On campuses across North America, more attention than ever is being paid to student success. But not all students define success the same. Rather than trying to shoehorn students into preconceived success models, enrollment managers may benefit from taking a more nuanced approach, according to Jody Gordon, Vice President, Students, University of the Fraser Valley and Stan Henderson, Vice Chancellor for Enrollment Management and Student Life, University of Michigan, Dearborn.
In their workshop “Fitting Success to Students: Retention, One Student at a Time,” Gordon and Henderson will discuss how students have different learning styles and respond to different means of support and examine the different barriers to success faced by various students, including first-generation, transfer, mature, LGBTTQ, Hispanic, Aboriginal/Native American, and Veterans, to name a few.
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Jody Gordon
Vice President, Students at University of the Fraser Valley
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Stan Henderson
Vice Chancellor for Enrollment Management and Student Life at University of Michigan, Dearborn ï
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Sunday, October 26, 2014 12:30 PM - 4:00 PM
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AACRAO: Why is it important to focus on student success in this targeted way?
Henderson: It’s an old cliché—it costs less money to retain than to recruit. And we can better retain these students—do it more efficiently, effectively and with more common sense—if we have strategies custom built for their success. Retention and completion are becoming more and more important. Increasingly the emphasis in higher education is a commitment to help students be successful, as well as the accountability of public institutions. Legislators are holding colleges and universities to account for success of students.
Gordon: Both Canada and the U.S. are seeing similar trends along these lines—the focus on outcomes is strong. This workshop offers us an opportunity to bring the best practices in both countries together in one room and learn from each other.
AACRAO: On campus, who is most responsible for student success?
Henderson: Student success is not the purview of just one area—academic affairs or student affairs. To have an effective implementation of a student success plan, everyone has to be at the table. It must be a collaboration informed by good communication. Everyone needs to understand what engagement looks like in both an academics and a student affairs context.
Gordon: A central message of the workshop will be to do away with the concept that one side or the other has all the answers when it comes to student success. It requires a blended approach.
Henderson: We want to encourage institutions to send teams of people—people from student affairs, strong faculty members, and so on. The team approach helps to see and integrate others’ perspectives.
Gordon: I agree with Stan completely. The team approach is essential to effective SEM. You will benefit the most as an institution if you can send three, four, five or even more people to the conference because you’ll be able to cover more of it. And in the case of our workshop specifically, you’ll have different members of the team, each with his/her own perspective, and each can internalize some of what we’re talking about from their perspective. Then you’re better prepared to take home workable solutions to your campus.
AACRAO: What’s the role of the student affairs office as you see it?
Gordon: At some institutions in Canada and the U.S., student affairs is not seen as a necessary component to ensuring student success. But it is critical. Retention isn’t just about what happens in the classroom.
Henderson: "There's a trend towards moving student affairs under Academic Affairs rather than keeping it as a freestanding division." Although that’s a viable approach, our message is that the real value of student affairs sometimes gets lost in the academic world. But retention is driven by students feeling that they are connected outside of classroom as well as in classroom. It doesn’t take away from academics but enhances what’s happening in classroom.
We’ll talk about some retention/student success models on different campuses. For example, UT Austin has begun work with at-risk and we’ll discuss some longitudinal success rates with those kinds of students. However, we’re not going to provide a one-size-fits all template. We’ll walk people through planning tools that will help customize SEM for student success for their individual campus. Then attendees will take that toolbox back to campus to start the planning process that works on their own campus and ties the campus strategic plan to the strategies for student success.