Published: January 15, 2008 09:44 am      

IU Southeast officials taking action to increase student retention

With a retention rate hovering just above 62 percent, officials with IU Southeast are taking action.

School officials will develop a new comprehensive retention program this spring that will be aimed at keeping students in school through graduation, said Lawrence Mand, vice chancellor for information technology and community engagement. This is part of a statewide initiative to increase the retention rates at all public colleges and universities.

Leaders at IUS already are implementing changes that a university task force came up with last year. One of those changes includes having an academic adviser for each of the six schools.

“Far too often students quit school simply because, ‘Well, I’m not doing well in class’ and ‘It’s not working out and I don’t know what else I can do, so I’m out of here,’” said Mand, who co-chaired the task force. “So they leave on the basis of incomplete or incorrect information or without actually checking out their options.”

He said he hopes the advisers will stop those students from checking out early.

“We feel that is going to be a very effective way to help students stay on track, catch them before they fall off and give them the right information at the right times so that they can make good decisions,” Mand said.

Another segment includes adding more flexible courses, such as ones that start later in the semester and others that meet online. Mand said the goal of the shorter classes is to catch students who drop a class midway through the semester. He said IUS hopes to have that new option available in the fall.

These ideas do not come without a cost. Mand said adding a few more advisers will cost the university more than $100,000 a year. Adding teachers for the shorter classes also will take another chunk out of the funds.

One way the university came up with extra money to pay for the changes was eliminating the position of vice chancellor for university advancement held until recently by Susan Griffin.

Mand and Chancellor Sandra Patterson-Randles will now split the responsibilities left by that vacancy. Mand said Patterson-Randles elected to take over the fundraising aspect and he will oversee public relations, marketing, alumni affairs and special events, which is something he had done on an interim basis when the school was seeking a candidate for the former advancement position.

Mand said the goal is to keep adding money to the retention program for the next five years.

“It’s an investment with the expectation that it’s going to pay off,” he said, explaining that students who come back keep paying tuition. “If this is successful, it should pay its own way.”

Since the school had already started a retention initiative before the state called for action, Mand said IUS has a head start.

“We got a leg up,” he said. “We got started before the ball game was announced.”

Mand said the impact of the changes that were already made should start to show this fall.

There is no set time for when IU will announce the university-wide retention initiative, though Mand said he hopes the changes decided then will start in August. However, he said even when that is over the issue will not be solved.

“This will be an ongoing process in trying to increase our investment in retention and graduation,” he said.