September 8, 2025 • 52 mins
Community colleges lose a staggering number of students before they even show up in official retention data. For this episode, I interviewed Dr. Rita Karam of RAND Corporation. She and her colleagues at RAND examined this often-overlooked group across 15 colleges in California, Texas, and Kentucky. The findings? More than 60% of students are lost between application and census date, with the majority leaving due to a mix of personal barriers and institutional processes.
This episode unpacks the research and offers practical steps colleges can take to reduce these losses and re-engage students.
Key Findings
- Enrollment leakage is real and large: About 10–15% drop after enrolling but before census. Another ~50% are lost between application and enrollment over 60% combined loss.
- Institutional processes matter: Complex onboarding, unclear handoffs, and overwhelming communication push students out just as much as financial or personal challenges.
- Financial aid is a critical barrier: Students often don’t realize aid requires a declared major or other criteria. Many are dropped when aid decisions aren’t resolved in time.
- Students want relational, not transactional, support: They seek caring, transformative relationships with advisors, not one-off transactions.
- Timing is crucial: Roughly 30% of students enroll within two weeks of term start, overwhelming advisors and limiting the quality of advising.
- Few colleges systematically track these students: Data systems are fragmented, making it hard to identify where and why students disappear.
Key Chapter Makers
00:00: Introduction
02:45: Why Students Leave Before Census
06:20: Institutional vs. Personal Barriers
11:10: The Role of Financial Aid in Early Attrition
15:30: Communication Breakdowns During Onboarding
20:40: Timing Matters: The First Two Weeks
26:15: Tracking Students Who Disappear
31:00: Effective Re-Engagement Strategies
36:20: Rethinking Advising: From Transactional to Transformational
41:50: Practical Steps Colleges Can Take Now
47:00: Closing Thoughts & Key Takeaways
For the full transcript and detailed show notes, including ACTION STEPS, visit the episode page.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Al (00:01):
Welcome to the Student Success Podcast.
If you work in higher ed andwant to learn ways to support
students, check out today'sepisode.
Rita (00:10):
[Quote teaser] Colleges are losing around 10 to 15
percent of their students whoenroll, who drop before they
enroll and then they drop beforethe census date.
So it's between 10 to 15percent.
But the colleges are alsolosing students from application
to enrollment as well.
So from application toenrollment I believe it's around
(00:36):
50 percent or so from those whoapplied and all the way before
enrolling.
So I guess if you want to lookat percentage of students being
lost from application all theway to census date, that's a bit
over 60%.
Al (00:54):
Welcome to the Student Success Podcast, so tell us a
little bit about yourself.
Rita (00:58):
Yeah, so I'm Rita Karam.
I'm a senior policy researcherat the RAND Corporation, which
is a research organization.
It's a private, nonprofitresearch organization.
We conduct research andanalysis to help improve
decision making and policiesacross a variety of fields, and
(01:22):
my specialty is in education andlabor, and a lot of the work
that I do is on post-secondaryeducation.
Al (01:30):
So, Rita, so nice to have you on the Student Success
Podcast.
I've known you for many yearsand I've always appreciated the
quality of your work, thequality of your research and
your passion, and you and yourcolleagues recently produced a
research study.
The title of it is Lost but NotForgotten: Community College
(01:52):
Efforts to Track and Re-engageStudents Before the Census Date.
So take us through thebeginning of this.
How did it get started?
What's your methodology?
Rita (02:02):
So this is a very interesting story of how it
started, because it did not come.
This idea did not come from us,my colleagues and I.
Actually it came from AscendiumFoundation.
We were having conversationwith them on a variety of issues
(02:22):
, including enrollment andretention, and they asked the
question if we had research onstudents who dropped before the
census date.
Because you know, Al, there's alot of research on student
retention for those after thecensus date and retention and
(02:46):
persistence from one year to theother, but not on this group of
students.
And we looked into it and atthat point, I think at that time
, we only found like one studyat that time that addressed the
student population.
It was over 10 years old, itwas addressing like one
(03:08):
community college and that wasit.
There was nothing else sincethen.
We did more research and wefound like a couple of more
addressing community collegesthat were also old, but there
wasn't much research on thatstudent population.
Al (03:21):
So tell us, so everybody's on the same page on the
definition of census date.
What is the census date?
Rita (03:29):
So the census date is the official point, any term where a
college or a universitydetermines the number of
students who are enrolled intheir institution, and this is
the official day and this is theofficial number of student
enrollment that is reported tothe state and federal government
(03:51):
in the reporting.
Students who drop before thecensus date do not show in these
reports and they are notconsidered dropouts from the
college and, as we haveindicated in our report, for
some colleges those studentseven disappear, like they're not
(04:12):
necessarily well-tracked intotheir system as well.
We ended up looking at thewhole journey of onboarding,
starting from application allthe way up to the census date,
and estimated the number or theproportion of students that are
dropping out at these differentstages of onboarding.
(04:33):
And there is a reason why wedid this and I can talk about
that as well.
Al (04:37):
Wonderful, Just quickly, how many colleges did you look at?
Approximate number of students.
Rita (04:44):
So this study had two components.
The first component was lookingat 15 community colleges in
three different states.
We selected California, Texas,and Kentucky.
We did that because we wantedcolleges in different parts of
(05:04):
the country.
We also wanted, you know,colleges that function on their
own versus KCTCS, which is theKentucky Community and Technical
College System.
They tend to have a moreintegrated data, data
integration at the system level.
So we wanted kind of to see ifthere's variation in terms of
(05:28):
our findings and also withineach college.
We selected five colleges thatvaried in terms of urbanicity
and rurality.
I think that is a veryimportant thing to be able to
distinguish.
And the goal is to from thesecolleges is to understand what
is it that they're doing, youknow, to track the student
(05:50):
population, whether that studentpopulation is important for
their enrollment.
As you know, Al, studentenrollment has been declining
for more than a decade.
The COVID years haveintensified that decline.
Yes, enrollment now is going up, but for most colleges it did
(06:14):
not reach the pre-COVID studentenrollment levels.
So we wanted to understand ifthe colleges are focusing on the
student population as a way notjust to retain them, but also
to increase the enrollment andalso understand, you know, how
(06:36):
they are interacting with thestudent population and what kind
of engagement they're involvedin.
But then there was a secondcomponent and Dallas College is
a close collaborator on thesecond component.
And the second component is wewanted to go in specifically
into one of the institutions toconduct more in-depth interviews
(07:00):
that included students, becausethe first component included
staff and directors, but notstudents as well, as we wanted
to analyze their administrativedata to understand what is the
proportion of students that havebeen lost between enrollment
(07:22):
and census, but as well asbefore census.
Also, from application as well.
Al (07:28):
Well, like I said from the beginning, you do quality work
and this methodology acrossthree different states, I'm sure
you got some really goodfindings on this, so let's dig
into some of the findings.
Rita (07:40):
So we so we have lots of findings, because I want to go
back to what I said thatinitially we wanted to design
the study to look only at thetime when students enroll and
then they dropped.
So we started interviewingstudents who did drop before the
(08:09):
census date.
There's no surprise.
You know students were givingus a variety of reasons personal
barriers, financial you knowthey needed, you know, financial
help, or they had help or theyhad, or they had transportation
issues, or they had mentalhealth or family issues.
But as we were talking to thestudents, they also started
(08:33):
mentioning processes thathappened before they enrolled,
right, for example, regardingtheir interaction with the
advisors or their interactionwith the financial aid advisors.
And, as a result, we decidedthat we need to start expanding
(08:56):
and understanding theinstitutional processes right,
because the institutionalprocesses have contributed to
them dropping before the censusdates.
For this group of students andthey are not the majority of
students, but for this group ofstudents it's really the
combination of their personalbarriers and their experience
(09:21):
and their onboarding, startingfrom the application part, from
the application timeline.
Al (09:28):
So when I work with colleges and they ask me to help them
with onboarding, one of thefirst things I ask them to do is
to actually register.
And these are people with withdoctorates who have worked in
the college and every singletime they can't believe just how
difficult the registrationprocess is as a barrier.
So it's not surprising, right?
(09:51):
And were there any other thingsthat the students told you that
was specific about theprocesses
Rita (09:59):
So one of the things the student told us is that they did
not think they did notexperience a process that is
streamlined, right?
So what the studentsexperienced is that the colleges
, they receive detailedinformation, welcome emails.
(10:21):
When you know, when they apply,they also receive lots of
information, right?
I mean regarding lots ofdifferent, lots of different
topics, and the students youknow mentioned that it was very
(10:42):
difficult for them to digesteverything, and some of the
students what they needed islike a personal, you know,
interaction with someone to beable to talk to.
That was also an issue for onereason the students also did not
understand that there aredifferent stages and that there
are different handoffs, right?
(11:03):
So whoever helps with theapplication and registration
ready, like, did they do theirvaccination for some of the
states that have placementassessments?
Did they take the placementassessments?
Did they provide their highschool transcripts?
