Monday, March 23, 2009

Three Ways to Ground Helicopter Parents


Last week I was flattered and honored. I had the pleasure to work with Northeastern Illinois University, an important school with an attrition issue it is starting to aggressively tackle. I came there to do a study, provide some presentations and help obtain thoughts and issues from everyone to improve retention and academic customer service across the university community. This is a serious effort from some sincere and wonderful people who want to enrich the lives of their students and community.

 

The flattery came from the use of my tag line Great Service Matters for the entire conference and effort. More came from the attention and kind comments from the wonderful people from Arthur (the birthday boy in public works) all the way down to President Haas at NEIU. They all seemed so eager to work with the ideas and techniques we discussed.  But the greatest praise came from the email from the Director of Enrollment Services, Dr. Janice Harring-Hendon.

 

Thank you again for helping us to launch Northeastern’s customer service initiative.  Every employee I passed this morning on my way in made eye contact and said good morning.  One of my managers stopped in to say that her staff has vowed to practice “Meet and Greet” program.  We are thrilled with the positive feedback from conference and can’t thank you enough for all you did to help us get this started…customer service is indeed a gift that keeps on giving.   Thanks again.

 

Not just talking the talk but walking the walk and greeting!  This is a group of people who will succeed so their students succeed.

 

Helicopter Parents   

 

While there, the issue of helicopter parents came up. As a problem. Seemed that helicopter parents were providing NEIU more help than they needed – or wanted. (Sort of like the College of DuPage’s Board of Trustees who may be more like drone bombers than helicopters). They wanted to find ways to eliminate them; to stop them from landing.

 

That’s not necessarily going to happen nor even good for the school.

 

First, helicopter parents are not going to go away if they feel they need to be helping their kids. This is actually a value to be lauded. Parents who care! Haven’t we been told that parents are detached and that’s why our society is slipping? These are parents who are fully involved so they will not just go away. The real issue is how to channel the interest.

 

Second, they can bring you good information on issues that are harming retention and students. No, not the ones about my daughter is a genius and should have gotten an A on the exam. If she really were a genius she should have gotten the A on her own. More the ones with issues about how their son was treated, a policy or procedure that is problematic, professional indifference or a problem with an employee of the school. If any of these come up more than once, you have just been given free consultation on a problem that likely affects more than just two students.

 

Three Steps to Ground Helicopter Parents

 

There are ways to get the helicopters from flying as often as they may be right now. Here are three things you can do to keep the grounded more.

 

1)    Have All Students Sign A FERPA Release. An issue that will always get the engines revving starts when a parent calls to get some information on how someone is doing in school or even if they have simply been showing up. They call and make a reasonable request. We tell them we cannot talk to them because of FERPA. “Because of what?” Then we try to explain what FERPA is and they respond by telling us they are paying the bills so take FERPA and….  Can you hear that helicopter engine starting to warm up? Oh yes, and they are starting to consider loading stinger missiles too.

 

Little angers people than when they feel we are hiding behind a smokescreen and that’s how they see FERPA. They may have to accept what we tell them right then but they do not believe us.  That just makes them angry and distrustful . That in turn make them ready and looking for a fight, or a pre-emptive helicopter strike. Give them a semblance of a reason and they come swooping in.

 

So, take away the issue. Have all students sign a FERPA release. With that in hand, you can discuss issues and supply answers that will keep the engine from warming up.

 

2) Give Them a Landing Pad. There are going to be some parents and spouses who will want to fly in for a check of the landing site no matter what one does to dissuade them.  Give them places to land so you can control some of the air traffic. Moreover by providing landing pads set far enough off campus, you might have them be happy not to keep coming forward after they have landed. Give them places they can make contact, get information and send comments from off-campus such as:

 

          A parental liaison: identify a person who will be the point of contact between pilots and the school.  After studying and talking with helicopters parents, I have found that many take off because they do not know where or who they should talk with on an issue or problem.  They start to fly around the institution trying to find someone who might help them resolve the issue or provide information.  Provide them with a person who will take all questions, issues, concerns and complaints; get information and report back. And, though it should not be necessary to do so (it is unfortunately) make sure the liaison can provide great customer service.  Don’t use the position to banish or punish someone who is miserable to work with. Just adds to the problem.

