Guest post by Lisa Brown, Mathematics Faculty at GCC. This is a review of the Go2Knowledge Webinar listed in the title.
“10 Strategies To Decrease Dropouts & Increase Retention Using Technology”–
With all of our discussions with 4DX and our goals for increasing student retention, this title jumped out at me. I assumed that it would be about classroom strategies, and that was not the case. I suppose it would be possible to tweak a few of the strategies and incorporate in the classroom, but the strategies presented were campus wide. I found the presenter easy to listen to and was actually fascinated by her ideas.
The ten strategies, in a nutshell, give online access to students in all student service areas. But that would be oversimplifying it, and you really have to listen to get the full perspective. For example, this college created an online orientation for students. A 30 minute video for students by students focused on what every student needs to know/do to be successful in college; it ends with links to customized modules for the different specialty topics, i.e. things honors students need to know, so every student does not have to listen to things that are not important to them.
Other strategies that interested me included the following:
- Providing students with an online interest inventory to help them find their pathway. As a parent of college students, I can attest to how helpful that would be.
- Online access to 24/7, 365-day access to counseling and medical care. The presenter quoted 70-80% of our students are dealing with mental health issues which increase the chance of dropping out significantly. I am not sure how that gets funded, but that would be an amazing resource for students.
- There are many more, but the last one I’ll mention is online student support groups for any group that might need one. Some examples mentioned included DACA students, veterans, first-gen students, parents, depression, and test anxiety.
Overall I thought this was a highly worthwhile presentation and gave me a look into an area of campus that I don’t really see often.