You know those are questionsthat are asked of different
staff than, let's say, you know,what class should I enroll in?
(11:25):
Right?
And the students were unable todifferentiate that, and so
sometimes they would misdirectthe questions to, or ask the
questions to the wrong staffbecause they did not have that
information, you know, and thenthey explained to us that they
would get information that wasnot helpful or information that
(11:46):
was not correct.
But part of that is becausethey were asking the wrong
person and not the right person.
So the colleges did notnecessarily make clear.
You know that handoff stagesand who should be who should
they be contacting.
You know for these handoff, youknow which staff for these
(12:07):
different handoff stages.
There's about three of them interms of the stages.
I mean there's those who helpwith the registration ready,
those who are enrolling studentsand then, after students enroll
, sometimes they are also handedoff to their academic advisor.
So there's three differenthandoffs.
Al (12:30):
And during this process, often the students are ping
ponged all over the campus andthe handoffs are not always warm
.
Rita (12:41):
Yes, the handoffs.
You know this is a bit of,because I think it's a
complicated issue.
Our study has shown that around30% of the students they enroll
two weeks before the beginningof the term.
(13:04):
That's a lot for advisors tohandle and I think that's part
of the well, that's part of theissue.
First of all, you know advisorsI mean, you know the advisor
student ratio is is pretty low,uh.
Second of all, if you have,like a a large number of
students doing it last minute,you know that's also going to
(13:25):
cut time from the advisorregarding how much they can
spend and discuss things withthem.
So there's multitude of factorsand, of course, there's another
factor, probably that there aresome advisors that are better at
interacting with students thanothers.
Some are good at making thoserelationships less transactional
(13:47):
and more transformative.
So those are a few of thereasons and, again, one of the
things I'd like to point out forthis specific study we were not
looking at, we were reallyfocusing on those students who
were not satisfied and whodropped out.
So I just want to make thatclear.
So if the finding seems, youknow, going towards the negative
(14:12):
side, it's not because thecolleges are not doing a great
job.
You know good work, but it'sbecause you know for a certain
group of students, you know it'snot enough what they're doing.
Al (14:25):
Right.
Any other findings before wejump into the recommendations?
Rita (14:30):
Yeah, so there's a lot of findings, ok.
So I want to say one of theregarding their financial aid
status and also they do not knowhow to access the financial
(15:01):
support that they need, sosometimes they drop because they
don't have the finances.
But many colleges also dropthem.
The colleges drop them if theirfinancial aid decisions have
not been made or they cannotshow that they can pay for the
term, and part of why this is anissue is because you know, when
(15:22):
I mentioned the welcome emails,you know, welcoming them to the
college, and everything thatthe steps that they need to take
to be able to enroll to enrollfinancial aid is not part of,
for the most part, is notincluded in those emails,
because financial aid is not arequirement to enroll.
So one of the things that werecommend is for the community
(15:48):
colleges is, first of all, tostart sending customized
messages to different groups ofstudents, you know, but also to
start including, you know, mainpoints of the financial aid,
like when are the timelines?
What kind of eligibilitycriteria are there?
I mean a few of the colleges.
One of their eligibilitycriteria for financial aid is
(16:11):
that students need to bedeclared have a declared major.
Not all colleges, a few of thecolleges, but if those students
in those colleges did not knowthat, then they're not going to
get their financial aid and, asa result, they're going to drop.
So that's one of the majorfindings of why students are
(16:33):
dropping before the census datethings related to financial aid.
Al (16:38):
Because financial aid is so big.
I'm just wondering is there astate or it's all over the place
among the 15, but is there astate California, Kentucky or
Texas that does a better job atthe financial aid aspect?
Rita (16:54):
No, it's just not.
It's not state related, I thinkit's college, it's at the
college, yeah.
So, for example, we havecolleges, for example, who if
you do not declare a major,that's it.
You know you're not going toget financial aid for that term
unless you know you declare amajor.
(17:16):
But other colleges have done itdifferently, right?
So, for example, they allowstudents their first year, they
will allow the financial aid togo through for the first year,
because then the students duringtheir first year are supposed
to through their first yearstudent success courses you know
can explore, you know what theywant to major in.
So some colleges are doing itdifferently.
(17:37):
I think other colleges areallowing students to defer, you
know, till the following term aswell.
So the colleges really vary inhow they're dealing with the
financial aid.
But it's not a state issue,it's not a system issue
necessarily.
Al (17:56):
It's at the college level.
Got it.
Because it could be a policyissue for states to then try to
resolve for a more fair play forstudents, right so, but yeah,
got it.
So you got the the advisorissue that by the time they get
to them there's just a flood ofstudents.
We've got the financial aidaspect.
(18:18):
What are their findings?
Rita (18:20):
So the other aspect is also the identifying student
basic needs early.
So colleges are doing a great,great job in serving their
students, and those are thestudents who are enrolled after
this, who are part of the censusenrollment group, right, and so
(18:44):
during the semester they mightsurvey them regarding basic
needs, what is needed.
But what we found is for forthe group of students who are
dropping out, okay, they needed,they would have made a
different decision if they wereaware of what services that the
(19:06):
colleges have that they couldutilize for their own individual
challenges.
And so and the colleges are,most colleges are not doing that
, and so one of the things thatwe recommend is that to start
gathering this information earlyon in the process.
(19:28):
You know, by the way, in theapplication I mean, the
application is really at this,it's a state application, right,
each state has its ownapplication, and it allows
colleges to add a few questions.
So what we recommended is forthe colleges to add, you know,
five to 10 questions, whether inthe application or at different
times, so that students can,you know, tell them exactly, you
(19:52):
know, what their basic needsare, and so by that time they
they get to the advisor.
The advisor has thatinformation to have a meaningful
conversation and to connectthem right, to connect them to
the services that are availableand make the students feel that
(20:15):
they are part of a communitythat cares about them.
So part of it, I believe, ismaybe a better data collection
of basic needs, of what thestudents need, and then do it
doing it at an earlier stage,not after the census date, not
(20:39):
after the census date.
I think the other thing that wealso recommend is the early
alert.
You know colleges have earlyalert systems, but the early
alert systems are implementedafter the fourth week of and
this is, like you know, afterthe census date, right?
So one of the things thatcolleges can start thinking
about, if they collectinformation on student basic
needs early and if they can getinformation on who because they
(21:04):
will know from the applicationwhether students are not decided
, have undecided majors and ifthey're able to bring that
information into the early alertsystem right, then those alerts
can be generated very early andimplemented during the first
(21:25):
week of the term, okay, and thenthose students could be
immediately referred to advisorsas well as counselors to
discuss, you know, those twomain issues that we think are
contributing to student loss.
I think the colleges couldleverage their online courses,
(21:45):
they could leverage theirlearning management system to
identify students who are notengaged early on, which is, in
the first few weeks, not fewweeks in the first week and that
does not require faculty totake any absences, right,
(22:07):
because this is really atechnological technology.
If a student does not log intotheir learning management system
the first week, then thatstudent should be referred to an
advisor, or we recommend thatthat student is referred to an
advisor to ask why If a studentdid not do their assignment or
(22:27):
did not log into their onlinecourse.
That's also another way andthat really does not put much
pressure on faculty to take, youknow, absence, absences,
because we want to reduce, wewant to reduce burden on faculty
.
Al (22:42):
So thank you, Rita.
There's so many findings, somany recommendations thus far.
I'm learning so much.
What else did you learn?
Rita (22:50):
We learned that there are few colleges that are paying
attention to the studentpopulation and I want to kind of
highlight a bit the practicesthat they're doing to minimize
the loss of the studentpopulation.
So one of the colleges has anddoing this in a very targeted
(23:14):
way, you know is texting everystudent during the first and
second week of the term to askthem if they need anything.
This is not about academic.
This is just like a check-inmessage to show them that they
care and to tell them do youneed anything, whether academic
or non-academic support?
(23:34):
You know, and we are here foryou, and I think this is a
really good practice.
Okay, because first of all, nowthe students have someone they
can connect to and email orcontact and feel that the
college cares about them.
So one of the colleges is doingthat.
(23:55):
Two other colleges and thiscollege is focusing on doing
this early in the semester sothat the students don't drop
before the census date.
Two other colleges have focusedon the students who already
dropped out and have theyengaged with external vendors,
who then calls the students whodropped out to understand the
(24:20):
reasons for why they dropped outand to re-engage them again
into subsequent and, you know,encourage them to enroll in
subsequent semesters.
So those are actually goodpractices to think about.
Al (24:39):
Did you have the time to find that, the things that they
were doing to bring them back,re-engage, to have them enroll
are they pretty effective orthey still have a long way to go
?
Rita (24:52):
We have data from one college and it was pretty
effective.
I believe it was around 800.
It's a large college thatdropped out in one term and they
were able to bring in, Ibelieve, like 300 or so back,
(25:14):
300 or 350 back.
That's a good amount.
Al (25:19):
Yeah, that's significant.
I mean, we look at it in rawnumbers, but you know these are
people.