          Email Landing Pad:  Create an email address that is just for parents/spouses to use to send in questions, issues, complaints, whatever, even compliments (heaven forbid).  Make sure it has an automatic responder saying that the email will be responded to by a real person  by the end of the day. Have the liaison check it every day and respond with either an answer, proposed resolution or an assurance it is being looked into and “I will be back by….(date). I will keep you up-to-date as I can”  Then get on it.

 

DO NOT EVER SAY THE ISSUE WILL BE RESOLVED UNLESS IT CAN BE AND WILL BE. DO NOT OVER PROMISE. OVER DELIVER.

 

          Parent’s Website: A number of schools have established a web site just for parents and others interested in what is going on, when things are happening and other relevant information. These can provide information and an outlet for parents so they can be involved and get information they may want without even glancing at their Hughies  A couple of examples of different approaches are James Madison University; Purchase College-SUNY  Hope College;  and Harford Community College


Parent’s Blog or Wiki: Provide them an opportunity to communicate with you and other parents. It is quite possible that by talking/writing about issues, concerns or confusions with one another, they can actually help one another in a non-threatening manner.  Yes, it is possible that someone might write something negative about the school or an experience.  So?  Realize that if they wrote about it they are certainly talking about it. This gives you a chance tio hear what they are saying and even respond starting with a thank you for your comments…. It is also very possible that if you can promoter and build the interactions, another parent will have an experience that counters the complaint. If it should lead to a thread of complaints, congratulate yourself. You now have an issue to solve and save students, parents and time in the future. And, yes tell the writers you have heard them, looked into it and…

 

A Blog or wiki also provides many helicopter parents just what they want – to be heard.  

 

3)         Keep in Touch Regularly: Don’t just send parents and others just bills and warnings. Include them on the possible donor list because they are. They will donate tuition, fees, housing, books and other expenses. Okay, they aren’t exactly donations but they are revenue and I am not aware of many schools that do not want that. Treat them as if they were potential donors and they will return your reaching out to them with not reaching back in a helicopter. They could even become a real donor later on.

 

Realize of course I am not saying to send them the same materials as you might alumni or potential donors but treat then to mailings and contacts on the same sorts of positive information. Have the student’s major department do the same. Keep in touch on the good days to offset the bad ones such as payment dates that just add fuel to the helicopter tank.

 

Will these suggestions end all helicoptering? No. But they will certainly slow it down. And they will also provide you with important information that can only help you make the school better.

IF THIS ARTICLE MAKES SENSE TO YOU, YOU WILL WANT TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE BEST-SELLING NEW BOOK ON RETENTION AND ACADEMIC CUSTOMER SERVICE THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION by clicking here

AcademicMAPS is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through research training and academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that seek to work with them 
We increase your success
Contact Us Today


“We had hoped we’d improve our retention by 3% but with the help of Dr. Raisman, we increased it by 5%.” Rachel Albert, Provost, University of Maine-Farmington

“Neal led a retreat that initiated customer service and retention as a real focus for us and gave us a clear plan. Then he followed up with presentations and workshops that kicked us all into high gear. We recommend with no reservations; just success.” Susan Mesheau, Executive Director U First: Integrated Recruitment & Retention University of New Brunswick

“Thank you so much for the wonderful workshop at Lincoln Technical Institute. It served to re-center ideas in a great way. I perceived it to be a morale booster, breath of fresh air, and a burst of passion.” 
Shelly S, Lincoln Technical Institute



 

 

 

 

 

 

Monday, March 16, 2009

Students Are/are not Customers - a Dialogue


“Students are not customers.” If I had a dollar for every time I hear that I would not have to work. Might even be able to fund the bailout. But because I hear that phrase so often, there is a lot of work for me with colleges concerned about their retention of students.


