Job Hunt: Infinity

This is a long one, folks. The tl;dr is that retention and graduation are byproducts of success, and that our work should be driven by theory to implement programs and services that we know improve student success. If you’re in for a longer read than that sentence, read on, dear reader. ********* We bandy the terms retention and persistence around all the time, and often use them as the driving force behind the initiatives we create and implement. And, quite frankly, we should, at least to some extent. But here’s the thing. First, terminology. Students persist, colleges retain. The act of persisting is done by the one actually moving through a situation, while colleges work to retain students at a given institution. They are not the same term, and should not be used interchangeably. Second, focus. Retention and persistence (and, ultimately, graduation) are byproducts of student success. Kuh and Pascarella (and Astin, and Levine, and Padilla, among others) touch on this in their writing...

Today was a day (but not the first) that I realized I will not stay at my institution for the long-term. I might not even stay in higher ed. Today showed me the two very different sides of retention, of risk factors, of student process. Today I was reminded of how powerless I am in the machine of higher ed. This afternoon I attended a training session focused on student retention and one of our efforts to reduce student loss. It was framed in a very interesting way: get students back on campus for Spring term. Take specific steps for a specific group of students: reach out, get in contact, work on a plan to get them back on campus for the Spring. There was no discussion about student success. No mention of student goals. We talked about process, numbers, data, and enrollment. Later in the day I attended a student veteran group meeting. One student veteran, after a discussion about being on campus, said "I would rather be back in Iraq". Yes. A student would rather be I...