Rita (25:27):
Right.
One of the findings that willlead to that leads to a
recommendation is I think it'svery important to start thinking
about majors and careers early,not during, not just at the
(25:47):
application, because again, as Isaid, for a few of the colleges
, being undecided is affectingthe financial aid, decided is
affecting the financial aid orwe found it was affecting the
financial aid in our sample.
But, as you know, there's a lotof, for example, partnerships
with high schools.
Right, you have the dualenrollment, you have P-TECH, you
(26:10):
have a lot of other kind ofother kind of partnerships that
community colleges have withhigh schools.
School students do thefinancial aid or, you know, do
(26:33):
the academics, you know, orprovide the dual enrollment, you
know curriculum and so forth.
But also maybe the counselorsfrom the high school and the
counselors from the college canwork together and help the high
school students start exploringyou know their careers, start
(26:54):
exploring different kind of youknow their careers, start
exploring different kind of youknow fields.
So by the time they apply theyalready have a pretty good idea
of what they want.
So if those things can startearlier, I think that would be a
good thing and also I thinkthat's a good opportunity for
community colleges to also letthe student know about their
(27:14):
value, about their educationalvalue, because sometimes
students are not applying to onecollege, right, they're
applying to a four-yearuniversity, they're applying to
community colleges and thecommunity colleges might not be
their priority, okay, and theymight be waiting to hear from
(27:36):
the four-year university andwhen they do they decide, you
know, they're not going tocontinue enrollment at the
community college.
And so one of the things that wethink is that if the colleges
who are partnering with highschools invest in having their
having students, high schoolstudents understand regarding
(27:58):
their program offering and whattheir value is, okay, and and
and how they and how studentscan then transfer into four-year
universities.
Because you know at the, youknow in the beginning, you don't
necessarily have to take your,your general education courses
at a four-year university.
So we feel that there is roomfor the colleges to start, maybe
(28:25):
behaving more like, maybemarketing better their offerings
to high schools.
Al (28:33):
So there was this thing Rita called guided pathways.
I laugh because yes.
See, the thing about higher edis especially community colleges
.
They're asked to do too much A.
B, there's so much bureaucraticinertia.
(28:54):
It's very difficult to enactchange, to change antiquated
practices, and then, soberingly,there are too many people in
the system that just want tomaintain the status quo.
And the reason I mention thisis because if campuses had and
many have done a good job, butfor the most part, if they had
(29:15):
actually implemented the GuidedPathways framework and every
year worked to continuallyimprove, clarifying the path for
students, helping them enter,helping them stay, ensure
learning, everything that youtouched on would be addressed as
a continuous improvement typeof process.
(29:36):
I have a question for you aboutAI, because I'm beginning to
hear a lot from colleagues, fromeducators, students even, that
with AI, for example, a studentnow, provided the information is
correct, a student can uploadto AI the college catalog along
(30:02):
with the course schedule andeven the information from Rate
my Professor and say give me aschedule of classes for fall.
Also, I have these needs.
I have an IEP from my highschool and I'm having issues
(30:25):
with housing and so forth.
Does this college offer anyresources?
So, in other words, AI isbecoming more and more like an
assistant.
I think a lot of too manypeople use it for research, like
they would for Google, likeresearch, like search, and I
don't think that's great yet,but it could serve as a great
(30:47):
assistant to people and I'm justwondering what are your
thoughts on that.
Rita (30:51):
That's a very you know.
I've never thought of AI beingused like that and you're saying
students are using it.
Al (30:59):
Yes, they're becoming, especially now that ChatGPT 5.0
has come out.
The functionality and how muchit knows is just astronomical.
Rita (31:10):
You know well.
First of all, I don't know howAI has been trained.
I mean, just because you'reuploading things you know, it's
not clear to me how AI is makingthe decision right, like what
the criteria is or what theparameter right?
Ai is not perfect, but I guessmaybe the question I'm having is
(31:33):
why our students are doing that, when it seems to me that the
colleges have mapped out Right,like the education pathway, the
educational plans for students,right, I mean, you know, if
you're going to do this majorthe first year, this is what you
(31:54):
need to take.
Ok, and probably the first yearthey cannot enroll on their own
, they have to enroll with anadvisor, but then it's.
But my understanding is is thatthe paths are made a bit, that
they are quite defined, butthat's my understanding.
So I'm not so sure what benefitthey're like, I'm not exactly
(32:16):
sure what other kind ofinformation they're getting.
That's not in the educationalmapping that the colleges have.
And also, and also like, ifstudents want to change majors,
like, like, like, I mean that'sanother thing.
Like many I mean all of us, Imean I changed my major.
I was a chemistry major thatended up being sociology.
Right, I mean, all of us.
I mean, I changed my major.
I was a chemistry major thatended up being sociology.
Right, I needed to talk tosomeone, like I believe, like I
(32:39):
should.
Yeah, I needed to talk to anadvisor.
Al (32:42):
Yeah, two things.
Colleges did work during thelast five, six years throughout
the country on creating what arecalled program maps, and they
did.
The problem is that they neverreally brought them to life.
They they're like five clicksaway on a webs ite.
Advisors don't always use them.
(33:03):
Every student is not handed one, and that's why they want to
see advisors to go.
Ok, I'm interested in this.
What classes should I take?
But if they can't see anadvisor because the ratio is so,
so high, some of them are justgoing, you know, I'm just going
to prompt, I'm going to do theparameters on AI, upload the the
(33:26):
college info and let it assistme.
And since I can't get anadvisor because of the ratio,
come again November to knowabout my classes, I'm going to
prompt it again because Ichanged my major.
I think that's kind of wherethings are heading.
I'm not saying it's right orwrong either way.
Students find a way, especiallywhen the technology is becoming
(33:47):
much more available.
Rita (33:50):
Yeah, and I don't know if it's, and I'm not going either
way right, I think for me iswhere I think we need to do
first is try to kind of figureout are the responses AI giving
them?
Were they correct?
I guess, like I think maybethat's the first thing we need
(34:10):
to kind of figure out, like, didit delay students from
finishing their certificates ordegrees or did it help?
I guess, maybe to me as aresearcher I'm not saying it's
good, I'm not saying it's bad, Ido not know but I think the
first thing I would want to dois kind of research that because
(34:32):
it can be helpful to advise.
It cannot replace an advisor,but it can be helpful to
advising students as an add-on.
And I don't know where I standon this, because as a researcher
I need to do that research.
(34:52):
But you give me an idea for thenext research.
Al (34:55):
There you go.
That's why I appreciate you,because you look at this and
already looking at it from Ineed to study this.
I can tell you right now thatit's pretty accurate.
Rita (35:05):
Okay, you can Okay.
Al (35:06):
It's, it's pretty, now it's not going to be perfect, even
even AI a year ago, I'm like, ohmy gosh, I can't believe it
cranked this out.
I just, I can't believe justhow, and I think part of the
reason, Rita, is that there havebeen billions of prompts and
billions of things alreadyuploaded and its knowledge base
(35:27):
is so incredible that, forexample, I prompted the other
day as I'm having a meetingworking with a team and they're
like we need to create a survey,and I gave it the parameters
and it cranked it out in fiveseconds.
Now, was it perfect?
But we were able to tweak thatsurvey to meet our needs, anyway
, this is a great next researchproject and I don't want to kind
(35:49):
of take you like on anotherroad here, but I just kind of
wanted your sense of technologygiving all these issues that you
studied.
Rita (36:00):
It's interesting and also it's interesting on what does
that mean in terms of theadvisor's role?
Right, I mean it's now theadvisor for a specific group of
students is just going to be avalidator, right?
Like you know, the studentswill figure it out.
Maybe the advisor will take alook and just validate, as
opposed to meeting with thestudents.
(36:21):
That would reduce, that wouldreduce the, that would change
the responsibility and alsoreduce maybe the pressure
advisors might have.
Al (36:30):
Yeah, because what they can do is already.
I know some of the UCs areworking on these bots to do what
I'm saying.
Yeah, but they're training thebots so that they give right
information, and so what'shappening is that the other
things that you mentioned, Rita,the basic needs, the need to
(36:55):
you know, reach out to them,check in on them.
Rita (36:56):
Then humans can really do more of that work instead of the
other work, right, yeah, and Ithink that's really where I
wanted to go, that this is notabout replacing advisors, but
maybe changing what advisors doand directing advisors' roles
and responsibilities tosomething else to ensure that
students continue and persist.
(37:16):
That's, I think, where I wasgoing with that one, but I see
that all the time, like evenwith radiology, right.
Like now, AI can read X-rays,like with very high accuracy,
and so the question I have whatdoes that mean in terms of the
role?
You know?
Then, what do radiologists do?
Now, right, like this is likethe first thing that comes to
(37:39):
mind.
Al (37:41):
Our world's going to change in like five like right now, we
have the highest unemploymentrate for recent college grads.
Well, part of it is thisadministration's policies, but
the other aspect is that AI isdoing a lot of the entry level
work and doing it quite well.