I was working with a college that was experiencing 42% attrition. FORTY-TWO PERCENT!!! Each year it loses 42% of its student body. Not good any time but now could be a financial disaster. While I was discussing academic customer service, I referred to students as customers. A faculty member jumped to his feet and yelled out the statement. “Students are not customers.” There was some applause.


“Okay. If they are not customers or clients of the college, what are they?” I asked.


The professor thought for a moment and retorted that “they are students.”


“Ahhh. Then students are students?” That brought my philosophy courses into play. “Isn’t that an absolute tautology? Defining a term by the term? If so, isn’t that also a logical error that does not define what students are.”


So I asked for a better definition.


“Students are people who come to the university to learn from us.”


“Okay. That’s a good start. Are there any conditions placed on them to be able to do so?”


“Yes. We must be accepted to the university first.”

“Do they then get to come here for free?”


“Paying does not make them customers. Their tuition does not even pay for half of the actual costs.”


“Just because they may not pay all the cost does not take away the fact that they are spending money for something even if they don’t pay for all of it. They…”

“They pay some money to gain an education. They are here to learn. That makes them students not customers” another audience member chimed in.


“So your contention is they are paying for an education and that is the definition of a student not a customer?”


“Yes. Purpose controls the interaction not the exchange of dollars. The why of their coming to college; not the how. Since they come to college to learn, they are students not customers.”


“So if they come to learn they are students?”


“Yes.”


“But is that really why they come to college? To learn as an end in itself? I don’t think so. And I don’t think that’s why you went to college either. Sure, for you learning was a part of it but I think there was another reason too.”


“That’s ridiculous. I came to college to study literature because I love literature and not for any other reason.”


“Nah. That’s not wholly true and you know it. Sure you came to study lit, be an English major just like I did. But you could have done that anywhere without having to do it in a classroom. Nothing stopped you from reading all you wanted outside of college. But you went to college because you wanted to not just study literature; you wanted to get a job so you could do so. You came to college to become a faculty member and that’s a job. You went to college to get a job.”


“The goal of becoming a faculty member was secondary. I do that just so I can have time to study literature. If I didn’t have to teach, I would be even happier.”


“Let’s not go there because you can only say that because you have as job and likely because you’re tenured. If you didn’t have a job you wouldn’t have the time or luxury to say you don’t even want one. “


“That’s insulting.”

“Perhaps and if it is I apologize but it is true. Just ask an adjunct or unemployed PhD looking for a job. They’ll tell you that is about a position, a salary. That’s what they are after. I mean haven’t we all heard “I went to college for ten years and I can’t get a job.” Not, “I went to college for ten years and thrilled I have all the time I want to just enjoy what I learned. Thank goodness I did not get those degrees so I could try to get a teaching position.


And the truth is that you went to college as did all or us including me to become something. For us it was a faculty member and we did this not just once but three times to get the BA,MA and PhD in our case. And when you were in school, you took courses because you had to not because you wanted to learn some of that required stuff. And while you were a student, you grumbled too as do our current students about the costs and whether or not you were getting your money’s worth or were just wasting time with a third year of Spanish, a calculus or humanities course perhaps. You thought you’d be better off if you could take more courses in your major.


If we could we chose grad school by where we had the best chance to study with someone well known so we could invest our time and money to learn and get a job. But if that prof was at Podunck U we would have found someone else because people do not get jobs from Podunck. Not good ones at least. Because grad school needs to pay off. Needs to give us a good return on our investment like a tenure-track position in a good school.


Is there anyone here who isn't identifying with any of this? Who didn’t care whether or not college led to a job? And before you jump up and claim ME, know that my follow-up question is “Okay, then will you give up your job and all that comes with it so you can just go and study and learn for the love of it? And if you say yes, I will have a resignation letter for you to sign and we’ll hand it in together so you can live your dream.”


Dramatic grumbling from some followed. Those who agreed with me did not move for they knew that academic vengeance can be quite painful.


