Promoting student success Mantz Yorke Liverpool John Moores

Promoting student success Mantz Yorke Liverpool John Moores University m. yorke@livjm. ac. uk London South Bank University 21 January 2005

The general plan 1. Policy context 2. Retention/completion 3. What the Action on Access studies found 4. Formative assessment 5. Employability 6. Who can do what? (Emphasis on institutions)

The ‘impossible pentagon’ Five policy ‘desirables’ • Widened participation • High completion rates • Higher quality of HE provision • Higher standards of student performance, including employability • Lower cost

What drives institutions? Fear of poor performance indicator statistics? Funding streams? Desire to enhance students’ achievement?

% non-continuation, 02 -03, English HEIs 30 25 20 15 10 5 % SEG IIIm - V, 01 -02 0 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 4

% non-continuation, 02 -03, English HEIs 30 25 20 15 10 LSBU 5 % SEG IIIm - V, 01 -02 0 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 4

% non-continuation, 02 -03, English HEIs 30 25 20 15 10 5 % SEG IIIm - V, 01 -02 0 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 4

% non-continuation, 02 -03, English HEIs 30 25 20 15 10 5 % SEG IIIm - V, 01 -02 0 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 4

% non-continuation, 02 -03, English HEIs 30 25 r = 0. 65 20 15 10 LSBU 5 % SEG IIIm - V, 01 -02 0 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 4

US degree attainment rates Institution type % completing bachelor’s degree within 4 years within 6 years Private university 67. 1 79. 6 Public university 28. 1 57. 7 Public college 24. 3 47. 4 Nonsectarian college 56. 3 66. 2 Catholic college 46. 4 60. 2 Other Christian college 51. 0 61. 3 All 36. 4 57. 6 Astin & Oseguera 2002

Why do students leave? Yorke 1999 a Davies & Elias 2003 N = 2151 FT/SW Response rate 32% N = 1510 FT/SW Response rate 10% Wrong choice Academic difficulties Financial problems Personal problems Poor student experience Academic difficulties Dislike environment Poor institutional provision Wrong institution

Why do students leave? Yorke 1999 a Davies & Elias 2003 N = 2151 FT/SW Response rate 32% N = 1510 FT/SW Response rate 10% Wrong choice Academic difficulties Financial problems Personal problems Poor student experience Academic difficulties Dislike environment Poor institutional provision Wrong institution

Voices 1 My A-levels were geared towards accounts and economics, and I just carried on in that direction and didn’t think of anything else. I should have researched it all a bit more. ‘HD’, in Davies & Elias (2003, p. 32) … I wasn’t having a particularly happy time personally and I just thought I’ll do what the school says, and once I actually got to it [the institution] I realised that maybe it wasn’t the only option and maybe I could be happier doing something else … ‘Irene’ in Longden (2001, p. 30)

Voices 2 Academic staff, on occasions, had a tendency to project themselves as being very pushed for time, stressed out and could not fit you into their timetable of work. No matter who you turned to, or when you seeked (sic) someone’s aid, they seemed to be busy. Student reading Science, in Yorke (1999 a, p. 40).

Voices 3 My main reason for leaving was finance. I soon realised that once I had paid my rent for the year, I would have no money left. Didn’t want to leave the university owing ’ 000 s of £. So got a job. Student reading Humanities, in Yorke (1999 a, p. 44) … I was forced to work PT which ate into my studying time and my relaxation time. This generated a lot of stress for me … My commitment to the course was affected. I didn’t feel that studying an Art degree subject with little career/job assurance justified the severe three-year struggle required to achieve it. Student reading Art and Design, in Yorke (1999 a, p. 45)

Voices 4 I was amazed by the ‘big city’. I started clubbing regularly, took more and more drugs, became increasingly more ill, lost weight, became paranoid. I messed up in a very big way. One minute I was on top, the next rock bottom. I came from a cushioned background and believe if I had maybe waited a year or two and learnt more about the reality of life, then it would have been a different story. Student reading joint Arts and Social Science, in Yorke (1999 b, p. 32)

Academic experiences Preentry attribut es Intentions, goals, commitments Social experiences I n t e g r a t i o n Intentions, Departure goals, decision commitments Tinto, 1993

Entry Ch’cs Envir Interact Psychological Process Outcome Intermed Outcomes Attitudes Intent’n Institutional Environment Past Behav Person’y Initial Attribs Normat Beliefs Coping Strategs Motiv’n Skills & Abilities Self-Eff +ve S-E Bureau Academ Social Coping Stress Process: & Approach Confid / Avoid’ce External Attribs: L of C Internal Attrib & Motiv Acad Integ & Perf Inst’l Fit Intent to Persist Social Integ Persist Loyalty to Inst Bean & Eaton, 2000

Problems with models • Slippery concepts and terminology • Multiple theories • Varied foci of attention • Linearity • Rationality • Predictiveness

Weak empirical support Academic experiences Preentry attribut es Intentions, goals, commitments Social experiences I n t e g r a t i o n Intentions, Departure goals, decision commitments Stronger empirical support

Adventitious happenings Psych of Indiv Institutional context Broader society

Understanding I meant, there’s no end to understanding a person All one can do is understand them better, To keep up with them; so that as the other changes You can understand the change as soon as it happens Though you couldn’t have predicted it. TS Eliot ‘The confidential clerk’

