Universities are inundated with detailed applicant and enrolment data from a variety of sources. However, for these data to be useful there is a need to convert them into strategic knowledge and information for decision-making processes. This study uses predictive modelling to identify at-risk adult learners in their first semester at SIM…

This article focuses on the model used at the University of Kansas Medical Center to reach graduate students in the School of Nursing. Like many students returning for graduate degrees, distance students are balancing the demands of professional positions, graduate studies, and family life. Topics addressed include: point-of-need assistance,…

The student traceback model is described and is used to demonstrate various concepts relative to institutional research methodology. The methodology of the problem-solving institutional researcher includes a wide spectrum of how-to's: how to anticipate issues in higher education and estimate their practical institutional impact; how to develop the…

A model was developed of the choice-making behavior of students participating in postsecondary occupational education. The model was estimated empirically with data from a national survey of public or nonprofit institutions that offer such education, conducted in spring 1987. The survey involved 432 institutions and 3,330 students. Data were…

As a response to the problems of nontraditional student attrition at two-year and four-year urban colleges, this paper introduces the constructs of career decision-making self-efficacy, perceived stress, and financial difficulty into a model built on the synthesis of Cabrera (1993). A questionnaire was administered to adult nontraditional (age 24…

A study of the transition of students to higher education in Victoria, Australia, is reported based on data supplied by the Victorian Universities Admissions Committee (VUAC), a mail survey of 1,300 applicants in 1980, and a series of extended interviews with a small number of applicants. A basic causal model for enrollment decisions (college…

This study investigated whether the one-year retention rate for the cohort of full-time, baccalaureate-degree-seeking, first-time freshmen could be predicted from institutional and aggregate cohort characteristics, including institutional type and control, institutional size, cohort size, average entrance exam score, percentage of part-time…