I continued. “And that is a consumerism attitude. I pay this to gain that. The pay may be money, time, hoop jumping or whatever but it as an exchange of value for a potential value in the case of college. And people who engage in that consumerist action are customers and clients no matter if you call them students or something else.


We did it. Others before us did it and our current students do it and that makes them customers of our services. The only ones who did not have to do it were the ones wealthy enough to be able to not worry about a job or an income and I am not seeing many of them here.

Or in your college either.


So let’s just accept the reality and do all we can to treat our customer appropriately. Doesn’t mean pander to them at all either. It means helping them to their goals such as learning and training they will need to graduate get a job, become a productive person and citizen. That’s finally what they pay us for after all. That’s why they submit to the required courses. Because they have to as a vocational necessity and because they may prepare them to succeed better in career and life.

And if along the way, they like us, gain a good, disciplined broad education – so much the better for them. They also want respect, recognition and to feel valued and that is also what every customer wants in every service or business.”


I sort of felt a bit badly because I knew there were many faculty who agreed with me but did not feel they could make any public agreement. I guess I was just too tired of some sanctimonious folk who think that if they recognize their students as anything but students, those who they can have power over, they might have to treat them better and even give a damn about them.


I do realize most faculty are very decent, caring professionals but they need to let their colleagues who toss off “jokes” like “it is so nice here without them (students)” they are making them all look badly.


IF THIS ARTICLE MAKES SENSE TO YOU, YOU WILL WANT TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE BEST-SELLING NEW BOOK ON RETENTION AND ACADEMIC CUSTOMER SERVICE THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION by clicking here


AcademicMAPS is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through research training and academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that seek to work with them
We increase your success


“We had hoped we’d improve our retention by 3% but with the help of Dr. Raisman, we increased it by 5%.” Rachel Albert, Provost, University of Maine-Farmington

“Neal led a retreat that initiated customer service and retention as a real focus for us and gave us a clear plan. Then he followed up with presentations and workshops that kicked us all into high gear. We recommend with no reservations; just success.” Susan Mesheau, Executive Director U First: Integrated Recruitment & Retention University of New Brunswick

“Thank you so much for the wonderful workshop at Lincoln Technical Institute. It served to re-center ideas in a great way. I perceived it to be a morale booster, breath of fresh air, and a burst of passion.”
Shelly S, Lincoln Technical Institute


Thursday, March 12, 2009

A Proposal to End Our Economic Burdens Worth Reading

This excellent article came across my screen today, sent to me by the futurist John Partridge. The piece by Isaac Bickerstaffe makes such clear sense and its argument is so powerful that I decided to post it for all to read. I do not know Bickerstaffe but I am told he is a very forward thinking economist but rather modest so does not publish much which is ironic considering what he says here.

But this is an economic proposal that should be distributed. Please forward it to others so we might find a way out of the economic depression and perhaps even some of all the punditry that is eating away at our mental health, the economy, society and especially our children and their futures.




Don't Lower Taxes -

Do Away With Them To End Our Depression


Isaac Bickerstaffe, esq

Chief Economic Analyst
The Tattler Foundation



The relationship between no taxes and having more money to spend is unquestionable. The relationship between me and you spending more is key to the success of business and the economy. So, it logically follows that with fewer or no taxes, the more we can spend, the stronger the economy and the better off we will be.


The issue then is not how much we should cut taxes, but as swift Republicans like John Kasich ask, why have taxes at all? If we do away with taxes altogether, we could spend our way out of the depression. And can’t we all live without those wasteful government programs and services?


The 27 new Columbus,OH police officers that were hired with tax dollars, will they stop crime? NO!! We have had police as long as anyone can recall and we still have crime. Do firemen stop fires? NO! Do publicly-funded hospitals stop illness? Has Medicare made people healthy and ended death? Not at all.


Do we need public schools and colleges? Not really. Kids aren’t learning anyhow and so many of the teachers already buy the supplies needed in the classroom. Cooler classrooms save on heating costs and make sure the kids stay awake to learn.


