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March 2010

Opportunity & Integrity

A newsletter for higher education executives to ensure financial and strategic success in their online learning initiatives.
Dr. Fredrick R. Snow

Dr. Snow has served in academia as university President, Vice President, Dean, and Tenured Faculty. He was the Founding Dean of the Online Graduate Programs of Norwich University. These programs are often cited as industry examples of academic rigor, financial success, retention, and effective marketing.

The Myth of Poor Retention in Online Learning

The evidence is clear: online learning suffers from student attrition issues more so than face-to-face programs. The recently released 2010 Sloan-C report (Allen and Seaman, 2009) reemphasizes this point, which has been made by a chorus of researchers and reports. Those reports estimate online course attrition to be anywhere from 10 to 100% higher than attrition in traditional face-to-face courses. (Ali and Leeds, 2009; Harrell, 2008; Angelina, Williams, and Natvig, 2007; Tinto, 2006; Yukselturk and Inan, 2006; Dagger and Wade, 2004; Martinez, 2003; Diaz, 2002; Frankola, 2001) With double-digit growth in online learning become an annual event, the trend line for student success might be a train wreck of extrapolation awaiting higher education.

But while retention in online learning is poor in some sectors and for some schools, it is absolutely stellar in others. In fact, if approached with good process, there is a way to make retention in online learning far superior to traditional face-to-face learning. So the fact that the industry average is indeed poor suggests this might not be as much of a myth as it is an industry that has not availed itself of well established best practices for retaining students. Before we explain the difference between good and bad retention, we should discuss why it matters in the first place. There are several reasons.

First, schools are increasingly being judged on their graduation rates by accreditation agencies, government, school ranking systems, and scholars themselves. Accreditation and government agencies view graduation rates as evidence that we are fulfilling our basic mission, the accountability for which will continue to increase. Graduation rates are a component of numerous ranking systems, and even if rankings are unpopular with academicians, tens of millions of hits a year on rankings web pages prove that students use them to make decisions. We all grumble about it, but we also continue to try to climb the ladder.
Second, there is the cost. It is very expensive to enroll a student. Depending on the market and the school, it can range from $800 to well over $5000 to get a student to enroll. If they stay one semester – or even worse gain admission and drop at the start of their first course with a full or partial refund – we just lost a lot of money. Even greater are the costs of the student’s investment, societal loss of an educated citizen and worker, and likely negative testimonials about online learning. High retention is the difference between an online program providing marginal resources (or even losing money, as many do) and earning millions for the university, the student, and society.
Third, students need to graduate as a matter of personal growth and as a matter of national competitiveness. This is increasingly becoming a matter of national economic and education policy.

So what is acceptable? With a well executed, proactive, and personalized retention plan, course retention rates can consistently exceed 90%. As stated, achieving that requires a plan and a good execution of that plan. The plan requires a holistic understanding of the science behind retention as well as an appreciation for and willingness to practice the art of getting students to persist term over term. Retention planning is a complex elixir whose main ingredients include recruitment of qualified students, proactive approach to student preparedness, orientation programs, reducing friction in student services, faculty preparedness and effectiveness, good online instructional course design, an appreciation for the complex lives that online students live, a method to immediately intervene when students struggle or disappear, and retention specialists with just the right coaching skills, personality, and work ethic. It is not easy, but it is achievable. It is based in the concept of customer service, it requires regular proactive action on an individual level, and it requires a level of personal interaction with students that is rarely achieved in face-to-face education. We find that it isn’t the academics that overwhelm students and cause them to fail or withdraw; it is isolation, life, and logistics—textbooks that don’t arrive, the birth of baby, job promotion, husband with cancer, financial aid officers that don’t return calls, technology interruptions, etc.

So why don’t institutions figure out the formula on their own? Most times it is a budget issue; other times it is just a lack of knowledge of the best practices behind online student retention. Too often we think that retention will occur because we have some automated contact service in place. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is a science that requires personalized attention. Regarding budgets, investing in retention takes money, time, and effort. Most organizations still rely on faculty to retain students, primarily because it seems that faculty provide the service for free. That reflects well on our budget, but this is not what faculty are trained for, especially if they are adjunct, and it distracts them from good teaching and student learning. The resource issue pervades the industry, and many institutions are unable to practice or even find out what best practices are. That is why decoupling and outsourcing this part of the services supply chain makes sense for organizations, allowing professionals to perform – and finance – those parts of the process. Those who have figured it out have become very, very successful. And so have their students.

Compass engages over 7500 students every academic term on behalf of our prominent and highly ranked academic institutions. Our best practices have successfully dispelled the myth of poor retention in online learning. On average, the programs we support have course retention rates consistently above 90-95%. But the gains to these successful institutions, and their successful students, are far greater than that. It is an issue of fulfilling our educational mission and changing lives, one student at a time. After all, that is what education is all about, and online education should be no less.

Allen, IE., & Seaman, J., (2010) Learning On Demand : Online Education in the United States, 2009, Babson Survey Research Group and The Sloan Consortium.

Ali, R., &Leeds, E., (2009) The Impact of Face-to-Face Orientation on Online Retention: A Pilot Study Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration, Volume XII, Winter 2009

Angelino, L. M., Williams, F. K., & Natvig, D. (2007). Strategies to engage online students and reduce attrition rates. The Journal of Educators Online, 4 (2),1-14.

Betts, K., (2008) Online Human Touch Instruction and Programming, Journal of Online Learning and Teaching, 4 (3).

Dagger, D. & Wade, V. P. (2004) Evaluation of adaptive course construction toolkit (ACCT).

Diaz, D. P. (2002). Online drop rates revisited. The Technology Source.

Flood, J. (2002) Read all about it: online learning facing 80% attrition rates, Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education, 3 (2).

Martinez, M. (2003). High attrition rates in e-learning: challenges, predictors, and solutions. The eLearning Developers’ Journal.

Tinto, V. (2006). Research and practice of student retention: What next? Journal of College Student Retention: Research, Theory & Practice, 8(1), 1-20.

Yukseltruk, E., & Inan, F. A. (2006). Examining the factors affecting student dropout in an online learning environment. ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report (ERIC No. ED 494 345)