It Takes a Whole Village
In reading the posts on this forum, it reminded of the saying "it takes a whole village to raise a child." In our schools, it takes the involvement of all departments to identify and assist at-risk students.
For example, a collector in the finance department notices that they are sending a past due notice to a student. Passing along that information to the DOE or program chair would provide an opportunity for us to talk with the student and perhaps refer them to career services for a part-time job.
Or an instructor who notes that a student is frequently absent because he/she lacks transportation or child care, could contact student services to see if there are resources available.
One of the ways in which our campus management team tries to accomplish this is to have weekly meetings (Education with Finance, Career Services with Education, Finance with Admissions, and so on) at which we can discuss students that are having some issue that may result in withdrawal from school.
Something I would like to do is organize a retention committee with representatives from all departments; I would appreciate any comments that folks may have on the impact of retention committees.
Hi Denise:
We have used a retention committee at my school in the past! What we found was that it turned into a big gossip session of students who were not performing up to par! What we have now implemented since last semester is an Attendance Scrubbing Committee. It consists of the Campus Director, Both Deans, Both Advisors, Career Services Director, FA Manager, Director of Admissions and a few First Term faculty members.
With this group, we review a series of topics:
First, we review the status of our expected grads for the semester making sure that they are attending regularly and are completing their internship hours on consistently.
Second, we review the status of our new student population with our first term instructors and the Director of Admissions.
Third, we review the status of our continuing student population including all of the departments.
Lastly, we take a look at who our next semester expected grads will be and if they have started researching an internship site yet.
Our goal with this committee to to target individuals who may be at risk of not passing a class or having a possible incomplete for a class, poor attendance, not graduating, etc... With each of the individuals that we include in this group, we are able to specifically assign someone to that at risk student for follow up based on what type of advisement they need and from which department!
So far, it is working well and has made a huge impact on the awareness of who our at-risk student are!
Thanks,
Sara
I like the 'village' concept. Every department must understand, and appreciate, the inter-related nature of the student experience. Clearly, one of the major challenges is to get busy people talking freely and frequently with one another. Have you considered a shared data base where staff and faculty can post information. Someone has to be responsible for monitoring this data and making sure that the appropriate person is responding on a timely basis.
There are several ways to organize a retention committee. I think the most common format is to gather representatives from education, student services and enrollment management. This group can become rather large and unwieldy if you have representation from every academic program as well as people from admissions and financial aid. Usually it is very difficult to get all of these people at the same place at the same time.
Another format is to include retention issues as a standing agenda item for the senior management meetings. Issues are discussed from a strategic perspective and each manager is responsible for driving improved practices within their sphere of influence. This can be particularly meaningful if compensation is tied to results.
Doing a post mortem on all dropped students is another way to identify issues. Obviously, this is after the fact, but hopefully, you will be able to resolve areas of student dissatisfaction and avoid further withdrawals.
Congratulations! Sounds like you have developed a good working team. How often do you meet? Who chairs the meeting? Do you keep minutes?
At our campus all level managers are involved in communication. We work together to try to stay one step ahead of a potential problem such as student payments, attending behavior, and possible dissatisfaction with the class. We have open communication on student feedback from one department to another. Often reminding ourselves that "preception" is 100% reality for that person.
That is how we are. Communicate personality conflicts to others so they watch for problems.
Is there a formal procedure for this communication? Is it recorded? Does anyone follow up to make sure the student has been contacted? Are the results of the conversation shared? What "personality conflicts" do you discuss?
This seems like a great strategy for dealing with retention. Getting all departments involved, I believe would be the best strategy. This way the school as a whole can all be on the same page as far as to whats going on with the students.
Denise stated, “Or an instructor who notes that a student is frequently absent because he/she lacks transportation or child care, could contact student services to see if there are resources available.”
I just read that one third of all freshmen entering four year public colleges and universities will drop out before the sophomore year. This represents an enormous loss of resources, both human and economic. It seems that one rational response to this statistic is to suggest ways that MMI/UTI might help prepare instructors to recognize students at risk and to foster students' study skills and metacognitive abilities. I guess in a way, CEE is helping with this issue.
We have a comittee like this at our school. As an Instructor one of my jobs is to Identafy at risk students,at risk of failing ,houring out,disruptive in class or talking obout dropping out. I try to interact with them and offer what support I can, it could be as simple as a word of encouragement. I also let my teem leader know of this situation as soon as possible and I explain the action that I have taken, they may decide to talk to the student themself.I also include the ED manager, by letting them know about the situation and see if they will offer any assistance.If this path is not working I can e-mail the retention team that is made of all department heads that have the power to intervene and the response I have found has been quick and effective.The communication between everyone is impressive and it makes me feel good that I have used all the tools that I can to help.We do not save every student,but I feel that we as a village do make a differance.
Our largest drop rate in trade programs has always been in there first two classes. Having our best instructors assigned to those classes has made a big difference. It really does take all hands on deck!!!
