Abstract:

Previous research recognises that students leave of college for many reasons including cost, the course being too difficult, unmatched expectations of the course, isolation from being away from home and in a new environment and social challenges. The aim of this research is to investigate if academic interventions could help students and reduce college attrition rates.

The focus of the paper is students who have entered university to do a course in Business Administration. Each year, a significant number of this student group enter with combinations of social issues, intellectual and/or physical disabilities, very poor prior academic achievements and low levels of self-confidence. They come from families within which they are the first to enter university and are usually on state grants for fees and living expenses. Most are working to support themselves and contribute to the household income. The findings of this research are drawn from retention data as well as focus groups and qualitative surveys.

The intervention selected for this study was titled REACH. The REACH programme was developed by the university as an intervention to help first-year students. It involved an academic mentor being appointed to each student. The programme comprised a multi-pronged flexible approach which drew on services from across the university ensuring the needs of all students were acknowledged.

The transition period to third level education is challenging. The initial intervention was to help students choose best-fit elective modules and assist with individual goal setting for each module. In subsequent iterations interventions included bringing in experts in mindfulness, resilience and self-confidence. Throughout the semester students connected with their academic mentor to re-establish goals set. It was through observation and interaction with the academic mentor that extra resources were found to be needed so counselling and additional academic coaching services were accessed. REACH also saw the programme offer an academic learning centre which allowed students drop in for free one to one tuition in topics they found difficult. To develop a sense of community, off campus activities and on campus breakfasts were run so students got to know each other outside the classroom environment. Students from multiple years of the programs were invited to these events so first year students got to see what was ahead for them and developed a network for work placement and support.

During the class surveys and focus groups all students expressed a sense of community and an affinity with the course. They knew the REACH program by name and the benefits it offered, were happy they could seek help from their academic mentor and identified the benefit of the group activities undertaken as helping them belong to the programme community thus enhancing their overall student experience. Applying advice from the university academic success coaches, module assessment and the program structure has been changed to include a better spread and frequency of assessment and a rearrangement of modules across the program. Retention figures have not improved but other factors such as online teaching during the Covid19 pandemic, very low entry level points in the year reviewed and a high level of entrants of people with intellectual disabilities have impacted results. Therefore, further iterations of the project will be required to determine the impact of REACH on retention.

Keywords:

Engagement, 1st year, student support, belonging, community, student retention strategies.