Retention and Graduation Rates at the Program Level - Part II Emma Gyasi, Mary Meier, and Robert M. Roe Central Michigan University

Outline History of issue Importance Difficulties to overcome Solution Examples Rollout and next steps

History At the Port Huron MIAIR conference, Mary and Robert led a discussion about ways to measure retention and graduation by program Some issues addressed:

Some Issues Discussed People who do not work with cohorts have difficulty understanding them Why you can’t work backwards from graduates Other cohorts of interest (other than First Time at Any College (FTIAC)) Transfer Cohorts Major Cohorts Fiscal Year Cohorts

Some Issues Discussed How to interpret data - signed major cohort different than FTIAC cohort FTIAC definition of returned is enrolled fall of next year Other cohorts definition is returned in time frame that defines the cohort (e.g. FY) Majors can be signed at any time from first term to last term Students have multiple majors and change majors multiple times Unlike FTIAC no standard definition across institutions

Why We Need a Solution Program accrediting bodies often require persistence and graduation rates for students in program For example Accrediting Council on Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (ACEJMC) requires data regarding persistence and graduation rates However, they do not clearly define how to calculate those numbers

Why We Need a Solution Schools accredited by ACEJMC publish a wide range of measures to meet the requirement Some schools report years to graduation (e.g. of all journalism graduates, what is the average number of years to graduation) Some schools report the number of current and prior year majors and define retention as current divided by prior year

CMU’s Solution Define cohort as all students who signed major within fiscal year Define persist as returned at any time in the next fiscal year or previously graduated Defined graduation rate as the proportion of graduates in a FY divided by the number in the appropriate entry FY cohort

First Step The initial attempt at a solution was a pdf with persistence and graduation by program

Original Display of Data

Issues Persistence and graduation rates vary dramatically by program Some majors have early signers (in first year) while some much later (in third year) Therefore must include proportion of class level of students in each cohort

Variables Needed to Report and Understand Data Number of signed majors Class Level of signed majors Sex and ethnicity Graduation and persistence Current and historic data Need some way to display data efficiently (without using Tableau)

Data Display: MS Excel dashboard Used what we learned from Rueben’s preconference workshop last year on excel slicers and dashboards And excel macros

Cohort file for each FY(July 1-June 30) All students who signed a major in that FY and enrolled within the FY (some students sign major in the summer semester and do not enroll for class, hence they become part of the next FY cohort) If student changes major the student remains in the cohort of the initial major and also included in a new cohort for the FY in which a new major is signed Duplicates within cohort year (student signed multiple majors in the same FY are in multiple cohorts) Duplicates between cohort years (student signed multiple majors in different FY’s, or student changed major in another FY) Once cohort is defined it does not change for each FY

Data (Cohort file) Development Identify class standing at the time of signing major Track subsequent year enrollment for each cohort Track graduation in major within FY after signing major Calculate: Retention, Graduation and Persistence rate within Major for each cohort New Dashboard

Dashboard

Development of Excel Dashboard Export data to Excel Features Use Pivot tables (Insert/Pivot table tools tab) Slicers (Insert tab) Graphs (Insert tab) Buttons and macros (Developer tab)

Dashboard Buttons: Macros Pivot Tables Aggregate Data Behind Graphs Slicers

How it Works Demo of Dashboard Can look at persistence and graduation by: University (signed majors) College Department Major/Program

All of This Data! What Does it Mean? Interpreting data is difficult if no thought given to what the numbers represent For example, graduation rates reflect the rate of graduation at 1 through 8 years FROM TIME OF SIGNING MAJOR Around 60% of CBA students graduate in 4 years from signing a major This number should not be confused with the 4 year FTIAC cohort graduation rate of around 25% for CMU Why?

Data Comparison Over Time Within College or Major Can’t compare across colleges, departments, or programs as the class standing at which students sign majors varies across those factors Example:

Department Comparison

Comparison Within Program Across Years CSE

4 Years from Signing Major

Rollout and Reception Council of Deans and Deans Retreat Asked for feedback and received very little Multiple programs have used data for accreditation (Journalism) Overall reception has been positive but still working on informing programs of its existence