So I think, as a society and Iwork with faculty on this is
(38:02):
that this is becoming more.
It's here to stay.
It's exponential.
How do we leverage it?
How do we adapt?
The reality is we are going tosee some things that are
obsolete or the way our jobdescriptions are going to be
changed so drastically.
Right, but yeah, I think whatyou identified here because, as
(38:24):
you mentioned earlier, higher edhas not really look, let's be
honest.
Right, enrollment means funding, and if we don't keep enrolling
and getting students into highvalue programs and deal with all
this stuff that you haveidentified, we're just going to
keep bleeding students.
Rita (38:46):
And again, what you just touched on also is really one of
the things that I think I didmention.
But students who dropped outkept saying that they do not
want a transactionalrelationship.
They want a transformationalrelationship.
Right, you have always a groupof students that might require
(39:07):
more, that need more support,you know, from advisors than
others.
Right, depending on thebackground, you know, if you're
a first generation college goer,you don't have all the
information to navigate thesystem.
Right, and that's what they'reseeking from advisors, and I'm
all for figuring out ways thatadvisors can provide that
(39:31):
transformational support thatthe students are seeking.
And if that means, as you said,use AI for certain things so
that advisors can do otherthings, go for it.
Al (39:45):
And it's because community college students spend most of
their time in the classroom.
If that first week or two thefaculty is throwing down the law
, making their syllabi look likecontracts, not making it very
engaging, and that plays asignificant role.
(40:07):
I remember when I was are-entry student I went to
community college and it wasvery interesting.
At the Veterans Center therewas a list of faculty and they
called them friendlies.
And friendlies for veteransmeans they're not the enemy
right, they're the ones who arefriends.
But the reason we have the listthere is not because they're
(40:30):
easy, it's not because any ofthat is because we just wanted
to know who are the faculty whocare, right.
So if I went to my first classand I had a faculty say, well,
look to your left and now lookto your right, those people are
probably not going to be therebecause I only give one A, I
mean that kind of attitude,students don't feel a sense of
(40:51):
belonging and so I think facultyplay a critical role in that
and keeping them before censusright or after census.
Before census right or aftercensus.
Rita (41:01):
It's you know, it's for or after census.
It's very interesting becausethe before census, the faculty
issue never showed up, remember,like they decided to drop
before they even experienced thefaculty.
That much, right?
No, they dropped out.
I mean, they enrolled, theyshowed up, they showed up to
some classes, right, but theynever told us anything about the
(41:24):
faculty.
What some told us is that theydid not think that the courses
that their advisors gave themwas relevant to them.
Think that had to do with theconversation, because probably
the advisors were telling them,hey, you need to take this and
(41:49):
this and this, right, but therewasn't a conversation of why and
how.
That feeds into the few of themwho told us that it wasn't
about they did not understandhow everything fits right and so
they didn't understand.
Understand is this needed ornot?
And I think part of it also is,you know, at one point, because
, again, as I said, you know,enrollment happens last minute.
There aren't enough resourcesfor advisors, not a lot of
(42:11):
advisors.
They might end up just tellingstudents you know, these are the
courses, without having thatconversation.
And those students I told youabout wanted to have that
conversation and in fact acouple of them told me they went
to another college where theywere able to have that
conversation.
Al (42:27):
So they moved, yeah, yeah, when I first started, my first
community college was fiveminutes away and when I started
talking to the column counselors, this person was literally, she
never looked at me, wasliterally putting on her makeup,
her lipstick while talking tome, and I felt like, wow, okay,
(42:50):
and they lost my financial aidpackage.
And this was back in the daybefore it was all done on online
and I ended up driving 35minutes to the other one where I
had a very different experience, right.
So those little things, youknow, make all the difference.
So, as we start wrapping up,I'm wondering that, let's say,
(43:11):
you're presenting to a group ofcommunity college educators,
from president down to Ishouldn't say down to the
research analysts, and what arewhat's like two or three things
that you want to leave with them, like elevator speech style, so
(43:33):
that, like they know, okay,when I go back to my campus, I
really got to think of thesethings much more, be much more
thoughtful about it, really digin and ask good questions of our
teams to see what we can doabout this.
Rita (43:49):
I would suggest starting with things that are probably
maybe easy to do, which is,first of all, streamline that
onboarding process.
Reduce the handoffs if possible.
If hands-off cannot be reduced,then communicate to the
(44:10):
students you know exactlyregarding the hands-off, and
provide names right, not officenames.
Provide names of counselors,advisors, whoever it is that
they can contact.
So I think that's one of thethings that I would, you know, I
would say that they should do.
(44:31):
I think the other thing, too,is invest in building the
capacity of advisors, whetherthrough professional development
or whether through having moreadvisors, and I think it's very
important.
I mean, that piece which is therelational piece with students,
(44:52):
I think is very important and Ithink there needs to be more
development of those skills ornurturing of those skills, so
that the staff can have, youknow, good conversation with
students.
I think the other thing, too,is the amount of information is
a lot of information that thestudents get.
For some students, that is OK,right, but for those who are
(45:15):
having personal barriers, it'stoo much pressure on them.
So if the welcoming emails andall of this information are
provided in more, smallerportions, at different times and
more digestible, I think thatwould be more helpful, I think,
using text messaging maybedepending on the generation,
(45:39):
okay, but with the youngergeneration, text messaging, any
two-way text messaging, probablyis the most efficient way, and
if they can work with studentson that, I think that is, I'm
sorry.
If they can work on buildingthose two-way systems with
students, I think that would behelpful.
(46:00):
I think that the other thingthat I would suggest also is the
financial aid.
The financial aid is veryimportant and this is really why
either students are droppingout, they enroll and they drop
out before the census date, orthe college drops them out Right
them out right, and soproviding information on for
(46:23):
each institution.
It's not just the FAFSA right,it's not just the form.
Each institution has its owneligibility criteria.
You know some people andthey're you know, and so that
needs to be communicated in avery simple way to students
early on, so to ensure that theyare doing the forms, they are
(46:43):
providing the documents thatthey need to provide in time, so
that the decision is made, okay, before the start of the term.
The other thing, too, which Ithink is I'm going to go back
which I think is I recognizeit's more difficult to implement
, but it's really building acase management teams, similar
to the meta-majors, right, likeyou have for each meta-major.
(47:06):
Maybe this onboarding canactually adopt a kind of like
this kind of case managementmeta-major models, right?
So, for those who are applying,let's say, for one of the
meta-major models, right?
So, for those who are applying,let's say, for one of the
meta-majors, here is the teamthat you communicate with for
(47:29):
the onboarding, right?
So, here's your coach, here'syour financial aid person,
here's your, you know, advisor,right, and do it, you know,
based on those meta-pagers youknow.
And then for the undecidedstudents, they have their own,
they would have their own team.
So those are some of the thingsthat I would suggest.
(47:50):
Oh, and then the other thingtoo, is it's really important to
for the messages not to begeneric.
So, you know, you mentionedveterans, right, al?
Okay, you mentioned veterans,right, al Okay, the emails that
go to veterans should bedifferent than the emails that
might go to, let's say, studentsjust coming from high school,
(48:14):
or the emails that go to adultlearners should be customized.
So, again, think aboutcustomizing those messages and
those emails and to differentstudent population.
Al (48:25):
Beautiful Rita.
I've always appreciated yourwork.
Oh, did you have something else?
Rita (48:33):
No, I mean, the only thing is is probably we did not talk
about how many, what percentageof students colleges are losing.
Yeah, you know, and I thinkthat was probably the first
question we answered and wereally worked with Dallas
(48:56):
College on that and answeringthat, and my colleague, also
worked on that, and we foundthat and this was substantiated
actually with other colleges whotold us that they have reports
that show similar percentages.
(49:18):
So colleges are losing around10 to 15 percent of their
students who enroll, who dropbefore, yeah, they enroll and
then they drop before the censusdate.
So it's between 10 to 15percent.
However, but the colleges arealso losing students from
(49:39):
application to enrollment aswell, right, so from application
to enrollment, I believe it'saround probably around 50% or so
, okay, from those who appliedand all the way before enrolling
, and so I guess, if you wantedto look at the percentage of
(50:02):
students being lost fromapplication all the way to
census date, that's a bit over60% right.
Now, some of the loss fromapplication to before enrollment
makes sense, right, because youknow students apply to multiple
places Right, because you knowstudents apply to multiple
(50:23):
places, but still there's, butstill we believe that it's a
group of students that isimportant for colleges to
understand why they're losingthem and at what point in the
pipeline you know where is theleakage happening, and so that's
one of the things that ourreport also addresses.
It also addresses how to trackthese students, because some
(50:46):
colleges, a few colleges, trackthem, but many of the colleges
are not tracking them because,as because you know, different
pieces of information are indifferent data systems and so
there needs to besynchronization of these data
systems, and that's verydifficult to do.
Al (51:05):
So many findings and recommendations and tying it
here actually, in the end, isfine to create a sense of
urgency.
