second-year students Archives - Ruffalo Noel Levitz Blog: Higher Education Enrollment, Student Retention, and Student Success

Why create a 1st through 4th semester plan for college student success and retention?

June 5, 2015 by Dr. Mari Normyle, Asst. Vice President for Retention Solutions, RNL Leave a Comment

One of the assumptions operating in higher education is that once college students make it to their second year of enrollment, they are committed to completing their degrees at their current institution. And, yet, the data from the 2015 Student Retention Indicators Report show there continues to be significant attrition after the first year of enrollment:

Now new data from a second report, Attitudes of Second-Year College Students, confirm the problem, showing approximately 16 percent of second-year students at four-year public institutions and 9 percent of second-year students at four-year private institutions are either uncertain about their plans or are planning to transfer as they begin their second year:

College completion plans of second-year college students

But very few institutions have made the commitment to retention programs designed specifically for second-year students:

Institutions will not realize improved graduation rates unless they make changes in how they are attending to the needs of second-year students in addition to what they have been doing for their first-year students. This calls for the creation of a “1st through 4th semester” strategy for student success.

5 recommendations for building an effective 1st to 4th semester plan

How should a four-year institution or a two-year institution get started with expanding student success efforts beyond the first year? Data from the aforementioned report on the attitudes of second-year college students offer some guidelines. Here are five recommendations for shaping the programs and resources that will improve the retention rates of second-year students, based on student responses to our noncognitive survey, the Second-Year Student Assessment.

Address the advising and career development needs of second-year students early in the second year. Almost 80 percent of the second-year college students surveyed reported they wanted help identifying work experiences or internships related to their majors as they began their second year. In addition, more than two-thirds asked for support in defining goals related to their majors and careers, along with the opportunity to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of their current career choices. And while almost 78 percent reported they planned to continue with the major they had selected, that left a significant number of students who were still searching for the right major “fit.”
Provide academic support to second-year students. Students’ survey responses also indicated significant needs for assistance in getting tutoring and help with study skills as their classes were getting under way. Fully 73.3 percent reported they planned to study harder than they did in year one. Ensuring that academic support services expand to address the needs of second-year students is obviously necessary.
Address the financial concerns of second-year students. Only 55 percent of the second-year students surveyed reported they had the financial resources needed to finish college. An equal percentage of the second-year students requested opportunities to discuss financing their education and help with managing their personal finances. Recommendation: Target financial literacy programs to second-year students.
Continue to create opportunities for second-year students to deepen their “sense of belonging” at the institution. About 30 percent of second-year students reported that they did not have many friends or feel at home at their institutions.
Develop a more holistic view of second-year students. Gathering noncognitive data that goes beyond GPAs and credits earned (although these are important markers, too) will expose issues that impede student success and expectations students have about their second-year experience. Try to answer the question: What is the unique pathway forward for each cohort, each subpopulation, and each individual student in order to achieve institutional goals?

The first place to start is with the data—gathering the right data and making use of it to inform planning and drive decisions about aligning resources with the needs of second-year students. If you are interested in collecting noncognitive survey data with the Second-Year Student Assessment, please email me.

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Plan ahead for second-year college student retention and completion

March 20, 2015 by Dr. Mari Normyle, Asst. Vice President for Retention Solutions, RNL Leave a Comment

Do second-year students get the attention they need and deserve on your campus? When your next cohort of second-year students begins its second year, will your advisors and student services staff be ready to retain them with focused interventions to keep them moving toward graduation? How will these interventions be prioritized?

I have three nieces who right now are all completing their first-year of college: one in North Carolina, one in Texas, and one in Virginia. They all began their studies with clear majors in mind: chemical engineering, nursing, and aerospace engineering. They have all been reasonably successful in their first-year courses, although each of them also admits that they underestimated how much more they would have to study in college than they ever did in high school (and these women worked very, very hard in high school).

With spring break over now, they returned to their campuses for the last blitz of their spring semesters—only eight weeks remain in their first years of college. What were they all talking about during their spring breaks? Their SOPHOMORE years! In many ways, they have already turned the page and are looking ahead to next fall—registering for their courses, signing leases to live off campus, and sorting through the various components of their social lives.

At the same time I was talking with them over their spring breaks, I received 2014 data from the Second-Year Student Assessment (SYSA) which reports the “motivational status”—non-cognitive motivational variables, prioritized—of more than 5,000 sophomores from 55 institutions across the country. As I looked at these data and tried to understand the national perspective of what seems to be going on with sophomores across the country, I couldn’t help but wonder about my “rising sophomores” and what transitions lie ahead for them as they move from their first to second years of college.

Top 10 needs of second-year college students

In what ways do second-year students need assistance to remain motivated? Here are the “top 10” requests made by second-year college students among 25 requests that were measured in the 2014 data:

Data taken from the Second-Year Student Assessment for college sophomores.

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Five factors behind the college “sophomore slump” and five ways to intervene

April 25, 2013 by Jo Hillman 3 Comments

New research shows the challenges many students face in the second year of college (Click to enlarge).

A new study of slumping motivation among last year’s sophomores has found that many respondents indeed did not feel energized by their courses and shows some of the reasons why—including relatively low satisfaction in areas such as students’ frequency of communication with advisors and the availability of work experiences associated with students’ career interests. The findings shed light on the mindsets behind the substantial dropout rate of second-year college students nationally, reported earlier this year by Noel-Levitz.

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Reflections from a college sophomore and the need for second-year interventions

June 7, 2012 by Beth J. Richter Leave a Comment

Second-year college students need opportunities to grow academically while still requiring the support first-year students receive

As students transition from the first to second year of college, they can feel isolated and adrift if they do not receive the support they need.

“We were not freshmen, yet we felt as though we were treated like them.”

That was a comment from a college student who had just completed his sophomore year, who I will call “A.” He was working in the Noel-Levitz offices with me, and I used the opportunity to interact with him and discuss his attitudes toward the transition from his freshman to sophomore years.

Though one may expect second-year students to be soaring in their academic experiences, having effectively traversed their path through the first year of college and moving into study of a major, we know from our direct experiences with students—as well as through attrition and transfer statistics—that not all students enter their second year with optimism and a sense of academic well-being. (My colleague Tim Culver listed some important studies in this blog post.) In fact, some may be experiencing frustration or even malaise with a system that they don’t understand or that they misperceive. If so, what might be underlying changes in motivation and aggravation among these students?

A’s comments about his sophomore year are reflective of his changing academic and social identity, as well as his perceived lack of relevance with curriculum and a sense of belonging in the campus community:

“[College] suddenly, without my intentions, turned from the unknown adventure into adulthood back into school… the newness was over, the friends were already made, and the expectations already set. It was the start of just another year of school.”

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Strategies for strengthening second-year student retention during the summer months

April 24, 2012 by Janene Panfil, Senior Vice President for Retention Solutions, RNL Leave a Comment

On most campuses, we feel as if we’re sprinting down the home stretch to the lazy days of summer. However, in terms of year to year retention, we’re still mid-way through the race.

Noel-Levitz research shows that, for both first- and second-year cohorts, more students make the decision not to return during the spring and summer months than between the fall and spring terms. Thus there is a compelling reason for extra focus and emphasis this time of year and over the summer months.

Data from the Noel-Levitz Mid-Year Indicators report shows when college students are most likely to leave an institution.

Click on image to enlarge.

Lew Sanborne, one of our Noel-Levitz retention consultants, works with his clients now, while the students are still enrolled, to make sure that continuing students are well positioned and confident for a smooth transition back to campus in the fall. Lew and his clients typically focus on the following areas.

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