Few studies have been conducted on nontraditional student attrition in postsecondary vocational educational programs. This lack of attention is due to methodological limitations, lack of priority on data collection in vocational education, and lack of perceived need for research. The conceptual model of student attrition in postsecondary…

John Wood Community College's Open Learning Center (OLC) offers an alternative to traditional classroom approaches using one-to-one instruction, a competency-based learning format, and flexible scheduling. Due to concern over the high attrition rate in OLC courses, a study was conducted to identify the characteristics and variables contributing to…

The influence of summer experiences on the re-enrollment pattern of students at the City University of New York was studied. Students who began as first-time freshmen in fall 1978 were evaluated over a 2-year period. Information was available for 21,079 students; however, 1,466 students who completed associate degrees during the study period were…

The status of black staff and faculty at Kennesaw College, a predominantly white campus in Georgia, during 1976-1986 is discussed. Until 1981, very few blacks were employed at the college, black personnel turnover was high, and black faculty and staff had low morale. In 1981-1982, a new president sought to promote affirmative action and the…

A report of a 1986 planning conference on postsecondary assessment is presented along with four commissioned papers from the conference and their summaries. Titles and authors of the papers are as follows: "Postsecondary Assessment: The State of the Art" (Leonard L. Baird); "Assessing Student Progress in College: A Process-Oriented…

The paper reviews findings, many of them unexpected, of college institutional research offices and other educational researchers listed under the following headings: the working student, the academic load, economic background, cooperation, cultural literacy, retention, and outcomes assessment. Noted findings include: the student who holds a…

In 1984, a year-long evaluation was conducted at Los Medanos College (California) of the Language Arts Tutorial Program, a cross-curricular assessment and retention program built around course-specific assessments and tutorial assistance. The primary objective of the evaluation was to measure the effectiveness of the assessment procedure and…

Between 1979 and 1987, there was a 73% increase in the number of students transferring from two-year colleges to universities in Alberta (Canada). Three recent studies investigated this rapid growth. The first study, conducted over a three-year period, explored whether a group of 50 transfer students were sufficiently prepared to succeed…

Data from the Cooperative Institutional Research Program Follow-Up Surveys were used to study student retention at four-year colleges and universities. Data used were from the 1985-1988 follow-up surveys of 1981-1984 freshmen. Student data were also requested directly from the institutions themselves, concerning degree earned, number of years…

This paper analyzes changes in educational aspirations and related constructs as an approach to understanding student careers. It explores the effects of beginning postsecondary education in a two-year college versus a four-year college/university, after controlling for background characteristics (gender, race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and…

College transfer students have been shown to have a high risk of attrition from their second institution, in part because of errors in judgment during course preregistration. Accordingly, the Admissions Office at the University of Maryland at College Park (UMCP) reviewed the proposed course registrations (for fall 1988) of a sample of transfer…

The effects of student characteristics and remedial program placement policy on academic achievement and other outcomes were studied at 10 Michigan community colleges. The study population consisted of 3,448 students enrolled in remedial writing at colleges with a compulsory remedial placement policy and 2,669 students enrolled in remedial writing…

A study was conducted at Northern Virginia Community College (NVCC) to examine student enrollment and retention patterns; quarter-to-quarter retention; retention rates by full-time/part-time status, sex, race, and age; cumulative graduation rates; and the relationship between first-quarter academic performance and subsequent quarter enrollment.…

A mandatory developmental education program at Vincennes University Junior College (Indiana) was evaluated, based on Roueche's standards for successful developmental programs. The college tests all incoming students whose scores on the American College Testing Program/Scholastic Aptitude Test suggest the need for remediation. Students who need…

Glendale (Arizona) Community College (GCC) conducted a survey of students who attended the college in fall 1984 and did not return for the spring 1985 term to determine former students' perceptions of GCC, reasons for not reenrolling, educational goals, transfer and employment experiences, salaries, and characteristics. Study findings, based on…