A second intervention that shows great promise in boosting retention is sophisticated early alert systems. As Hilary
Pennington of the Gates Foundation pointed out recently in
The New York Times, it is easier for a student today to drop
out of college than to drop out of a cell phone plan. As soon
as individuals try to drop their cell phone coverage, they are
besieged with queries about why they quit and entreaties to
restore coverage. Students who drop out of college typically
disappear with little or no institutional follow-up, much less
sustained encouragement to re-enroll.
By contrast, Dakota State University has developed a
web-based early alert system that flags student services and
academic advisors as soon as a student starts missing classes,
assignments, and exams, or displays behavioral problems. The
instructor’s report is immediately forwarded electronically to
the student’s academic advisor and a centralized campus liaison, who is responsible for identifying and setting up services
like tutoring and ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) testing. Since Dakota State University implemented the early alert
system, the persistence rate for first-time freshmen referred
through early alert rose to 84 percent in the fall of 2008 from
67 percent the previous year.
Albion College, a four-year liberal arts college in Michigan,
chose a different academic support program for students in
terminal probation status, the most serious of three levels
of academic probation at the school. It required all terminal
probation students to attend and complete a new Academic
Success Course (ASC) in which instructors provided not only
intensive academic coaching and personal mentoring but also
worked to strengthen key non-cognitive skills, such as the
readiness to change and a capacity for sustained effort. The
one-year retention rate for ASC students was 56 percent, a full
25 percentage points higher than the retention rate for terminal probation students prior to the program’s inception.
Learning communities, early alert systems, better adoption
of technology, and more active use of integrated classroom
supports can all help raise retention rates. Improving the
learning environment is a significant step student affairs staff
can take to elevate college completion rates, but it is not the
only road to bolstering college persistence. No one questions
that steep tuition costs, in the midst of a severe recession, have
propelled low-income students to quit school. However, that
does not mean that student affairs administrators are helpless
in the face of rising cost burdens. Information and incentives
can help reduce the price tag of a college education for low-income students.
During my presidency at De Anza College, one student
who appeared to be successfully balancing work and school
dropped out mysteriously, failing to complete his required
summer composition course. He subsequently told me that he
had dropped out because the book for the composition course
was too expensive. He was ashamed to let me know he could
not afford it. Little did he realize that our college had an emergency loan program that would have paid for the textbook. I
felt terrible—how frustrating that we did not have a system to
log in his problem, search, and find a solution.
The power of information and incentives to boost student
persistence is similarly demonstrated by the recent results
of performance-based scholarships. These new scholarships
provide aid to students in good standing in the form of bonus
increments over the course of the school year. A rigorous,
random assignment experiment involving more than 1,000
low-income parents enrolled at Delgado Community College
and the Louisiana Technical College-West Jefferson in the
New Orleans area found that performance-based scholarships
significantly increased both student retention and the number
of course credits earned at the community colleges.
Evidence-based Practices in Student Affairs
It’s true that performance-based scholarships and effec-
tive support strategies like learning community initiatives
are often more expensive than existing student affairs pro-
grams, but they might still be more cost-effective solutions.
Unfortunately, we will never know if that is the case unless,
and until, colleges start doing a better job of collecting data on
student outcomes. As a 2006 report from the CCRC points
out, few institutional research departments at community
colleges collect data on student outcomes, apart from numbers
compiled for purposes of compliance and accountability. Even
fewer institutions use data on student outcomes to shape pro-
grams and services. If the old adage is that “you measure what
you value,” its poignant corollary is that “you don’t value what
you don’t measure.”
Student affairs leaders now have a great opportunity to
demonstrate leadership in finding new ways to better support
today’s college students. But postsecondary institutions need
to start measuring the outcomes in higher education that we
value yet often fail to monitor. A shift to evidence-based prac-
tices in student affairs is a critical first step. Even then student
affairs must become more directive, to go where the students
are. It is time for student affairs to take a larger leadership role
in preparing students for the world of the 21st century. LE
Martha Kanter is the U.S. Under Secretary of Education.
David Whitman, a senior writer for the U.S. Department of Education,
contributed to this article.
Meet the Author
U.S. Under Secretary of Education
Martha Kanter will present opening remarks at the 2010 NASPA Annual
Conference on Sunday, March 7, from
6 to 7 p.m. Visit www.naspa.org/conf/
for more information.
