A study was conducted at St. Louis Community College to disaggregate statistics for fall 1985 nonreturning students by educational goal and full-time/part-time status in order to provide more meaningful data for both internal and external evaluation of student retention and outcomes. Study findings included the following: (1) the comparison of…

In 1988, a study was conducted at John Tyler Community College (JTCC) to investigate patterns in student retention during the 1987-88 academic year. A survey was mailed to 124 full-time and 237 part-time students who enrolled in the fall quarter but did not return for the winter or spring quarters. Study findings, based on a 50% response rate,…

Berkeley undergraduates were surveyed in 1970 and again in 1973 to identify determinants of the decision to leave college among four types of leavers: failing transfers, failing dropouts, transfers in good standing, and dropouts in good standing. The following student characteristics are analyzed: family background, academic preparation, family…

This report presents estimated data on the exit reasons for students with disabilities projected to leave Illinois public schools after the 1997-98 school year. The data were prepared by averaging the information provided by school districts regarding students who were no longer receiving special education services during the 1995-96 and 1996-97…

As a response to the problems of nontraditional student attrition at two-year and four-year urban colleges, this paper introduces the constructs of career decision-making self-efficacy, perceived stress, and financial difficulty into a model built on the synthesis of Cabrera (1993). A questionnaire was administered to adult nontraditional (age 24…

This study, which is a companion to a study on 10-year enrollment and graduation patterns for new freshmen and transfers, sought to quantify how much more likely college students were to graduate if they were transfers, were enrolled continuously, were mostly full-time, and began their academic careers with good first-semester grade point averages…

Examines factors associated with persistence to a second term for 796 first time, two-year college students. Demographic variables correlated with low persistence were taking nondegree courses only, enrolling part time, working full time, and being over age 40. The only academic factor related to low persistence was a first term grade point…

To make educational assessments and comparisons meaningful, dropout data must be collected according to the same definitions, by the same procedures, and over the same time periods. A 31-state pilot project represents an effort by the National Center for Education Statistics to standardize data collection about high school completion. (SLD)

A study was conducted to measure the impact of the Virginia Community College System's (VCCS's) tuition increases on enrollment by randomly surveying students who had enrolled in the VCCS in fall 1991, but who had not enrolled for fall 1992. Some 76,191 of the 133,662 students enrolled in community colleges in fall 1991 did not re-enroll in fall…

The Michigan Student Information System (MiSIS) is the student flow component of the Michigan Community College Occupational Education Evaluation System (MCCOEES), a comprehensive state-wide system for evaluating occupational education. The Michigan Student Information System (MiSIS) Activities Manual was designed to help college-level personnel…

A follow-up study of undergraduate student attrition at Indiana University is presented. It builds upon previous research on student attrition documenting high rates of attrition among Black and Hispanic undergraduates. It also builds upon the Conceptual Model of Black Student Attrition. One goal is to compare persisters and non-persisters within…

This handbook for state and local education agencies is intended as a reference to assist in initiating and/or improving follow-up systems or studies of former vocational students classified as special populations. The handbook is a complement to Evaluation Handbook: Guidelines and Practices for Follow-Up Studies of Former Vocational Students,…

This study analyzed institutional factors that significantly affect cohort default rates at historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) and assessed the potential for reducing these rates. It has been hypothesized that the HBCUs most successful in lowering student cohort default rates are those that have also succeeded in increasing…

To determine factors affecting new students in their first semester, a study was conducted at Diablo Valley College, in California, to draw a profile and track 4,251 students who applied or were identified as new in fall 1992. Percentage distributions were calculated for the sample and for the sub-groups who applied only, completed testing only,…

This paper explores the practical implications of the distributional perspective on dropping out of school--a perspective that says that the concentration of student exodus from certain schools may reflect the impact of contextual or organizational factors as opposed to those that operate simply at the individual level. Based on data from the…