You gave us percentages, andthese are sobering percentages,
and so if colleges are able totake your recommendations and
operationalize them, I think alot of colleges are already
(51:27):
working on a lot of these things.
It's just a matter of makingthem more cohesive, improving
processes.
Thank you so much for thisstudy.
Rita (51:39):
Al, thank you so much.
I enjoyed talking with you.
I always enjoy talking to you,and so, yeah, that was great.
Al (51:47):
Thank you for participating in the Student Success Podcast
and I look forward to your nextstudy on the role of AI with
community college students.
Rita (51:57):
Do you want to collaborate on that?
Al (51:59):
Let's do it, let's do it.
Rita (52:03):
All right, you always give me ideas.
Thanks Al.
Al (52:06):
Thank you.
Thank you for listening to theStudent Success Podcast.
You can subscribe to the showand newsletter on the Continuous
Learning Institute link belowand, of course, on Apple
Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube orwherever you get your podcasts.
Welcome to the Student Success Podcast.
If you work in higher ed andwant to learn ways to support
students, check out today'sepisode.
Rita (00:10):
[Quote teaser] Colleges are losing around 10 to 15
percent of their students whoenroll, who drop before they
enroll and then they drop beforethe census date.
So it's between 10 to 15percent.
But the colleges are alsolosing students from application
to enrollment as well.
So from application toenrollment I believe it's around
(00:36):
50 percent or so from those whoapplied and all the way before
enrolling.
So I guess if you want to lookat percentage of students being
lost from application all theway to census date, that's a bit
over 60%.
Al (00:54):
Welcome to the Student Success Podcast, so tell us a
little bit about yourself.
Rita (00:58):
Yeah, so I'm Rita Karam.
I'm a senior policy researcherat the RAND Corporation, which
is a research organization.
It's a private, nonprofitresearch organization.
We conduct research andanalysis to help improve
decision making and policiesacross a variety of fields, and
(01:22):
my specialty is in education andlabor, and a lot of the work
that I do is on post-secondaryeducation.
Al (01:30):
So, Rita, so nice to have you on the Student Success
Podcast.
I've known you for many yearsand I've always appreciated the
quality of your work, thequality of your research and
your passion, and you and yourcolleagues recently produced a
research study.
The title of it is Lost but NotForgotten: Community College
(01:52):
Efforts to Track and Re-engageStudents Before the Census Date.
So take us through thebeginning of this.
How did it get started?
What's your methodology?
Rita (02:02):
So this is a very interesting story of how it
started, because it did not come.
This idea did not come from us,my colleagues and I.
Actually it came from AscendiumFoundation.
We were having conversationwith them on a variety of issues
(02:22):
, including enrollment andretention, and they asked the
question if we had research onstudents who dropped before the
census date.
Because you know, Al, there's alot of research on student
retention for those after thecensus date and retention and
(02:46):
persistence from one year to theother, but not on this group of
students.
And we looked into it and atthat point, I think at that time
, we only found like one studyat that time that addressed the
student population.
It was over 10 years old, itwas addressing like one
(03:08):
community college and that wasit.
There was nothing else sincethen.
We did more research and wefound like a couple of more
addressing community collegesthat were also old, but there
wasn't much research on thatstudent population.
Al (03:21):
So tell us, so everybody's on the same page on the
definition of census date.
What is the census date?
Rita (03:29):
So the census date is the official point, any term where a
college or a universitydetermines the number of
students who are enrolled intheir institution, and this is
the official day and this is theofficial number of student
enrollment that is reported tothe state and federal government
(03:51):
in the reporting.
Students who drop before thecensus date do not show in these
reports and they are notconsidered dropouts from the
college and, as we haveindicated in our report, for
some colleges those studentseven disappear, like they're not
(04:12):
necessarily well-tracked intotheir system as well.
We ended up looking at thewhole journey of onboarding,
starting from application allthe way up to the census date,
and estimated the number or theproportion of students that are
dropping out at these differentstages of onboarding.
(04:33):
And there is a reason why wedid this and I can talk about
that as well.
Al (04:37):
Wonderful, Just quickly, how many colleges did you look at?
Approximate number of students.
Rita (04:44):
So this study had two components.
The first component was lookingat 15 community colleges in
three different states.
We selected California, Texas,and Kentucky.
We did that because we wantedcolleges in different parts of
(05:04):
the country.
We also wanted, you know,colleges that function on their
own versus KCTCS, which is theKentucky Community and Technical
College System.
They tend to have a moreintegrated data, data
integration at the system level.
So we wanted kind of to see ifthere's variation in terms of
(05:28):
our findings and also withineach college.
We selected five colleges thatvaried in terms of urbanicity
and rurality.
I think that is a veryimportant thing to be able to
distinguish.
And the goal is to from thesecolleges is to understand what
is it that they're doing, youknow, to track the student
(05:50):
population, whether that studentpopulation is important for
their enrollment.
As you know, Al, studentenrollment has been declining
for more than a decade.
The COVID years haveintensified that decline.
Yes, enrollment now is going up, but for most colleges it did
(06:14):
not reach the pre-COVID studentenrollment levels.
So we wanted to understand ifthe colleges are focusing on the
student population as a way notjust to retain them, but also
to increase the enrollment andalso understand, you know, how
(06:36):
they are interacting with thestudent population and what kind
of engagement they're involvedin.
But then there was a secondcomponent and Dallas College is
a close collaborator on thesecond component.
And the second component is wewanted to go in specifically
into one of the institutions toconduct more in-depth interviews
(07:00):
that included students, becausethe first component included
staff and directors, but notstudents as well, as we wanted
to analyze their administrativedata to understand what is the
proportion of students that havebeen lost between enrollment
(07:22):
and census, but as well asbefore census.
Also, from application as well.
Al (07:28):
Well, like I said from the beginning, you do quality work
and this methodology acrossthree different states, I'm sure
you got some really goodfindings on this, so let's dig
into some of the findings.
Rita (07:40):
So we so we have lots of findings, because I want to go
back to what I said thatinitially we wanted to design
the study to look only at thetime when students enroll and
then they dropped.
So we started interviewingstudents who did drop before the
(08:09):
census date.
There's no surprise.
You know students were givingus a variety of reasons personal
barriers, financial you knowthey needed, you know, financial
help, or they had help or theyhad, or they had transportation
issues, or they had mentalhealth or family issues.
But as we were talking to thestudents, they also started
(08:33):
mentioning processes thathappened before they enrolled,
right, for example, regardingtheir interaction with the
advisors or their interactionwith the financial aid advisors.
And, as a result, we decidedthat we need to start expanding
(08:56):
and understanding theinstitutional processes right,
because the institutionalprocesses have contributed to
them dropping before the censusdates.
For this group of students andthey are not the majority of
students, but for this group ofstudents it's really the
combination of their personalbarriers and their experience
(09:21):
and their onboarding, startingfrom the application part, from
the application timeline.
Al (09:28):
So when I work with colleges and they ask me to help them
with onboarding, one of thefirst things I ask them to do is
to actually register.
And these are people with withdoctorates who have worked in
the college and every singletime they can't believe just how
difficult the registrationprocess is as a barrier.
So it's not surprising, right?
(09:51):
And were there any other thingsthat the students told you that
was specific about theprocesses
Rita (09:59):
So one of the things the student told us is that they did
not think they did notexperience a process that is
streamlined, right?
So what the studentsexperienced is that the colleges
, they receive detailedinformation, welcome emails.
(10:21):
When you know, when they apply,they also receive lots of
information, right?
I mean regarding lots ofdifferent, lots of different
topics, and the students youknow mentioned that it was very
(10:42):
difficult for them to digesteverything, and some of the
students what they needed islike a personal, you know,
interaction with someone to beable to talk to.
That was also an issue for onereason the students also did not
understand that there aredifferent stages and that there
are different handoffs, right?
(11:03):
So whoever helps with theapplication and registration
ready, like, did they do theirvaccination for some of the
states that have placementassessments?
Did they take the placementassessments?
Did they provide their highschool transcripts?
You know those are questionsthat are asked of different
staff than, let's say, you know,what class should I enroll in?
(11:25):
Right?
And the students were unable todifferentiate that, and so
sometimes they would misdirectthe questions to, or ask the
questions to the wrong staffbecause they did not have that
information, you know, and thenthey explained to us that they
would get information that wasnot helpful or information that
(11:46):
was not correct.
But part of that is becausethey were asking the wrong
person and not the right person.
So the colleges did notnecessarily make clear.
You know that handoff stagesand who should be who should
they be contacting.
You know for these handoff, youknow which staff for these
(12:07):
different handoff stages.
There's about three of them interms of the stages.
I mean there's those who helpwith the registration ready,
those who are enrolling studentsand then, after students enroll
, sometimes they are also handedoff to their academic advisor.
So there's three differenthandoffs.
Al (12:30):
And during this process, often the students are ping
ponged all over the campus andthe handoffs are not always warm
.
