TERRE HAUTE — An outside group is suggesting Indiana State University set more realistic, achievable first-year retention goals.
As part of its strategic plan, ISU set a retention goal of 74 percent by 2014 (freshmen returning for their sophomore year). The long-term goal was 80 percent.
This past year, ISU’s actual freshmen retention rate dropped to 58 percent from 63 percent, prompting the university to take a hard look at the reasons why it is declining and ways to improve student success.
ISU hired AACRAO Consulting, part of a nonprofit professional organization based in Washington, D.C., to look at those issues. Senior consultant Tom Green made a public presentation Friday to discuss some of the findings and suggestions. AACRAO stands for American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers.
In developing retention benchmarks or goals, the consultant suggests using a different peer group of universities than ISU has used in the past.
The universities share similar freshmen student profiles; also, they are public doctoral and research institutions not located next to major urban areas. Entering freshmen at those universities share with ISU’s freshmen similar backgrounds in academic preparation, income levels and proportion of underrepresented minorities.
Among the nine peer institutions are Illinois State University, Ball State, Central Michigan, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, University of West Florida and Louisiana Tech University. Some are the same as those previously used.
Even with the new peer group, “there is still room for improvement” in retention, Green said.
The average first-year retention rate of the peer group is 74.2 percent, which the consultant suggests as a more realistic long-term goal for ISU than 80 percent.
The consultant also suggests a five-year goal of 70 percent for first-year retention.
“Given the latest rate of 58 percent, this is aggressive and will require a concerted, campuswide effort,” Green said.
In seeking to improve retention and student success, the consultant does not suggest higher admission standards as a way to improve retention. ISU wants to continue working with the students it currently serves, but find ways to help them be more successful, Green said.
That’s important to Darlene Hantzis, ISU professor of communication and women’s studies. “We should be able to be more successful with more of the students we currently enroll,” she said. Because of the recent drop in retention, ISU almost seems to be in “sort of alarm mode,” she said.
She doesn’t want the answer to be more selective admission requirements, although that would improve retention and overall long-term persistence and graduation rates, she said. “We know that will work. It’s worked everywhere they’ve done it.”
She wants ISU to continue working with the students it currently serves. “These are our students,” she said. “They are qualified to be in college and they are capable of success.”
She agrees ISU appears to have set its initial retention goals too high, and it should establish more realistic goals.
Next week, AACRAO Consulting will present possible short-term strategies ISU can use to help increase the numbers of students returning next fall, Green said. In the future, it also will review ISU’s student success organizational structure.
The consultants will visit three times over six weeks and then issue a final report. AACRAO Consulting will be paid $54,630 for its three-part review.
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