Early Intervention: Using Assessment to Reduce Student Attrition

Abstract

Brian A. Vander Schee describes how incorporating the College Student Inventory into an existing freshman seminar measurably improved student retention.

THE NUMBER OF STUDIES conducted on college-student attrition is overwhelming. But few examine the impact of adding an early-intervention assessment tool to existing retention programs. Too often, colleges and universities conduct initiatives with similar purposes as disconnected efforts; retention programs in particular can benefit from a more coordinated approach. In addition, bringing existing efforts together can produce significant results with minimal resistance to change. This article presents a case study of an institution that combined two previously unrelated retention initiatives in a way that dramatically increased the effectiveness of both.

Institutional Background

THE INSTITUTION IN THIS STUDY is a small, A public, liberal arts college in the Northeast. For a number of years, the college had been administering the College Student Inventory (CSI), a commercially available early-intervention assessment, during the summer orientation program for incoming freshmen. Students were given the option of voluntarily contacting the appropriate office to review the results, but very few ever followed up. Those who did found the sessions somewhat irrelevant, since they took place two or three months after the assessment was administered. The institution had also been offering an elective three-credit freshman seminar to first-year students since 1987; the seminar, however, was not tied to the early-intervention assessment.

Neither of these initiatives had clearly articulated goals beyond a general desire to introduce students to the campus community and ease their transition to college life. The CSI was administered by the Academic Success Center, while the freshman seminar was coordinated by a faculty member. But in 2005, new-student enrollment began to decrease. This trend prompted institutional leadership to consider ways to improve student recruitment and retention, and to launch a fresh effort to accomplish these aims.

Assessment and Freshman Seminar

AS PART OF THE INITIATIVE to increase stu-dent retention from the first to the second year, the academic dean appointed a faculty member to serve as the director of the freshman seminar with a reduced teaching load. The new director saw an opportunity to increase efficiency and effectiveness by aligning the well-documented benefits of the freshman seminar with an established intervention, the CSI, that was already being used, but without effective follow-up. It was not difficult to work with the course instructors, who included both faculty and student affairs staff, to couple the CSI administration with the freshman seminar curriculum; most were already aware of the two programs and readily acknowledged the ineffectiveness of operating them as unrelated endeavors.

The College Student Inventory

The CSI is an early-intervention assessment available from Noel-Levitz (www.noellevitz.com) as part of its Retention Management System. New students complete the inventory, which takes between 30 and 50 minutes, during orientation or the first week of classes. Student responses are sent in for processing, and shortly thereafter the campus coordinator can download the resulting reports.

The advisor report includes background information supplied by the student as well as the assessment results for academic motivation, social motivation, general coping skills, and receptivity to support services. The report also lists specific recommendations in rank order. These recommendations might entail helping the student to select a major or talking with the student about the job market for college graduates. A report given to the student provides the same information.

As a pilot, the CSI was administered on the second day of each freshman seminar class in the fall semester. Students met individually with their instructors the following week to discuss the results and receive three campus referrals based on the report's recom-mendations. Students earned credit in the course by completing the referrals within the following two weeks. Campus referrals included the Academic Success Center, Career Services, Counseling Services, Faculty Advisor, Financial Aid, Leadership & Service, Residence Life, Student Activities, and TRIO Student Support Services.

All students who met with their instructors to discuss the CSI results were assigned to meet with their faculty advisors and given two other campus referrals. Students whose CSI results showed few indications that they faced challenges to their adjustment to campus were routinely referred to the Office of Leadership & Service and to the Residence Life Office. These referrals provided additional points of personal contact for these students and highlighted opportunities to take an active role on campus.

Student Participation and Retention

COMBINING THE EARLY-INTERVENTION ASSESSMENT with the freshman seminar yielded a substantial increase in retention. First- to second-year retention for students who enrolled in the freshman seminar pilot that included the CSI was 84.6 percent, compared to less than 67 percent retention for freshman seminar students in prior years when the course was not linked to the CSI, and to 67.9 percent for students who did not take the course at all.

Combining the early-intervention assessment with the freshman seminar also led to an increase in student engagement. Students reported that they used more campus services during their first semester than they would have if not for the CSI. They also used more campus services on average than second- to fourth-year students had as freshmen when the systematic administration of the CSI was not yet in place. As a result of these outcomes, the college faculty approved the freshman seminar, including the CSI administration and follow-up, as a general education requirement for all new students the following year. All first-year students in the next incoming class were thus engaged with both the early-intervention assessment and the freshman seminar program. The new requirement instituted the following year produced an overall increase in first- to second-year retention from 68.6 percent to 71.2 percent.

Conclusions

EARLY-INTERVENTION ASSESSMENTS allow instructors and advisors to gain insight into the lives of students that would otherwise not be available. They can help the institution become aware immediately of challenges that might cause a student to withdraw and can provide an opportunity to intervene in ways that are personal and appropriate for each student. They offer a starting point for building rapport with students, sharing information with them, and connecting them with relevant assistance within the first two weeks of the first semester.

In addition, it is clear that the freshman seminar can furnish an effective context and structure for administering the early-intervention assessment. The results of the assessment in turn provide a mechanism for evaluating student needs in order to take constructive action as early as possible. It is this combination of complementary retention initiatives, such as the freshman seminar and an early-intervention assessment like the CSI, that leads to reduced student attrition. Incorporating the early-intervention assessment into a required course not only encourages participation, but also highlights the institution's commitment to student success. Finally, taking advantage of existing programs, rather than introducing completely new initiatives, makes implementing change less taxing and more efficient for all involved'faculty, staff, and students alike.