Rita (12:41):
Yes, the handoffs.
You know this is a bit of,because I think it's a
complicated issue.
Our study has shown that around30% of the students they enroll
two weeks before the beginningof the term.
(13:04):
That's a lot for advisors tohandle and I think that's part
of the well, that's part of theissue.
First of all, you know advisorsI mean, you know the advisor
student ratio is is pretty low,uh.
Second of all, if you have,like a a large number of
students doing it last minute,you know that's also going to
(13:25):
cut time from the advisorregarding how much they can
spend and discuss things withthem.
So there's multitude of factorsand, of course, there's another
factor, probably that there aresome advisors that are better at
interacting with students thanothers.
Some are good at making thoserelationships less transactional
(13:47):
and more transformative.
So those are a few of thereasons and, again, one of the
things I'd like to point out forthis specific study we were not
looking at, we were reallyfocusing on those students who
were not satisfied and whodropped out.
So I just want to make thatclear.
So if the finding seems, youknow, going towards the negative
(14:12):
side, it's not because thecolleges are not doing a great
job.
You know good work, but it'sbecause you know for a certain
group of students, you know it'snot enough what they're doing.
Al (14:25):
Right.
Any other findings before wejump into the recommendations?
Rita (14:30):
Yeah, so there's a lot of findings, ok.
So I want to say one of theregarding their financial aid
status and also they do not knowhow to access the financial
(15:01):
support that they need, sosometimes they drop because they
don't have the finances.
But many colleges also dropthem.
The colleges drop them if theirfinancial aid decisions have
not been made or they cannotshow that they can pay for the
term, and part of why this is anissue is because you know, when
(15:22):
I mentioned the welcome emails,you know, welcoming them to the
college, and everything thatthe steps that they need to take
to be able to enroll to enrollfinancial aid is not part of,
for the most part, is notincluded in those emails,
because financial aid is not arequirement to enroll.
So one of the things that werecommend is for the community
(15:48):
colleges is, first of all, tostart sending customized
messages to different groups ofstudents, you know, but also to
start including, you know, mainpoints of the financial aid,
like when are the timelines?
What kind of eligibilitycriteria are there?
I mean a few of the colleges.
One of their eligibilitycriteria for financial aid is
(16:11):
that students need to bedeclared have a declared major.
Not all colleges, a few of thecolleges, but if those students
in those colleges did not knowthat, then they're not going to
get their financial aid and, asa result, they're going to drop.
So that's one of the majorfindings of why students are
(16:33):
dropping before the census datethings related to financial aid.
Al (16:38):
Because financial aid is so big.
I'm just wondering is there astate or it's all over the place
among the 15, but is there astate California, Kentucky or
Texas that does a better job atthe financial aid aspect?
Rita (16:54):
No, it's just not.
It's not state related, I thinkit's college, it's at the
college, yeah.
So, for example, we havecolleges, for example, who if
you do not declare a major,that's it.
You know you're not going toget financial aid for that term
unless you know you declare amajor.
(17:16):
But other colleges have done itdifferently, right?
So, for example, they allowstudents their first year, they
will allow the financial aid togo through for the first year,
because then the students duringtheir first year are supposed
to through their first yearstudent success courses you know
can explore, you know what theywant to major in.
So some colleges are doing itdifferently.
(17:37):
I think other colleges areallowing students to defer, you
know, till the following term aswell.
So the colleges really vary inhow they're dealing with the
financial aid.
But it's not a state issue,it's not a system issue
necessarily.
Al (17:56):
It's at the college level.
Got it.
Because it could be a policyissue for states to then try to
resolve for a more fair play forstudents, right so, but yeah,
got it.
So you got the the advisorissue that by the time they get
to them there's just a flood ofstudents.
We've got the financial aidaspect.
(18:18):
What are their findings?
Rita (18:20):
So the other aspect is also the identifying student
basic needs early.
So colleges are doing a great,great job in serving their
students, and those are thestudents who are enrolled after
this, who are part of the censusenrollment group, right, and so
(18:44):
during the semester they mightsurvey them regarding basic
needs, what is needed.
But what we found is for forthe group of students who are
dropping out, okay, they needed,they would have made a
different decision if they wereaware of what services that the
(19:06):
colleges have that they couldutilize for their own individual
challenges.
And so and the colleges are,most colleges are not doing that
, and so one of the things thatwe recommend is that to start
gathering this information earlyon in the process.
(19:28):
You know, by the way, in theapplication I mean, the
application is really at this,it's a state application, right,
each state has its ownapplication, and it allows
colleges to add a few questions.
So what we recommended is forthe colleges to add, you know,
five to 10 questions, whether inthe application or at different
times, so that students can,you know, tell them exactly, you
(19:52):
know, what their basic needsare, and so by that time they
they get to the advisor.
The advisor has thatinformation to have a meaningful
conversation and to connectthem right, to connect them to
the services that are availableand make the students feel that
(20:15):
they are part of a communitythat cares about them.
So part of it, I believe, ismaybe a better data collection
of basic needs, of what thestudents need, and then do it
doing it at an earlier stage,not after the census date, not
(20:39):
after the census date.
I think the other thing that wealso recommend is the early
alert.
You know colleges have earlyalert systems, but the early
alert systems are implementedafter the fourth week of and
this is, like you know, afterthe census date, right?
So one of the things thatcolleges can start thinking
about, if they collectinformation on student basic
needs early and if they can getinformation on who because they
(21:04):
will know from the applicationwhether students are not decided
, have undecided majors and ifthey're able to bring that
information into the early alertsystem right, then those alerts
can be generated very early andimplemented during the first
(21:25):
week of the term, okay, and thenthose students could be
immediately referred to advisorsas well as counselors to
discuss, you know, those twomain issues that we think are
contributing to student loss.
I think the colleges couldleverage their online courses,
(21:45):
they could leverage theirlearning management system to
identify students who are notengaged early on, which is, in
the first few weeks, not fewweeks in the first week and that
does not require faculty totake any absences, right,
(22:07):
because this is really atechnological technology.
If a student does not log intotheir learning management system
the first week, then thatstudent should be referred to an
advisor, or we recommend thatthat student is referred to an
advisor to ask why If a studentdid not do their assignment or
(22:27):
did not log into their onlinecourse.
That's also another way andthat really does not put much
pressure on faculty to take, youknow, absence, absences,
because we want to reduce, wewant to reduce burden on faculty
.
Al (22:42):
So thank you, Rita.
There's so many findings, somany recommendations thus far.
I'm learning so much.
What else did you learn?
Rita (22:50):
We learned that there are few colleges that are paying
attention to the studentpopulation and I want to kind of
highlight a bit the practicesthat they're doing to minimize
the loss of the studentpopulation.
So one of the colleges has anddoing this in a very targeted
(23:14):
way, you know is texting everystudent during the first and
second week of the term to askthem if they need anything.
This is not about academic.
This is just like a check-inmessage to show them that they
care and to tell them do youneed anything, whether academic
or non-academic support?
(23:34):
You know, and we are here foryou, and I think this is a
really good practice.
Okay, because first of all, nowthe students have someone they
can connect to and email orcontact and feel that the
college cares about them.
So one of the colleges is doingthat.
(23:55):
Two other colleges and thiscollege is focusing on doing
this early in the semester sothat the students don't drop
before the census date.
Two other colleges have focusedon the students who already
dropped out and have theyengaged with external vendors,
who then calls the students whodropped out to understand the
(24:20):
reasons for why they dropped outand to re-engage them again
into subsequent and, you know,encourage them to enroll in
subsequent semesters.
So those are actually goodpractices to think about.
Al (24:39):
Did you have the time to find that, the things that they
were doing to bring them back,re-engage, to have them enroll
are they pretty effective orthey still have a long way to go
?
Rita (24:52):
We have data from one college and it was pretty
effective.
I believe it was around 800.
It's a large college thatdropped out in one term and they
were able to bring in, Ibelieve, like 300 or so back,
(25:14):
300 or 350 back.
That's a good amount.
Al (25:19):
Yeah, that's significant.
I mean, we look at it in rawnumbers, but you know these are
people.
Rita (25:27):
Right.
One of the findings that willlead to that leads to a
recommendation is I think it'svery important to start thinking
about majors and careers early,not during, not just at the
(25:47):
application, because again, as Isaid, for a few of the colleges
, being undecided is affectingthe financial aid, decided is
affecting the financial aid orwe found it was affecting the
financial aid in our sample.
But, as you know, there's a lotof, for example, partnerships
with high schools.
Right, you have the dualenrollment, you have P-TECH, you
(26:10):
have a lot of other kind ofother kind of partnerships that
community colleges have withhigh schools.
School students do thefinancial aid or, you know, do
(26:33):
the academics, you know, orprovide the dual enrollment, you
know curriculum and so forth.
But also maybe the counselorsfrom the high school and the
counselors from the college canwork together and help the high
school students start exploringyou know their careers, start
(26:54):
exploring different kind of youknow their careers, start
exploring different kind of youknow fields.