There are excellent private colleges to go to if there were no tax dollars for public universities or community colleges. Besides, state schools are not turning out enough graduates anyhow. Just look where so many important discoveries and technology are coming from? India, China, even Europe. They can supply all the new ideas we need. And technicians? We even buy most of our weapon system components from foreign suppliers. We are importing all the stuff we need so why do we need colleges to turn out educated and trained workers? Private schools were good enough for our forefathers who built this country and should be good enough for our children too.


In fact, taxes contribute to our problems. For example, if there were no taxes for road maintenance, roads and highways would fall into disrepair and the potholes and crumbling roadways would make everyone slow down. This would all but end speed-related traffic deaths. Look how well this works when we don’t plow the roads to keep taxes low.


Health inspections of restaurants just adds to the closure of small business and add to their cost of doing business. Besides, just look at the peanut situation. Did tax-supported health inspections stop that? No the market did. A few people getting very sick, I forget if anyone died, did more than any food inspectors.


Same with building inspectors. They just add to costs of building and rentals by demanding that places be up to code and “safe”. When they close up places because they are inhabitable, does that help business? If a building falls in or catches fire from poor or illegal construction or wiring, doesn’t that destruction erase the problem itself?

Has a new tax-supported stadium or arena made your favorite team a winner?


In fact, taxes do little but create problems. Trash and garbage pickup just give people excuses not to re-cycle. Tax filtered and treated tap water just encourages people to drink too much and bathe more than is necessary. We even have tax built and supported places where sewage is collected and allowed to sit in large tanks creating a health hazard. How disgusting. We have sewers and drains that could simply just dump that all in the river.

Civic organizations just encourage people to get together and find out what else they want to make their lives better and longer. That costs more money. Athletic centers encourage people to engage in sports which makes them get hurt at times thereby leading to more health costs. People who sit and watch TV all the time do not get ankle injuries.


Taxes for prisons just give judges somewhere to send guilty people. No taxes for prisons, fewer criminals and prisoners. No taxes, there would be no tax cheats or fraud. No taxes, no public offices, so no corrupt politicians to jail.


Nationally, having armed forces just leads to wars which cost more taxpayer dollars. If there were no army, we would not be in Iraq!


I am sure you have examples too and I hope you find this modest proposal to have merit and support those who oppose all taxes. But if you do not agree, do not simply waste my and others' time with foolishness such as suggesting that the administration's package should be given more time to work.


And please do not just say I wrote this because I will be in those who have succeeded in our society and make so much money that my taxes will go up. Yes, my tax bracket places me in the group that will have to pay more but fear not, I have accountants who can find the loopholes so I do not pay taxes this year either. It is with full sincerity that I can say I have not the least personal interest in endeavoring to promote this necessary work. The only motive I have is the public good of my country.I have not had to pay taxes for the past eleven years so there is nothing in my proposal for anyone to attack me for personal gain by it.


-END OF ARTICLE-


Okay, if you are like me and you feel there is a message in here that should be read by others please, by all means, forward it to others so it can gain fullest exposure. Thanks. And feel free to comment on it here too!

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Video Seminar Will Save You Students and Budgets


I regularly get requests for information on when I will be doing a seminar on customer service and retention. So here is one coming up this month.



I will be doing an on-line seminar 5 Ways to Improve Retention Starting Tomorrow for Magna Publications this month. These will be five absolutely field tested and proven ways to increase customer service, moral and yes, retention. Topics will include:


Auditing and attending to POCmarks

Signage on campus that leads out the back door

The best, simplest and most productive survey ever

Making teaching and work fun again and

Decorum as customer service



This will be the first seminar I have done on these topics and it could not come at a better time. You are losing students and money and this seminar can help you save both.



I am completing a major study of retention and attrition over six year cohort periods at over 3000 four-year colleges and universities. Every one of the schools is losing unimaginable numbers of students and huge sums of money to attrition. Some schools are losing MILLIONS a year. Your school may be one of them.(Contact me and I just may have your school's dollar figure)



This seminar will help you save students and your budgets. It is highly probable that with some customer service training for retention your school would not have to cut as deeply as it will, It may not even have to make cuts at all.



