Is early enrollment in a qualified first-year seminar (FYS) positively associated with second-year retention rates of new community college students? A large mid-Atlantic community college (MAC) believes that it is, and this belief is the basis for the hypothesis being tested in this research. Beginning in 2010, new first-time college and…

Inequalities in student enrolment, retention and success for specific demographic groups exist throughout the higher education sector. Although there are numerous and diverse initiatives implemented in universities to support student retention and/or success, experience and/or satisfaction, the feasibility or effectiveness of programs targeting…

Nearly half of all new community college students drop out of school before successfully completing a degree or credential. It has been found that the greatest percentage of these "non-completer" students terminate their college careers before entering their second year of attendance. First-year seminars (FYS) have long been believed to…

This article focuses on the role of theory and assessment in shaping student services and support through collaboration between student and academic affairs. Specifically, this paper highlights the use of a first-year student assessment tool that informs student support practices in the College of Agriculture at Louisiana State University (LSU).…

This study examined retention and First-Year GPA for all FTIC students, Black students, and Black Pell-eligible students at the UOTSE as a function of participation in a First-Year Seminar Course. A statistically significant relationship was determined to exist between First-year GPA and participation in the FYS course. For retention, participants…

This nonexperimental, longitudinal panel study was designed to test the predictive capacity of a grit intervention within a first-year seminar course that targeted academically underprepared students at a Mississippi community college. Extant pre- and post-grit scores for developmental students enrolled in the first-year seminar were analyzed for…

Student retention is a major concern for many universities. We use observational data from a regional university located in Alabama to test whether taking a first-year seminar improves student retention rates. Using a linear probit model, we find that taking a first-year seminar course is negatively correlated with retention rates, after…

This study examines the basic communication course (BCC) as it relates to students' first academic year at a university. Specifically, we compared students completing both a first-year experience (FYE) course and BCC against students completing only an FYE course. Data was collected over two cohorts of students and after analytical procedures, we…

There are more STEM jobs than there are qualified graduates to fill these positions, and recruiting students into STEM majors is insufficient. Of students who enter college intending to pursue STEM, nearly half do not finish their STEM degrees. In this article, we focus on retaining students who enter college with a declared biology major. This…

The first-year seminar (FYS) has been widely implemented at colleges and universities as a strategy for facilitating student success. However, empirical evidence indicates that the observed effects of FYS on retention and academic performance are mixed. Drawing on data from first-time full-time degree-seeking cohorts from Fall 2010 through Fall…

The high-school-to-college transition can be difficult as students are adapting to a multitude of academic and social changes simultaneously. The University of Wyoming has created a first-semester program targeted at development of student skills for at-risk students using paired first-year seminar classes. Using student survey data from both pre-…

At Georgia State University (GSU), like at most other institutions, corequisite courses must be taken simultaneously--the information in one is necessary to the full understanding of the other. However, the corequisite pairing describe in this article has a unique history; GSU 1010 course, part of the larger Freshman Learning experience, was…

College student attrition rates remain a major concern and many students leave due to unsatisfactory academic performance. Colleges have responded by offering first-year seminars focused on study skills. There is limited research on the effectiveness of these programmes. More research is needed to assess actual student behaviours after completing…

To promote learning and academic success among undergraduates, many colleges and universities offer or require students to participate in high-impact practices, which include first-year seminars, learning communities, writing-intensive courses, service-learning, diversity/global learning, internships, and capstone projects. However, the research…

The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of first-year seminar (FYS) course modality on first-semester GPA and second-semester retention of community college students' system-wide. For many student's community colleges serve as an affordable option for higher education. The first-year seminar course connects students to the college to…