After reviewing the state of student retention research and practice, past and present, the author looks to the future and identifies three areas of research and practice that call for further exploration. These concern issues of institutional action, program implementation, and the continuing challenge of promoting the success of low-income students.

Research and Practice of Student Retention: What Next?:

(2008). Unmasking the Effects of Student Engagement on First-Year College Grades and Persistence. The Journal of Higher Education: Vol. 79, No. 5, pp. 540-563.

/pdf/unmasking-the-effects-of-student-engagement-on-first-year-3scux77r31.pdf

Unmasking the Effects of Student Engagement on First-Year College Grades and Persistence

Table 1 Correlations between institutional mean scores of NSSE clusters of effective educational practices and institutional graduation rates (N=680 4-year colleges and universities) .

https://nces.ed.gov/npec/pdf/Kuh_Team_Report.pdf

What Matters to Student Success: A Review of the Literature

In a 1992 Calvin and Hobbs cartoon (Watterson), 6-year-old Calvin asks his teacher whether he is being adequately prepared for the challenges of the 21st century. He wants to know if he will have the skills and competencies that will allow him to succeed in a tough, global economy. In response, the teacher suggests he start working harder because what he will get out of school depends on how much effort he puts into it. Calvin ponders this advice for a moment and says, “Then forget it.” The exchange between Calvin and his teacher gets right to the point about what matters to student learning and personal development. Indeed, one of the few unequivocal conclusions from How College Affects Students (Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005) is that the amount of time and energy students put forth—student engagement—is positively linked with the desired outcomes of undergraduate education. Unfortunately, Calvin’s response is all too common, if not according to what students say, then by what they do or do not do. In this paper, I summarize the role and contributions of the scholarship and institutional research about student engagement and its relevance for student development professionals and others committed to enhancing the quality of the undergraduate experience. The presentation is organized into four major sections. First, I briefly describe the evolution of the student engagement concept and explain its importance to student development. Then, I summarize findings from research studies about the relationships between student engagement and selected activities including participation in high-impact practices, employment, and some other experiences of relevant a relevance to the current generation of undergraduates. Next, I discuss some topics that warrant additional investigation to better understand how to further potential and utility of student engagement research and institutional policies and practices that the findings suggest. I close with some observations about the implications of student engagement research for student affairs professionals and others on campus committed to improving the quality of undergraduate education.

What Student Affairs Professionals Need to Know About Student Engagement

Arguably, student retention has been the primary goal for higher education institutions for several decades. Certainly, it has been the focus of much research effort among higher education scholars. Unfortunately, efforts to improve retention seem to be ineffective; attrition rates have endured despite significant efforts to close them (ACT, 2004b; Braxton, Brier, & Steele, 2007; Terenzini, Cabrera, & Bernal, 2001). Notwithstanding the emphasis placed on student retention, decades of research, and countless institutional initiatives, slightly over half of students who begin a bachelor’s degree program at a fouryear college or university will complete their degree at that same institution within six years (Berkner, He, & Cataldi, 2002). During the 1990s, while some colleges and universities certainly improved their retention of rates, in the aggregate student graduation rates changed little. Students enrolling in a four-year institution in the 1995–1996 academic year, for example, were no more likely to complete a baccalaureate degree five years later than were their counterparts who entered during the 1989–1990 academic year (Horn & Berger, 2004). A substantial empirical and prescriptive literature does exist to guide faculty members, campus administrators, and public policy makers in attempts to increase student persistence in higher education. With rare exception (e.g., Astin, 1993), these persistence studies possess the same major flaw as most higher education outcomes research; these studies fail to consider the wide variety of influences that shape student persistence, focusing instead on discrete conditions, interventions, and reforms (Terenzini & Reason, 2005). In 2005, Terenzini and Reason proposed a conceptual framework that takes into account the multiple and interrelated student, faculty, and institutional forces that influence college success. Although Terenzini and Reason originally proposed their framework to guide student outcomes research generally, they argued that it is applicable to specific outcomes like retention. I, therefore, use this framework to organize and synthesize the research on college student persistence. Writing a comprehensive review of research on student persistence is a Herculean task. The publications that feature persistence as a primary outcome measure are almost innumerable. Moreover, literature reviews of persistence research have been published periodically in the higher education literature. I use these existing reviews as the foundation for this article. Beside my own previous review (Reason, 2003), I draw heavily upon reviews by Tinto (2006-2007) and Pascarella and Terenzini (1991, 2005), as well as the many scholarly and empirical works by Braxton. I supplement these secondary sources by incorporating persistence research published more recently. By using Terenzini and Reason’s framework to organize the following discussion, this review offers scholars and practitioners a

/pdf/an-examination-of-persistence-research-through-the-lens-of-a-3oqvvm7p9p.pdf

An Examination of Persistence Research Through the Lens of a Comprehensive Conceptual Framework

Foreword. The Ill-Structured Problem of College Student Departure. Overview of the Volume. Intended Audience. Tinto's Interactionalist Theory. Tinto's Interactionalist Theory. An Empirical Assessment of Tinto. Propositions Receiving Strong Support. Explanations for Unanticipated Academic Integration Findings. Tinto's Theory: Revise or Abandon? Toward a Revision of Tinto's Theory for Residential Colleges and Universities. Influences on Social Integration. Underlying Conceptual Orientation of the Six Influences. Tinto's Theory Revisited in Residential Colleges and Universities. Implications for Racial or Ethnic Minority Students. Student Departure in Commuter Colleges and Universities. Sixteen Propositions: Elements of a Theory of Student Departure in Commuter Institutions. Formulating a Theory of Student Departure in Commuter Colleges and Universities. Exemplary Student Retention Programs. Sources of Retention Programs. Selecting Exemplary Retention Programs. Nine Exemplary Retention Programs. Reducing Institutional Rates of Departure. An Overarching Recommendation. Powerful Institutional Levers of Action. Residential Colleges and Universities. Commuter Colleges and Universities. Reducing the Departure of Racial or Ethnic Minority Students. Conclusions and Recommendations for Scholarship. Conclusions. Recommendations for Further Scholarship. Closing Thoughts. References. Name Index. Subject Index.

Understanding and reducing college student departure

This article presents institutional practices that spring from empirically grounded forces that influence social integration and retention. We present 20 recommendations for implementation by eight...

The Fostering of Social Integration and Retention through Institutional Practice

This study examines the perceptions of undergraduate students about what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate campus behavior. A normative structure for college and university students was found. These normative patterns include four inviolable norms, four admonitory norms, and two laudatory norms.

Toward an Empirical Delineation of a Normative Structure for College Students

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Understanding and reducing college student departure

The Fostering of Social Integration and Retention through Institutional Practice

Toward an Empirical Delineation of a Normative Structure for College Students