This is a seminar which yes I am a bit prejudiced for since I am doing it but I know the concepts work. I know you may be concerned about spending money now but consider this…For the cost of a metaphoric student finger tip you can save the whole student and many more too.



Why am I pushing this? I do not get any more money if a lot of people attend. I am promoting the video seminar because I am upset at the lives that are hurt from attrition. Students lose their dreams of a better life. They lose thousands of tuition, fee and book dollars invested in those dreams. They gain a sense of being a loser when it is often not their faulty at all but ours.



I am tired of colleges not facing their responsibility to their students and their communities through enrollment ethical deficit syndrome. I am upset when colleges cut back even more student services to make budgets thereby harming students even more, I am angered at the blatant medievalism that turns people into adjunct serfs. And I am frustrated that colleges and universities are losing over $4 billion a year from attrition and are not doing enough to turn that around.

Help us all start to change things by having your school in attendance at this on-line seminar.


This is almost two seminars actually since any school that signs up for the Magna seminar will also be able to call into a free Q+A and solution seminar I will do as a follow-up that will be announced at the end of the Magna seminar 5 Ways to Improve Retention Starting Tomorrow. In the follow-up bring your particular issues and we will solve them right then and there whenever possible.



So this is a two-for-one deal that you and your school or business should be at. Magna only charges $249 per site. That’s a price I hate in some ways since after this on-line seminar, you may not need to have me come to your college, university or career college for a presentation or training session. I lose money every time I do one of these but I gain in personal satisfaction that I am helping students and schools succeed.



So sign up now at 5 Ways to Improve Retention Starting Tomorrow.



AcademicMAPS is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through research training and customer service solutions to colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as to businesses that seek to work with them
We increase your success

CALL OR EMAIL TODAY
TO INCREASE YOUR SCHOOL'S RETENTION

www.GreatServiceMatters.com
info@GreatServiceMatters.com
413.219.6939
GET A COPY OF MY NEW BOOK THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION by clicking here. It will add to the enjoyment of the seminar.
Discounts on multiples copies of The Power of Retention.


“We had hoped we’d improve our retention by 3% but with the help of Dr. Raisman, we increased it by 5%.” Rachel Albert, Provost, University of Maine-Farmington

“Neal led a retreat that initiated customer service and retention as a real focus for us and gave us a clear plan. Then he followed up with presentations and workshops that kicked us all into high gear. We recommend with no reservations; just success.” Susan Mesheau, Executive Director U First: Integrated Recruitment & Retention University of New Brunswick

“Thank you so much for the wonderful workshop at Lincoln Technical Institute. It served to re-center ideas in a great way. I perceived it to be a morale booster, breath of fresh air, and a burst of passion.” Shelly S, Lincoln Technical Institute

Friday, March 06, 2009

College Attrition Costs US Over 4 Billion Annually


Hardly a day goes by without a college announcing jobs, programs or spending cuts.


You’d think with all the brainpower at our colleges and universities they would be able to come up with better solutions than lopping off people, sections and services to students. But they don’t seem to. Why not?


For organizations preparing students and society for the future, we seem to still be stuck in the past at least when it comes to thinking about enrollment. The churn and burn of continually bringing new students through the front door, and then just watching them go out the back door is killing college enrollments. And individual and institutional futures. As students drop out, budgets, employment, class sections, services and the ability to meet the educational mission go down. Tuition and fees go up.


In Ohio where I consult with the Chancellor for example, the average non-graduation rate for all colleges and universities is about 48% over six years. That means the average Ohio college or university loses up to almost half of its population. The average state-assisted four-year schools have a slightly higher 53% six-year attrition rate. These are four-year or more selective schools. They choose who can be accepted; who they believe is capable of succeeding. Community college attrition rates are higher but they are non-selective. They accept any student who wishes to try to succeed and that is going to open them up to much greater attrition.


