Retention, Bonding, and Academic Achievement: Success of a First-Year Seminar

Abstract

As the movement to hold institutions of higher education accountable for student success has gained momentum, colleges and universities have tried to enhance student satisfaction with the college experience, decrease the percentage of students who drop out of college, improve students' academic achievement, and increase the number of students who graduate from their institutions. This study used multiple assessment measures to follow the progress of eight cohorts of first-year students exposed to a college seminar between 1986 and 1993 and to compare their college careers with those of students who did not take the course. The data indicate that students who enrolled in a three-credit first-year orientation course fared significantly better than students who did not take the course by 6 to 28 percentage points on measures of retention over four years of college and by 14 to 32 percentage points on graduation rates four, five, and six years after entering college. These advantages held true for both minority and White students. The data also showed significantly higher scores for students enrolled in a college seminar on mean academic grade point average (1.1 point increase), satisfaction with their college experience, interaction with the faculty, participation in extracurricular experiences, and on many academic, personal, and social skills.