A study was conducted to determine the effectiveness of community colleges in aiding those students who transfer to a senior institution, fail academically, return to the community college, and then re-enter the senior institution. The study, involving an examination of student records and a survey, centered on three groups: (1) 137 community…

A study explored possible reasons why technical and further education (TAFE) students enrolling in vocational education and training (VET) courses in New South Wales, Victoria, and Western Australia do not complete those courses. Findings were based on these two kinds of evidence: evidence obtained from a statistical investigation of the outcomes…

Forty to sixty percent of students who begin doctorates in selective colleges and universities do not persist to graduation. Although numerous research studies have focused on doctoral attrition and persistence, there have been no systematic studies because, among other reasons, there are no nationwide databases on attrition as there are for…

Research on student withdrawals has largely ignored the issue of stop-outs, those students who withdraw from a college or university but subsequently reenroll. As a result, student withdrawals have been seen as an attrition issue. However, this study suggests they should be viewed as a retention possibility rather than an attrition issue. This…

A longitudinal study was conducted at Southwestern College (SWC) in Chula Vista, California, to assess the impact of the matriculation process on SWC students. Three groups of students were compared: students who started "Pre-Matriculation" (in 1985); students who started during the "Phase-In" (in 1987); and students who…

St. Augustine College (SAC), in North Carolina, has undertaken four studies to gather data on factors related to student persistence, transfer, and withdrawal from the college. In the first study, graduating students from June 1990 to December 1992 were surveyed to determine influences on their decisions to transfer to a university. Three major…

This report contains four case studies from further education colleges in England that have been addressing student retention and dropout issues during the last several years. The case studies demonstrate successful student retention strategies in diverse college contexts with different student populations. They cover the following colleges:…

Focusing on student admission, academic performance, and persistence patterns, this two-part report examines transfer outcomes data on students who attended the Community College of Philadelphia (CCP) and transferred to LaSalle University. The first section presents former CCP student application patterns to LaSalle day and evening divisions…

In 1981-82, a study was conducted to determine why students left LaGuardia Community College (LCC) before completing the requirements for an associate degree. Interviews were conducted with dropout students over the course of the study, and questionnaires were administered to entering and continuing students to provide a comparative framework. The…

In 1987-88, a study was conducted at Piedmont Virginia Community College to determine between-quarter retention rates for various student groups and to compare the characteristics of returning and non-returning students. The study used end-of-quarter data to determine retention rates based on headcount and full-time equivalency. Rates were also…

As a contribution to the statewide Mississippi Student Information System (MisSIS), Mississippi Gulf Coast Junior College (MGCJC) conducted two surveys to determine: (1) the reasons students cited for withdrawing from courses during Fall 1979, and (2) the reasons students cited for withdrawing from college during that semester. Survey participants…

A study of 185 undergraduate students withdrawing from a publicly-funded Canadian university compared student characteristics and experiences (demography, academic performance, employment, financial support, social integration, personal circumstances, and perception of university learning experience) for three discipline areas (arts, education,…

Graduation rates are often used indicators of the performance of institutions of higher education. How institutions are represented can be profoundly affected by different approaches used to develop the data for the rates. The impact of variations in how these rates are constructed is illustrated by the example of the City University of New York…

Each year, in order to determine the factors that influence student attrition, Vancouver Community College (VCC) selectively surveys former students who dropped out (discontinuants) of occupational programs on VCC's three main campuses. Former students were surveyed regarding their personal characteristics, main goals for coming to VCC, activities…

The proliferation of e-Learning programmes on offer within the UK raises critical issues that have yet to be fully addressed in terms of the nature of learning, effective pedagogy, learning expectations and student profile. The amalgamation and influence of these factors is also having an impact upon student retention. This paper examines student…