As a student, choosing a college is a significant decision that has a lifelong impact, personally and professionally. Many factors come into play: the campus experience, available academic programs, cost, sports and athletic opportunities, residences, and word-of-mouth referrals.
Once a selection is made and the student enrolls, many of these same factors will also determine how students perceive their college experience. Living conditions, their roommate, how they finance their education, the groups they’re involved in, and the friends they meet, all shape student success—and that’s a perennial challenge for administrators charged with improving retention rates.
Uncovering retention insights with big data
As vice president for academic administration at Gannon University in Erie, Pennsylvania, making sense of the vast array of data that we know about students is critical to our objective of closing the student retention gap and developing programs that provide encouragement, coaching, and advice to those who exhibit the earliest signs of dropout risk.…Read More