in underrepresented groups. The Institutional Integration Scale (IIS) has been suggested as a predictor of student persistence. Accurate prediction of…

The present study utilizes a multilevel approach to assess the effects of four different types of intervention on college student retention, focusing on the interaction effects between the student characteristics and the types of intervention. The program effects on a 3-year trend are also explored. The findings of the present study reveal that…

This article presents seven guidelines to direct professional practice aimed toward the improvement of institutional student retention rates. For each of the seven guidelines, specific recommendations to provide direction to the enactment of the focal guideline are described. These seven guidelines spring from empirical studies of campus-based…

Despite decades of interest in Ph.D. student outcomes, there have been few comprehensive studies of doctoral student completion. Compared to research on undergraduate students, longitudinal studies of doctoral student completion in multiple disciplines at multiple institutions are exceptionally rare. As a consequence, there is relatively scant…

The Transition to College Inventory (TCI) designed to identify patterns of noncognitive factors related to academic performance and persistence was adapted and validated for use with first-year transfer students in a university setting. In this study, 369 entering transfer students were surveyed during Transfer Preview, an orientation program for…

The Open University has been undertaking an extended initiative to improve student retention through enhanced support for at-risk students. This initiative has evolved through a series of stages from ad hoc small scale local interventions relying largely on tutors and student self-referral, to an institution-wide pro-active system implemented by…

A qualitative study using grounded theory was conducted to examine the reasons that a sample of undergraduate baccalaureate nursing students withdrew from their nursing programs. The sample consisted of 11 nursing students who left generic baccalaureate nursing programs located in an urban area of a southeastern state. A semi-structured interview…

In this longitudinal study of 21,243 students, the academic disqualification and persistence to graduation by financial aid category and academic ability were studied. Students who had greater financial need disqualified at higher rates and persisted to graduation at lower rates. However, when financial aid categories were stratified by academic…

This study explored the difficulties that probationary students viewed as obstacles to their academic progress. These difficulties were compared to those identified by regularly matriculated students and to probationary students' deficits on a standardized study skills test. We compared the responses of participants (N = 150) in an intervention…

We conducted an archival study of at-risk students who had "stopped out" of college for many reasons (academic dismissal, financial problems, personal problems, etc.) and who later were accepted to return to school. Approximately 27% of the accepted students chose not to return. Those who returned had higher grade point averages, had completed…

A unilateral decision was made by the Office of the Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs, the Office of Academic Outreach and Support, and the Office of Academic Support and Retention (AS&R) to implement a pilot initiative for reporting, monitoring, and tracking excessive absenteeism during the Spring semester 2003. A…

Utilizing data from the national administration of a Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP) baseline and follow-up survey of the first-year experience during the 2002-2003 academic year, this study explores the relationship between three curricular interventions--first-year seminars, service-learning, and learning communities--and the…