Higher Education Project Prt 2

Running head: INCREASING FIRST TO SECOND YEAR RETENTION RATES

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INCREASING FIRST TO SECOND YEAR RETENTION RATES

INCREASING FIRST TO SECOND YEAR RETENTION RATES

Tangela Jones

Walden University

March 18, 2018

INSTITUTIONAL CHARACTERISTICS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO INCREASED FIRST TO SECOND YEAR RETENTION

This paper will review the various attributes of the student demographics at City Community College with the single aim of determining what can be done in order to increase the rates of first to second year student retention rates. The class attributes under consideration among the student population include gender, age, race, educational goals and work obligations. A careful review of these attributes and how they have affected the current retention rate of 24% will be pivotal in establishing recommendations for realizing increased retention rates.

Characteristic 1: Fewer students with full time jobs

According to the submitted research document, a majority of the student population falls within the age bracket of 24-40 years. In addition, a better part of the population has full time work obligations with a quantitative figure standing at 72%. Therefore, it can be concluded that students with jobs rarely complete their college studies. Using this observation and the accompanying data, it can be determined that the college should encourage its students to concentrate on their studies much more in order to ensure that they successfully graduate before taking on full time jobs.

Characteristic 2: Younger student population

The age bracket of 24-40 has the highest number of students within the school. However, it must be noted that this particular age group comprises the most economically active individuals in society. This is because people within this group are usually working hard to maintain and provide for their families. Therefore, they are even forced to have more than one job in order to satisfy higher financial needs and make provisions for their needs.

Therefore, members of the community should be encouraged to attend school at a much younger age. This will enable them to get done with their studies and graduate early before responsibilities ‘catch’ up with them. More focus should be shifted towards encouraging younger students to convince their colleagues to enroll in college since they are more likely to complete their studies to graduation.

Characteristic 3: Gender equality

From the data provided for the research at City Community College, it is evident that there is a clear disparity between the number of male and female student enrollments. Although there hasn’t been any direct correlation between this observation and overall completion rates, one can’t help to wonder what role this imbalance could have played on the overall final graduation turnout rates.

Existing secondary research into communities with population behaviors such as the one in question can help establish some deductions about the effects of gender imbalance. For instance, additional data from the published document has indicated that the ethnicity of a majority of the students is African-American. Hispanics come in second place and whites come in third place. Many a time, most American neighborhoods have whites living in better conditions than any other ethnicities (Delano-Oriaran & Parks, 2015). Therefore, the relatively low population density of whites in this school is suggestive that the institution might actually be set within one of the ‘not very expensive’ neighborhoods’. Figures from the research paper indicate that male enrollments stand at 43%, whereas female enrollments into various certifications is higher at 57%. Using the deductions made above about the characteristics of the community in question, one can arrive at the conclusion that higher proportions of the male population are not being taken care of in terms of education needs. Therefore, effort towards balancing the figures in terms of gender enrollments will certainly be directly proportional to heightened stability of the learning environment. This will eventually translate into increased first to second year retention rates.

References Delano-Oriaran, O., & Parks, M. (2015). One Black, One White: Power, White Privilege, & Creating Safe Spaces. Multicultural Education, 15-19. Reason for choosing article: This journal article gives a reflection about the sensitive concept behind 'white privilege'. This extends to classroom environments and explains why more whites might be able to afford school than blacks or any other ethnicity in America. This argument is important since it is a precursor of the observed figures from the published data from community college, which has indicated higher African American population-which will be important in concluding that the community might actually be a 'low-end'. This forms a basis of studying the characteristics of such communities, the challenges they face and the most appropriate recommendations that can be put in place to increase retention rates of students in schools within these communities.