Action on Access Studied what HEIs with high proportions of ‘WP students’ were doing 6 HEIs that were beating retention benchmarks 9 other HEIs with high WP levels

Action on Access studies Demonstrated the potential in • Commitment to the student experience • Pre-entry and early engagement with students • Curricula attuned to widened participation • Making the curriculum a social arena • Allocating resources preferentially to 1 st year • Emphasising formative assessment, esp. in Sem. 1

Work on • formative assessment • employability offers some pointers

Formative assessment … implies no more (and no less) than a discerning judgement about [a] learner’s progress; it is ‘on-going’ in the sense that it goes on all the time; and it is formative in so far as its purpose is forward-looking, aiming to improve future learning (as distinct from the retrospective nature of summative assessment). Greenwood et al. (2001, p. 109)

A typology of formative assessment From Teachers Peers Others Self Formal Informal Probably the main approach in HE Where circumstances permit Via peer assessment Over coffee or in activities the bar Problems if assessor In work-based is mentor, supervisor situations Only if an assessment. Where student is requirement acting self-critically

Formative assessment Black and Wiliam’s meta-analysis showed a size effect of 0. 7 … formative assessment does improve learning … The gains in achievement [are] among the largest ever reported for educational interventions. Black and Wiliam (1998, p. 61)

Weaknesses (Subject Review etc. ) In 49 per cent of cases, marking systems could be improved particularly in respect of feedback to students. This sometimes lacked a critical edge, gave few helpful comments and failed to indicate to students ways in which improvement could be made. QAA (2001, para 28: Subject overview report, Education) See also QAA (2004) Learning from Subject Review, Learning from higher education in further education colleges in England QAA (2003) Review of 33 Foundation Degrees

Towards greater autonomy From Teachers Peers Others Self Formal Informal Probably the main approach in HE Where circumstances permit Via peer assessment Over coffee or in activities the bar Problems if assessor In work-based is mentor, supervisor situations Only if an assessment. Where student is requirement acting self-critically

Employability Its development is aligned with good learning, and hence with the development of student success The four-component USEM approach has been found useful in thinking about student development

USEM U Understanding of subject and broader situations S Skilful practices in subject, employment and life E Efficacy beliefs and personal qualities M Metacognition

S USEM Skilful practices in context Employability; broader personal effectiveness E Personal qualities, including self-theories and efficacy beliefs Subject understanding U Metacognition M

Some relevant theorists Bourdieu & Passeron (1977): cultural and social capital Flavell (1979): metacognition Salovey & Mayer (1990): emotional intelligence Pintrich & Schunk (1996): motivation Bandura (1997): self-efficacy Sternberg (1997): practical intelligence Dweck (1999): self-theorising Biggs (2003): constructive alignment in pedagogy …

This theoretical plurality suggests why simplistic attempts to improve student success are unlikely to be successful

This theoretical plurality suggests why simplistic attempts to improve student success are unlikely to be successful There is no simple causality

Evidence for E and M: effect sizes Meta-analyses Size N studies Self-system (E of USEM) 0. 74 147 Metacognition (M) 0. 72 556 Marzano (1998)

Who can do what? • The system • Institutions • Students

The system • Operate a post-qualification admissions system • Do not over-privilege research • Use the QA system to ensure threshold quality • Relax about completion statistics • Make student funding system simpler • Ensure that policy initiatives do not conflict

What can institutions do? Wrong choice Academic difficulties Financial problems Poor student experience Dislike environment Poor institutional provision

What can institutions do? • Assist student decision-making • Enhance the student experience • Promote student engagement • Help students to cope with the demand… • … and with failure • Deal sympathetically with adventitious events

Student decision-making • Provide good information to prospective students • Welcome all students in the information provided • Recruit realistically • Advise according to the student’s best interests

The student experience: general • Be welcoming • Engage with students before they arrive • Encourage a sense of belonging • Make induction effective • Provide a ‘one stop shop’ for support services • Help students to become ‘streetwise’ • Treat HE as a predominantly social process • Promote the development of teaching expertise

The student experience: academic • A culture of learning • Programme structures likely to engender success • Teaching approaches likely to engender success • Assessment for learning • Make the 1 st year/level relatively resource-rich

Helping students to cope • Respond to students’ existing knowledge-level • Ensure that students know what is expected • Use formative assessment early • See failure as a developmental opportunity • Be supportive when disaster strikes • Understand the pressures on today’s students

What students should do • Choose programmes wisely and unhurriedly • If uncertain, take time out • Be motivated towards their programmes, & engage • Understand that regurgitation is not enough • Take note of, and act on, formative assessments • Be prepared for low initial grades • Use poor performance as a stimulus for learning

Remember that change is easy to propose

Remember that change is easy to propose but not so easy to implement

Epilogue Institutions cannot guarantee student success, not least because students have to contribute their effort

Epilogue Institutions cannot guarantee student success, not least because students have to contribute their effort We can, however, ‘bend the odds’ in favour of success

Epilogue Institutions cannot guarantee student success, not least because students have to contribute their effort We can, however, ‘bend the odds’ in favour of success We have to act with intelligence in the ways in which we design our educational provision, and in the ways in which we respond to our students’ needs