So by the time they apply theyalready have a pretty good idea
of what they want.
So if those things can startearlier, I think that would be a
good thing and also I thinkthat's a good opportunity for
community colleges to also letthe student know about their
(27:14):
value, about their educationalvalue, because sometimes
students are not applying to onecollege, right, they're
applying to a four-yearuniversity, they're applying to
community colleges and thecommunity colleges might not be
their priority, okay, and theymight be waiting to hear from
(27:36):
the four-year university andwhen they do they decide, you
know, they're not going tocontinue enrollment at the
community college.
And so one of the things that wethink is that if the colleges
who are partnering with highschools invest in having their
having students, high schoolstudents understand regarding
(27:58):
their program offering and whattheir value is, okay, and and
and how they and how studentscan then transfer into four-year
universities.
Because you know at the, youknow in the beginning, you don't
necessarily have to take your,your general education courses
at a four-year university.
So we feel that there is roomfor the colleges to start, maybe
(28:25):
behaving more like, maybemarketing better their offerings
to high schools.
Al (28:33):
So there was this thing Rita called guided pathways.
I laugh because yes.
See, the thing about higher edis especially community colleges
.
They're asked to do too much A.
B, there's so much bureaucraticinertia.
(28:54):
It's very difficult to enactchange, to change antiquated
practices, and then, soberingly,there are too many people in
the system that just want tomaintain the status quo.
And the reason I mention thisis because if campuses had and
many have done a good job, butfor the most part, if they had
(29:15):
actually implemented the GuidedPathways framework and every
year worked to continuallyimprove, clarifying the path for
students, helping them enter,helping them stay, ensure
learning, everything that youtouched on would be addressed as
a continuous improvement typeof process.
(29:36):
I have a question for you aboutAI, because I'm beginning to
hear a lot from colleagues, fromeducators, students even, that
with AI, for example, a studentnow, provided the information is
correct, a student can uploadto AI the college catalog along
(30:02):
with the course schedule andeven the information from Rate
my Professor and say give me aschedule of classes for fall.
Also, I have these needs.
I have an IEP from my highschool and I'm having issues
(30:25):
with housing and so forth.
Does this college offer anyresources?
So, in other words, AI isbecoming more and more like an
assistant.
I think a lot of too manypeople use it for research, like
they would for Google, likeresearch, like search, and I
don't think that's great yet,but it could serve as a great
(30:47):
assistant to people and I'm justwondering what are your
thoughts on that.
Rita (30:51):
That's a very you know.
I've never thought of AI beingused like that and you're saying
students are using it.
Al (30:59):
Yes, they're becoming, especially now that ChatGPT 5.0
has come out.
The functionality and how muchit knows is just astronomical.
Rita (31:10):
You know well.
First of all, I don't know howAI has been trained.
I mean, just because you'reuploading things you know, it's
not clear to me how AI is makingthe decision right, like what
the criteria is or what theparameter right?
Ai is not perfect, but I guessmaybe the question I'm having is
(31:33):
why our students are doing that, when it seems to me that the
colleges have mapped out Right,like the education pathway, the
educational plans for students,right, I mean, you know, if
you're going to do this majorthe first year, this is what you
(31:54):
need to take.
Ok, and probably the first yearthey cannot enroll on their own
, they have to enroll with anadvisor, but then it's.
But my understanding is is thatthe paths are made a bit, that
they are quite defined, butthat's my understanding.
So I'm not so sure what benefitthey're like, I'm not exactly
(32:16):
sure what other kind ofinformation they're getting.
That's not in the educationalmapping that the colleges have.
And also, and also like, ifstudents want to change majors,
like, like, like, I mean that'sanother thing.
Like many I mean all of us, Imean I changed my major.
I was a chemistry major thatended up being sociology.
Right, I mean, all of us.
I mean, I changed my major.
I was a chemistry major thatended up being sociology.
Right, I needed to talk tosomeone, like I believe, like I
(32:39):
should.
Yeah, I needed to talk to anadvisor.
Al (32:42):
Yeah, two things.
Colleges did work during thelast five, six years throughout
the country on creating what arecalled program maps, and they
did.
The problem is that they neverreally brought them to life.
They they're like five clicksaway on a webs ite.
Advisors don't always use them.
(33:03):
Every student is not handed one, and that's why they want to
see advisors to go.
Ok, I'm interested in this.
What classes should I take?
But if they can't see anadvisor because the ratio is so,
so high, some of them are justgoing, you know, I'm just going
to prompt, I'm going to do theparameters on AI, upload the the
(33:26):
college info and let it assistme.
And since I can't get anadvisor because of the ratio,
come again November to knowabout my classes, I'm going to
prompt it again because Ichanged my major.
I think that's kind of wherethings are heading.
I'm not saying it's right orwrong either way.
Students find a way, especiallywhen the technology is becoming
(33:47):
much more available.
Rita (33:50):
Yeah, and I don't know if it's, and I'm not going either
way right, I think for me iswhere I think we need to do
first is try to kind of figureout are the responses AI giving
them?
Were they correct?
I guess, like I think maybethat's the first thing we need
(34:10):
to kind of figure out, like, didit delay students from
finishing their certificates ordegrees or did it help?
I guess, maybe to me as aresearcher I'm not saying it's
good, I'm not saying it's bad, Ido not know but I think the
first thing I would want to dois kind of research that because
(34:32):
it can be helpful to advise.
It cannot replace an advisor,but it can be helpful to
advising students as an add-on.
And I don't know where I standon this, because as a researcher
I need to do that research.
(34:52):
But you give me an idea for thenext research.
Al (34:55):
There you go.
That's why I appreciate you,because you look at this and
already looking at it from Ineed to study this.
I can tell you right now thatit's pretty accurate.
Rita (35:05):
Okay, you can Okay.
Al (35:06):
It's, it's pretty, now it's not going to be perfect, even
even AI a year ago, I'm like, ohmy gosh, I can't believe it
cranked this out.
I just, I can't believe justhow, and I think part of the
reason, Rita, is that there havebeen billions of prompts and
billions of things alreadyuploaded and its knowledge base
(35:27):
is so incredible that, forexample, I prompted the other
day as I'm having a meetingworking with a team and they're
like we need to create a survey,and I gave it the parameters
and it cranked it out in fiveseconds.
Now, was it perfect?
But we were able to tweak thatsurvey to meet our needs, anyway
, this is a great next researchproject and I don't want to kind
(35:49):
of take you like on anotherroad here, but I just kind of
wanted your sense of technologygiving all these issues that you
studied.
Rita (36:00):
It's interesting and also it's interesting on what does
that mean in terms of theadvisor's role?
Right, I mean it's now theadvisor for a specific group of
students is just going to be avalidator, right?
Like you know, the studentswill figure it out.
Maybe the advisor will take alook and just validate, as
opposed to meeting with thestudents.
(36:21):
That would reduce, that wouldreduce the, that would change
the responsibility and alsoreduce maybe the pressure
advisors might have.
Al (36:30):
Yeah, because what they can do is already.
I know some of the UCs areworking on these bots to do what
I'm saying.
Yeah, but they're training thebots so that they give right
information, and so what'shappening is that the other
things that you mentioned, Rita,the basic needs, the need to
(36:55):
you know, reach out to them,check in on them.
Rita (36:56):
Then humans can really do more of that work instead of the
other work, right, yeah, and Ithink that's really where I
wanted to go, that this is notabout replacing advisors, but
maybe changing what advisors doand directing advisors' roles
and responsibilities tosomething else to ensure that
students continue and persist.
(37:16):
That's, I think, where I wasgoing with that one, but I see
that all the time, like evenwith radiology, right.
Like now, AI can read X-rays,like with very high accuracy,
and so the question I have whatdoes that mean in terms of the
role?
You know?
Then, what do radiologists do?
Now, right, like this is likethe first thing that comes to
(37:39):
mind.
Al (37:41):
Our world's going to change in like five like right now, we
have the highest unemploymentrate for recent college grads.
Well, part of it is thisadministration's policies, but
the other aspect is that AI isdoing a lot of the entry level
work and doing it quite well.
So I think, as a society and Iwork with faculty on this is
(38:02):
that this is becoming more.
It's here to stay.
It's exponential.
How do we leverage it?
How do we adapt?
The reality is we are going tosee some things that are
obsolete or the way our jobdescriptions are going to be
changed so drastically.
Right, but yeah, I think whatyou identified here because, as
(38:24):
you mentioned earlier, higher edhas not really look, let's be
honest.
Right, enrollment means funding, and if we don't keep enrolling
and getting students into highvalue programs and deal with all
this stuff that you haveidentified, we're just going to
keep bleeding students.
Rita (38:46):
And again, what you just touched on also is really one of
the things that I think I didmention.
But students who dropped outkept saying that they do not
want a transactionalrelationship.
They want a transformationalrelationship.
Right, you have always a groupof students that might require
(39:07):
more, that need more support,you know, from advisors than
others.