The cost of attrition to students who leave (most drop out rather than flunk out by the way) is extremely high for them, our society and culture. Most leave feeling as if they failed in some way even though 72% usually leave because of what has been identified as weak to poor academic customer service. Their educational and personal needs were not met. Many dropouts also use their college savings, financial aid and ability to obtain a college loan. Many will not go back to school. They become part of the State’s employment problem.


When students drop out and do not graduate, the schools lose their ability to meet their educational mission as well as their chance to assist people and our state to meet career and intellectual goals. And they lose millions of dollars a year; something neither individuals not taxpayers can afford.


It costs an average of about $6,000 to recruit, enroll and process each new college or university student. So, every student who leaves takes at least $12,000 out the door with him or her. The dropping student takes the $6,000 average financial investment the school made to recruit and enroll him or her initially. The lost student must also be replaced so that will cost another $6,000 recruitment and enrollment cost. Since not every drop out is replaced immediately, tuition revenue is also lost equal to the number of dropouts times tuition cost.


Let’s look at Mammon University as an example. Mammon has a six-year dropout average of just about 56%. With 10,989 undergraduate student population and tuition of $8,055, Mammon annually loses around $8.2 million from attrition. So, if MU increased its retention/graduation rates it would save many millions of dollars annually. Millions it could use to fund programs, faculty, additional course sections, equipment, etc. and eliminate cuts. Mammon would save millions.


Nationally, the US has an average publicly assisted college undergraduate retention rate of just 44.61%. Public colleges and universities collectively lose more students each year than graduate. Calculating 6,837,605 students in publicly-assisted four-year colleges paying an average of $6,585 tuition, US public colleges and universities lose an average of $4,156,615,977 annually. Add in direct public support of about another $5 billion a year and we are starting to talk numbers big enough to be concerned with attrition.

To see how a focus on retention could benefit publicly-assisted colleges, the State of Ohio will be our example. Ohio’s state four-year has a total of 182,631 undergraduate students who drop out at an average 6-year rate of 55.26%. That is within a few percentage points of the national average. Tuition ranges from a high of $ 12,033 to a low of $5,294. The average tuition is $7,911. As a result, Ohio lost an average $115,678,232 a year over the past six years for a six-year total revenue loss from attrition of $694,069,390.


So, focusing more on helping students stay and graduate would have significant results for individual states, the nation, its citizens and economy. Not that Ohio or any other state or its colleges and universities could use additional money and more college grads…. Just by making retention at least as important as admissions. This change would require colleges to change their thinking to turn churn and burn into learn earn


Could this happen? Yes! In fact, right now Ohio Board of Regents Chancellor Eric Fingerhut is getting ready to recommend a new higher education funding formula that will reward results based on specific performance measures. The new formula will focus on retention and on graduates rather than fall numbers reflecting new freshmen and current start population for all of the State colleges. This is a bold and needed move that will have long term positive effects for the state colleges and universities and Ohio. It could and should become a model nationally as well.


IF THIS ARTICLE MAKES SENSE TO YOU, YOU WILL WANT TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE BEST-SELLING NEW BOOK ON RETENTION AND ACADEMIC CUSTOMER SERVICE THE POWER OF RETENTION: MORE CUSTOMER SERVICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION by clicking here


AcademicMAPS is the leader in increasing student retention, enrollment and revenue through research training and academic customer service solutions for colleges, universities and career colleges in the US, Canada, and Europe as well as businesses that seek to work with them
We increase your success


“We had hoped we’d improve our retention by 3% but with the help of Dr. Raisman, we increased it by 5%.” Rachel Albert, Provost, University of Maine-Farmington

“Neal led a retreat that initiated customer service and retention as a real focus for us and gave us a clear plan. Then he followed up with presentations and workshops that kicked us all into high gear. We recommend with no reservations; just success.” Susan Mesheau, Executive Director U First: Integrated Recruitment & Retention University of New Brunswick

“Thank you so much for the wonderful workshop at Lincoln Technical Institute. It served to re-center ideas in a great way. I perceived it to be a morale booster, breath of fresh air, and a burst of passion.”
Shelly S, Lincoln Technical Institute