(from the Chronicle of Higher Education—subscriber-only content) The first year is all too often the only year many students spend at their initial colleges, a pattern that plays out at many K-12 schools as well. Before embarking on a comprehensive "first-year experience" program aimed at shoring up retention, Southern Utah University welcomed back only 64 percent of freshman for their sophomore year. To turn things around, the school's chief retention officer and vice president for student affairs undertook an effort that combined overhauling orientation, creating a new peer-mentoring program, enhancing financial support, identifying struggling students earlier and fostering a greater sense of belonging. First-to-second year retention rose 7 percent in the first year of the program.
In higher education overall, just 61 percent of students who started college in the fall of 2015 returned to their starting institution in 2016, according to the National Student Clearinghouse. One in eight transferred to another college.
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