Right, depending on thebackground, you know, if you're
a first generation college goer,you don't have all the
information to navigate thesystem.
Right, and that's what they'reseeking from advisors, and I'm
all for figuring out ways thatadvisors can provide that
(39:31):
transformational support thatthe students are seeking.
And if that means, as you said,use AI for certain things so
that advisors can do otherthings, go for it.
Al (39:45):
And it's because community college students spend most of
their time in the classroom.
If that first week or two thefaculty is throwing down the law
, making their syllabi look likecontracts, not making it very
engaging, and that plays asignificant role.
(40:07):
I remember when I was are-entry student I went to
community college and it wasvery interesting.
At the Veterans Center therewas a list of faculty and they
called them friendlies.
And friendlies for veteransmeans they're not the enemy
right, they're the ones who arefriends.
But the reason we have the listthere is not because they're
(40:30):
easy, it's not because any ofthat is because we just wanted
to know who are the faculty whocare, right.
So if I went to my first classand I had a faculty say, well,
look to your left and now lookto your right, those people are
probably not going to be therebecause I only give one A, I
mean that kind of attitude,students don't feel a sense of
(40:51):
belonging and so I think facultyplay a critical role in that
and keeping them before censusright or after census.
Before census right or aftercensus.
Rita (41:01):
It's you know, it's for or after census.
It's very interesting becausethe before census, the faculty
issue never showed up, remember,like they decided to drop
before they even experienced thefaculty.
That much, right?
No, they dropped out.
I mean, they enrolled, theyshowed up, they showed up to
some classes, right, but theynever told us anything about the
(41:24):
faculty.
What some told us is that theydid not think that the courses
that their advisors gave themwas relevant to them.
Think that had to do with theconversation, because probably
the advisors were telling them,hey, you need to take this and
(41:49):
this and this, right, but therewasn't a conversation of why and
how.
That feeds into the few of themwho told us that it wasn't
about they did not understandhow everything fits right and so
they didn't understand.
Understand is this needed ornot?
And I think part of it also is,you know, at one point, because
, again, as I said, you know,enrollment happens last minute.
There aren't enough resourcesfor advisors, not a lot of
(42:11):
advisors.
They might end up just tellingstudents you know, these are the
courses, without having thatconversation.
And those students I told youabout wanted to have that
conversation and in fact acouple of them told me they went
to another college where theywere able to have that
conversation.
Al (42:27):
So they moved, yeah, yeah, when I first started, my first
community college was fiveminutes away and when I started
talking to the column counselors, this person was literally, she
never looked at me, wasliterally putting on her makeup,
her lipstick while talking tome, and I felt like, wow, okay,
(42:50):
and they lost my financial aidpackage.
And this was back in the daybefore it was all done on online
and I ended up driving 35minutes to the other one where I
had a very different experience, right.
So those little things, youknow, make all the difference.
So, as we start wrapping up,I'm wondering that, let's say,
(43:11):
you're presenting to a group ofcommunity college educators,
from president down to Ishouldn't say down to the
research analysts, and what arewhat's like two or three things
that you want to leave with them, like elevator speech style, so
(43:33):
that, like they know, okay,when I go back to my campus, I
really got to think of thesethings much more, be much more
thoughtful about it, really digin and ask good questions of our
teams to see what we can doabout this.
Rita (43:49):
I would suggest starting with things that are probably
maybe easy to do, which is,first of all, streamline that
onboarding process.
Reduce the handoffs if possible.
If hands-off cannot be reduced,then communicate to the
(44:10):
students you know exactlyregarding the hands-off, and
provide names right, not officenames.
Provide names of counselors,advisors, whoever it is that
they can contact.
So I think that's one of thethings that I would, you know, I
would say that they should do.
(44:31):
I think the other thing, too,is invest in building the
capacity of advisors, whetherthrough professional development
or whether through having moreadvisors, and I think it's very
important.
I mean, that piece which is therelational piece with students,
(44:52):
I think is very important and Ithink there needs to be more
development of those skills ornurturing of those skills, so
that the staff can have, youknow, good conversation with
students.
I think the other thing, too,is the amount of information is
a lot of information that thestudents get.
For some students, that is OK,right, but for those who are
(45:15):
having personal barriers, it'stoo much pressure on them.
So if the welcoming emails andall of this information are
provided in more, smallerportions, at different times and
more digestible, I think thatwould be more helpful, I think,
using text messaging maybedepending on the generation,
(45:39):
okay, but with the youngergeneration, text messaging, any
two-way text messaging, probablyis the most efficient way, and
if they can work with studentson that, I think that is, I'm
sorry.
If they can work on buildingthose two-way systems with
students, I think that would behelpful.
(46:00):
I think that the other thingthat I would suggest also is the
financial aid.
The financial aid is veryimportant and this is really why
either students are droppingout, they enroll and they drop
out before the census date, orthe college drops them out Right
them out right, and soproviding information on for
(46:23):
each institution.
It's not just the FAFSA right,it's not just the form.
Each institution has its owneligibility criteria.
You know some people andthey're you know, and so that
needs to be communicated in avery simple way to students
early on, so to ensure that theyare doing the forms, they are
(46:43):
providing the documents thatthey need to provide in time, so
that the decision is made, okay, before the start of the term.
The other thing, too, which Ithink is I'm going to go back
which I think is I recognizeit's more difficult to implement
, but it's really building acase management teams, similar
to the meta-majors, right, likeyou have for each meta-major.
(47:06):
Maybe this onboarding canactually adopt a kind of like
this kind of case managementmeta-major models, right?
So, for those who are applying,let's say, for one of the
meta-major models, right?
So, for those who are applying,let's say, for one of the
meta-majors, here is the teamthat you communicate with for
(47:29):
the onboarding, right?
So, here's your coach, here'syour financial aid person,
here's your, you know, advisor,right, and do it, you know,
based on those meta-pagers youknow.
And then for the undecidedstudents, they have their own,
they would have their own team.
So those are some of the thingsthat I would suggest.
(47:50):
Oh, and then the other thingtoo, is it's really important to
for the messages not to begeneric.
So, you know, you mentionedveterans, right, al?
Okay, you mentioned veterans,right, al Okay, the emails that
go to veterans should bedifferent than the emails that
might go to, let's say, studentsjust coming from high school,
(48:14):
or the emails that go to adultlearners should be customized.
So, again, think aboutcustomizing those messages and
those emails and to differentstudent population.
Al (48:25):
Beautiful Rita.
I've always appreciated yourwork.
Oh, did you have something else?
Rita (48:33):
No, I mean, the only thing is is probably we did not talk
about how many, what percentageof students colleges are losing.
Yeah, you know, and I thinkthat was probably the first
question we answered and wereally worked with Dallas
(48:56):
College on that and answeringthat, and my colleague, also
worked on that, and we foundthat and this was substantiated
actually with other colleges whotold us that they have reports
that show similar percentages.
(49:18):
So colleges are losing around10 to 15 percent of their
students who enroll, who dropbefore, yeah, they enroll and
then they drop before the censusdate.
So it's between 10 to 15percent.
However, but the colleges arealso losing students from
(49:39):
application to enrollment aswell, right, so from application
to enrollment, I believe it'saround probably around 50% or so
, okay, from those who appliedand all the way before enrolling
, and so I guess, if you wantedto look at the percentage of
(50:02):
students being lost fromapplication all the way to
census date, that's a bit over60% right.
Now, some of the loss fromapplication to before enrollment
makes sense, right, because youknow students apply to multiple
places Right, because you knowstudents apply to multiple
(50:23):
places, but still there's, butstill we believe that it's a
group of students that isimportant for colleges to
understand why they're losingthem and at what point in the
pipeline you know where is theleakage happening, and so that's
one of the things that ourreport also addresses.
It also addresses how to trackthese students, because some
(50:46):
colleges, a few colleges, trackthem, but many of the colleges
are not tracking them because,as because you know, different
pieces of information are indifferent data systems and so
there needs to besynchronization of these data
systems, and that's verydifficult to do.
Al (51:05):
So many findings and recommendations and tying it
here actually, in the end, isfine to create a sense of
urgency.
You gave us percentages, andthese are sobering percentages,
and so if colleges are able totake your recommendations and
operationalize them, I think alot of colleges are already
(51:27):
working on a lot of these things.
It's just a matter of makingthem more cohesive, improving
processes.
Thank you so much for thisstudy.
Rita (51:39):
Al, thank you so much.
I enjoyed talking with you.
I always enjoy talking to you,and so, yeah, that was great.
Al (51:47):
Thank you for participating in the Student Success Podcast
and I look forward to your nextstudy on the role of AI with
community college students.
Rita (51:57):
Do you want to collaborate on that?
Al (51:59):
Let's do it, let's do it.
Rita (52:03):
All right, you always give me ideas.
Thanks Al.
Al (52:06):
Thank you.
Thank you for listening to theStudent Success Podcast.
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Learning Institute link belowand, of course, on Apple
Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube orwherever you get your podcasts.
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